he church, for the inhabitants of
Grenville are a serious and God-fearing people. The church is the spot
around which cluster the most sacred associations 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
associations 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 mass.

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
associate 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.

[Illustration: From a carbon print by Braun, Clement & Co. John Andrew
& Son, Sc. THE CHURCH AT GREVILLE]

Years passed; 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