The devotion of Jean Francois to his wife and children had a deep, sober, religious quality, such as we associate with Abraham and Jacob and the other patriarchs of old.
The heart of Millet was often wrung by the thought of the privation and hardships his wife and children had to undergo. He blamed himself for their lack of creature comforts, and the salt tears rained down his beard when he had to go home and report that he had tramped the streets all day with a picture under his arm, looking for a buyer, but no buyer could be found.
But all this time the old grandmother up in Normandy waited and watched for news from her boy.
Now and again during the years she saw his name mentioned in connection with the Salon; and once she heard a medal had been granted him, and at another time an "Honorable Mention."
Her heart throbbed in pride and she wrote congratulations, and thanked the good God for answering her prayers. Little did she know of the times when bread was cut in tiny bits and parceled out to each hungry mouth, or the days when there was no fuel and the children kept to their beds to prevent freezing.
But the few friends of Jean Francois who had forced the "Honorable Mention" and secured the medal, now got something more tangible; they induced the Government Director of Fine Arts to order from Jean Francois Millet a picture for which the artist was to receive two thousand francs; two hundred francs were paid on account and the balance was to be paid on delivery of the picture.
Jean Francois hurried home with the order in his trembling fingers. Catherine read the order with misty eyes. She was not unduly elated—she knew that success must come some time. And husband and wife then and there decided that when the eighteen hundred francs were paid over to them they would move out of Paris.
They would make a home in the country. People do without things in the country, but they do not starve. You can raise vegetables, and even though the garden be small and the folks poor, God is good and the sunshine and showers come and things grow. And for fuel one can gather fagots if they are near a wood.
They would go to Barbizon—Barbizon, that tiny village on the edge of the Forest of Fontainebleau. Several artists who had been there in the Summer sketching had told them of it. The city was gradually smothering Jean Francois. He prayed for a sight of the great open stretches of pasture, and green woods and winding river.
And now it was all so near.