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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Famous Women: George Sand
+
+Author: Bertha Thomas
+
+Release Date: February 27, 2009 [EBook #28209]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS WOMEN: GEORGE SAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Delphine Lettau, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _FAMOUS WOMEN_]
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+BY
+
+BERTHA THOMAS.
+
+BOSTON:
+ROBERTS BROTHERS.
+1883.
+
+_Copyright, 1883_,
+BY ROBERTS BROTHERS.
+
+UNIVERSITY PRESS:
+JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE.
+
+
+
+
+PREFATORY NOTE.
+
+
+The authentic materials available for an account of the life of George
+Sand, although lately increased by the publication of a large part of
+her correspondence, are still incomplete. Her memoirs by her own hand,
+dealing fully with her early life alone, remain unsupplemented by any
+entire and detailed biography, for which, indeed, the time seems hardly
+yet come. Hence one among many obvious difficulties in the way of this
+attempt to prepare for English readers a brief sketch that shall at
+least indicate all the more salient features of a life of singularly
+varied aspect.
+
+Much, though of interest in itself, must here be omitted, as beyond the
+scope of the present study. There are points again into which, as
+touching persons still living or quite recently deceased, it would be
+premature to enter. But none seem of such importance as to forbid the
+endeavor, by a careful review of those facts in the life of George Sand
+which most justly represent her character as a whole, and were the
+determining influences on her career and on her work, to arrive at truth
+and completeness of general outline, the utmost it is possible to hope
+to accomplish in this little volume.
+
+BERTHA THOMAS.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY YEARS
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+GIRLHOOD AND MARRIED LIFE
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+DÉBUT IN LITERATURE
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+LÉLIA--ITALIAN JOURNEY
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+MENTAL DEVELOPMENT
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+SOLITUDE, SOCIETY AND SOCIALISM
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+CONSUELO--HOME LIFE AT NOHANT  149
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+NOVELIST AND POLITICIAN  170
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+PASTORAL TALES
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+PLAYS AND LATER NOVELS
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+ARTIST AND MORALIST
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+LATER YEARS
+
+
+
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY YEARS.
+
+
+In naming George Sand we name something more exceptional than even a
+great genius. Her rise to eminence in the literature of her century, is,
+if not without a parallel, yet absolutely without a precedent, in the
+annals of women of modern times.
+
+The origin of much that is distinctive in the story of her life may be
+traced in the curious story of her lineage.
+
+George Sand was of mixed national descent, and in her veins ran the
+blood of heroes and of kings. The noble and the artist, the
+_bourgeoisie_ and the people, all had their representatives among their
+immediate ancestors. Her grandmother, the guardian of her girlhood, was
+the child of Maurice, Marshal Saxe, that favorite figure in history and
+romance, himself son of the famous Augustus II., Elector of Saxony, and
+King of Poland, and the Swedish Countess Aurora von Königsmark. The
+Marshal's daughter Aurore, though like her father of illegitimate
+birth--her mother, who was connected with the stage, passed by her
+professional name of Mlle. Verrieres--obtained after the Marshal's death
+the acknowledgment and protection of his relatives in high places,
+notably of his niece, the Dauphin of France, grand-daughter of Augustus
+of Poland, and mother of the three kings--Louis XVI., Louis XVIII., and
+Charles X.
+
+Carefully educated at St. Cyr, Mlle. de Saxe was married, when little
+more than a child, to the Count de Horn, who was also of partly royal
+but irregular origin. He very shortly afterward fell in a duel. His
+widow, at thirty, became the wife of M. Dupin de Franceuil, an old
+gentleman of good provincial family and some fortune. Maurice, their
+only child, was the father of George Sand.
+
+Madame Dupin (the suffix de Franceuil was afterwards dropped by her
+husband) appears to have inherited none of the adventurous and erratic
+tendencies of her progenitors. Aristocratic in her sympathies,
+philosophic in her intellect, and strictly decorous in her conduct,
+throughout the whole of her long and checkered life she was regarded
+with respect. Left a widow again, ten years after her second marriage,
+she concentrated her hopes and affections on her handsome and amiable
+son Maurice. Though fondly attached to her, he was yet to be the cause
+of her heaviest sorrows, by his more than hazardous marriage, and by his
+premature and tragical fate.
+
+His strongest natural leanings seem to have been towards art in general,
+music and the drama in particular, and of his facile, buoyant, artist
+temperament there is ample evidence; but the political conditions of
+France under the Directory in 1798 left him no choice but to enter the
+army, where he served under Dupont, winning his commission on the field
+of Marengo in 1800. It was during this Italian campaign that the young
+officer met with the woman who, four years later, became his wife, and
+the mother of his illustrious child.
+
+Mademoiselle Sophie Victorie Delaborde, was, emphatically speaking, a
+daughter of the people. Her father had been a poor bird-seller at Paris,
+where she herself had worked as a milliner. Left unprotected at a very
+early age, thoroughly uneducated and undisciplined, gifted with
+considerable beauty, and thrown on the world at a time when the very
+foundations of society seemed to be collapsing, she had been exposed to
+extreme dangers, and without any of the ordinary safeguards against
+them. That she proved herself not undeserving of the serious attachment
+with which she inspired Maurice Dupin, her least favorable judges were
+afterwards forced to admit; though, at the time this infatuation of the
+lieutenant of six-and-twenty for one four years his senior, and of the
+humblest extraction, and whose life hitherto had not been blameless, was
+naturally regarded as utterly disastrous by his elders.
+
+The devoted pair were married secretly at Paris in 1804; and on the 5th
+of July in the same year--the last of the French Republic and the first
+of the Empire--their daughter entered the world, receiving the name of
+Amantine-Lucile-Aurore.
+
+The discovery of the _mésalliance_ she had been dreading for some time,
+and which her son had not dared to confess to her, was a heavy blow to
+old Madame Dupin. However, she schooled herself to forgive what was
+irrevocable, and to acknowledge this most unwelcome daughter-in-law, the
+infant Aurore helping unconsciously to effect the reconciliation. But
+for more than three years M. Dupin's mother and his wife scarcely ever
+met. Madame Dupin _mère_ was living in a retired part of the country, in
+the very centre of France, on the little property of Nohant, which she
+had bought with what the Revolution had left her out of her late
+husband's fortune. Maurice, now Captain Dupin and _aide-de-camp_ to
+Murat, resided, when not on service, in Paris, where he had settled with
+his wife and child. The union, strange though it may seem, continued to
+be a happy one. Besides a strong attachment there existed a real
+conformity of disposition between the two. The mother of George Sand was
+also, in her way, a remarkable woman. She has been described by her
+daughter as "a great artist lost for want of development"; showing a
+wonderful dexterity in whatever she put her hand to, no matter if
+practiced in it or not. "She tried everything, and always
+succeeded"--sewing, drawing, tuning the piano--"she would have made
+shoes, locks, furniture, had it been necessary." But her tastes were
+simple and domestic. Though married out of her rank, she was entirely
+without any vain ambition to push herself into fashionable society, the
+constraint of which, moreover, she could not bear. "She was a woman for
+the fire-side, or for quick, merry walks and drives. But in the house or
+out of doors, what she wanted was intimacy and confidence, complete
+sincerity in her relations with those around her, absolute liberty in
+her habits and the disposal of her time. She always led a retired life,
+more anxious to keep aloof from tiresome acquaintance than to seek such
+as might be advantageous. That was just the foundation of my father's
+character; and in this respect never was there a better-assorted couple.
+They could never be happy except in their own little _ménage_.
+Everywhere out of it they had to stifle their melancholy yawns, and they
+have transmitted to me that secret shyness which has always made the gay
+world intolerable, and home a necessity to me."
+
+In a modest _bourgeois_ habitation in the Rue Meslay, afterwards
+transferred to the Rue Grange-Batelière, Aurore Dupin's infancy passed
+tranquilly away, under the wing of her warmly affectionate mother who,
+though utterly illiterate, showed intuitive tact and skill in fostering
+the child's intelligence. "Mine," says her daughter, "made no
+resistance; but was never beforehand with anything, and might have been
+very much behindhand if left to itself."
+
+Aurore was not four years old when adventures began for her in earnest.
+In the spring of 1808, her father was at Madrid, in attendance upon
+Murat; and Madame Maurice Dupin, becoming impatient of prolonged
+separation from her husband, started off with her little girl to join
+him. The hazards and hardships of the expedition, long mountain drives
+and wild scenery, strange fare and strange sights, could not fail
+vividly to impress the child, whose imagination from her cradle was
+extraordinarily active. Her mother ere this had discovered that Aurore,
+then little more than a baby, and pent up within four chairs to keep her
+out of harm's way, would make herself perfectly happy, plucking at the
+basket-work and babbling endless fairy tales to herself, confused and
+diluted versions of the first fictions narrated to her. A picturesque
+line in a nursery song was enough to bring before her a world of
+charming wonders; the figures, birds, and flowers on a Sèvres china
+candelabrum would call up enchanting landscapes; and the sound of a
+flageolet played from some distant attic start a train of melodious
+fancies and throw her into musical raptures. Her daily experiences,
+after reaching Madrid with her mother, continued to be novel and
+exciting in the extreme. The palace of the Prince de la Paix, where
+Murat and his suite had their quarters, was to her the realization of
+the wonder-land of Perrault and d'Aulnoy; Murat, the veritable Prince
+Fanfarinet. She was presented to him in a fancy court-dress, devised for
+the occasion by her mother, an exact imitation of her father's uniform
+in miniature, with spurs, sword, and boots, all complete. The Prince
+was amused by the jest, and took a fancy to the child, calling her his
+little _aide-de-camp_. After a residence of several weeks in this abode,
+whose splendor was alloyed by not a little discomfort and squalor, the
+return-journey had to be accomplished in the height of summer, amid
+every sort of risk; past reeking battle-fields, camps, sacked and
+half-burnt villages and beleaguered cities. Captain Dupin succeeded,
+however, in escorting his family safely back into France again, the
+party halting to recruit awhile under his mother's roof.
+
+Nohant, a spot that has become as famous through its associations as
+Abbotsford, lies about three miles from the little town of La Châtre, in
+the department of the Indre, part of the old province of Berry. The
+manor is a plain gray house with steep mansard roofs, of the time of
+Louis XVI. It stands just apart from the road, shaded by trees, beside a
+pleasure ground of no vast extent, but with its large flower-garden and
+little wood allowed to spread at nature's bidding, quite in the English
+style. Behind the house cluster a score of cottages of the scattered
+hamlet of Nohant; in the centre rises the smallest of churches, with a
+tiny cemetery hedged around and adjoining the wall of the manor garden.
+
+At this country home the tired travellers gladly alighted; but they had
+barely a few weeks in which to recover from the fatigues of their
+Spanish campaign, when a terrible calamity overwhelmed the household.
+Maurice Dupin, riding home one night from La Châtre, was thrown from his
+horse and killed on the spot.
+
+The story of Aurore Dupin's individual life opens at once with the death
+of her father--a loss she was still too young to comprehend, but for
+which she was soon to suffer through the strange, the anomalous
+position, in which it was to place her. Maurice Dupin's patrician mother
+and her plebeian daughter-in-law, bereft thus violently of him who had
+been the only possible link between them, found themselves hopelessly,
+actively, and increasingly at variance. Their tempers clashed, their
+natures were antipathetic, their views contradictory, their positions
+irreconcilable. Aurore was not only thrust into an atmosphere of strife,
+but condemned to the apple of discord. She was to grow up between two
+hostile camps, each claiming her obedience and affection.
+
+The beginning was smooth, and the sadness which alone kept the peace was
+not allowed to weigh on the child. She ran wild in the garden, the
+country air and country life strengthening a naturally strong
+constitution; and her intelligence, though also allowed much freedom in
+its development, was not neglected. A preceptor was on the spot in the
+person of the fourth inmate of Nohant, an old pedagogue, Deschartres by
+name, formerly her father's tutor, who had remained in Madame Dupin's
+service as "intendant." The serio-comic figure of this personage, so
+graphically drawn by George Sand herself in the memoirs of her early
+life, will never be forgotten by any reader of those reminiscences.
+Pedant, she says, was written in every line of his countenance and every
+movement that he made. He was possessed of some varied learning, much
+narrow prejudice, and a violent, crotchety temper, but had proved during
+the troubles of the Revolution his sincere and disinterested devotion to
+the family he served, and Aurore and "the great man," as she afterwards
+nicknamed her old tutor, were always good friends.
+
+Before she was four years old she could read quite well; but she remarks
+that it was only after learning to write that what she read began to
+take a definite meaning for her. The fairy-tales perused but half
+intelligently before were re-read with a new delight. She learnt grammar
+with Deschartres, and from her grandmother took her first lessons in
+music, an art of which she became passionately fond; and it always
+remained for her a favourite source of enjoyment, though she never
+acquired much proficiency as a musical performer. The educational
+doctrines of Rousseau had then brought into fashion a _régime_ of
+open-air exercise and freedom for the young, such as we commonly
+associate with English, rather than French, child-life; and Aurore's
+early years--when domestic hostilities and nursery tyrannies, from
+which, like most sensitive children, she suffered inordinately, were
+suspended--were passed in the careless, healthy fashion approved in this
+country. A girl of her own age, but of lower degree, was taken into the
+house to share her studies and pastimes. Little Ursule was to become, in
+later years, the faithful servant of her present companion, who had then
+become lady of the manor, and who never lost sight of this humble
+friend. Aurore had also a boy playmate in a _protégé_ of her
+grandmother's, five years her senior, who patronised and persecuted her
+by turns, in his true fraternal fashion. This boy, Hippolyte, the son of
+a woman of low station, was in fact Aurore's half-brother, adopted from
+his birth and brought up by Madame Dupin the elder, whose indulgence,
+where her son was concerned, was infinite. With these, and the children
+of the farm-tenants and rural proprietors around, Aurore did not want
+for companions. But the moment soon arrived when the painful family
+dispute of which she was the object, was to become the cause of more
+distress to the child than to her elders. There were reasons which stood
+in the way of Madame Maurice Dupin's fixing her residence permanently
+under her mother-in-law's roof. But the mind of the latter was set on
+obtaining the guardianship of her grand-daughter, the natural heir to
+her property, and on thus assuring to her social and educational
+privileges of a superior order. The child's heart declared unreservedly
+for her mother, whose passionate fondness she returned with the added
+tenderness of a deeper nature, and all attempts to estrange the two had
+only drawn them closer together. But the pecuniary resources of Maurice
+Dupin's widow were of the smallest, and the advantages offered to her
+little girl by the proposed arrangement so material, that the older lady
+gained her point in the end. Madame Maurice settled in Paris. Aurore
+grew up her grandmother's ward, with Nohant for her home; a home she was
+to keep, knowing no other, till the end of her life.
+
+The separation was brought about very gradually to the child. The first
+few winters were spent in Paris, where her grandmother had an
+establishment. Then she could pass whole days with her mother, who, in
+turn, spent summers at Nohant, and Aurore for years was buoyed up by the
+hope that a permanent reunion would still be brought about. But meantime
+domestic jealousy and strife, inflamed by the unprincipled meddling of
+servants, raged more fiercely than ever, and could not but be a source
+of more than ordinary childish misery to their innocent object. It was
+but slowly that she became attached to her grandmother, whose
+undemonstrative temper, formal habits and condescending airs were little
+calculated to win over her young affections, or fire her with gratitude
+for the anxiety displayed by this guardian to form her manners and
+cultivate her intellect. Nay, the result was rather to implant in her a
+premature dislike and distrust for conventional ideals. From the
+standard of culture and propriety, from the temptations of social rank
+and wealth held up for her preference, she instinctively turned to the
+simple, unrestrained affection of the despised mother, and the greater
+freedom and expansion enjoyed in such company. In vain did disdainful
+lady's-maids try to taunt her into precocious worldly wisdom, asking if
+she could really want to go and eat beans in a little garret. Such a
+condition, naturally, she began to regard as the equivalent of a noble
+and glorious existence!
