This little sketch on panel captures a sunny afternoon in a small hamlet. A woman is feeding chickens, whilst another stands with her children in the background. Écouen is an ancient town north of Paris dominated by its great Renaissance château built for Constable Anne de Montmorency. It was here that the artist Charles-Edouard Frère, whose reputation was based upon his peasant scenes, founded a School of Sympathetic Art. Pauline Elise Léonide Bourges, one of Edouard Frère's pupils, painted this view of her tutor's home. The sketchy quality of the brushstrokes suggests it was probably painted rapidly en plein air. The work is a pupil's homage to Frère, an artist who was much discussed during the 1860s and whose work was regularly illustrated in the leading periodicals of the day.