I grew gradually stronger. Reporting was still impossible,
but, introduced by Boyde, I earned something
by posing in the studios. A "sitting" was three hours.
Some artists paid by the hour, but Charles Dana Gibson,
then drawing his weekly cartoons in Life, always paid
for a full sitting, though he might use his model for
an hour only. He was a rapid worker, and a good
fellow; he never forgot to ask if one was tired of any
particular attitude; my first pose to him was for a broken-down
actor leaning against a hoarding covered with advertisements,
the joke being something about a bill-board
and a board-bill. I was thrilled when it appeared in
Life. There was always a great rush among the models
for Gibson's studio. The only other poses I remember
are swinging a golf club and sitting for a bishop's arms
and hands. I wore big sleeves. These, however, were
not in Gibson's studio.
My memory of this work is dim; it was not unpleasant; only its uncertainty against it, though a good week might bring in as much as fifteen dollars. Smedley, who illustrated for Harper's Magazine, was the painter we all disliked most; Cox, son of Bishop Cox, Cleveland Cox being his full name, I think, was a favourite: he was a gentleman. There was Zogbaum too, another illustrator, and there was Lynwood Palmer, the horse-painter, and leading artist on The Rider and Driver, a first-class weekly of that day. "Artist Palmer," as the papers called him later, was a character. His kindness to me stands out. He had very great talent--for getting the likeness of a horse. We called him "The Horse." He made a success at his work, painted the "King's Horses and Men" in subsequent years, and settled down eventually--he was an Englishman--I believe, at Heston, Hounslow. His New York studio was in Fifth Avenue. Many a time he gave me food there.
"Artist Palmer" was self-taught. I forget the whole story, but he had known his hard times. Looking at my dirty boots the first time I called, he said: "When I
drove a cab here, my boots were better cleaned than any
