The Bonheur family had moved to the sixth story of a tenement house in the Rue Rumfort, now the Rue Malesherbes.  The sons, Auguste and Isadore, had both become artists; the former a painter, the latter a sculptor.  Even little Juliette was learning to paint.  Rosa was working hard all day at her easel, and at night was illustrating books, or molding little groups of animals for the figure-dealers.  All the family were happy despite their poverty, because they had congenial work.

On the roof, Rosa improvised a sort of garden, with honeysuckles, sweet-peas, and nasturtiums, and here they kept a sheep, with long, silky wool, for a model.  Very often Isadore would take him on his back and carry him down the six flights of stairs,—­the day of elevators had not dawned,—­and after he had enjoyed grazing, would bring him back to his garden home.  It was a docile creature, and much loved by the whole family.  For Rosa’s birds, the brothers constructed a net, which they hung outside the window, and then opened the cage into it.

At nineteen Rosa was to test the world, and see what the critics would say.  She sent to the Fine Arts Exhibition two pictures, “Goats and Sheep” and “Two Rabbits.”  The public was pleased, and the press gave kind notices.  The next year “Animals in a Pasture,” a “Cow lying in a Meadow,” and a “Horse for sale,” attracted still more attention.  Two years later she exhibited twelve pictures, some from her father and brother being hung on either side of hers, the first time they had been admitted.  More and more the critics praised, and the pathway of the Bonheur family grew less thorny.

Then, in 1849, when she was twenty-seven, came the triumph.  Her magnificent picture, “Cantal Oxen,” took the gold medal, and was purchased by England.  Horace Vernet, the president of the commission of awards, in the midst of a brilliant assembly, proclaimed the new laureate, and gave her, in behalf of the government, a superb Sevres vase.

Raymond Bonheur seemed to become young again at this fame of his child.  It brought honors to him also, for he was at once made director of the government school of design for girls.  But the release from poverty and anxiety came too late, and he died the same year, greatly lamented by his family.  “He had grand ideas,” said his daughter, “and had he not been obliged to give lessons for our support, he would have been more known, and to-day acknowledged with other masters.”

Rosa was made director in his place, and Juliette became a professor in the school.  This same year appeared her “Plowing Scene in the Nivernais,” now in the Luxembourg Gallery, thought to be her most important work after her “Horse Fair.”  Orders now poured in upon her, so that she could not accede to half the requests for work.  A rich Hollander offered her one thousand crowns for a painting which she could have wrought in two hours; but she refused.