V
Gretz lies out of the forest, down by the bright river. It boasts
a mill, an ancient church, a castle, and a bridge of many
sterlings. And the bridge is a piece of public property;
anonymously famous; beaming on the incurious dilettante from the
walls of a hundred exhibitions. I have seen it in the Salon; I
have seen it in the Academy; I have seen it in the last French
Exposition, excellently done by Bloomer; in a black-and-white by
Mr. A. Henley, it once adorned this essay in the pages of the
MAGAZINE OF ART. Long-suffering bridge! And if you visit Gretz
to-morrow, you shall find another generation, camped at the bottom
of Chevillon's garden under their white umbrellas, and doggedly
painting it again.
The bridge taken for granted, Gretz is a less inspiring place than
Barbizon. I give it the palm over Cernay. There is something
ghastly in the great empty village square of Cernay, with the inn
tables standing in one corner, as though the stage were set for
rustic opera, and in the early morning all the painters breaking
their fast upon white wine under the windows of the villagers. It
is vastly different to awake in Gretz, to go down the green inn-
garden, to find the river streaming through the bridge, and to see
the dawn begin across the poplared level.
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