Jean Francois Millet Part 6

Three healthy, happy children have been playing about in the yard,--a girl of six, her younger sister, and a brother still younger. They are dressed simply, so as to enjoy themselves thoroughly without fear of injuring any fine clothes. All three wear long ap.r.o.ns and wooden sabots. The little girls have their flying hair confined in close bonnet caps tied under the chin. The boy rejoices in a round cap ornamented on top with a b.u.t.ton. The sisters take great care of their little brother.

The toys are of a very rude sort and evidently of home manufacture. A cart is constructed of a board set on clumsy wheels. A doll is roughly shaped of wood and wrapped in a hood and blanket. There is a basket besides, in which one can gather bits of treasure picked up here and there in the yard.

By and by the play is interrupted by a familiar voice. The children look up and see their mother standing smiling in the doorway. A bowl which she has in her hand is still steaming, and an appetizing odor reminds them that they are hungry. The basket and the cart are hastily dropped, but not the doll, and they all run to the doorstep. The brother is placed in the middle and the sisters seat themselves on either side. The elder girl still holds her doll with maternal solicitude; the other two children clasp hands, and the sister's arm is put around the boy's neck.

[Ill.u.s.tration: From a carbon print by Braun, Clement & Co. John Andrew & Son, Sc. FEEDING HER BIRDS]

Meanwhile the mother has seated herself directly in front of them, on a low stool such as is used by country people as a milking-stool. She tips it a little as she leans over to feed the children in turn from a long-handled wooden spoon. Of course the first taste is for the little brother, and he stretches out his neck eagerly, opening his mouth wide so as not to lose a drop. The sisters look on eagerly, the younger one opening her own mouth a little, quite unconsciously. An inquisitive hen runs up to see what good things there are to eat. In the garden beyond, the father works busily at his spading.

The name which Millet gave to this picture is the French word _Becquee_, which cannot be translated into any corresponding word in English. It means a _beakful_, that is, the food which the mother bird holds in her beak to give to the nestlings.

The painter had in mind, you see, a nestful of birds being fed. The similarity between the family and the bird life is closely carried out in the picture. The children sit together as snugly as birds in a nest. The mother bends toward them in a brooding att.i.tude which is like the bird mother's. Her extended hand suggests a bird's beak, tapering to a sharp point at the end of the spoon. The young bird's mouth is wide open, and in pops the nice spoonful of broth! The house itself is made to look like a cosy little nest by the vine that embowers it. The st.u.r.dy stem runs up close by the doorstep and sends out over door and window its broad branches of beautiful green leaves.

And just as the father bird watches the nest from his perch on some branch of the tree, the father at work in the garden can look from time to time at the little family circle in the doorway. As in the picture of the Woman Feeding Hens, the house is built of stone covered with plaster. The door casing is of large ill-matched blocks of stone.

The dooryard is made to appear much larger by the glimpse of the orchard we get through the gateway. No out-of-door picture is complete which does not show something of the beauty of nature. The dooryard itself would be a bare place but for the shady garden beyond.

X

THE CHURCH AT GReVILLE

The village-commune of Greville has nothing to make it famous except that it was the birthplace of the painter Millet. It is at the tip of Cape La Hague, which juts abruptly from the French coast into the English channel. The cape is a steep headland bristling with granite rocks and needles, and very desolate seen from the sea. Inland it is pleasant and fruitful, with apple orchards and green meadows.

The village life centres about the church, for the inhabitants of Grenville are a serious and G.o.d-fearing people. The church is the spot around which cl.u.s.ter the most sacred a.s.sociations of life. Here the babies are baptized, and the youths and maidens confirmed; here the young people are married, and from here young and old alike are carried to their last resting-place. The building is hallowed by the memories of many generations of pious ancestors.

The Millet family lived in an outlying hamlet (Gruchy) of Grenville, and were somewhat far from the church. Yet they had even more a.s.sociations with it than other village families. Here our painter's father had early shown his talent for music at the head of the choir of boys who sang at the Sunday service. Here at one time his old uncle priest, Charles Millet, held the office of vicar and went every morning to say ma.s.s.

