In 1881, after twenty-three years of almost annual exhibition in the Paris Salons, Boudin obtained a medal in the third class. Nowadays this award is usually made to the young man who exhibits for the first time. Three years later Boudin received a medal of the second class, which exempted his work from judgment by the jury, and places its recipient “hors concours.” He commenced, at the age of fifty, to sell his pictures more regularly, but at prices extremely low and out of proportion to their present value. At the Hôtel Drouot, Paris, in 1888, one hundred canvases by Boudin fetched the grand total of £280. It is difficult to estimate what sum such a lot would reach at the present day. The tide had changed, for the Government bought a large painting, _Une Corvette Russe dans le Bassin de l’Eure au Havre_ for the Luxembourg. In 1889, public honour was marred by the most mournful blow. To his inconsolable grief his wife died, after twenty-five years of the happiest companionship. Amongst the letters of sympathy were many acknowledgments of the artist’s genius, notably from Claude Monet, “in recognition of the advice which has made me what I am”—a striking and flattering phrase from the head of the Impressionist group. In this same year Boudin was awarded the gold medal at the Salon. In 1896 the Government purchased his _Rade de Villefranche_ for the Luxembourg, and the old artist received from the hands of Puvis de Chavannes, at the recommendation of the Minister Léon Bourgeois, the ribbon and cross of the Legion of Honour. [Illustration: THE REPAIRING DOCKS AT DUNKIRK · EUGENE BOUDIN ]