Page:Women in the Fine Arts From the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentiet.djvu/111

50 culty of reaching her models proved such a hindrance to her that she conceived the idea of visiting the abattoirs, where she could see animals living and dead and study their anatomy.

It is not easy to imagine all the difficulties she encountered in doing this—the many repulsive features of such places—while the company of drovers and butchers made one of the disagreeables of her pursuits. Her love for the animals, too, made it doubly hard for her to see them in the death agony and listen to their pitiful cries for freedom.

In all this experience, however, she met no rude or unkind treatment. Her drawings won the admiration of the men who watched her make them and they treated her with respect. She pursued her studies in the same manner in the stables of the Veterinary School at Alfort and in the Jardin des Plantes.

At other times she studied in the country the quiet grazing herds, and, though often mistaken for a boy on account of the dress she wore, she inspired only admiration for her simplicity and frankness of manner, while the graziers and horse-dealers respectfully regarded her and wondered at her skill in picturing their favorite animals. Some very amusing stories might be told of her comical embarrassments in her country rambles, when she was determined to preserve her disguise and the pretty girls were equally determined to make love to her!

Aside from all this laborious study of living animals, she obtained portions of dead creatures for dissection; also moulds, casts, and illustrated anatomical books; and,