ompanions in adversity at the _Salon des Refuses_--JAMES
M'NEILL WHISTLER, who left Paris and settled with his mother in Chelsea
in the late 'sixties. That he should have existed for fifteen whole
years without breaking forth into strife is so extraordinary that we are
almost tempted to attribute it to the influence of his mother, who used
to bring him to the old church on Sundays, as the present writer dimly
remembers. In this case it was not the public, but the critic, John
Ruskin, who so deftly dropped the fat into the fire. Having, as we saw,
taken up the cudgels for poor Turner against the public in 1843, and for
the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1850, he now, in 1877, ranged himself
on the other side, and accused Whistler of impertinence in "flinging a
pot of paint in the face of the public." The action for libel which
Whistler commenced in the following year resulted in strict fact in a
verdict of one farthing damages for the libelled one; but in reality the
results were much farther reaching. The artist had vindicated not only
himself, but his art, from the attacks of the ignorant and bumptious.
"Poor art!" Whistler wrote, "What a sad state the slut is in, an these
gentlemen shall help her. The artist alone, by the way, is to no purpose
and remains unconsulted; his work is explained and rectified without
him, by the one who was never in it--but upon whom God, always good
though sometimes careless, has thrown away the knowledge refused to the
author, poor devil!" This recalls Turner's comment on Ruskin's
eulogies--which Whistler had probably never heard of--and making every
allowance for Whistler's fiery, combative nature, and sharp pen, there
is much truth, and truth that needed telling, in his contention. "Art,"
he continues, "that for ages has hewn its own history in marble, and
written its own comments on canvas, shall it suddenly stand still, and
stammer, and wait for wisdom from the passer-by? For guidance from the
hand that holds neither brush nor chisel? Out upon the shallow conceit!"

Of the hopeless banality of the critics during this period there are
plenty of examples to be found without looking very far. Several of the
most amusing have been embodied in a little volume of "Whistler
Stories," lately compiled by Mr Don C. Seitz of New York. Here we find
_The Standard's_ little joke about Whistler paying his costs in the
action--apart from those allowed on taxation, that is to say--"But he
has only to pa