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LIVING AMERICAN ARTISTS.nnnnn 41

but which, we fancy, have a use so noble that wee may well bear this. Were we up beside that solitary sparrow- a Madison Square aristocrat, who has winged it out thus far for a breath of country air, maybe we would know for certain what those wide windows mean; for he is looking in and earnestly, as if he saw foreshadowings of the coming spring behind those panes. But as we are, alas! Unfeathered bipeds only, our inquisitiveness must wait. Let us be patient and ring the bell. 

We are in the home of Asher B. Durand, our oldest living landscape painter; a man whose life has been one of over threescore years of wedded love and labor, unbroken by romantic incident; with its shadows, it is true, but in the main radiant with light and peace, as are the creations of his brain and hand. 

Passing through the broad hall, its walls well-nigh hidden by rare engravings, we reach the painter's library, and rest a moment. "'Tis a nipping and an eager air" without, but here a hospitable glow comes from behind the polished grate. This is an artist's snuggery, sure enough! From floor to ceiling, on one side, ascent long rows of well-read books; the remainder of the walls is hidden with works of art, and odds and ends of interest hide the table-covers. A large engraving of one of Turner's masterpieces is above the mantel; elsewhere we note examples of the works of other no less renowned; and here and there--disposed for favorable effect of light--are little gems, enframed, the touch of each of which we recognize--the gifts of brother artists.

"Will you step this way, sir?" Mr. Durand is disengaged."

And we leave the glowing grate and the pictures and books behind us; but the hospitable warmth, and the joy, begotten of things of beauty, these go with us, as we pass through the hall again, and upward to the studio.

Cold as the day is, with the hills outside whiter even than this snowy head that bends in kindly greeting, the artist has been at work. And now as with a glance we note the studio-walls, covered from floor to ceiling with a wealth of color-the artist's studies of more than fifty years,-we no longer wonder why that sparrow sat so livingly on the bare bough outside. 

Soon seated, in comfortable chat, we exchange the pleasant gossip of the day.  Fresh from the studios, we have much to give away, but for this are bountifully repaid; for the good old man is eloquent in art-lore and wise with the gathered knowledge of five-and-seventy years. 

How well he wears! As stately in his gate, and in face expressive as when Huntington painted him twenty years ago. Vigorous in mind too; no faltering in speech or memory, and as eager in his talk of work as if another half century of loving labor lay before him. Nature, whom he has loved so dearly, rewards him with a ripe old age.  This is no nervous touch upon the canvas here; each spray and leaf is given with a nice result. No doubting the texture of these rocks, this river's bed; the stream is limpid and we sound its depths; the silver birch reflects the sunlight lovingly; this lonely pine is rugged truth itself.  And yet the color is still moist upon the canvas, and the hand that laid it there has known sixty years of labor!

And now we come to the duty immediately before us: to tell you the story of this veteran painter's life-as much of it as we may within the narrow limits here prescribed. We have thus prefaced our sketch that you might guess the source of it.  There is nothing of it ours but the way of telling. 

Scarce a stone's throw from his present home-you can see the old stone well there, to this day-stood the birth-place of the painter, Asher Brown Durand.  His father was a watchmaker and the descendant of a Huguenot surgeon, who sought refuge in this country after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.  The workshop of the mechanic was in the village of Jefferson, about a mile distant, where Asher was taught to make himself useful at a very early age.  In those days it fell to the tradesman's lot, whatever his specialty, to be called upon for odd jobs not strictly in his line of business.  Durand, the watchmaker, was skillful and inherited good taste.  It frequently happened that the silver