Then came Corot, Daubigny, Diaz and others of giant stature, to Barbizon, and when they went back to Paris they told of Millet and his work.  And then we find Meissonier, the proud, knocking at the gate of Le Grand Rustique.

It is pleasant to recall that Americans were among the first to recognize the value of Millet’s art.  His “Sower” is the chief gem of the Vanderbilt collection; and the “Angelus” has been thought much more of in France since America so unreservedly set her seal upon it.

Millet died in Eighteen Hundred Seventy-five.

It was only during the last ten years of his life that he felt financially free, and even then he was far from passing rich.  After his death his fame increased, and pictures he had sold for twenty dollars, soon changed hands for as many hundred.

Englishmen say that America grew Millet-mad, and it may be true that our admiration tipped a bit to t’ other side; yet the fabulous prices were not always paid by Americans—­the rich men of earth vied with each other for the possession of a “Millet.”

The “Gleaners” was bought by the French Government for three hundred thousand francs, and is now in the Louvre “in perpetuity.”  This sum paid for this one picture represents a larger amount of money than passed through the hands of Millet during his entire life; and yet it is not one-half what another “Millet” brought.  The “Angelus” was sold for the sum of eight hundred thousand francs—­a larger amount than was ever before paid for a single canvas.

It is idle to say that no picture is worth such a sum.  Anything is worth what some one else will pay for it.

The number of “Millets,” it may be explained, is limited, and with men in America who have incomes of ten million dollars or more a year, no sane man dare prophesy what price the “Sower” may yet command.

Millet himself, were he here, would be aghast at the prices paid for his work, and he would turn, too, with disfavor from the lavish adulation bestowed upon his name.

This homely, simple artist was a profound thinker; a sympathetic dreamer; a noble-hearted, generous man; so truthful and lovable that his virtues have been counted a weakness; and so they are—­for the planet Earth.

JOSHUA REYNOLDS

To make it people’s interest to advance you, by showing that their business will be better done by you than by any other person, is the only solid foundation of success; the rest is accident.

    —­Reynolds to His Nephew

[Illustration:  Joshua Reynolds]

On the curious little river Plym, five miles from Plymouth, is the hamlet of Plympton.  It is getting on towards two hundred years since Joshua Reynolds was born there.  The place has not changed so very much with the centuries:  there still stand the quaint stone houses, built on arches over the sidewalk, and there, too, is the old Norman church with its high mullioned windows.  Chester shows the best example of that very early architecture, and Plympton is Chester done in pigmy.