+
+Meantime, throughout all these alternations of content and distress,
+Nohant and its surroundings were perforce becoming dear to her, as only
+the home of our childhood can ever become. The scenery and
+characteristics of that region are familiar to all readers of the works
+of George Sand; a quiet region of narrow, winding, shady lanes, where
+you may wander long between the tall hedges without meeting a living
+creature but the wild birds that start from the honey-suckle and
+hawthorn, and the frogs croaking among the sedges; a region of
+soft-flowing rivers with curlew-haunted reed beds, and fields where
+quails cluck in the furrows; the fertile plain studded with clumps of
+ash and alder, and a rare farm-habitation standing amid orchards and
+hemp-fields, or a rarer hamlet of a dozen cottages grouped together. The
+country is flat, and, viewed from the rail or high road, unimpressive.
+But those fruitful fields have a placid beauty, and it needs but to
+penetrate the sequestered lanes and explore the thicket-bound courses of
+the streams, to meet with plenty of those pleasant solitudes after a
+poet's own heart, whose gift is to seize and perpetuate transient
+effects, and to open the eyes of duller minds to charms that might pass
+unnoticed. In this sense only can George Sand be said to have idealized
+for us the landscapes she loved.
+
+The thoughtful, poetic side of her temperament showed itself early,
+leading her to seek long intervals of solitude, when she would bury
+herself in books or dreams, to satisfy the cravings of her intellect and
+imagination. On the other hand, her vigorous physical organization kept
+alive her taste for active amusements and merry companionship. So the
+child-squire romped on equal terms with the little rustics of Nohant,
+sharing their village sports and the occupations of the seasons as they
+came round: hay-making and gleaning in summer; in winter weaving
+bird-nets to spread in the snowy fields for the wholesale capture of
+larks; anon listening with mixed terror and delight to the picturesque
+legends told by the hemp-beaters, as they sat at their work out of doors
+on September moonlight evenings--to all the traditional ghost-stories of
+the "Black Valley," as she fancifully christened the country round
+about. Tales were these of fantastic animals and goblins, the
+_grand'-bête_ and the _levrette blanche_, Georgeon, that imp of
+mischief, night apparitions of witches and charmers of wolves, singing
+Druidical stones and mysterious portents--a whole fairy mythology, then
+firmly believed in by the superstitious peasantry.
+
+As a signal contrast to this way of life came for a time the annual
+visits to Paris--suspended after she was ten years old. There liberty
+ended, and the girl was transported into a novel and most uncongenial
+sphere. Her grandmother's friends and relatives were mostly old people,
+who clung to antiquated modes and customs; and distinguished though such
+circles might be, the youngest member only found out that they were
+intolerably dull. The wrinkled countesses with their elaborate toilettes
+and ceremonious manners, the _abbés_ with their fashionable
+tittle-tattle and their innumerable snuff-boxes, the long dinners, the
+accomplishment-lessons, notably those in dancing and deportment, were
+repugnant to the soul of the little hoyden. She made amends to herself
+by observing these new scenes and characters narrowly, with the acute
+natural perception that was one of her leading gifts. From this
+artificial atmosphere of constraint, it was inevitable that she should
+welcome hours of escape into her mother's unpretending domestic circle;
+and already at ten years old she had pronounced the lot of a
+scullery-maid enviable, compared to that of an old _marquise_.
+
+Nevertheless the fact of her having, at an age when impressions are
+strongest, and most lasting, mixed freely and on equal terms with the
+upper classes of society, was a point in her education not without its
+favorable action on her afterwards as a novelist. Despite her firm
+republican sympathies, emphatic disdain for mere rank and wealth, and
+her small mercy for the foibles of the fashionable world, she can enter
+into its spirit, paint its allurements without exaggeration, and
+indicate its shortcomings with none of that asperity of the outsider
+which always suggests some unconscious envy lurking behind the scorn.
+
+The despised accomplishment-lessons, in themselves tending only to so
+much agreeable dabbling, proved useful to her indirectly by creating new
+interests, and as an intellectual stimulus. There seems to have been
+little or no method about her early education. The study of her own
+language was neglected, and the time spent less profitably, she
+considered in acquiring a smattering of Latin with Deschartres. She took
+to some studies with avidity, while others remained wholly distasteful
+to her. For mere head-work she cared little. Arithmetic she detested;
+versification, no less. Her imagination rebelled against the
+restrictions of form. Nowhere, perhaps, except in the free-fantasia
+style of the novel, could this great prose-poet have found the right
+field in which to do justice to her powers. The dry _technique_ in music
+was a stumbling-block of which she was impatient. History and literature
+she enjoyed in whatever they offered that was romantic, heroic, or
+poetically suggestive. In her Nohant surroundings there was nothing to
+check, and much to stimulate, this dominant, imaginative faculty. Her
+youthful attempts at original composition she quickly discarded in
+disgust; but it seemed almost a law of her mind that whatever was
+possessing it she must instinctively weave into a romance. Thus in
+writing her history-epitome she must improve on the original, when too
+dry, by exercising her fancy in the description of places and
+personages. The actual political events of that period were of the most
+exciting character; Napoleon's Russian campaign, abdication, retreat to
+Elba, the Hundred Days, Waterloo, the Restoration, following each other
+in swift succession. Old Madame Dupin was an anti-Bonapartist, but
+Aurore had caught from her mother something of the popular infatuation
+for the emperor, and her fancy would create him over again, as he might
+have been had his energies been properly directed. Her day-dreams were
+often so vivid as to effect her senses with all the force of realities.
+
+Such a visionary life might have been most dangerous and mentally
+enervating had her organization been less robust, and the tendency to
+reverie not been matched by lively external perception and plentiful
+physical activity. As it was, if at one moment she was in a cloud-land
+of her own, or poring over the stories of the Iliad, the classic
+mythologies, or Tasso's _Gerusalemme_, the next would see her scouring
+the fields with Ursule and Hippolyte, playing practical jokes on the
+tutor, and extemporizing wild out-of-door games and dances with her
+village companions.
+
+Of serious religious education she received none at all. Here, again,
+the authorities were divided. Her mother was pious in a primitive way,
+though holding aloof from priestly influences. The grandmother, a
+disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of Voltaire, had renounced the
+Catholic creed, and was what was then called a Deist. But beyond
+discouraging a belief in miraculous agencies she preserved a neutrality
+with her ward on the subject, and Aurore was left free to drift as her
+nature should decide. Instinctively she felt more drawn toward her
+mother's unreasoning, emotional faith than toward a system of
+philosophic, critical inquiry. But on both sides what was offered her to
+worship was too indefinite to satisfy her strong religious instincts.
+Once more she filled in the blank with her imagination, which was
+forthwith called upon to picture a being who should represent all
+perfections, human and divine; something that her heart could love, as
+well as her intelligence approve.
+
+This ideal figure, for whom she devised the name _Corambé_, was to
+combine all the spiritual qualities of the Christian ideal with the
+earthly grace and beauty of the mythological deities of Greece. For very
+many years she cherished this fantasy, finding there the scope she
+sought for her aspirations after superhuman excellence. It is hardly too
+much to say that the Christianity which had been expressly left out in
+her teaching she invented for herself. She erected a woodland altar in
+the recesses of a thicket to this imaginary object of her adoration, and
+it is a characteristic trait that the sacrifices she chose to offer
+there were the release of birds and butterflies that had been taken
+prisoners--as a symbolical oblation most welcome to a divinity whose
+essential attributes were infinite mercy and love. It will be remembered
+that a somewhat similar anecdote is related of the youthful Goethe.
+
+Aurore, as the years went on, had grown sincerely fond of Madame Dupin;
+but her mother still held the foremost place in her heart, and she had
+never ceased to cherish the belief that if they two could live together
+she would be perfectly happy. The discovery of this deeply irritated her
+grandmother, who at length was provoked to intimate to the girl
+something of the real motive for insisting on this separation--namely,
+that her mother's antecedents were such as, in the eyes of Aurore's
+well-wishers, rendered it desirable to establish the daughter's
+existence apart from that of her parent. Sooner or later such a
+revelation must have been made; but made as it was, thus precipitately,
+in a moment of jealous anger, the chief result was of necessity to cause
+a painful and dangerous shock to the sensitive young mind. It brought
+about an unnatural discord in her moral nature, forbidden all at once to
+respect what she had loved most, and must continue to love, in spite of
+all. On the injurious effects of the over-agitation to which she was
+subjected in her childhood she has laid much stress in her remarkable
+work, "The Story of My Life." Much of this book, written when she was
+between forty and fifty, reads like a romance; and had a certain amount
+of retrospective imagination entered into the treatment of these
+reminiscences it would not be surprising. The tendency to impart
+poetical color and significance to whatever was capable of taking it was
+her mastering impulse, and may sometimes have led her to lose the
+distinction between fancy and reality, especially as by her own
+confession her memory was never her strong point. But she had an
+excellent memory for impressions, and no reader whose own recollections
+of childhood have not grown faint, but will feel the profound truth of
+the spirit of the narrative, which is of a kind that occasional
+exaggerations in the letter cannot depreciate in value as a
+psychological history. For an account of her early life it must always
+remain the most important source.
+
+Aurore was now thirteen, and though she had read a good deal of
+miscellaneous literature her instruction had been mostly of a desultory
+sort; she was behindhand in the accomplishments deemed desirable for
+young ladies; and her country manners, on the score of etiquette, left
+something to be desired. To school, therefore, it was decided that she
+must go; and her grandmother selected that held by the nuns of the
+"English convent" at Paris, as the most fashionable institution of the
+kind.
+
+This _Convent des Anglaises_ was a British community, first established
+in the French capital in Cromwell's time. It has now been removed, and
+its site, the Rue St. Victor, has undergone complete transformation. In
+1817, however, it was in high repute among conventual educational
+establishments. To this retreat Aurore was consigned and there spent
+more than two years, an untroubled time she has spoken of as in many
+respects the happiest of her life. There is certainly nothing more
+delightful in her memoirs than the vivid picture there drawn of the
+convent-school interior, drawn without flattery or malice, and with
+sympathy and animation.
+
+The nunnery was an extensive building of rambling construction--with
+parts disused and dilapidated--quite a little settlement, counting some
+150 inmates, nuns, pupils and teachers; with cells and dormitories, long
+corridors, chapels, kitchens, distillery, spiral staircases and
+mysterious nooks and corners; a large garden planted with chestnut
+trees, a kitchen garden, and a little cemetery without gravestones,
+over-grown with evergreens and flowers. The sisters were all English,
+Irish, or Scotch, but the majority of the pupils and the secular
+mistresses were French. Of the nuns the ex-scholar speaks with respect
+and affection, but their religious exercises left them but the smaller
+share of their time and attention to devote to the pupils. The girls
+almost without exception were of high social rank, the _bourgeois_
+element as yet having scarcely penetrated this exclusive seminary.
+Aurore formed warm friendships with many of her school-fellows, and
+seems to have been decidedly popular with the authorities as well, in
+spite of the high spirits which amid congenial company found vent in
+harmless mischief and a sort of organized playful insubordination. The
+school had two parties: the _sages_ or good girls, and the _diables_,
+their opposites. Among the latter Aurore conscientiously enrolled
+herself and became a leader in their escapades, acquiring the sobriquet
+of "Madcap." These outbreaks led to nothing more heinous than playing
+off tricks on a tyrannical mistress, or making raids on the forbidden
+ground of the kitchen garden. But the charm that held together the
+confraternity of _diables_ was a grand, long-cherished design, to which
+their best energy and ingenuity were devoted--a secret, heroic-sounding
+enterprise, set forth as "the deliverance of the victim." A tradition
+existed among them that a captive was kept languishing miserably in some
+remote cell, and they had set themselves the task of discovering and
+liberating this hapless wretch.
+
+It is needless to say that prisoner and dungeon existed in their
+girlishly romantic brains alone, but easy to see how such a legend might
+possess itself of their imaginations, and to what bewitching exploits it
+might invite firm believers. The supervision was not so very strict but
+that a _diable_ of spirit might sometimes play truant from the
+class-room unnoticed. The truants would then start on an exciting
+journey of discovery through the tortuous passages, exploring the
+darkest recesses of the more deserted portions of the convent; now
+penetrating into the vaults, now adventuring on the roofs, regardless
+of peril to life or limb. This sublimely ridiculous undertaking,
+half-sport, half-earnest, so fascinated Aurore as to become the most
+important occupation of her mind!
+
+The teaching provided for the young ladies appears to have been of the
+customary superficial order--of everything a little; a little music, a
+little drawing, a little Italian. With English she had the opportunity
+of becoming really conversant, as it was the language commonly spoken in
+the convent, where also she could not fail to acquire some insight into
+the English character. This she has treated more fairly than England for
+long was to treat her. Few of her gifted literary countrymen have done
+such justice to the sterling good qualities of our nation. Even when, in
+delineating the Briton, she caricatures those peculiarities with which
+he is accredited abroad, her blunders seem due to incomplete knowledge
+rather than to any inability to comprehend the spirit of a people with
+whom, indeed, she had many points of sympathy. She could penetrate that
+coldness and constraint of manner so repelling to French natures, and
+has said of us, with unconventional truth, that our character is in
+reality more vehement than theirs; but with less mastery over our
+emotions themselves, we have more mastery over the expression of our
+emotions. Among her chosen school-comrades were several English girls,
+but on leaving the convent their paths separated, and in her after life
+she had but rare opportunities for renewing these early friendships.
+
+Some eighteen months had elapsed in this fashion when Aurore began to
+tire of _diablerie_. The victim remained undiscoverable. The store of
+practical jokes was exhausted. Her restless spirit, pent up within those
+convent walls, was thirsting for a new experience,--something to fill
+her heart and life.
+
+It came in the dawn of a religious enthusiasm--different from her
+mystical dream of _Corambé_, which however poetical was out of harmony
+with the spirit and ritual of a Catholic convent. But monastic life had
+its poetical aspects also; and through these it was that its
+significance first successfully appealed to her. An evening in the
+chapel, a Titian picture representing Christ on the Mount of Olives, a
+passage chanced upon in the "Lives of the Saints," brought impressions
+that awoke in her a new fervor, and inaugurated a period of ardent
+Catholicism. All vagueness was gone from her devotional aspirations,
+which now acquired a direct personal import. The change brought a
+revolution in her general behavior. She was understood to have been
+"converted." "Madcap" was now nicknamed "Sainte Aurore" by her profane
+school-fellows, and she formed the serious desire and intention of
+becoming a nun.
+
+The sisters, a practical-minded community, behaved with great good sense
+and discretion. Without distressing the youthful proselyte by casting
+doubts on her "vocation," they reminded her that the consideration was a
+distant one, as for years to come her first duty would be to her
+relatives, who would never sanction her present determination. Her
+confessor, the Abbé Prémord, a Jesuit and man of the world, was likewise
+kindly discouraging; and perceiving that her zeal was leading her to
+morbid self-accusation and asceticism of mood, he shrewdly enjoined upon
+her as a penance to take part in the sports and pastimes with the rest
+as heretofore, much to her dismay. But she soon found her liking for
+these return, and with it her health of mind. Unshaken still in her
+private belief that she would take the veil in due time, she was content
+to wait, and in the interval to be a useful and agreeable member of
+society. No more insubordination, no more mischievous freaks, yet
+"Sainte Aurore" remained the life and soul of all recreations recognized
+by authority, which even included little theatrical performances now and
+then.