Among the earliest recollections of Jean Francois was a visit to the church of Greville at a time when some new bells had just been bought.

They were first to be baptized, as was the custom, before being hung in the tower, and it was while they still stood on the ground that the mother brought her little boy to see them. "I well remember how much I was impressed," he afterwards said, "at finding myself in so vast a place as the church, which seemed even more immense than our barn, and how the beauty of the big windows, with their lozenge-shaped panes, struck my imagination."

At the age of twelve the boy went to be confirmed at the church of Greville, and thenceforth had another memorable experience to a.s.sociate with the place. The vicar, who questioned him, found him so intelligent that he offered to teach him Latin. The lessons led to the poems of Virgil, which opened a new world to him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: From a carbon print by Braun, Clement & Co. John Andrew & Son, Sc. THE CHURCH AT GReVILLE]

Years pa.s.sed; the boy became a man and the man became a famous artist.

But the path to fame had been a toilsome one, and as Millet pressed on his way he was able to return but seldom to the spots he had loved in his youth, and then only on sad errands. At length the time came (1871) when the artist brought his entire family to his native Grenville to spend a long summer holiday. Millet made many sketches of familiar scenes which gave him material for work for the next three years. One of these pictures was that of the village church, which he began to paint sitting at one of the windows of the inn where the family were staying.

If the building had lost the grandeur it possessed for his childish imagination, it was still full of artistic possibilities for a beautiful picture.

It is a solid structure, and we fancy that the builders did not have far to bring the stone of which it is composed. The great granite cliffs which rise from the sea must be an inexhaustible quarry.

The building is low and broad, to withstand the bleak winds. A less substantial structure, perched on this plateau, would be swept over the cliffs into the sea. There is something about it suggestive of the st.u.r.dy character of the Norman peasants themselves, strong, patient, and enduring. It is very old; the pa.s.sing years have covered the walls with moss, and nature seems to have made the place her own. It is as if, instead of being built with hands, it were a portion of the old cliffs themselves.

The gra.s.sy hillock against which the church nestles is filled with graves, a cross here and there marking the place where some more important personage is buried. Here is the sacred spot where Millet's saintly old grandmother was laid to rest. A rough stone wall surrounds the churchyard, as old and moss-grown as the building itself. Some stone steps leading into the yard are hollowed by the feet of many generations of worshippers. In the rear is a low stone house embowered in trees.

The square bell-tower lifts a weather-vane against the sky, and the birds flock about it as about an old home. The rather steep roof is slightly depressed, as if beginning to sink in.

With a painter's instinct Millet chose the point of view from which all the lines of the church would be most beautiful and whence we may see to the best advantage the quaint outlines of the tower. Beside this, he took for his work the day and hour when that great artist, the sun, could lend most effective help. So we see the simple little building at its best. The sky makes a glorious background, with fleecy clouds delicately veiling its brilliancy. The bright light throws a shadow of the tower across the roof, breaking the monotony of its length. The bareness of the big barn-like end is softened by the shadow in which it is seen. The plain side is decorated with the shadows of the b.u.t.tresses and window embrasures.

The sheep are as much at home here as the birds. They nibble contentedly in the road by the wall, and are undisturbed by the approach of a villager. Beyond, at the left, is a glimpse of the level stretch of the sea. This is a spot where earth and sky and water meet, where the fishermen from the sea and the ploughmen from the fields come to worship G.o.d.

XI

THE SOWER

It is nightfall, and the sky is cloudy save where the last rays of the setting sun illumine a spot on the horizon. While the light lasts, the Sower still holds to his task of sowing the seed. A large sack of grain is fastened about his body and hangs at his left side, where one end of it is grasped firmly in the left hand lest any of the precious seed be spilled. Into this bag he plunges his right hand from time to time, and draws out a handful of grain which he flings into the furrow as he walks along.

The Sower's task ended, a series of strange transformations begins in the life of the seed. The winter rain softens and swells it, and when spring comes it pushes its way up in a tiny shoot. Soon the slender blades appear in close lines; by and by the stalks grow tall and strong, and the field is full of the beautiful green grain.

