Statistics
Since our interview with Mr. Whistler curious statements have been set afloat concerning the question of finance... giving circumstantial Pall Mall Gazette, July 6, 1888. evidence of the disaster brought upon the Society by the enforcement of the Whistlerian policy:—
This evidence, which is very interesting, is as follows:—The sales of the Society during the year 1881 were under £5000; 1882, under £6000; 1883, under £7000; 1884, under £8000; 1885 (the first year of Mr. Whistler’s rule), they fell to under £4000; 1886, under £3000; 1887, under £2000; and the present year, under £1000.
On the other hand, the fact of the Society having made itself responsible to Mr. Whistler for a loan raised by him to meet a sudden expenditure for repairs, is also true; but the unwisdom of the president and members of any society having money transactions between them need hardly be commented upon here....
Mr. Wyke Bayliss, the new president, strikes one as being “a strong man”—shrewd, logical, and self-restrained. The author of several books and pamphlets on the more imaginative realm of art, he is, one would say, as much permeated by religion as he is by art; to both of these qualities, curiously enough, his canvases, which usually deal with cathedral interiors of cheery hue, bear witness.
The hero of three Bond Street “one-man exhibitions,” a Board-school chairman, a lecturer, champion chess-player of Surrey, a member of the Rochester Diocesan Council, a Shaksperian student, a Fellow of the Society of Cyclists, a Fellow of the Society of Antiquarians, and public orator of Noviomagus... he is surely one of the most versatile men who ever occupied a presidential chair....