+
+She had become more regular in her studies since her mind had taken a
+serious turn, but her heart was less in them than ever. Considering
+this, and the deficiencies in the system of instruction itself, it is
+hardly surprising that when, in the spring of 1820, her grandmother
+fearing that the monastic idea was taking hold of Aurore in good earnest
+decided to remove her from the _Couvent des Anglaises_, she knew little
+more than when first she had entered it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+GIRLHOOD AND MARRIED LIFE.
+
+
+Aurore Dupin was now fifteen, and so far, though somewhat peculiarly
+situated, she and her life had presented no very extraordinary features,
+nor promise of the same. Her energies had flowed into a variety of
+channels, and manifestly clever and accustomed to take the lead though
+she might be, no one, least of all herself, seems to have thought of
+regarding her as a wonder. The Lady Superior of the _Couvent des
+Anglaises_, who called her "Still Waters," had perhaps an inkling of
+something more than met the eye, existent in this pupil. But a dozen
+years were yet to elapse before the moment came when she was to start
+life afresh for herself, on a footing of independence and literary
+enterprise, and by her first published attempts raise her name at once
+above the names of the mass of her fellow-creatures.
+
+Old Madame Dupin, warned by failing health that her end was not far off,
+would gladly have first assured a husband's protection for her ward,
+whom she had now succeeded in really dissociating from her natural
+guardian. The girl's bringing-up, and an almost complete separation for
+the last five years, had made a gap--in habits of mind and feeling--such
+as could hardly be quite bridged over, between her mother and herself.
+But though beginning to be sadly aware of this and of the increasing
+violence and asperities of poor Madame Maurice Dupin's temper, which
+made peace under one roof with her a matter of difficulty, Aurore hung
+back from the notion of marriage, and clearly was much too young to be
+urged into taking so serious a step. So to Nohant she returned from the
+convent in the spring of 1820. There she continued to strike that
+judicious compromise between temporal and spiritual duties and pleasures
+enjoined on her by her clerical adviser. Still bent on choosing a
+monastic life, when free to choose for herself, she was reconciled in
+the meantime to take things as they came, and to make herself happy and
+add to the happiness of her grandmother in the ordinary way. So we find
+her enjoying the visit of one of her school friends, getting up little
+plays to amuse the elders, practicing the harp, receiving from her
+brother Hippolyte--now a noisy hussar--during his brief visit home, her
+first initiation into the arts of riding--for the future her favorite
+exercise--and of pistol-shooting; and last, but not least, beginning to
+suspect that she had learned nothing whatever while at school, and
+setting to work to educate herself, as best she could, by miscellaneous
+reading.
+
+In the spring of the following year Madame Dupin's health and mental
+faculties utterly broke down. But she lived on for another ten months.
+Aurore for the time was placed in a most exceptional position for a
+French girl of sixteen. She was thrown absolutely on herself and her own
+resources, uncontrolled and unprotected, between a helpless, half
+imbecile invalid, and the eccentric, dogmatic pedagogue, Deschartres.
+Highly susceptible to influences from without, her mind, during their
+sudden and complete suspension, seemed as it were invited to discover
+and take its own bent.
+
+Piqued by the charge of dense ignorance flung at her by her ex-tutor,
+and aware that there was truth in it, she would now sit up all night
+reading, finding her appetite for the secular knowledge she used to
+despise grow by what it fed upon. The phase of religious exaltation she
+had recently passed through still gave the tone to her mind, and it was
+with the works of famous philosophers, metaphysicians, and Christian
+mystics that she began her studies. Comparing the "Imitation of Christ"
+with Châteaubriand's "Spirit of Christianity," and struck here and
+elsewhere with the wide discrepancies and contradictions of opinion
+manifest between great minds ranging themselves under one theological
+banner, she was led on to speculations that alarmed her conscience, and
+she appealed to her spiritual director, the Abbé Prémord, for advice,
+fearing lest her faith might be endangered if she read more. He
+encouraged her to persevere, telling her in no wise to deny herself
+these intellectual enjoyments. But her rigid Catholicism was doomed from
+that hour. Hers was that order of mind which can never give ostensible
+adhesion to a creed whilst morally unconvinced; never accept that refuge
+of the weak from the torment of doubt, in abdicating the functions of
+reason and conscience, shifting the onus of responsibility on to others,
+and agreeing to believe, as it were, by proxy. She had plunged
+fearlessly and headlong into Aristotle, Bacon, Locke, Condillac, Mably,
+Leibnitz, Bossuet, Pascal, Montaigne, Montesquieu; beginning to call
+many things in question, and, through the darkness and confusion into
+which she was sometimes thrown, trying honestly and sincerely to feel
+her way to some more glorious faith and light.
+
+In the convent she had been familiarized with Romanism under its most
+attractive aspects. The moral refinement, the mystery, the seclusion,
+and picturesque beauties of that abode had a poetic charm that had
+carried her irresistibly away. But, confronted with the system in its
+practical working, she was staggered by many of its features. In the
+country churches around her she saw the peasantry encouraged in their
+grossest superstitions, and the ritual, carelessly hurried through,
+degenerate often into mere mockery. The practice of confession,
+moreover--her ultimate condemnation of which, as an institution whose
+results for good are scanty, its dangers excessive, will be endorsed by
+most persons in this country--and the Church's denial of the right of
+salvation to all outside its pale, revolted her; and she caught at the
+teaching of those who claimed liberty of conscience. "Reading Leibnitz,"
+she observes, "I became a Protestant without knowing it." That purer and
+more liberal Christianity she dreamed of had, she discovered, been the
+ideal of many great men. The step brought her face to face with fresh
+and grave problems of which, she truly observes, the solutions were
+beyond her years, and beyond that era. There came to her rare moments of
+celestial calm and concord, but she owed them to other and indirect
+sources of inspiration. The study of philosophy, indeed, was not much
+more congenial to her at sixteen than arithmetic had been at six. In
+what merely exercised memory and attention she took comparatively but
+languid interest. Instruction, to bring her its full profit, must be
+conveyed through the medium of moral emotion, but the mysterious power
+of feeling to stimulate intellect was with her immense. She turned now
+to the poets--Shakespeare, Byron, Dante, Milton, Virgil, Pope. A poet
+herself, she discovered that these had more power than controversialists
+to strengthen her religious convictions, as well as to enlarge her mind.
+Above all, the writings of the poet-moralist, Jean-Jacques Rousseau,
+helped her towards resolving the question that occupied her, of her true
+vocation in life, now that her determination to take the veil was not a
+little shaken.
+
+The midnight student was by turns Amazon and sick-nurse as well. From
+the fatigue of long watches over her books or by the invalid's bedside,
+she found a better and more invigorating refreshment than sleep in
+solitary morning rides across country. Her fearlessness on horseback was
+madness in the eyes of the neighbors. Riding, then and there, was almost
+unheard of for ladies, a girl in a riding-habit regarded as simply a
+Cossack in petticoats, and Mademoiselle Dupin's delight in
+horse-exercise sufficed to stamp her as eccentric and strong-minded in
+the opinion of the country gentry and the towns-folk of La Châtre. They
+had heard of her studies, too, and disapproved of them as unlady-like in
+character. Philosophy was bad enough, but anatomy, which she had been
+encouraged to take up by Deschartres, himself a proficient in medical
+science, was worse--sacrilegious, for a person understood to be
+professedly of a devotional turn of mind. She went game-shooting with
+the old tutor; he had a mania for the sport, which she humored though
+she did not share. But when quails were the object, she owns to have
+enjoyed her part in the chase, which was to crouch in the furrows among
+the green corn, imitating the cry of the birds to entice them within
+gunshot of the sportsman. Lastly, finding in the feminine
+costume-fashions of that period a dire impediment to out-door enterprise
+of the sort, in a region of no roads, or bad roads, of rivers
+perpetually in flood, turning the lanes into water-courses for
+three-fourths of the year, of miry fields and marshy heaths, she
+procured for herself a suit of boy's clothes, donning blouse and gaiters
+now and then without compunction for these rough country walks and
+rambles.
+
+Here, indeed, was more than enough to raise a hue-and-cry at La Châtre,
+a small provincial town, probably neither better nor worse than the rest
+of its class, a class never yet noted for charity or liberality of
+judgment. The strangest stories began to be circulated concerning her,
+stories for the most part so false and absurd as to inspire her with a
+sweeping contempt for public opinion. By a very common phenomenon, she
+was to incur throughout her life far more censure through freaks,
+audacious as breaches of custom, but intrinsically harmless, nor likely
+to set the fashion to others, than is often reserved for errors of a
+graver nature. The conditions of ordinary middle-class society are
+designed, like ready-made clothes, to fit the vast majority of human
+beings, who live under them without serious inconvenience. For the
+future George Sand to confine her activities within the very narrow
+restrictions laid down by the social code of La Châtre was, it must be
+owned, hardly to be expected. It was perhaps premature to throw down the
+gauntlet at sixteen, but her inexperience and isolation were complete.
+The grandmother in her dotage was no counsellor at all. Deschartres, an
+oddity himself, cared for none of these things. Those best acquainted
+with her at La Châtre, families the heads of which had known her father
+well and whose younger members had fraternized with her from childhood
+upwards, liked her none the less for her unusual proceedings, and
+defended her stoutly against her detractors.
+
+"You are losing your best friend," said her dying grandmother to her
+when the end came, in December, 1821. Aurore was, indeed, placed in a
+difficult and painful situation. She had inherited all the property of
+the deceased, who, in her will, expressed her desire that her own
+nearest relations by her marriage with M. Dupin, a family of the name of
+de Villeneuve, well-off and highly connected, should succeed her as
+guardians to her ward. But it was impossible to dispute the claims of
+Madame Maurice Dupin to the care of her own daughter if she chose to
+assert them, which she quickly did, bearing off the girl with her to
+Paris--Nohant being left under the stewardship of Deschartres--and by
+her unconciliatory behavior further alienating the other side of the
+family from whom Aurore, through no fault of her own, was virtually
+estranged at the moment when she stood most in need of a friend. Twenty
+years later they came forward to claim kinship and friendship again: it
+was then with George Sand, the illustrious writer, become one of the
+immortals.
+
+Thus her lot was cast for her in her mother's home and plebeian circle
+of acquaintance. So much the worse, it was supposed, for her prospects,
+social and matrimonial. This did not distress her, but none the less was
+the time that followed an unhappy one. The mother whom she had idolized,
+and of whom she always remained excessively fond, appears to have been
+something of a termagant in her later years. The heavy troubles of her
+life had aggravated one of those irascible and uncontrollable tempers
+that can only be soothed by superior violence. Aurore, saddened, gentle,
+and submissive, only exasperated her. Her fitful affection and fitful
+rages combined to make her daughter's life miserable, and to incline the
+girl unconsciously to look over-favorably on any recognized mode of
+escape that should present itself.
+
+A long visit to the country-house of some friends near Melun, was hailed
+as a real relief by both. Here there were young people, and plenty of
+cheerful society. Aurore became like one of the family, and her mother
+was persuaded to allow her to prolong her stay indefinitely. Among the
+new acquaintance she formed whilst on this visit was one that decided
+her future.
+
+M. Casimir Dudevant was a young man on terms of intimacy with her hosts,
+the Duplessis family. From the first he was struck by Mlle. Dupin, who
+on his further acquaintance was not otherwise than pleased with him.
+The sequel, before long, came in an offer of marriage on his part, which
+she accepted with the approval of her friends.
+
+He was seven-and-twenty, had served in the army, and studied for the
+law; but had expectations which promised an independence. His father,
+Colonel Dudevant, a landed proprietor in Gascony, whose marriage had
+proved childless, had acknowledged Casimir, though illegitimate, and
+made him his heir. It was reckoned not a brilliant _parti_ for the
+_châtelaine_ of Nohant, but a perfectly eligible one. It was not a
+_mariage de convenance_; the young people had chosen freely. Still less
+was it a love match. Romantic sentiment--counted out of place in such
+arrangements by the society they belonged to--seems not to have been
+dreamed of on either side. But they had arranged it for themselves,
+which to Aurore would naturally seem, as indeed it was, an improvement
+on the usual mode of procedure, according to which the burden of choice
+would have rested with her guardians. It was a _mariage de raison_
+founded, as she and he believed, on mutual friendliness; in reality on a
+total and fatal ignorance of each other's characters, and probably, on
+Aurore's side, of her own as well. She was only just eighteen, and had a
+wretched home.
+
+The match was sanctioned by their parents, respectively. In September,
+1822, Aurore Dupin became Madame Dudevant, and shortly afterwards she
+and her husband established themselves at Nohant, there to settle down
+to quiet country life.
+
+If tranquillity did not bring all the happiness that was expected, it
+was at least unbroken by such positive trials as those to come, and
+whatever was lacking to Madame Dudevant's felicity she forgot for a
+while in her joy over the birth of her son Maurice, in the summer of
+1823--a son for whom more than ordinary treasures of maternal affection
+were in store, and who, when his childhood was past, was to become and
+remain until the time of her death a sure consolation and compensation
+to her for the troubles of her life.
+
+The first two years after her marriage were spent almost without
+interruption in the still monotony of Nohant. "We live here as quietly
+as possible," she writes to her mother in June, 1825, "seeing very few
+people, and occupying ourselves with rural cares." That absolute
+dependence on each other's society that might have had its charm for a
+really well-assorted couple was, however, not calculated to prolong any
+illusions that might exist as to the perfect harmony of their
+dispositions. Already in the summer of 1824 the Dudevants had sought a
+change from seclusion in a long visit to their friends the Duplessis,
+after which they rented a villa in the environs of Paris for a short
+while. The spring found them back at Nohant, and the summer of 1825 was
+marked by a tour to the Pyrenees, undertaken in concert with some old
+school-fellows of Aurore's, two sisters, who with their father were
+starting for Cauterets. The pleasure of girlish friendships renewed gave
+double charm to the trip, and her delight in the mountain scenery knew
+no bounds.
+
+"I am in such a state of enthusiasm about the Pyrenees," she writes to
+her mother, "that I shall dream and talk of nothing but mountains and
+torrents, caves and precipices, all the rest of my life." She joined
+eagerly in every excursion on foot and horseback, but even moderate
+feats of mountaineering, such as are now expected of the quietest
+English lady-tourists by their husbands and brothers, were then deemed
+startlingly eccentric, and got her into fresh trouble on this head.
+
+Her letters and the fragments of her journal kept during this time, and
+in which she tried to commit to paper her impressions, whilst fresh and
+vivid, of the Pyrenees, show the same peculiar descriptive power that
+distinguished her novels--that art of seizing grand general effects
+together with picturesque detail, and depicting them in a simple and
+straightforward manner, in which she was an adept. It must be added that
+the diffuseness which characterizes her fiction, also pervades her
+correspondence. Neither can be adequately represented by extracts. Her
+composition is like a gossamer web, that must be shown in its entirety,
+as to split it up is to destroy it.
+
+The ensuing winter and spring were passed agreeably in visits with her
+husband to his family at Nérac, Gascony, and to friends in the
+neighborhood. In the summer of 1826 their wanderings ended. Once more
+they settled down at Nohant, where Madame Dudevant, except for a few
+brief absences on visits to friends, or to health resorts in the
+vicinity, remained stationary for the next four years, during which her
+after-destiny was unalterably shaping itself.
