A native of Vermont, Hunt displayed precocious talents in the arts while a student at Harvard. His education continued with a number of visits abroad, and in 1846, he settled in Paris to study with academic painter, Thomas Couture. In the course of his artistic endeavors, he befriended Jean-François Millet whose noble peasant subjects had a lasting influence on his style. Hunt lived at Barbizon for two years before returning to America in the summer of 1855 where he was instrumental in introducing the tenets of the Barbizon school to a generation of painters. On July 9, 1893, Lucas wrote in his Diary of a visit to his Paris apartment by Millet’s son, who brought with him a drawing by his father and a painting by Hunt, possibly this canvas. Hunt is known to have owned several large works by Millet, which were destroyed in the Great Boston Fire of 1872. William M. Hunt is one of those who are over-inclined to disregard force of design for subtleties of expression and color, but it is so deliciously done, and with so tender and fascinating a sentiment that one scarcely notes the deficiency. . .