UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

System Number: 02910
Date: [27/28 February 1899]^[1]
Author: JW
Place: [Paris]
Recipient: William Cleverley Alexander^[2]
Place: [London]
Repository: Glasgow University Library
Call Number: MS Whistler LB 2/101
Document Type: ALd^[3]

My dear Alexander -

I am very much pleased with your kind letter^[4] and ^most courteous letter

Your letter is most kind and nice - and I am very much gratified at your so gracefully acqui  consent to me  and Nothing could be more graceful than your consent to my request - and the pretty manner of compliment that accompanies it! -

[p. 2] I have at once written to the Mayor^[5] and council in Venice, conveying your to inform them of your willingness to lend them the picture^[6] - and doubtless you will at once hear from them in acknowledgement -

The opening Ceremony, with ^and the King's visit^[7] is to be ^on the 22 of March^[8]! Now dont you think you might on this one occasion announce to the Dublin Directors that you require to must withdraw the picture from their Gallery by the 15th of next month - ^{telling them also the reason}

Of course they must yeild to your wish - however much they might at first try to oppose it - both as a matter of amiability^recognition to you - and as a question of etiquette to the People in Venice -

Do^[9] try and manage this for me - I shall be so greatly obliged to you - and the dear good Venetians will be so highly gratified -

Very sincerely

This document is protected by copyright.

Notes:

1.  [27/28 February 1899]
Dated from the sequence on letters in JW's letterbook, and by JW's reference to the '15th of next month', his letter to Alexander, 17 March 1899, #02942, and by the opening of 3rd Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte della Città di Venezia,Venice, 1899, on 22 April 1899.

2.  William Cleverley Alexander
William Cleverly Alexander (1840-1916), banker and patron [more].

3.  ALd
Written on deep-bordered mourning paper.

4.  kind letter
Untraced.

5.  Mayor
Comte Filippo Grimani (1850-1921), Mayor of Venice, President of the Internation Art Exhibition of the City of Venice [more].

6.  picture
Harmony in Grey and Green: Miss Cicely Alexander (YMSM 129), then on exhibition at A Loan Collection of Modern Paintings, Leinster Hall, Dublin, 1899 (cat. no. 79), and then sent on to Venice where it was shown ex-catalogue.

7.  King's visit
The visit of Umberto I (1844-1900), King of Italy [more].

8.  the 22 of March
'To be ... March' is double underlined.

9.  Do
Double underlined.