+
+It is perfectly idle to speculate on what might have happened had her
+lot in marriage turned out a fortunate one, or had she married for love,
+or had the moral character of the partner of her life preserved any
+solid claim on her respect, since the contrary was unhappily the case.
+Their situation, no doubt, was anomalous. In the young girl of barely
+eighteen, country-bred and intellectually immature, whom M. Dudevant had
+chosen to marry, who could have discerned one of the greatest poetical
+geniuses and most powerful minds of the century? Some commiseration
+might _à priori_ be felt for the petty squire's son who had taken the
+hand of the pretty country-heiress, promising himself, no doubt, a
+comfortable jog-trot existence in the ordinary groove, to discover in
+after years that he was mated with the most remarkable woman that had
+made herself heard of in the literary world since Sappho! But he
+remained fatally blind to the nature of the development that was taking
+place under his eyes, preserving to the last the serenest contempt for
+his wife's intelligence. Her large mind and enthusiastic temperament
+sought in vain for moral sympathy from a narrow common spirit, and in
+proportion as her faculties unfolded, increasing disparity between them
+brought increasing estrangement. Such a strong artist-nature may require
+for its expansion an amount of freedom not easily compatible with
+domestic happiness. But of real domestic happiness she never had a fair
+chance, and for a time the will to make the best of her lot as it was
+cast appears not to have been wanting.
+
+The Dudevants, after their return home in 1826, began to mix more freely
+in such society as La Châtre and the environs afforded, and at certain
+seasons there was no lack of provincial gayeties. Aurore Dudevant all
+her life long was quite indifferent to what she has summarily dismissed
+as "the silly vanities of finery"--"_Souffrir pour être belle_" was what
+from her girlhood she declined to do. Regard for the brightness of her
+eyes, her complexion, the whiteness of her hands, the shape of her foot,
+never made her sacrifice her midnight study, her walks in the sunshine,
+or her good country sabots for the rough lanes of Berry. "To live under
+glass, in order not to get tanned, or chapped, or faded before the time,
+is what I have always found impossible," she for her part has
+acknowledged. And she cared very moderately for general society. She
+writes to her mother in spring, 1826: "It is not the thing of all others
+that reposes, or even that amuses me best; still there are obligations
+in this life, which one must take as they come." She was not yet
+two-and-twenty, and carnival-tide with its social "obligations" in the
+form of balls and receptions was not unwelcome. They snatched her away
+from her increasing depression. She writes of these diversions to her
+mother in a lively strain, describing how one ball was kept up till nine
+o'clock the next day, how every Sunday morning the _curé_ preaches
+against dancing, but in the evening the dance goes on in despite of
+him--how this cross _curé_ is not their own parish _curé_ of St.
+Chartier,--a very old friend and a "character" who, when Madame Dudevant
+was five-and-thirty, used to say of her, "Aurore is a child I have
+always been fond of." "As for him, if only he were sixty years younger,"
+she adds, "I would undertake to make him dance himself if I set about
+it." Then follows an amusing sketch of a rustic bridal, the double
+marriage of two members of the Nohant establishment:
+
+     The wedding-feast came off in our coach-houses--there was dinner in
+     one, dancing in the other. The splendor was such as you may
+     imagine; three tallow candle-ends by way of illumination, lots of
+     home-made wine for refreshment; the orchestra consisting of a
+     bagpipe and a hurdy-gurdy, the noisiest and, therefore, the best
+     appreciated in the country side. We invited some friends over from
+     La Châtre, and made fools of ourselves in a hundred thousand ways;
+     as, for instance, dressing up as peasants in the evening and
+     disguising ourselves so well as not to recognize each other. Madame
+     Duplessis was charming in a red petticoat; Ursule, in a blue blouse
+     and a big hat was a most comical fellow; Casimir, got up as a
+     beggar, had some halfpence given him in all good faith; Stephane,
+     whom I think you know, as a spruce peasant, made believe to have
+     been drinking, stumbled against our _sous-prèfet_ and accosted
+     him--he is a nice fellow, and was just going to depart when all of
+     a sudden he recognized us. Well, it was a most farcical evening,
+     and would have amused you I will engage. Perhaps you, too, would
+     have been tempted to put on the country-cap, and I will answer for
+     it that there would not have been a pair of black eyes to compete
+     with yours.
+
+In other letters written in a vein of charming good humor, her facility
+and spirit are shown in her treatment of trivial incidents, or sketches
+of local characters, as this, for example, of an ancient female servant
+in her employ:
+
+     The strangest old woman in the world--active, industrious, clean
+     and faithful, but an unimaginable grumbler. She grumbles by day,
+     and I think by night, when asleep. She grumbles whilst making the
+     butter, she grumbles when feeding the poultry, she grumbles even at
+     her meals. She grumbles at other people, and when she is alone she
+     grumbles at herself. I never meet her without asking her how her
+     grumbling is getting on, and she grumbles away more than ever.
+
+And elsewhere she has her fling at the little squabbles and absurdities
+of provincial society, the "sets" and petty distinctions, giving a
+humorous relation of the collapse of her well-meaning efforts, in
+conjunction with friends at the _sous-prèfecture_, to do away with some
+of these caste prejudices, of the horror and indignation created in the
+oligarchy of La Châtre by the apparition of an inoffensive music-master
+and his wife at the _sous-prèfet's_ reception, horror so great that on
+the next occasion, the _salon_ of the official was unfurnished with
+guests, except for the said music-master and the Dudevants themselves.
+She wrote a poetical skit to commemorate the incident, which created
+great amusement among her friends.
+
+In the autumn, 1828, her daughter Solange was born. The care of her two
+children, to whom she was devoted, occupied her seriously. Maurice's
+education was beginning, a fresh inducement to her to study that she
+might be better able to superintend his instruction. His least
+indisposition put her into a fever of anxiety. Her own health during all
+these years had repeatedly given cause for alarm. Symptoms of
+chest-disease showed themselves, but afterwards disappeared, her
+constitutional vigor triumphing in the end over complaints which seem to
+a great extent to have been of a nervous order. Meantime her domestic
+horizon was becoming overcast at many points.
+
+Her brother, Hippolyte Chatiron, now married, came with his family to
+settle in the neighborhood, and spent some time at Nohant. He had fallen
+into the fatal habit of drinking, in which he was joined by M. Dudevant
+to the degradation of his habits and, it would be charitable to suppose,
+to the confusion of his intelligence. This grave ill came to make an
+open break in the household calm, hitherto undisturbed on the surface.
+Low company and its brutalizing influences were tending to bring about a
+state of things to which the most patient of wives might find it hard to
+submit. A rôle of complete self-effacement was not one it was in her
+power long to sustain, and the utter moral solitude into which she was
+thrown consolidated those forces inclining her to the extreme of
+self-assertion. For together with trials without came the growing sense
+of superiority, the _ennui_ and unrest springing from mental faculties
+with insufficient outlet, and moreover, denied the very shadow of
+appreciation at home, where she saw the claim to her deference and
+allegiance co-exist with a repudiation she resented of all idea of the
+reciprocity of such engagements.
+
+She had voluntarily handed over the management of her property--the
+revenue of which was hardly proportionate to the necessary expenses and
+required careful economy--to her husband, an arrangement which left her,
+even for pocket money, dependent on him. She now set herself to devise
+some means of adding to her resources by private industry. The more
+ambitious project of securing by her own exertions a separate
+maintenance for herself and her children would at this time have seemed
+chimerical, but it haunted her as a dream long before it took definite
+shape.
+
+It was not in literature that she first fancied she saw her way to
+earning an independent income. She had begun to make amateur essays in
+novel-writing, but was as dissatisfied with them as with the
+compositions of her childhood, and with a religious novelette she had
+produced whilst in the convent, and speedily committed to the flames.
+Again, alluding to her attempts, in 1825, at descriptions of the
+Pyrenees, she says: "I was not capable then of satisfying myself by what
+I wrote, for I finished nothing, and did not even acquire a taste for
+writing."
+
+But she had dabbled in painting, and remained fond of it. "The finest of
+the arts," she calls it, writing to her mother in 1830, "and the most
+pleasant, as a life-occupation, whether taken up for a profession, or
+for amusement merely. If I had real talent, I should consider such a lot
+the finest in the world." But neither did the decoration of fans and
+snuff-boxes nor the production of little water-color likenesses of her
+children and friends, beyond which her art did not go, promise anything
+brilliant in the way of remuneration.
+
+In her circle of friends at La Châtre--old family friends who had known
+her all her life--were those who had recognized and admired her superior
+ability. Here, too, she met more than one young spirit with literary
+aspirations, and one, at least, M. Jules Sandeau, who was afterwards to
+achieve distinguished literary success. The desire to go and do
+likewise came and took hold of her, together with the conviction of her
+capability to make her mark. However discontented with her essays in
+novel-writing hitherto, she began to be conscious she was on the right
+track. The Revolution of July, 1830, had just been successfully
+accomplished, and new hopes and ambitions for the world in general, and
+their own country in particular, lent a stimulus to the intellectual
+activity of the youth of France--a movement too strong not to make
+itself felt, even in Berry.
+
+The state of things at Nohant for the last two years had, as we have
+seen, been tending rather to stifle than to keep alive any hesitation or
+compunction Madame Dudevant might have felt at breaking openly from her
+present condition. In a letter, dated October, 1830, to her son's
+private tutor, M. Boucoiran, who had then been a year under their roof
+in that capacity, she remarks, significantly:
+
+     You often wonder at my mobility of temper, my flexible character.
+     What would become of me without this power of self-distraction? You
+     know all in my life, and you ought to understand that but for that
+     happy turn of mind which makes me quickly forget a sorrow, I should
+     be disagreeable and perpetually withdrawn into myself, useless to
+     others, insensible to their affection.
+
+The distance between herself and her husband had, indeed, been widening
+until now the sole real link between them was their joint love for the
+children. No pretence of mutual affection existed any longer. Madame
+Dudevant's feeling seems to have been of indifference merely; M.
+Dudevant's of dislike, mingled, probably, with a little fear. It appears
+that he committed to paper his sentiments on the subject, and that this
+document, ostensibly intended by him not to be opened till after his
+death, was found and perused by his wife. It was the provocation thus
+occasioned her, and the certainty thus acquired of her husband's
+aversion to her society, that brought matters to a climax; so, at least,
+she asserted in the heat of the moment. But nothing, we imagine, could
+long have deferred her next step, strange and venturesome though it was.
+Violent in acting on a determination when taken, after the manner, as
+she observes, of those whose determinations are slow in forming, she
+declared her intentions to her husband, and obtained his consent to her
+plan.
+
+According to this singular arrangement she was to be permitted to spend
+every alternate three months in Paris, where she proposed to try her
+fortune with her pen. She looked forward to having her little girl to be
+there with her as soon as she was comfortably settled, supposing the
+experiment to succeed. For half the year she would continue to reside,
+as hitherto, at Nohant, so as not to be long separated from her son, who
+was old enough to miss her, and to part from whom, on any terms, cost
+her dear. But he was to be sent to school in two years, and for the
+meantime she had secured for him the care and services of M. Boucoiran,
+whom she thoroughly trusted.
+
+Her husband was to allow her £120 a year out of her fortune, and on
+condition that the allowance should not be exceeded, he left her at
+liberty to get on as she chose, abstaining from further interference.
+
+It seems obvious that this compromise, whilst postponing, could only
+render more inevitable a future separation on less amicable terms,
+though neither appear to have realized it at the time. Madame Dudevant
+can have had no motive to blind her in the matter beyond her desire, in
+detaching herself from her present position, not to disconnect her life
+from that of her children. The freedom she demanded it was probably too
+late to deny. Those about her, her husband and M. Chatiron, who, with
+his family, was temporarily domesticated at Nohant, and who so far
+supported her as to offer her the loan of rooms held by him in Paris,
+for the first part of her stay, thought her resolution but a caprice.
+And viewed by the light of her subsequent success it is hard now to
+realize the boldness of an undertaking whose consequences, had it
+failed, must have been humiliating and disastrous. She had no practical
+knowledge of the world, had received no artistic training, and enjoyed
+none of the advantages of intellectual society. But she had
+extraordinary courage, spirit, and energy, springing no doubt from a
+latent sense of extraordinary powers, almost matured, though as yet but
+half-manifest. So much she knew of herself, and states modestly: "I had
+discovered that I could write quickly, easily, and for long at a time
+without fatigue; that my ideas, torpid in my brain, woke up and linked
+themselves together deductively in the flow of the pen; that in my life
+of seclusion, I had observed a good deal, and understood pretty well the
+characters I had chanced to come across, and that, consequently, I knew
+human nature well enough to describe it." A most moderate estimate, in
+which, however, she had yet to convince people that she was not
+self-deceived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+DÉBUT IN LITERATURE.
+
+
+In the first days of January 1831, the Rubicon was passed. The step,
+though momentous in any case to Madame Dudevant, was one whose ultimate
+consequences were by none less anticipated than by herself, when to town
+she came, still undecided whether her future destiny were to decorate
+screens and tea-caddies, or to write books, but resolved to give the
+literary career a trial.
+
+For actual subsistence she had her small fixed allowance from home; for
+credentials she was furnished with an introduction or two to literary
+men from her friends in the country who had some appreciation, more or
+less vague, of her intellectual powers. Though courageous and
+determined, she was far from self-confident; she asked herself if she
+might not be mistaking a mere fancy for a faculty, and her first step
+was to seek the opinion of some experienced authority as to her talent
+and chances.
+
+M. de Kératry, a popular novelist, to whom she was recommended, spoke
+his mind to her without restraint. It was to the crushing effect that a
+woman ought not to write at all. Her sex, Madame Dudevant was informed,
+can have no proper place in literature whatsoever. M. Delatouche,
+proprietor of the _Figaro_, poet and novelist besides, and cousin of her
+old and intimate friends the Duvernets, of La Châtre, was a shade more
+encouraging, even so far committing himself as to own that, if she would
+not let herself be disgusted by the struggles of a beginner, there might
+be a distant possibility for her of making some sixty pounds a year by
+her pen. Such specimens of her fiction as she submitted to him he
+condemned without appeal, but he encouraged her to persevere in trying
+to improve upon them, and advised her well in advising her to avoid
+imitation of any school or master, and fearlessly to follow her own
+bent.
+
+Meantime he took her on to the staff of his paper, then in its infancy
+and comparative obscurity. Journalism however was the department of
+literature least suited to her capabilities, and her
+fellow-contributors, though so much less highly gifted than Madame
+Dudevant, excelled her easily in the manufacture of leaders and
+paragraphs to order. To produce an article of a given length, on a given
+subject, within a given time, was for her the severest of ordeals; here
+her exuberant facility itself was against her. She would exhaust the
+space allotted to her, and find herself obliged to break off just at the
+point when she felt herself "beginning to begin." But she justly valued
+this apprenticeship as a professional experience, bringing her into
+direct relations with the literary world she was entering as a perfect
+stranger. Once able to devote herself entirely to composition and to
+live for her work, she found her calling begin to assert itself
+despotically. In a letter to a friend, M. Duteil, at La Châtre, dated
+about six weeks after her arrival in Paris, she writes:--
+
+     If I had foreseen half the difficulties that I find, I should not
+     have undertaken this enterprise. Well, the more I encounter the
+     more I am resolved to proceed. Still, I shall soon be returning
+     home again, perhaps without having succeeded in launching my boat,
+     but with hopes of doing better another time, and with plans of
+     working harder than ever.
