Millet's hands would be able in time to paint quite a beautiful altar-
piece for the village church.

By-and-by, when the time came for Francois to choose a trade, he being
then a big lad of about nineteen, it was suggested to his father that
young Millet might really make a regular painter--that is to say, an
artist. In France, the general tastes of the people are far more
artistic than with us; and the number of painters who find work for
their brushes in Paris is something immensely greater than the number in
our own smoky, money-making London. So there was nothing very
remarkable, from a French point of view, in the idea of the young
peasant turning for a livelihood to the profession of an artist. But
Millet's father was a sober and austere man, a person of great dignity
and solemnity, who decided to put his son's powers to the test in a very
regular and critical fashion. He had often watched Francois drawing, and
he thought well of the boy's work. If he had a real talent for painting,
a painter he should be; if not, he must take to some other craft, where
he would have the chance of making himself a decent livelihood. So he
told Francois to prepare a couple of drawings, which he would submit to
the judgment of M. Mouchel, a local painter at Cherbourg, the nearest
large town, and capital of the department. Francois duly prepared the
drawings, and Millet the elder went with his son to submit them in
proper form for M. Mouchel's opinion. Happily, M. Mouchel had judgment
enough to see at a glance that the drawings possessed remarkable merit.
"You must be playing me a trick," he said; "that lad could never have
made these drawings." "I saw him do them with my own eyes," answered the
father warmly. "Then," said Mouchel, "all I can say is this: he has in
him the making of a great painter." He accepted Millet as his pupil; and
the young man set off for Cherbourg accordingly, to study with care and
diligence under his new master.