I did not leave London without a sight of Turner himself, due to the friendly forethought of Griffiths, who so appreciated my enthusiasm for the old man that he lost no opportunity to satisfy it.  Turner was taken ill while I was on this visit, with an attack of the malady which later killed him, and I had begged Griffiths to ask him to let me come and nurse him.  He declined the offer, but was not, Griffiths told me, quite unmoved by it.  One day, after his recovery, I received a message from Griffiths to say that Turner was coming to the gallery at a certain hour on a business appointment, and if I would happen in just before the time fixed for it I might see him.

At the appointed hour Turner came and found me in an earnest study of the pictures in the farther end of the gallery, where I remained, unnoticing and unnoticed, until a sign from Griffiths called me up.  He then introduced me as a young American artist who had a great admiration for his work, and who, being about to return home, would be glad to take him by the hand.  It was difficult to reconcile my conception of the great artist with this little, and, to casual observation, insignificant old man with a nose like an eagle’s beak, though a second sight showed that his eye, too, was like an eagle’s, bright, restless, and penetrating.  Half awed and half surprised, I held out my hand.  He put his behind him, regarding me with a humorous, malicious look, saying nothing.  Confused, and not a little mortified, I turned away, and, walking down the gallery, went to studying the pictures again.  When I looked his way again, a few minutes later, he held out his hand to me, and we entered into a conversation which lasted until Griffiths gave me a hint that Turner had business to transact which I must leave him to.  He gave me a hearty handshake, and in his oracular way said, “Hmph—­(nod) if you come to England again—­hmph (nod)—­hmph (nod),” and another hand-shake with more cordiality and a nod for good-by.  I never saw a keener eye than his, and the way that he held himself up, so straight that he seemed almost to lean backwards, with his forehead thrown forward, and the piercing eyes looking out from under their heavy brows, and his diminutive stature coupled with the imposing bearing, combined to make a very peculiar and vivid impression on me.  Griffiths afterwards translated his laconism for me as an invitation to come to see him if I ever came back to England, and added that though he was in the worst of tempers when he came in, and made him expect that I should be insulted, he was in fact unusually cordial, and he had never seen him receive a stranger with such friendliness except in the case of Cattermole, for whom he had a strong liking.  In the conversation we had during the interview, I alluded to our good fortune in having already in America one of the pictures of his best period, a seacoast sunset in the possession of Mr. Lenox, and Turner exclaimed, “I wish they were all put in a blunderbuss and shot off!” but he looked pleased at the simultaneous outburst of protest on the part of Griffiths and myself.  When I went back to England for another visit he was dead.