UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW

It was published in an album of Cancelled Plates ('Cancelled Set') by The Fine Art Society, London, 1879.

It was not exhibited in Whistler's lifetime but a unique impression of the first state was lent after Whistler's death by Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919) to Memorial Exhibitions in Boston and New York (). 8

An impression from the destroyed plate was lent by the dealers Messrs. Ernest Brown & Phillips to the London Memorial Exhibition in 1905. 9

The unique impression of the first state was acquired by Mortimer Luddington Menpes (1860-1938) and was sold through Obach & Co. to Charles Lang Freer (1856-1919) in 1903 (). Freer had already acquired an impression in a cancelled set from Knoedler & Co. in 1893 ().

Many of the surviving impressions from the cancelled plate are still in the albums as published in 1879. For instance, the British Museum bought an album in 1887 (), and Thomas Glen Arthur (1858-1907) also acquired a set in 1887 () which later went to Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Likewise, in 1902 Josiah Bradlee (fl. 1902) gave an impression to the BMFA (). Boston Public Library also acquired a set (). A set acquired by J. Littauer, Munich, was sold to the Hamburger Kunsthalle in 1896 ().

Prices were low but collectors and collections were keen to have the set of cancelled etchings, as a record of a substantial number of otherwise unrecorded etchings and drypoints. A set, probably acquired from the Fine Art Society by Alphonse Wyatt Thibaudeau (ca 1840- d.1892), was auctioned in 1889 and bought by the London print dealer Robert Dunthorne (b. ca 1851) for £0.6.0. 10 Dunthorne exchanged it for other works with Whistler's sister-in-law Rosalind Birnie Philip (1873-1958) who bequeathed it to the University of Glasgow (see ). She acquired another set, trimmed the impressions and stuck them on the envelopes containing the copper plates, which did not greatly improve their condition (i.e. ).