Another outburst greeted the appearance of the wonderful _Olympia_ in 1865, this time in the official catalogue. This is now enshrined in the Louvre. It was painted in 1863, but fortunately, perhaps, Manet had not the courage to exhibit it then--for who can tell to what length the fury of the Philistines might not have been goaded by two such shocks? As it was, this second violation of the sacred traditions of the nude, which had been exclusively reserved for allegorical subjects, was considered an outrage; and the innocent, natural model, of by no means voluptuous appearance, was regarded as a disgraceful intrusion into the chaste category of nymphs and goddesses. As a painter, however, Manet had shown himself unmistakably as the great figure of [Illustration: PLATE XLVIII.--EDOUARD MANET OLYMPIA _Louvre, Paris_] the age, and if we have to go to Paris or to New York to catch a glimpse of any of his work, it is partly because we are too backward in seizing opportunities so eagerly snapped up by others. The next great storm in the artistic world followed in the wake of one of Manet's companions in adversity at the _Salon des Refuses_--JAMES M'NEILL WHISTLER, who left Paris and settled with his mother in Chelsea in the late 'sixties. That he should have existed for fifteen whole years without breaking forth into strife is so extraordinary that we are almost tempted to attribute it to the influence of his mother, who used to bring him to the old church on Sundays, as the present writer dimly remembers. In this case it was not the public, but the critic, John Ruskin, who so deftly dropped the fat into the fire. Having, as we saw, taken up the cudgels for poor Turner against the public in 1843, and for the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1850, he now, in 1877, ranged himself on the other side, and accused Whistler of impertinence in "flinging a pot of paint in the face of the public." The action for libel which Whistler commenced in the following year resulted in strict fact in a verdict of one farthing damages for the libelled one; but in reality the results were much farther reaching. The artist had vindicated not only himself, but his art, from the attacks of the ignorant and bumptious. "Poor art!" Whistler wrote, "What a sad state the slut is in, an these gentlemen shall help her. The artist alone, by the way, is to no purpose and remains unconsulted; his work is explained and rectified without him, by the one who was never in it--but upon whom God, always good though sometimes careless, has thrown away the knowledge refused to the author, poor devil!" This recalls Turner's comment on Ruskin's eulogies--which Whistler had probably never heard of--and making every allowance for Whistler's fiery, combative nature, and sharp pen, there is much truth, and truth that needed telling, in his contention. "Art," he continues, "that for ages has hewn its own history in marble, and written its own comments on canvas, shall it suddenly stand still, and