yond, as his eyesight had been impaired. All his life his eyes troubled
him; if he painted too long they became inflamed. For a while he
worked in what the early accounts vaguely call "commercial life."
He began painting by himself, without regular instruction, though
helped somewhat by an amateur artist of the town. In later life he
described his youthful struggles: "Nature is a teacher who never
deceives. When I grew weary with the futile struggle to imitate the
canvases of the past, I went out into the fields, determined to serve
nature as faithfully as I had served art. In my desire to be accurate
I became lost in a maze of detail. Try as I would, my colors were
not those of nature. My leaves were infinitely below the standard
of a leaf, my finest strokes were coarse and crude. The old scene
presented itself one day before my eyes framed in an opening be-
tween two trees. It stood out like a painted canvas--the deep blue of
a midday sky--a solitary tree, brilliant with the green of early sum-
mer, a foundation of brown earth and gnarled roots. There was no
detail to vex the eye. Three solid masses of form and color--sky,
foliage and earth--the whole bathed in an atmosphere of golden
luminosity. I threw my brushes aside; they were too small for the
work in hand. I squeezed out big chunks of pure, moist color and
taking my palette knife, I laid on blue, green, white and brown in
great sweeping strokes. As I worked I saw that it was good and
clean and strong. I saw nature springing into life upon my dead
canvas. It was better than nature, for it was vibrating with the thrill
of a new creation. Exultantly I painted until the sun sank below the
horizon, then I raced around the fields like a colt let loose, and
literally bellowed for joy." ^*

His brother William had moved to New York, become proprie-
tor of a restaurant, and prospered; and about 1870 his father and
mother and Albert followed. New York was to be his home the rest
of his life. He applied for admission to the school of the National

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