Sitter

Mr Pecksniff, blown out , Pelouze's Album, p. 62, Colby College Museum of Art

This drawing illustrates a scene in The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit by Charles Dickens (1812-1870). It was first published 1843-4, and was borrowed by Whistler from the West Point Library in 1852, in the Philadelphia edition of 1850-51. Pecksniff was the hero's hypocritical cousin, an architect, shown here as drunk and falling down some steps.