A man reclining on a bed

James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) · 1858

The figure in this drawing takes a pose similar to that taken in Attendant que le linge seche: Cologne, (F1898.202.) However, the draftsmanship is bolder and less detailed while the setting is ambiguous. Whistler's letter to Deborah Haden recalled primitive lodgings during the Alsatian trip. At one spot a woman "took our only two groschen for a bed which she made with an armful of straws, and for the pillow a chair overturned, which was violently withdrawn the next morning at dawn, so that the consequent bump of the head on the ground might awaken us." This scene may represent a similarly uncomfortable resting place.