Then the hot summer sun shines with ripening power; the wheat turns a golden yellow; the ears bend under the weight of the grain, and it is time for the harvest. The reapers come with sickle and scythe, and the grain is cut, and bound into great sheaves. The thrashing follows, when the ear is shaken off the stalk, and the grain is winnowed. And now the mills take up the work, the golden wheat grains are crushed, and the fine white flour which they contain is sifted and put into bags. The flour is mixed and kneaded and baked, and at length comes forth from the oven a fragrant loaf of bread.

Now bread is a necessity of life to the people, and the supply of bread turns on the history of the seed. If the harvest is plenty, the people may eat and be happy. If it is poor, they suffer the miseries of hunger. If it fails altogether, they die of starvation. It is then a solemn moment when the seed is planted. Often the sower begins his task by tossing a handful of grain into the air in the sign of a cross, offering a prayer for a blessing on the seed. His is a grave responsibility; every handful of seed means many loaves of bread for hungry mouths. He must choose the right kind of seed for his soil, the right kind of weather for the planting, and use the grain neither too lavishly nor too sparingly.[1]

[Ill.u.s.tration: From a carbon print by Braun, Clement & Co. John Andrew & Son, Sc. THE SOWER]

This is why the Sower in our picture takes his task so seriously. He carries in his hand the key to prosperity. He is a true king. Peasant though he is, he feels the dignity of his calling, and bears himself royally. He advances with a long swinging stride, measuring his steps rhythmically as if beating time to inaudible music. His right arm moves to and fro, swinging from the shoulder as on a pivot, and describing the arc of a circle.

The hilly field in which he works is such as the painter Millet was familiar with in his peasant childhood in Normandy. A yoke of oxen are drawing the plough in the distance, as is the custom in that province.

The Sower himself is a true Norman peasant.

It is interesting to trace the outlines of the composition. There is first the long line on the Sower's right side, beginning at the shoulder and following the outer edge of the right leg to the ground.

On the other side, curving to meet this, is a line which begins at the top of the head, follows the left arm and the overhanging sack, and is faintly continued by the tiny stream of seed which leaks from the corner of the bag and falls near the Sower's foot. Crossing these curves in the opposite direction are the lines of the right arm and the left leg. Thus the figure is painted in strong simple outlines such as we see in the statues by great sculptors.

The line defining the edge of the field against the sky, sloping in the direction in which the Sower walks, adds to the impression of motion which is so strongly suggested by the picture. As we look, we almost expect to see the Sower reach the foot of the slope, and stride out of sight, still flinging the grain as he goes.

There is another thing to note about the composition, and that is the perfect proportion of the single figure to the canvas which it so completely fills. This was the result of the painter's experiments.

In the haste of his first inspiration he did not allow s.p.a.ce enough to surround the Sower.[2] He then carefully traced the figure on a larger canvas and made a second picture. Afterwards the same subject was repeated in a Barbizon landscape.

Our American poet William Cullen Bryant has written a poem called "The Song of the Sower," which is very suggestive in connection with Millet's painting.[3] This is the way the song ends:--

"Brethren, the sower's task is done, The seed is in its winter bed.

Now let the dark-brown mould be spread, To hide it from the sun, And leave it to the kindly care Of the still earth and brooding air, As when the mother, from her breast, Lays the hushed babe apart to rest, And shades its eyes, and waits to see How sweet its waking smile will be.

The tempest now may smite, the sleet All night on the drowned furrow beat, And winds that, from the cloudy hold, Of winter breathe the bitter cold, Stiffen to stone the yellow mould, Yet safe shall lie the wheat; Till, out of heaven's unmeasured blue Shall walk again the genial year, To wake with warmth and nurse with dew The germs we lay to slumber here."

[Footnote 1: For farmer's lore as to the diverse soils and diverse planting seasons, see Virgil's _Eclogues_, books i. and ii.]

[Footnote 2: In spite of this imperfection the first Sower is a highly prized painting and is in the Quincy-Shaw Collection, Boston.]

[Footnote 3: Compare also Victor Hugo's poem, often referred to in descriptions of this picture, _Saison des Semailles: Le Soir_.]