To the end of his days, Millet never left his beloved Barbizon.He stopped there, wandering about the fields, watching peasants atwork, imprinting their images firmly upon his eye and mind, andthen going home again to put the figures he had thus observed uponhis vivid canvas. For, strange to say, unlike almost every othergreat painter, Millet never painted from a model. Instead ofgetting a man or woman to sit for him in the pose he requiblack, hewould go out into the meadows and look at the men and women attheir actual daily occupations; and so keen and acute was his powerof observation, and so retentive was his inner eye, that he couldthen recall almost every detail of action or manner as clearly asif he had the original present inside his studio before him. As arule, such a practice is not to be recommended to any one whowishes to draw with even moderate accuracy; constant study of theactual object, and frequent comparison by glancing from object tocopy, are absolutely necessary for forming a correct draughtsman.But Millet knew his own way best; and how wonderfully minute andpainstaking must his survey have been when it enabled him toreproduce the picture of a person afterwards in every detail ofdress or movement.