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signed "J. F. Millet" lower right- -black and white chalks on blue paper 16 1/4 x 12 in. (41.3 x 30.5 cm.) unframed PROVENANCE M. Atger (probably commissioned directly from the artist); sale, Hotel Drouot, Paris, March 12, 1874, no. 69 to Henri Rouart, Paris; sale, Galerie Manzi-Joyant, Paris, Dec. 16-18, 1912, no. 222 (illustrated) to Knoedler & Co., Paris and New York With Frederick Keppel Ames Family, Boston (circa 1920) EXHIBITED Paris, Ecole des Beaux-Arts, "J. F.-Millet," 1887, no. 158 LITERATURE A. Alexandre, "La Collection Henri Rouart," Paris, 1912, p. 160 (illustrated following p. 104) H. Frantz, "The Rouart Collection. III. The Works of Millet," "International Studio," LIX, no. 244 (July 1913), p. 106 (illustrated p. 104) E. Moreau-Nelaton, "Millet raconte par lui-meme," Paris, 1921, 1 (fig. 81) Among Millet's many drawings recording the characters and tasks that defined the peasant population of the Barbizon countryside, "The Road Mender" surely stands as one of the artist's most original and successful compositions. Dating to 1854-56, during a period of great invention in Millet's career, "The Road Mender" expands the artist's well-known repertoire of timeless, unchanging agricultural activities to accommodate a particularly modern laborer in a moment of private leisure. Seated on the embankment of a forest road, in the shadow of a raised shutter, the road mender takes a break from his labors, striking a flint to light his pipe. Beside him a jug and knife suggest a meal just ended, while to either side a shovel, pick, and barrow document his interrupted labor. "Cantonniers" were hired by local communities to oversee village and forest roadways, as well as to manage communal resources such as springs or quarries. Throughout the countryside, road-building and a new emphasis on road upkeep during the nineteenth-century gave the "cantonnier" an unaccustomed visibility as a symbol of spreading prosperity as well as new connections between rural and urban interests. Even so tiny a village as Barbizon faced Parisian demands for easier access to the products and the pleasures of the great Forest of Fontainebleau. During the mid-1850s, Millet was still taking the measure of the changes around him; his paintings and drawings were not yet weighing the benefits of such progress against their costs. Indeed, the power of "The Road Mender" is a direct result of the skill with which Millet has fitted his laborer into the forest surroundings and suggested the complete compatibility of forests and roads. The "Cantonnier" himself is dwarfed by the strong shape of the sheltering lattice, while his simple hand tools and his absorption in an innocuous pleasure establish an air of rustic peace. Urban encroachment is still a long way off. The provenance of "The Road Mender" provides an unusually telling glimpse into the history of Millet drawing collecting. The drawing was purchased directly from Millet by a M. Atger, known to us only as a clerk in a Parisian insurance agency who carefully marshalled rather limited financial resources during the mid-1850s to amass the first serious collection of Millet drawings. Atger acquired some two dozen Millet works of particular beauty and importance- -Sensier, Millet's biographer (and one of Atger's rival collectors) described Atger's collection as a veritable 'mother lode of Millet's creativity'. At the sale following Atger's death in 1874, "The Road Mender" was purchased by Henri Rouart, a Parisian industrialist, amateur painter, and intimate friend of Degas. Rouart's immense collection matched superb holdings of Corot, Daumier and Millet to an impressive group of Impressionist paintings. Following Rouart's death, "The Road Mender" was brought to America where it was acquired by a Boston collector who represented his family's second generation of Millet collecting; reflecting the extraordinary rise in Millet prices prior to the First World War, he focused on adding drawings to the paintings and pastels acquired earlier by his father. We are grateful to Alexandra Murphy for her assistance in preparing this catalogue entry. The Property of A NORTHEAST MUSEUM.