At fifteen he began to study in Paris under Emmanuel Frémiet, modelling from animals in the Jardin des Plantes. He won a medal at the Paris Salon of 1887, and was elected as a member of the jury for the Paris "Exposition Universelle" of 1889 and again at the "Exposition" of 1900, each time sacrificing his own opportunities of receiving medals. He was twenty-nine when the Cross of a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor was bestowed upon him. In 1903, he collaborated with the dean of American sculptors, John Quincy Adams Ward, on the models for the pediment sculptures of the New York Stock Exchange; the pediment figures were carved by the Piccirilli Brothers.