Daubigny was one of the few men who appreciated Monet; he bought his pictures and urged others to buy. When he died in 1878 a sale of his effects was held. Duret says: I knew the “Canal à Saardam,” which seemed to me one of the most beautiful things Monet had painted; I made up my mind to go to the auction and try to buy it. The sale took place but the picture was not put up. I supposed that the heirs had decided to keep it as a work they understood and appreciated. One Sunday, fifteen days later, happening by chance in L’Hôtel Drouot I went into a room filled with unfinished works, old and grimy canvases, and a mass of stuff--in a word, all the worthless debris of a studio--and there at one side the “Canal à Saardam” of Claude Monet.... I inquired and learned that the room contained the scourings of Daubigny’s studio, sent in for sale anonymously. It was there the heirs had sent the picture of Monet, excluding it from the regular sale because they thought it would bring discredit. It was knocked down to me at the auction for $16. In 1894, when my collection was sold, the picture was bought by M. Durand-Ruel for $1,100. In 1901 it was withdrawn from a sale at the price of $6,000. * * * * * The second exhibition was held in 1876 in the galleries of Durand-Ruel. In passing, tribute should be paid to this great dealer and remarkable man who backed his belief in the new men with all he possessed, to the jeopardizing of his business, and who, happily, still lives to enjoy the confirmation of his judgment. Of this exhibition Albert Wolff, in “Figaro,” said: The Rue Peletier is unfortunate. Following upon the burning of the Opera House, a new disaster has fallen upon the quarter. There has just been opened at Durand-Ruel’s an exhibition of what is said to be painting. The innocent passerby enters, and a cruel spectacle meets his terrified gaze. Here five or six lunatics, of whom one is a woman (Berthe Morisot) have chosen to exhibit their works. There are people who burst out into laughter in front of these objects. Personally I am saddened by them. These so-called artists style themselves Intransigeants, Impressionists. They take paint, brushes and canvases; they throw a few colors on to the canvas at random, and then they sign the lot. In the same way the inmates of a madhouse pick up the stones on the road and believe they have found diamonds. All of which recalls what Ruskin said of Whistler, and the following choice bits about Turner. They (referring to two of his famous pictures) “mean nothing. They are produced as if by throwing handfuls of white and blue and red at the canvas, letting what chanced to stick, stick, and then shadowing in some forms to make the appearance of a picture.”