+
+Three weeks later we find her writing to her son's tutor, M. Boucoiran,
+in the same strain:--
+
+     I am more than ever determined to follow the literary career. In
+     spite of the disagreeables I often meet with, in spite of days of
+     sloth and fatigue that come and interrupt my work, in spite of the
+     more than humble life I lead here, I feel that henceforth my
+     existence is filled. I have an object, a task, better say it at
+     once, a passion. The profession of a writer is a violent one, and
+     so to speak, indestructible. Once let it take possession of your
+     wretched head, you cannot stop. I have not been successful; my work
+     was thought too unreal by those whom I asked for advice.
+
+But still she persisted, providing, as best she could, "copy" for the
+_Figaro_, at seven francs a column, and trying the experiment of
+literary collaboration, working at fictions and magazine articles, the
+joint productions of herself and her friend and fellow-student, Jules
+Sandeau, who wrote for the _Revue de Paris_. It was under his name that
+these compositions appeared, Madam Dudevant, in these first
+trial-attempts, being undesirous to bring hers before the public.
+
+"I have no time to write home," she pleads, petitioning M. Boucoiran for
+news from the country, "but I like getting letters from Nohant, it rests
+my heart and my head."
+
+And alluding to her approaching temporary return thither, in accordance
+with the terms of her agreement with M. Dudevant, she writes to M.
+Charles Duvernet:--
+
+     I long to get back to Berry, for I love my children more than all
+     besides, and, but for the hopes of becoming one day more useful to
+     them with the scribe's pen than with the housekeeper's needle, I
+     should not leave them for so long. But in spite of innumerable
+     obstacles I mean to take the first steps in this thorny career.
+
+In her case it was really the first step only that cost dear; whilst
+against the annoyances with which, as a new comer, she had to contend,
+there was ample compensation to set in the novel interests of the
+intellectual, political, and artistic world stirring around her. Country
+life and peasant life she had had the opportunity of studying from her
+youth up; of middle-class society she had sufficient experience; she
+counted relatives and friends among the _noblesse_, and had moved in
+those charmed circles; but the republic of art and letters, to which by
+nature and inclination she emphatically belonged, was a land of promise
+first opened up to her now. She was eager and impatient to
+deprovincialize herself.
+
+In the art galleries of the Louvre, at the theatre and the opera, in the
+daily interchange of ideas on all kinds of topics with her little circle
+of intelligent acquaintance, her mind grew richer by a thousand new
+impressions and enjoyments, and rapidly took fresh strength together
+with fresh knowledge. The heavy practical obstacles that interfere with
+such self-education on the part of one of her sex were seriously
+aggravated in her case by her narrow income. How she surmounted them is
+well known; assuming on occasion a disguise which, imposing on all but
+the initiated, enabled her everywhere to pass for a collegian of
+sixteen, and thus to go out on foot in all weathers, at all hours, alone
+if necessary, unmolested and unobserved, in theatre or restaurant,
+boulevard or reading-room. In defense of her adoption of this strange
+measure, she pleads energetically the perishable nature of feminine
+attire in her day,--a day before double-soles or ulsters formed part of
+a lady's wardrobe,--its incompatibility with the incessant going to and
+fro which her busy life required, the exclusion of her sex from the best
+part of a Paris theatre, and so forth; the ineffable superiority of a
+costume which, economy and comfort apart, secured her equal independence
+with her men competitors in the race, and identical advantages as to the
+rapid extension of her field of observation. The practice, though never
+carried on by her to such an extent as very commonly asserted, was one
+to which she did not hesitate to resort now and then in later years, as
+a mere measure of convenience--a measure the world will only tolerate in
+the Rosalinds and Violas of the stage. The career of George Sand was,
+like her nature, entirely exceptional, and any attempt to judge it in
+any other light lands us in hopeless moral contradictions. She had
+extraordinary incentives to prompt her to extraordinary actions, which
+may be condemned or excused, but which there could be no greater
+mistake than to impute to ordinary vulgar motives. It must also be
+remembered that fifty years ago, the female art student had no
+recognized existence. She was shut out from that modicum of freedom and
+of practical advantages it were arbitrary to deny, and which may now be
+enjoyed by any earnest art aspirant in almost any great city. However
+unjustifiable the proceeding resorted to for a time by George Sand and
+Rosa Bonheur may be held to be, it cannot possibly be said they had no
+motive for it but a fantastic one.
+
+Writing to her mother from Nohant, whither she had returned in April for
+a length of time as agreed, Madam Dudevant speaks out characteristically
+in defense of her love of independence:--
+
+     I am far from having that love of pleasure, that need of amusement
+     with which you credit me. Society, sights, finery, are not what I
+     want,--you only are under this mistake about me,--it is liberty. To
+     be all alone in the street and able to say to myself, I shall dine
+     at four or at seven, according to my good pleasure; I shall go to
+     the Tuileries by way of the Luxembourg instead of going by the
+     Champs Elysées; this is what amuses me far more than silly
+     compliments and stiff drawing-room assemblies.
+
+Such audacious self-emancipation, she was well aware, must estrange her
+from her friends of her own sex in the upper circles of Parisian
+society, and she anticipated this by making no attempt to renew such
+connections. For the moment she thought only of taking the shortest,
+and, as she judged, the only way for a "torpid country wife," like
+herself, to acquire the freedom of action and the enlightenment she
+needed. Those most nearly related to her offered no opposition. It was
+otherwise with her mother-in-law, the _baronne_ Dudevant, with whom she
+had a passage-of-arms at the outset on the subject of her literary
+campaign, here disapproved _in toto_.
+
+"Is it true," enquired this lady, "that it is your intention to _print
+books_?"
+
+"Yes, madame."
+
+"Well, I call that an odd notion!"
+
+"Yes, madame."
+
+"That is all very good and very fine, but I hope you are not going to
+put the name that I bear on the _covers of printed books_?"
+
+"Oh, certaintly not, madame, there is no danger."
+
+The liberty to which other considerations were required to give way was
+certainly complete enough. The beginning of July found her back at work
+in the capital. On the Quai St. Michel--a portion of the Seine
+embankment facing the towers of Notre Dame, the Sainte Chapelle, and
+other picturesque monuments of ancient Paris--she had now definitely
+installed herself in modest lodgings on the fifth story. Accepted and
+treated as a comrade by a little knot of fellow _literati_ and
+colleagues on the _Figaro_, two of whom--Jules Sandeau and Félix
+Pyat--were from Berry, like herself; and with Delatouche, also a
+Berrichon, for their head-master, she served thus singularly her brief
+apprenticeship to literature and experience;--sharing with the rest both
+their studies and their relaxations, dining with them at cheap
+restaurants, frequenting clubs, studios, and theatres of every degree;
+the youthful effervescence of her student-friends venting itself in such
+collegians' pranks as parading deserted quarters of the town by
+moonlight, in the small hours, chanting lugubrious strains to astonish
+the shopkeepers. The only great celebrity whose acquaintance she had
+made was Balzac, himself the prince of eccentrics. Although he did not
+encourage Madame Dudevant's literary ambition, he showed himself kindly
+disposed towards her and her young friends, and she gives some amusing
+instances that came under her notice of his oddities. Thus, once after a
+little Bohemian dinner at his lodgings in the Rue Cassini, he insisted
+on putting on a new and magnificent dressing-gown, of which he was
+exceedingly vain, to display to his guests, of whom Madame Dudevant was
+one; and not satisfied therewith, must needs go forth, thus accoutred,
+to light them on their walk home. All the way he continued to hold forth
+to them about four Arab horses, which he had not got yet, but meant to
+get soon, and of which, though he never got them at all, he firmly
+believed himself to have been possessed for some time. "He would have
+escorted us thus," says Madame Dudevant, "from one extremity of Paris to
+another, if we had let him."
+
+Twice again before the end of the year, faithful to her original
+intentions, we find her returning to her place as mistress of the house
+at Nohant, occupying herself with her children, and working at the novel
+_Indiana_, which was to create her reputation the following year.
+
+Meanwhile, a novelette, _La Prima Donna_, the outcome of the literary
+collaboration with Jules Sandeau, had found its way into a magazine, the
+_Revue de Paris_; and was followed by a longer work of fiction, of the
+same double authorship, entitled _Rose et Blanche_, published under
+Sandeau's _nom de plume_ of Jules Sand.
+
+This literary partnership was not to last long, and to-day the novel
+will be found omitted in the list of the respective works of its
+authors. Its perusal will hardly repay the curious. The powerful genius
+of Madame Dudevant, the elegant talent of the author of _Mlle. de la
+Seiglière_, are mostly conspicuous by their absence in _Rose et
+Blanche_, or _La Comédienne et la Réligieuse_, an imitative attempt, and
+not a happy one, in the style of fiction then in vogue.
+
+Madame Dudevant had stepped into the literary world at the moment of the
+most ardent activity of the Romantic movement. The new school was on the
+point of achieving its earliest signal triumphs. Victor Hugo's first
+poems had just been followed by the dramas _Hernani_ and _Marion
+Delorme_. Dumas' _Antony_ was drawing crowded and enthusiastic houses. A
+few months before the publication of _Rose et Blanche_ appeared _Notre
+Dame de Paris_. The passion for innovation which had seized on all the
+younger school of writers was leading many astray. The strange freaks of
+Hugo's genius had, to quote Madame Dudevant's own expression, excited a
+"ferocious appetite" for whatever was most outrageous, and set taste,
+precedent, and probability most flatly at defiance. From those
+aberrations into which the great master's imitators had been betrayed
+Madame Dudevant's fine art-instincts were calculated to preserve her;
+but she had not yet learned to trust to them implicitly.
+
+_Rose et Blanche_, though containing many clever passages--waifs and
+strays of shrewd observation, description and character analysis,--is in
+the main ill-conceived, ill-constructed, and unreal. The two authors
+have sacrificed their individualities in a mistaken effort to follow the
+fashion's lead, resulting in a most ineffective compound of tameness and
+sensationalism. Amazing adventures are undergone by each heroine before
+she is one-and-twenty. Angels of innocence, they are doomed to have
+their existences crushed out by the heartless conduct of man, Blanche
+expiring of dismay almost as soon as she is led from the altar, Rose
+burying herself and her despair in a convent. The then favorite heroes
+of romance were of the French Byronic type--young men of fortune who
+have exhausted life before they are five-and-twenty, whose minds are
+darkened by haunting memories of some terrific crime, but who are none
+the less capable of all the virtues and great elevation of sentiment on
+occasion. None of these requisitions are left unfulfilled by the
+unamiable hero of _Rose et Blanche_, a work which did little to advance
+the fortunes of its authors, and whose intrinsic merits offer little
+warrant for dragging it out of the oblivion into which it has been
+suffered to drop.
+
+To escape the influences of the literary revolution everywhere then
+triumphant was of course impossible. To make them serve her individual
+genius instead of enslaving her individuality was all Madame Dudevant
+needed to learn. Her friend Balzac had done this for himself, suiting
+his genius to the period without any sacrifice of originality. Although
+not yet at the height of his fame he had produced many most successful
+works, and Madame Dudevant, according to her own account, derived great
+profit from the study of his method, although with no inclination to
+follow in his direction. Yet he afterwards observed to her, "Our two
+roads lead to the same goal."
+
+_Rose et Blanche_, though little noticed by the public, brought a
+publisher to the door, one Ernest Dupuy, with an order for another novel
+by the same authors. _Indiana_ was ready-written, and came in response
+to the demand. But as Sandeau had had no hand whatever in this
+composition, the signature had of course to be varied. The publisher
+wishing to connect the new novel with its predecessor it was decided to
+alter the prefix only. She fixed on George, as representative of Berry,
+the land of husbandmen; and George Sand thus became pseudonym of the
+author of _Indiana_, a pseudonym whose origin imaginative critics have
+sought far afield and some have discovered in her alleged sympathy with
+Kotzebue's murderer, Karl Sand, and political assassination in general!
+Its assumption was to inaugurate a new era in her life.
+
+In the last days of April, 1832, appeared _Indiana_, by George Sand. "I
+took," says Madame Dudevant, in her account of the transaction, "the
+1,200 francs paid me by the publisher, which to me were a little
+fortune, hoping he would see his money back again." She had recently
+returned from one of her periodical visits to Nohant, accompanied this
+time by her little girl, whom the progress already achieved enabled her
+now to take into her charge, and was living very quietly and studiously
+in her humble establishment on the Quai St. Michel, when she awoke to
+find herself famous.
+
+Her success, for which indeed there had been nothing to prepare
+her--neither flattery of friends, nor vain-glorious ambition within
+herself--was immediate and conclusive. Whatever differences of opinion
+might exist about the book, critics agreed in recognizing there the
+revelation of a new writer of extraordinary power. "One of those masters
+who have been gifted with the enchanter's wand and mirror," wrote
+Sainte-Beuve, a few months later, when he did not hesitate to compare
+the young author to Madame de Staël. The novel of sentimental analysis,
+a style in which George Sand is unsurpassed, was then a fresh and
+promising field. _Indiana_, without the aid of marvellous incidents,
+startling crimes, or iniquitous mysteries, riveted the attention of its
+readers as firmly as the most thrilling tales of adventure and horror.
+It is a "soul's tragedy," and that is all--the love-tragedy vulgarized
+since by repeated treatment by inferior novelists, of a romantic,
+sensitive, passionate, high-natured girl, hopelessly ill-mated with a
+somewhat tyrannical and stupid, yet not entirely ill-disposed old
+colonel, and exposed to the seductions of a Lovelace--the truth about
+whose unloveable character, in its profound and heartless egoism, first
+bursts upon her at the moment when, maddened by brutal insult, she is
+driven to claim the generous devotion he has proffered a thousand times.
+Side by side with the ideal of selfishness, Raymon stands in contrast
+with the ideally chivalrous Ralph, Indiana's despised cousin, who,
+loving her disinterestedly and in silence, has watched over her as a
+guardian-friend to the last, and does save her ultimately. The florid
+descriptions, the high-flown strains of emotion, which now strike as
+blemishes in the book, were counted beauties fifty years since; and even
+to-day, when reaction has brought about an extreme distaste for
+emotional writing, they cannot conceal the superior ability of the
+novelist. The sentiment, however extravagantly worded, is genuine and
+spontaneous, and has the true ring of passionate conviction. The
+characters are vividly, if somewhat closely drawn and contrasted, the
+scenes graphic; every page is colored by fervid imagination, and despite
+some violations of probability in the latter portion, out of keeping
+artistically with the natural character of the rest of the book, the
+whole has the strength of that unity and completeness of conception
+which is the distinguishing stamp of a genius of the first order. The
+_entrain_ of the style is irresistible. It was written, she tells us,
+_tout d'un jet_, under the force of a stimulus from within. Ceasing to
+counterfeit the manner of anyone, or to consult the exigencies of the
+book-market, she for the first time ventures to be herself responsible
+for the inspiration and the mode of expression adopted.
+
+The papers spoke of the new novel in high tones of praise, the public
+read it with avidity. The authorship, for a time, continued to perplex
+people. In spite of the masculine pseudonym, certain feminine qualities,
+niceties of perception and tenderness, were plainly recognized in the
+work, but the possibility that so vigorous and well-executed a
+composition could come from a feminine hand was one then reckoned
+scarcely admissible. Even among those already in the secret were
+sceptics who questioned the author's power to sustain her success,
+since nearly everybody, it is said, can produce one good novel.
+
+"The success of _Indiana_ has thrown me into dismay," writes Madame
+Dudevant, in July, 1832, to M. Charles Duvernet, at La Châtre. "Till
+now, I thought my writing was without consequence, and would not merit
+the slightest attention. Fate has decreed otherwise. The unmerited
+admiration of which I have become the object must be justified." And
+_Valentine_ was already in progress; and its publication, not many
+months after _Indiana_, to be a conclusive answer to the challenge.
