Having endeavored to make clear the source from which Millet came, and indicated the formative influences of his early life, I may permit myself (as I warned my readers I should do) to return to my recollections of Barbizon in 1873, and the glimpses of Millet which my sojourn there in that and the following year afforded me.

Barbizon lies on a plain, more vast in the impression which it makes on the eye than in actual area, and the village consists of one long street, which commences at a group of farm buildings of some importance, and ends in the forest of Fontainebleau.  About midway down this street, on the way to the forest, Millet’s home stood, on the right of the road.  The house, of two low stories, had its gable to the street, and on the first floor, with the window breast high from the ground, was the dining-room.  Here, in pleasant weather, with the window wide open, sat Millet at the head of his patriarchal table, his children, of whom there were nine, about him; his good wife, their days of acute misery past, smiling contentedly on her brood, which, if I remember rightly, already counted a grandchild or more:  as pleasant a sight as one could readily see.  Later, in the autumn evenings, a lamplit replica of the same picture presented itself.  Or, if the dinner was cleared away, one would see Madame Millet busy with her needle, the children at their lessons, and the painter, whom even then tradition painted a sad and cheerless misanthrope, contentedly playing at dominoes with one of the children, or his honest Norman face wreathed in smiles as the conversation took an amusing turn.  This, it is true, was when the master of the house was free from his terrible enemy, the headache, which laid him low so often, and which in these days became more and more frequent.

[Illustration:  First steps.  From A Pastel by Jean Francois Millet.

Reproduced by permission of Braun, Clement & Co.  As Sensier remarks, Millet, with nine children, had abundant opportunity to study them.  This charming drawing was one of the collection of Millet’s pastels formed by M. Gavet, which was unfortunately dispersed by auction soon after the artist’s death.]

The house, to resume the description of Millet’s home, went back at right angles from the street, and contained the various apartments of the family, many of them on the ground floor, and all of the most modest character.  It was a source of wonder how so large a family could inhabit so small a house.  The garden lay in front, and extended back of the house.  A high wall with a little door, painted green, by which you entered, ran along the street, and ended at the studio, which was, like the dining-room, on the street.  The garden was pleasant with flowers and trees, the kitchen garden being at the rear.  But a few short years ago, within its walls Madame Millet plucked a red rose, and gave it to me, saying:  “My