or historical landscape, which then
formed part of the curriculum of the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Michallon
died in 1824, when only twenty-eight years old, too soon to have shown
the fruits of an independent spirit which had already revolted against
the trammels of the school. Desiring to save Corot from the mistakes
which he had himself made, he adjured him to remain _naif_, to paint
nature as he saw it, and to disregard the counsels of those who were
for the moment in authority. Gentle, almost timid by nature, having
met so far in life with little but disapproval, Corot disregarded his
friend's advice at first, and placed himself under the guidance of
Victor Bertin, a painter then in vogue, and, needless to say, deeply
imbued with scholastic tradition. In his company Corot made his first
voyage to Italy, in 1825, and thus came for the first time under the
true classic influence. The lessons taught in the school of nature,
where Claude had studied, were those best fitted for the temperament
of Corot, who has been called "a child of the eighteenth century,
grown in the midst of that imitation of antiquity so ardent, and so
often unintelligent, where the Directory copied Athens, and the Empire
forced itself to imitate Rome." It is a curious and interesting fact
that when, as in this case, the spirit of classicism reveals itself
anew, its never-dying influence can be the motive for work as
fresh and modern as that of Corot. It is also true that the rigid
enforcement of the study of drawing was a healthy influence on Corot's
early life. All the pictures of his early period show the most minute
attention to form and modelling; and when he had finally rid himself
of the hard manner which it entailed, there remained the substratum of
a constructive basis upon which his freer brush played at will.

[Illustration: A BY-PATH. FROM A PAINTING BY JEAN BAPTISTE CAMILLE
COROT.

One of Corot's later works, and treated with greater freedom than the
earlier.]

Many years, however, Corot was to wait before the memorable day when
he bewailed that his complete collection of works had been spoiled, he
having sold a picture. Living on his modest income, which his father
doubled when, in 1846, the son was given the cross of the Legion of
Honor, he was happy with his two loves, nature and painting. Little
by little he gained a reputation among the artists, especially when,
after 1835, on his return from a second voyage to Italy, he found
tha