+
+The season of 1832, in which George Sand made her _début_ in literature,
+was marked, in Paris, by public events of the most tragic character. In
+the spring, the cholera made its appearance, and struck panic into the
+city. Six people died in the house where Madame Dudevant resided, but
+neither she nor any of her friends were attacked. She was next to be a
+witness of political disturbances equally terrible. The disappointment
+felt by the Liberals at the results of the Revolution of 1830, and of
+the establishment of Louis Philippe's Government, upon which such high
+hopes had been founded, was already beginning to assert itself in secret
+agitation, and in the sanguinary street insurrections, such as that of
+June, 1832, sanguinarily repressed. Madame Dudevant at this time had no
+formulated political creed, and political subjects were those least
+attractive to her. But though born in the opposite camp she felt all her
+natural sympathies incline to the Republican side. They were further
+intensified by the scenes of which she was an eye-witness, and which
+roused a similar feeling even among anti-revolutionists. Thus Heine, in
+giving an account of the struggle mentioned above, and speaking of the
+enthusiasts who sacrificed their lives in this desperate demonstration,
+exclaims: "I am, by God! no Republican. I know that if the Republicans
+conquer they will cut my throat, and all because I don't admire all they
+admire; but yet the tears came into my eyes as I trod those places still
+stained with their blood. I had rather I, and all my fellow-moderates,
+had died than those Republicans."
+
+Amid such disturbing influences it is not surprising that we find her
+complaining in the letter last quoted that her work makes no progress;
+but the lost time was made up for by redoubled industry during her
+summer visit to Nohant.
+
+In the autumn appeared _Valentine_. This second novel not only confirmed
+the triumph won by the first, but was a surer proof of the writer's
+calibre, as showing what she could do with simpler materials. Here,
+encouraged by success, she had ventured to take her stand entirely on
+her own ground--dispensing even with an incidental trip to the tropics,
+which, in _Indiana_, strikes as a misplaced concession to the prevalent
+craze for Oriental coloring--and to lay the scene in her own obscure
+province of Berry, her first descriptions of which show her rare
+comprehension of the poetry of landscape. Like _Indiana_, _Valentine_ is
+a story of the affections; like _Indiana_, it is a domestic tragedy, of
+which the girl-heroine is the victim of a pernicious system that makes
+of marriage, in the first instance, a mere commercial speculation.
+Indeed, the extreme painfulness of the story would render the whole too
+repulsive but for the charm of the setting, which relieves it not a
+little, and a good deal of humor in the treatment of the minor
+characters, notably the eighteenth century _marquise_, and the Lhéry
+family of peasant-_parvenus_. The personages are drawn with more finish
+than those in _Indiana_; the tone is more natural in its pitch. It is
+the work of one who finds in every-day observation, as well as in such
+personal emotions as come but once in a lifetime, the inspiration that
+smaller talents can derive from the latter alone.
+
+In both her consummate art, or rather natural gift of the art of
+narrative, is the mainstay of the fabric her imagination has reared.
+That incomparable style of hers is like some magic fairy-ring, that
+bears the wearer, safe and victorious, through manifold perils--perils
+these of prolixity, exaggeration, and disdain of careful construction.
+Both _Indiana_ and _Valentine_, moreover, contain scenes and passages
+offensive to English taste, but it is impossible fairly to criticise the
+fiction of a land where freer expression in speech and in print than
+with us is habitually recognized and practiced, from our own standpoint
+of literary decorum. It was not for this feature that French criticism
+had already begun to charge her books with dangerous tendencies (thus
+contributing largely to noise her fame abroad), as breathing rebellion
+against the laws of present society; charges which, so far as _Indiana_
+and _Valentine_ are concerned, had, as is now generally admitted, but
+little foundation. Each is the story of an unhappy marriage, but there
+is no attempt whatever to throw contempt on existing institutions, or to
+propound any theory, unless it be the idea--no heresy or novelty in
+England at least--that marriage, concluded without love on either side,
+is fraught with special dangers to the wife, whose happiness is bound up
+with her affections. It was the bold and uncompromising manner in which
+this plain fact was brought forward, the energy of the protest against
+a real social abuse, which moved some critics to sound a war-cry for
+which, as yet, no just warrant had been given.
+
+Besides these two novels, containing full proof of her genius, if not of
+its highest employment, there appeared, late in 1832, that remarkable
+novelette, _La Marquise_, revealing fresh qualities of subtle
+penetration and clear analysis. The flexibility of her imagination, the
+variety in her modes of its application, form an essential
+characteristic of her work. Not by any single novel, nor, indeed by
+half-a-dozen taken at random, can she be adequately represented.
+
+When in the winter of 1832 Madame Sand returned with her little girl to
+Paris after spending the autumn, as usual, at Nohant, it was to rather
+more comfortable quarters, on the Quai Malplaquet. The rapid sale of her
+books was placing her in comparatively easy circumstances, and giving
+fresh spur to her activity. But her situation was transforming itself
+fast; the freedom of obscurity was lost to her for ever from the day
+when the unknown personage, George Sand, became the object of general
+curiosity--of curiosity redoubled in Paris by the rumors current there
+of her exceptional position, eccentric habits, and interesting
+personality.
+
+The celebrated portrait of her by Eugène Delacroix was painted in the
+year 1833. It is a three-quarter view, and represents her wearing her
+_quasi_ masculine _redingote_, with broad _revers_ and loosely knotted
+silk neck-tie. Of somewhat later date is a highly interesting drawing by
+Calamatta, well-known by engravings; but of George Sand in her first
+youth no likeness unfortunately has been left to the world. She has been
+most diversely described by her different contemporaries. But that at
+this time she possessed real beauty is perfectly evident; for all that
+she denies it herself, and that, unlike most women, and nearly all
+French women, she scorned to enhance it by an elaborated toilette.
+Heine, though he never professed himself one of her personal adorers,
+compares the beauty of her head to that of the Venus of Milo, saying,
+"It bears the stamp of ideality, and recalls the noblest remaining
+examples of Greek art." Her figure was somewhat too short, but her hands
+and feet were very small and beautifully shaped. His acquaintance with
+her dates from the early years of her literary triumphs, and his
+description is in harmony with Calamatta's presentation. She had dark
+curling hair, a beauty in itself, falling in profusion to her shoulders,
+well-formed features, pale olive-tinted complexion, the countenance
+expressive, the eyes dark and very fine, not sparkling, but mild and
+full of feeling. The face reminds us of the character of "Still Waters,"
+attributed to the Aurore Dupin of fifteen by the Lady Superior of the
+English convent. Her voice was soft and muffled, and the simplicity of
+her manner has been remarked on by those who sought her acquaintance, as
+a particular charm. Yet, like all reserved natures, she often failed to
+attract strangers at a first meeting. In general conversation she
+disappointed people, by not shining. Men and women, immeasurably her
+inferiors, surpassed her in ready wit and brilliant repartee. Her
+taciturnity in society has been somewhat ungenerously laid to a _parti
+pris_. She was one, it is said, who took all and gave nothing. That she
+was intentionally chary of her passing thoughts and impressions to those
+around her, is, however, sufficiently disproved by her letters. Here she
+shows herself lavish of her mind to her correspondents. Conversation and
+composition necessitate a very different brain action, and her
+marvellous facility in writing seems really to have been accompanied
+with no corresponding readiness of speech and reply. Probably it was
+only, as she herself states, when she had a pen in her hand that her
+lethargic ideas would arise and flow in order as they should. And the
+need of self-expression felt by all those who have not the gift of
+communicating themselves fully and easily in speech or manner, a strong
+need in her case, from her having so much to express, was the spur that
+drove her to seek and find the mode of so doing in art.
+
+Her silence in company certainly did not detract from her fascination
+upon a closer acquaintance. Of those who fell under the spell, the more
+fortunate came at once to terms of friendship with her, which remained
+undisturbed through life. Thus, of one among this numerous brotherhood,
+François Rollinat, with whom she would congratulate herself on having
+realized the perfection of such an alliance of minds, she could write
+when recording their friendship, then already a quarter of a century
+old, that it was still young as compared with some that she counted, and
+that dated from her childhood.
+
+Others fell in love with her, and found her unresponsive. With some of
+these, jealousies and misunderstandings arose, and led to estrangements,
+for the most part but temporary. Yet the winner of her heart was
+scarcely to be envied. She was apt--she has herself thus expressed
+it--to see people through a prism of enthusiasm, and afterwards to
+recover her lucidity of judgment. Great, no doubt, was her power of
+self-illusion; it betrayed her into errors that have been unsparingly
+judged. For her power of calm and complete disillusion she was perhaps
+unique among women, and it is no wonder if mankind have found it hard to
+forgive.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+LÉLIA.--ITALIAN JOURNEY.
+
+
+It was less than two years since she had come up to the capital, to seek
+her fortunes there in literature. Aurore Dudevant, hereafter to be
+spoken of as George Sand (for she made her adopted name more her own
+than that she had borne hitherto, and became George Sand for her private
+friends as well as for the public,) found herself raised to eminence
+among the eminent. And it was at an exceptionally brilliant epoch in
+French imaginative literature that the distinction had been won. Such a
+burst of talent as that which signalized the opening years of Louis
+Philippe's reign is unexampled in French literary history. With Hugo,
+Dumas, De Musset, Balzac, not to mention lesser stars, the author of
+_Indiana_ and _Valentine_, although a woman, was acknowledged as worthy
+to rank. The artist in her, a disturbing element in her inner life which
+had driven her out of the spiritual bondage and destitution of a petty
+provincial environment to secure for herself freedom and expansion, had
+justified the audacity of the move by a triumphant artistic success.
+From this time onward her artistic faculty dominated her life, often,
+probably, unknown to herself an invincible force of instinct she obeyed,
+whilst assigning, in all good faith, other motives for her course of
+action, and for real or apparent inconsequences, that have been
+constantly misrepresented and misunderstood.
+
+So sudden and abrupt a change would have turned all heads but the
+strongest. Publishers competed with one another to secure her next work.
+Buloz, proprietor of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, engaged her to write
+regularly for his periodical, to which, for the next ten years, she
+never ceased to be a regular and extensive contributor. Although the
+scale of remuneration was not then very high she was clearly secure, so
+long as she allowed nothing to interfere with her literary work, of
+earning a sufficient income for her own needs. She had learnt the
+importance of pecuniary independence, and never pretended to despise the
+reward of her industry. To luxury she was indifferent, but the necessity
+of strict economy was a burden she was impatient of; she liked to have
+plenty to give away, and was always excessively liberal to the poor. Her
+little dwelling on the Quai Malplaquet was no longer the hermitage of
+an anonymous writer of no account. The great in art and letters,
+leading critics, such as Sainte-Beuve and Gustave Planche, came eager to
+seek her acquaintance, and delighting to honor the obscure student of a
+year ago.
+
+Writing to M. Boucoiran after her return to Paris in December, 1832, she
+describes her altered position:--
+
+     All day long I am beset with visitors, who are not all
+     entertaining. It is a calamity of my profession, which I am partly
+     obliged to bear. But in the evening I shut myself up with my pens
+     and ink, Solange, my piano, and a fire. With all these I pass some
+     right pleasant hours. No noise but the sounds of a harp, coming I
+     know not whence, and of the playing of a fountain under my window.
+     This is highly poetical--pray don't make game of me!
+
+There was another side to her success. Fame brought trials and
+annoyances that fell with double severity on her as a woman. Her door
+was besieged by a troop of professional beggars, impostors, impertinent
+idlers, and inquisitive newsmongers. Jealousy and ill-will, inevitably
+attendant on sudden good fortune such as hers, busied themselves with
+direct calumny and insidious misrepresentation. No statement so
+unfounded, so wildly improbable about her, but it obtained circulation
+and credit. Till the end of her life she remained the centre of a cloud
+of myths, many, to the present day, accepted as gospel. People insisted
+on identifying her with the heroines of her novels. Incidents, personal
+descriptions, nay, whole letters extracted from these novels will be
+found literally transcribed into alleged biographies of herself and her
+friends, as her own statement of matters of fact. Now, though the spirit
+of her life is strongly and faithfully represented by her fiction taken
+as a whole, those who would read in any special novel the literal record
+of any of the special events of her existence cannot be too much on
+their guard. Whatever the material under treatment, George Sand must
+retouch, embellish, transform, artist-fashion, as her genius shall
+dictate, till often little resemblance is left between the original and
+the production it has done no more than suggest. Romance and reality are
+so fused together in these apparent outpourings of spirit that her
+nearest friends were at a loss how to separate them. As an actress into
+many a favorite part, so could she throw herself into her favorite
+characters; but seldom if ever will much warrant be found in actual fact
+for identifying these creations with their creatress.
+
+How, indeed, could so many-sided a nature as hers be truly represented
+in a single novel? Her rare physical and mental energies enabled her to
+combine a life of masculine intellectual activity with the more highly
+emotional life of a woman, and with vigilance in her maternal cares.
+Maurice was placed in the spring of 1833 at the College Henri IV., at
+Paris; thus she had now both son and daughter near her, and watched
+indefatigably over them, their childish illnesses and childish
+amusements, their moral and intellectual training absorbing a large
+share of her time and attention. Heine, a friendly visitor at her house,
+says:--
+
+     I have often been present for hours whilst she gave her children a
+     lesson in French, and it is a pity that the whole of the French
+     Academy could not have been present too, as it is quite certain
+     that they might have derived great profit from it.
+
+Not all the distractions of fame and work, of passionate pleasure or
+passionate sorrow, ever relaxed her active solicitude for the present
+and future welfare of her two young children. "They give me the only
+real joys of my life," she repeats again and again.
+
+_Lélia_, begun immediately after _Valentine_ was published in the spring
+of 1833, and created an immense sensation. Hailed by her admirers as a
+sign of an accession of power, of power exerted in quite a new
+direction, it brought down on the writer's head a storm of hostile
+criticism, as a declared enemy of religion and domestic
+morality--enhancing her celebrity not a little.
+
+_Lélia_, a lyrical novel--an outburst of poetical philosophy in prose,
+stands alone among the numerous productions of George Sand. Here she
+takes every sort of poetical license, in a work without the restrictions
+of poetic form, which are the true conditions of so much latitude.
+"Manfred" and "Alastor" are fables not further removed from real life
+than is _Lélia_. The personages are like allegorical figures, emblematic
+of spiritual qualities on a grand scale, the scenes like the
+paradisiacal gardens that visited the fancy of Aurore Dupin when a
+child. There is no action. The interest is not in the characters and
+what they do, but in what they say. The declamatory style, then so
+popular, is one the taste for which has so completely waned that _Lélia_
+will find comparatively few readers in the present day, fewer who will
+not find its perusal wearisome, none perhaps whose morality, however
+weak, will be seriously shaken by utterances ever and anon hovering on
+the perilous confines of the sublime and the ludicrous.
+
+_Lélia_, a female Faust or Manfred, a mysterious muse-like heroine, who
+one night sleeps on the heathery mountain-side, the next displays the
+splendor of a queen in palaces and fairy-like villas; her sorely tried
+and hapless lover, Sténio, the poet, who pours forth odes to his own
+accompaniment on the harp, and lingers the night long among Alpine
+precipices brooding over the abyss; Trenmor, the returned gentleman
+convict and Apostle of the Carbonari, whose soul has been refreshed,
+made young and regenerated at the galleys; and the mad Irish priest,
+Magnus, are impossible personages, inviting to easy ridicule, and
+neither wisdom nor folly from their lips is likely to beguile the ears
+of the present generation.
+
+It is no novel, but a poetical essay, fantastically conceived and
+executed with the _sans gêne_ of an improvisatore. For those who admire
+the genius of George Sand its interest as a psychological revelation
+remains unabated. Into _Lélia_, she owns, she put more of her real self
+than into any other of her books--of herself, that is, and her state of
+mind at the dawn of a period of moral disturbance and revolt. All must
+continue to recognize there an extraordinary exhibition of poetical
+power and musical style. As a work of art George Sand has herself
+pronounced it absurd, yet she always cherished for it a special
+predilection, and, as will be seen, took the trouble to rewrite it some
+years later, when in a happier and healthier frame of mind than that
+which inspired this unique and most characteristic composition.
+
+The note of despair struck in _Lélia_, the depth of bitter feeling, the
+capacity for mental and moral speculation and suffering it seemed to
+disclose, astounded many of her familiar acquaintance. "_Lélia_ is a
+fancy-type," so writes to the author her friend and neighbor in Berry,
+Jules Néraud, an ardent naturalist, whose botanical and entomological
+pursuits she had often shared: "it is not like you--you who are merry,
+dance the _bourrée_, appreciate lepidoptera, do not despise puns, who
+are not a bad needlewoman, and make very good preserves. Is it possible
+you should have thought so much, felt so much, without anyone having any
+idea of it?"
+
+_Lélia_ was certainly the expression of a new phase in her mind's
+history, a moral crisis she could not escape, which was all the more
+severe for her having, as she remarks, reached her thirtieth year
+without having opened her eyes to the realities of life. Till the time
+of her coming to Paris, for very dearth of outward impressions, she had
+lived chiefly in dreams, the life of all others most favorable to the
+prolongation of ignorance and credulity. The liberty and activity she
+had enjoyed for the last two years were fatal to Utopian theories.
+
+It was not only the bitterness that springs from disenchantment in
+individuals, the sense of the miserable insufficiency of human love to
+satisfy her spiritual aspirations producing "that widely concluding
+unbelief which," as her sister in greatness has said, "we call knowledge
+of the world, but which is really disappointment in you and in me."
+George Sand was one to whom scepticism was intolerable. Pessimistic
+doctrines were fatal to her mind's equilibrium, and private experience
+and outward intellectual influences were driving her to distrust all
+objects of her previous worship, human and divine. The moment was one
+when the most fundamental social and religious principles were being
+called in question.
+
+"Nothing in my old beliefs," she writes, "was sufficiently formulated in
+me, from a social point of view, to help me to struggle against this
+cataclysm; and in the religious and socialistic theories of the moment I
+did not find light enough to contend with the darkness." The poet's
+creed, with which her mind had hitherto rested satisfied, was shaken,
+and appeared to prove a false one. She was staggered by the infinity of
+evil, misery, and injustice, which dwellers in great cities are not
+allowed to forget, the problem of humanity, the eternal mystery of
+suffering and wrong predominant in a world on the beneficence of whose
+Supreme Power all her faiths were founded.
+
+Her mental revolt and suffering found vent in _Lélia_, which it was an
+immense relief to her to write. Characteristic as an exhibition of
+feeling and of mastery of language, it is not in the least typical of
+her fiction. Yet, but for _Lélia_, and its successor _Jacques_, it is
+impossible to point to a work of hers that would ever have lastingly
+stamped her, in the public mind, as an expounder of dangerous theories.
+In _Lélia_, however, which is strongly imbued with Byronic coloring, she
+had chosen to pose somewhat as the proud angel in rebellion; and the
+immediate effect of hostile criticism was to confirm her in the position
+taken up. Neither _Lélia_ nor _Jacques_ combined the elements of lasting
+popularity with those of instant success; but they roused a stir and
+strife which created an impression of her as a writer systematically
+inimical to religion and marriage--an impression almost ludicrously at
+variance with facts, taking her fiction as a whole, but which has only
+recently begun to give way, in this country, to a juster estimate of its
+tendencies.
+
+The morality of _Lélia_, which it is rather difficult to discuss
+seriously in the present day, both the personages and their environment
+being too preternatural for any direct application to be drawn from
+them, as reflecting modern society, found indiscreet champions as
+determined as its aggressors. Violently denounced by M. Capo de
+Feuillide, of the _Europe littéraire_, it was warmly defended by M.
+Gustave Planche, in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. The war of words grew
+so hot between them that a challenge and encounter were the
+result--surely unique in the annals of duelling. The swords of the
+critics fortunately proved more harmless than their words.
+
+From the morbid depression that had tormented her mind and imagination,
+and has its literary memorial in _Lélia_, she was to find a timely,
+though but a temporary rescue, in the charm of a new acquaintance--the
+delighting society of a poetic mind of an order not inferior to her own.
+
+It was in August, 1833, at a dinner given by Buloz to the staff of the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, that George Sand first made the personal
+acquaintance of Alfred de Musset, then in his twenty-third year, and
+already famous through his just published poem, _Rolla_, and his earlier
+dramas, _Andrea del Sarto_ and _Les Caprices de Marianne_. He rapidly
+became enamored of the author of _Lélia_, who for her part felt
+powerfully the attraction of his many admirable qualities, mutual
+enchantment leading them so far as to believe they could be the hero and
+heroine of a happy love tale. In a letter of September 21, addressed to
+her friend and correspondent Sainte-Beuve, whom she had made the
+confidant of her previous depression and strange moods of gloom, she
+writes of herself as lifted out of such dangers by a happiness beyond
+any she had imagined, restoring youth to her heart--the happiness
+accorded her by the poet's society and his preference for her own. De
+Musset, at this time, would have given the world to have been able to
+make her his wife.
+
+The story of their short-lived infatuation and of the swift-following
+mutual disenchantment,--a story which, says Sainte-Beuve, has become
+part of the romance of the nineteenth century,--is perhaps of less
+consequence here than in the life of De Musset,[A] in whom the
+over-sensitiveness of genius was not allied with the extraordinary
+healthy vitality which enabled George Sand to come out of the most
+terrible mental experiences unembittered, with the balance of her mind
+unshaken, and her powers unimpaired. Yet that he acquired an empire over
+her no other ever acquired there is much to indicate. It took her from
+France for a while, from her children, her friends--and the breaking of
+the spell set her at war, not only with him, but for a while with
+herself, with life, and her fellow creatures.
+
+In the last days of 1833, she and the author of _Rolla_ started on a
+journey to Italy, where George Sand spent six months, and where she has
+laid the scene of a number of her novels: the first and best part of
+_Consuelo_, _La Dernière Aldini_, _Leone_, _Leoni_, _La Daniella_, and
+others. The spirit of that land she has caught and reproduced perhaps
+more successfully than any other of the many novelists who have chosen
+it for a frame--of Italy as the artist's native country, that is--not
+the Italy of political history, nor of the Medici, but the Italy that is
+the second home of painters, poets, and musicians. Can anything be more
+enjoyable, and at the same time more vividly true, than George Sand's
+delineations of Venice; and, in the first of the _Lettres d'un
+Voyageur_, the pictures given of her wanderings on the shores of the
+Brenta, of Bassano, the Brenta valley, Oliero, Possagno, Asolo, a
+delicious land, till quite recently as little tourist-trodden as in
+1834? What a contrast to the purely imaginary descriptions in _Lélia_,
+written before those beauties had appeared to her except in dreams!
+
+From Genoa the travellers journeyed to Pisa, Florence, and thence to
+Venice, where first George Sand felt herself really at home in Italy.
+The architecture, the simplicity of Venetian life and manners, the
+theatres--from the opera-houses, where Pasta and Donzelli were singing,
+down to the national drama of Pulchinello--the pictures, the sea, the
+climate, combined to make of it a place of residence so perfectly to her
+mind, that again and again in her letters she expresses her wish that
+she could bring over her children and there fix her abode.
+
+"It is the only town I can love for its own sake," she says of it.
+"Other cities are like prisons, which you put up with for the sake of
+your fellow-prisoners." This Italian journey marks a fresh stage in her
+artistic development, quite apart from the attendant romantic
+circumstances, the alleged disastrous consequences to a child of genius
+less wise and fortunate than herself, which has given an otherwise
+disproportionate notoriety to this brief episode.
+
+George Sand was no doubt fatally in error when she persuaded herself,
+and even succeeded in persuading the poet's anxious mother, that she had
+it in her to be his guardian angel, and reform him miraculously in a
+short space of time; and that because he had fallen in love with her she
+would know how to make him alter a way of life he had no abiding desire
+to abandon. Such a task demands a readiness not merely for
+self-sacrifice, but for self-suppression; and her individuality was far
+too pronounced to merge itself for long in ministering to another's. She
+never seems to have possessed the slightest moral ascendancy over him,
+beyond the power of wounding him very deeply by the change in her
+sentiments, however much he might feel himself to blame for it.
+
+The history of the separation of the lovers--of De Musset's illness,
+jealousy, and departure from Venice alone--is a thrice-told tale. Like
+the subject of "The Ring and the Book," it has been set forth, by
+various persons, variously interested, with correspondingly various
+coloring. The story, as told by George Sand in her later novel, _Elle et
+Lui_, is substantially the same as one related by De Musset in his
+_Confession d'un Enfant du Siècle_, published two years after these
+events, and in which, if it is to be regarded as reflecting personal
+idiosyncrasies in the slightest degree, the poet certainly makes himself
+out as the most insupportable of human companions. None the less did the
+publication of _Elle et Lui_, a quarter of a century later, provoke a
+savage retort from the deceased poet's brother, in _Lui et Elle_.
+Finally, in _Lui_, a third novelist, Madame Colet, presented the world
+with a separate version of the affair from one who imagined she could
+have made up to the poet for what he had lost.
+
+But it needs no deep study of human nature, or yet of these novels, to
+understand the impracticability of two such minds long remaining
+together in unity. Genius, in private life, is apt to be a torment--its
+foibles demanding infinite patience, forbearance, nay, affectionate
+blindness, in those who would minister to its happiness, and mitigate
+the worst results of those foibles themselves. Certainly George Sand,
+for a genius, was a wonderfully equable character; her "satanic" moods
+showed themselves chiefly in pen and ink; her nerves were very strong,
+the balance of her physical and mental organization was splendidly even,
+as one imagines Shakespeare's to have been. But the very vigor of her
+character, its force of self-assertion, unfitted her to be the
+complement to any but a very yielding nature. The direct influence a
+passive, merely receptive spirit would have accepted, and gratefully,
+was soon felt as an intolerable burden by a mind in many ways different
+from her own, but with the same imperious instinct of freedom, and as
+little capable of playing anvil to another mind for long. He rebelled
+against her ascendancy, but suffered from the spell. She was no Countess
+Guiccioli, content to adore and be adored, and exercise an indirect
+power for good on a capricious lover. Her logical mind, energetic and
+independent, grew impatient of the seeming inconsistencies of her gifted
+companion; and when at last she began to perceive in them the fatal
+conditions of those gifts themselves, only compassion survived in her,
+as she thought, and compassion was cold.
+
+How could De Musset, with such an excellent example of prudence, regular
+hours, good sense, calm self-possession, and ceaseless literary industry
+as hers before his eyes, not be stirred up to emulate such admirable
+qualities? But her reason made him unreasonable; the indefatigability of
+her pen irritated his nerves, and made him idle out of contradiction;
+her homilies provoked only fresh imprudences--as though he wanted to
+make proof of his independence whilst secretly feeling her dominion--a
+phenomenon with which highly nervous people will sympathize not a
+little, but which was perfectly inexplicable to George Sand.
+
+His genius was of a more delicate essence than hers; he has struck, at
+times, a deeper note. But his nature was frailer, his muse not so easily
+within call, his character as intolerant of restraint as her own, but
+less self-sufficing; and the morbid taint of thought then prevalent, and
+which her natural optimism and better balanced faculties enabled her to
+throw off very shortly, had entered into him ineffaceably. Whether or
+not she brought a fresh blight on his mind, she certaintly failed to
+cure it.
+
+The spring had hardly begun when De Musset was struck down by fever.
+George Sand, who had previously been very ill herself, nursed him
+through his attack with great devotion; and in six weeks' time he was
+restored to health, if not to happiness. Theirs was at an end, as they
+recognized, and agreed to part--"for a time, perhaps, or perhaps for
+ever," she wrote,--with their attachment broken but not destroyed.
+
+It was early in April that De Musset started on his homeward journey.
+George Sand saw him on his way as far as Vicenza, and ere returning to
+Venice, made a little excursion in the Alps, along the course of the
+Brenta. "I have walked as much as four-and-twenty miles a day," she
+writes to M. Boucoiran, "and found out that this sort of exercise is
+very good for me, both morally and physically. Tell Buloz I will write
+some letters for the _Revue_, upon my pedestrian tours. I came back into
+Venice with only seven centimes in my pocket, otherwise I should have
+gone as far as the Tyrol; but the want of baggage and money obliged me
+to return. In a few days I shall start again, and cross over the Alps by
+the gorges of the Piave."
+
+And the spring's delights on the Alpine borders of Lombardy are
+described by her _con amore_, in the promised letters:--
+
+     The country was not yet in its full splendor; the fields were of a
+     faint green, verging on yellow, and the leaves only coming into bud
+     on the trees. But here and there the almonds and peaches in flower
+     mixed their garlands of pink and white with the dark clumps of
+     cypress. Through the midst of this far-spreading garden the Brenta
+     flowed swiftly and silently over her sandy bed, between two large
+     banks of pebbles, and the rocky _débris_ which she tears out of the
+     heart of the Alps, and with which she furrows the plains in her
+     days of anger. A semi-circle of fertile hills, overspread with
+     those long festoons of twisting vine that suspend themselves from
+     all the trees in Venetia, made a near frame to the picture; and the
+     snowy mountain-heights, sparkling in the first rays of sunshine,
+     formed an immense second border, standing, as if cut out in silver,
+     against the solid blue of the sky.
+
+None of these excursions, however, were ever carried very far. For the
+next three months she remained almost entirely stationary at Venice, her
+head-quarters. She had taken apartments for herself in the interior of
+the city, in a little low-built house, along the narrow, green, and yet
+limpid canal, close to the Ponte dei Barcaroli. "There," she tells us,
+"alone all the afternoon, never going out except in the evening for a
+breath of air, working at night as well, to the song of the tame
+nightingales that people all Venetian balconies, I wrote _André_,
+_Jacques_, _Mattea_, and the first _Lettres d'un Voyageur_."
+
+None can read the latter and suppose that the suffering of the recent
+parting was all on one side. The poet continued to correspond with her,
+and the consciousness of the pain she had inflicted she was clearly not
+sufficiently indifferent herself to support. But neither De Musset nor
+any other in whom, through the "prism of enthusiasm," she may have seen
+awhile a hero of romance, was ever a primary influence on her life.
+These were two. Firstly, her children, who although at a distance were
+seldom absent from her thoughts. Of their well-being at school and at
+home respectively, she was careful to keep herself informed, down to the
+minutest particulars, by correspondents in Paris and at Nohant, whence
+no opposition whatever was raised by its occupier to her prolonged
+absence abroad. Secondly, her art-vocation. She wrote incessantly; and
+independently of the pecuniary obligations to do so which she put
+forward, it is obvious that she had become wedded to this habit of work.
+"The habit has become a faculty--the faculty a need. I have thus come to
+working for thirteen hours at a time without making myself ill; seven
+or eight a day on an average, be the task done better or worse," she
+writes to M. Chatiron, from Venice, in March. Sometimes, as with _Leone
+Leoni_, she would complete a novel in a week; a few weeks later it was
+in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. Such haste she afterward deprecated,
+and, like all other workers, she aspired to a year's holiday in which to
+devote herself to the study of the masterpieces of modern literature;
+but the convenient season for such suspension of her own productive
+activity never came. And whilst at Venice she found herself literally in
+want of money to leave it. Buloz had arranged with her that she should
+contribute thirty-two pages every six weeks to his periodical for a
+yearly stipend of £160. She had anticipated her salary for the expenses
+of her Italian journey, and must acquit herself of the arrears due
+before she could take wing.
+
+_Jacques_, the longest of the novels written at Venice, afforded fresh
+grounds to those who taxed her works with hostility to social
+institutions. Without entering into the vexed question of the right of
+the artist in search of variety to exercise his power on any theme that
+may invite to its display, and of the precise bearing of ethical rules
+on works of imagination, it is permissible to doubt that _Jacques_,
+however bitter the sentiments of the author at that time regarding the
+marriage tie, ever seriously disturbed the felicity of any domestic
+household in the past or present day. It is too lengthy and too
+melancholy to attract modern readers, who care little to revel in the
+luxuries of woe, so relished by those of a former age. We cannot do
+better than quote the judgment pronounced by Madame Sand herself, thirty
+years later, on this work of pure sentimentalism--generated by an epoch
+thrown into commotion by the passionate views of romanticism--the epoch
+of René, Lara, Childe Harold, Werther, types of desperate men; life
+weary, but by no means weary of talking. "_Jacques_," she observes,
+"belonged to this large family of disillusioned thinkers; they had their
+_raison d'être_, historical and social. He comes on the scene in the
+novel, already worn by deceptions; he thought to revive through his
+love, and he does not revive. Marriage was for him only the drop of
+bitterness that made the cup overflow. He killed himself to bequeath to
+others the happiness for which he cared not, and in which he believed
+not."
+
+_Jacques_, taken as a _plaidoyer_ against domestic institutions,
+singularly misses its aim. As critics have remarked, some of the most
+eloquent pages are those that treat of married bliss. Our sympathies
+are entirely with the wronged husband against his silly little wife. It
+is a kindred work to _Lélia_, and its faults are the same; but whilst
+dealing ostensibly with real life and possible human beings it cannot,
+like _Lélia_, be placed apart, and retain interest as a literary
+curiosity.
+
+_André_ is a very different piece of work and a little masterpiece of
+its kind. The author, in her preface, tells us how, whilst mechanically
+listening to the incessant chatter of the Venetian sempstresses in the
+next room to her own, she was struck by the resemblance between the mode
+of life and thought their talk betrayed, and that of the same class of
+girls at La Châtre; and how in the midst of Venice, to the sound of the
+rippling waters stirred by the gondolier's oar, of guitar and serenade,
+and within sight of the marble palaces, her thoughts flew back to the
+dark and dirty streets, the dilapidated houses, the wretched moss-grown
+roofs, the shrill concerts of the cocks, cats, and children of the
+little French provincial town. She dreamt also of the lovely meadows,
+the scented hay, the little running streams, and the floral researches
+she had been fond of. This tenacity of her instincts was a safeguard she
+may have sometimes rebelled against as a chain; it was with her an
+essential feature, and, despite all vagaries, gave a great unity to her
+life.
+
+"Venice," she writes to M. Chatiron in June, "with her marble staircases
+and her wonderful climate, does not make me forget anything that has
+been dear to me. Be sure that nothing in me dies. My life has its
+agitations; destiny pushes me different ways, but my heart does not
+repudiate the past. Old memories have a power none can ignore, and
+myself less than another. I love on the contrary to recall them, and we
+shall soon find ourselves together again in the old nest at Nohant."
+_André_ she considered the outcome of this feeling of nostalgia. In it
+she has put together the vulgar elements of inferior society in a
+common-place country town, and produced a poem, though one of the
+saddest. If the florist heroine, Genevieve, is a slightly idealized
+figure, the story and general character-treatment are realistic to a
+painful degree. There is more power of simple pathos shown here than is
+common in the works of George Sand. _André_ is a refreshing contrast, in
+its simplicity and brevity, to the inflation of _Lélia_ and _Jacques_.
+It was an initial essay, and a model one, in a style with better claims
+to enduring popularity.
+
+As the summer advanced, George Sand found herself free to depart, and
+started on her way back to France, famishing, as she tells us, for the
+sight of her children. Her grand anxiety was to reach her destination
+in time for the breaking-up day and distribution of prizes at the
+College Henri IV. "I shall be at Paris before then," she writes from
+Milan, to her son, "if I die on the way, and really the heat is such
+that one might die of it." From Milan she journeyed over the Simplon to
+the Rhone valley, Martigny, Chamounix, and Geneva, performing great part
+of the way on foot. She reached Paris in the middle of August, and a few
+days later started with her boy for Nohant, where Solange had spent the
+time during her mother's absence, and where they remained together for
+the holidays. Here too she was in the midst of a numerous circle of
+friends of both sexes, in whose staunch friendliness she found a solace
+of which she stood in real need.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+MENTAL DEVELOPMENT.
+
+
+The period immediately following George Sand's return from Italy in
+August 1834, was a time of transition, both in her outer and inner life.
+If undistinguished by the production of any novel calculated to create a
+fresh sensation, it shows no abatement of literary activity. This, as we
+have seen, had become to her a necessity of nature. Neither vicissitudes
+without nor commotions within, though they might direct or stimulate,
+seem to have acted as a check on the flow of her pen.
+
+During the first twelvemonth she continued to reside alternately at
+Nohant, whither she came with her son and daughter for their
+holidays--Solange being now placed in a children's school kept by some
+English ladies at Paris,--and her "poet's garret," as she styled her
+third floor _appartement_ on the Quai Malplaquet.
+
+This winter saw the ending for herself and De Musset of their hapless
+romance. An approach to complete reconciliation--for the existing
+partial estrangement had been discovered to be more unbearable than all
+besides--led to stormy scenes and violent discord, and resulted before
+very long in mutual avoidance, which was to be final. It is said that
+forgiveness is the property of the injured, and it should be remembered
+that whenever De Musset's name is mentioned by George Sand it is with
+the admiring respect of one to whom his genius made that name sacred,
+and who refused to the end of his life to use the easy weapon offered
+her by his notorious frailties for vindicating herself at his expense.
+And, however pernicious the much talked of effect on De Musset's mind,
+it is but fair to the poet to recollect that it is no less true of him
+than of George Sand that his best work, that with which his fame has
+come chiefly to associate itself, was accomplished after this painful
+experience.
+
+Into her own mental state--possibly at this time the least enviable of
+the two--we get some glimpses in the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_ of the
+autumn 1834, and winter 1834-35. Here, again, we should be content with
+gathering a general impression, and not ingenuously read literal facts
+in all the self-accusations and recorded experiences of the
+"_voyageur_"--a semi-fictitious personage whose improvisations were,
+after all, only a fresh exercise which George Sand had invented for her
+imagination taking herself and reality for a starting-point merely, a
+suggestive theme.
+
+But the despair and disgust of life, to which both these and her private
+letters give such uncompromising and eloquent expression, indubitably
+reflect her feelings at this moral crisis--the feelings of one who
+having openly braved the laws of society, to become henceforward a law
+unto herself, recognizes that she has only found her way to fresh
+sources of misery. Never yet had she had such grave and deep causes of
+individual mental torment to blacken her views of existence, and incline
+her to abhor it as a curse. "Your instinct will save you, bring you back
+to your children," wrote a friend who knew her well. But her maternal
+love and solicitude themselves were becoming a source of added distress
+and apprehension.
+
+The extraordinary arrangement she and M. Dudevant had entered into four
+years before with regard to each other, was clearly one impossible to
+last. It will be recollected that she at that time had relinquished her
+patrimony to those who had thought it no dishonor to continue to enjoy
+it; and the terms of that agreement had since been nominally
+undisturbed. But besides that, the control of the children remained a
+constant subject of dissension. M. Dudevant was beginning to get into
+pecuniary difficulties in the management of his wife's estate. Sometimes
+he contemplated resigning it to her, and retiring to Gascony, to live
+with his widowed stepmother on the property which at her death would
+revert to him. But unfortunately he could not make up his mind to this
+course. No sooner had he drawn up an agreement consenting to a division
+of property, than he seemed to regret the sacrifice; upon which she
+ceased to press it.
+
+Meantime Madame Dudevant, whose position at Nohant was that of a visitor
+merely, and becoming untenable, felt her hold on her cherished home and
+her children becoming more precarious day by day.
+
+Some of her friends had strongly advised her to travel for a length of
+time, both as offering a mortal remedy, and as a temporary escape from
+the practical perplexities of the moment. Her rescue, however, was to be
+otherwise effected, and a number of new intellectual interests that
+sprang up for her at this time all tended to retain her in her own
+country.
+
+It was in the course of this spring that she made the acquaintance of M.
+de Lamennais, introduced to her by their common friend, the composer,
+Franz Liszt. The famous author of the _Paroles d'un Croyant_ had
+virtually severed himself from the Church of Rome by his recent
+publication of this little volume, pronounced by the Pope, "small in
+size, immense in perversity!" The eloquence of the poet-priest, and the
+doctrines of the anti-Catholic and humanitarian Christianity of which he
+came forward as the expounder, could not fail powerfully to impress her
+intelligence. Here seemed the harbor of refuge her half-wrecked faiths
+were seeking, and what the abbé's antagonists denounced as the
+"diabolical gospel of social science," came to her as the teachings of
+an angel of light. Christianity as preached by him was a sort of
+realization of the ideal religion of Aurore Dupin--faith divorced from
+superstition and the doctrine of Romish infallibility. Complete identity
+of sentiments between herself and the abbé was out of the question. But
+his was the right mind coming to her mind at the right moment, and
+exercised a healing influence over her troubled spirits. For _Le Monde_,
+a journal founded by him shortly after this time, she wrote the _Lettres
+à Marcie_, an unfinished series, treating of moral and spiritual
+problems and trials. Finally, the position M. de Lamennais had taken up
+as the apostle of the people further enlisted her sympathies in his
+cause, which made religious one with social reform, and amalgamated the
+protest against moral enslavement with the liberation-schemes then
+fermenting in young and generous minds all over Europe.
+
+The belief in the possibility of their speedy realization was then
+wide-spread--a conviction that, as Heine puts it, some grand recipe for
+freedom and equality, invented, well drawn up, and inserted in the
+_Moniteur_, was all that was needed to secure those benefits for the
+world at large. If George Sand, led afterwards into searching for this
+empirical remedy for the wrongs and sufferings of the masses, believed
+the elixir to have been found in the establishment of popular
+sovereignty by universal suffrage, it was through the persuasive
+arguments of the leaders of the movement, with whom at this period she
+was first brought into personal relations. Her own unbiassed judgment,
+to which she reverted long years after, when she had seen these
+illusions perish sadly, was less sanguine in its prognostications for
+the immediate future, as appears in her own reflections in a letter of
+this time:--
+
+     What I see in the midst of the divergencies of all these reforming
+     sects is a waste of generous sentiments and of noble thoughts, a
+     tendency towards social amelioration, but an impossibility for the
+     time to bring forth through the want of a head to that great body
+     with a hundred hands, that tears itself to pieces, for not knowing
+     what to attack. So far the struggles make only dust and noise. We
+     have not yet come to the era that will construct new societies, and
+     people them with perfected men.
+
+She had recently been introduced to a political and legal celebrity of
+his day, the famous advocate Michel, of Bourges. He was then at the
+height of his reputation, which, won by his eloquent and successful
+defense of political prisoners on various occasions, was considerable.
+Madame Sand had been advised to consult him professionally about her
+business affairs, and for this purpose went over one day with some of
+her Berrichon friends to see him at Bourges. But the man of law had, it
+appears, been reading _Lélia_, and instead of talking of business with
+his distinguished client, dashed at once into politics, philosophy, and
+social science, overpowering his listeners with the strength of his
+oratory. His sentiments were those of extreme radicalism, and he carried
+on a little private propaganda in the country around. The force of his
+character seems to have spent itself in oratorical effort. He could
+preach revolution, but not suggest reform; denounce existing abuses, but
+do nothing towards the remodelling of social institutions; and in after
+years he failed, as so many leading men in his profession have failed,
+to make any impression as a speaker in Parliament. The author of
+_Lélia_ was overwhelmed, if not all at once converted, by the tremendous
+rhetorical power of this singular man. She was a proselyte worth the
+trouble of making, and Michel was bent on drawing her more closely into
+active politics, with which hitherto she had occupied herself very
+little. He began a correspondence, writing her long epistles, the sum of
+which, she says, may thus be resumed:--"Your scepticism springs from
+personal unhappiness. Love is selfish. Extend this solicitude for a
+single individual to the whole human race." He certainly succeeded in
+inspiring her with a strong desire to share his passion for politics,
+his faith, his revivifying hopes of a speedy social renovation, his
+ambition to be one of its apostles. To Michel, under the sobriquet of
+"Everard," are addressed several of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_ of the
+spring and summer of 1835, letters which she defines as "a rapid
+analysis of a rapid conversion."
+
+But Michel's work was a work of demolition only; and when his earnest
+disciple wanted new theories in place of the old forms so ruthlessly
+destroyed, he had none to offer. There were others, however, who could.
+She was soon to be put into communication with a number of the active
+workers for the republican cause throughout the country. They counted
+many of the best hearts and not the worst heads in France, and were
+naturally eager to enlist her energies on their side.
+
+Foremost, by right of the influence exercised over her awhile by his
+writings, was the philosopher Pierre Leroux, with whom her acquaintance
+dates from this same year. In spite of the wide divergence between her
+pre-eminently artistic spirit and a mind of the rougher stamp of this
+born iconoclast, he was to indoctrinate her with many new opinions. His
+disinterested character won her admiration; he was a practical
+philanthropist as well as a critical thinker, one whose life and
+fighting power were devoted to promoting the good of the working classes
+to whom he belonged, having been brought up as a printer. He was
+regarded as the apostle of communism, as then understood, or rather not
+understood--for the form under which it suggested itself to the social
+reformers of the period in question was entirely indefinite.
+
+Meantime the novelist's pen was far from idle. One or two pleasant
+glimpses she has given us into her manner of working belong to this
+year. In the summer the heat in her "poet's garret" becoming
+intolerable, she took refuge in a congenial solitude offered by the
+ground-floor apartments of the house, then in course of reconstruction,
+dismantled and untenanted. The works had been temporarily suspended,
+and Madame Sand took possession of the field abandoned by the builders
+and carpenters. The windows and doors opening into the garden had been
+taken away, and the place thus turned into an airy, cool retreat. Out of
+the apparatus of the workmen, left behind, she constructed her
+writing-establishment, and here, secure from interruption, denying
+herself to all visitors, never going out except to visit her children at
+their respective schools, she completed her novel with no companions but
+the spiders crawling over the planks, the mice running in and out of the
+corners, and the blackbirds hopping in from the garden; the deep sense
+of solitude enhanced by the roar of the city in the very heart of which
+she had thus voluntarily isolated herself.
+
+As an artistic experience she found it refreshing, and repeated it more
+than once. Soon after, a friend offered her the loan of an empty house
+at Bourges, a town that had been suggested to her as a desirable place
+of residence, should the circumstances at Nohant ever force her to
+abandon it entirely. As a home she saw and disapproved of Bourges, but
+she thoroughly enjoyed a brief retreat spent there in an absolutely
+deserted, vine-covered dwelling, standing in a garden enclosed by stone
+walls. Her meals were handed in through a wicket. A few friends came to
+see her in the evenings. The days, and often the nights, she passed in
+study and meditation, shut up in the library reading Lavater,
+expatiating on her impressions of his theories in a letter addressed to
+Franz Liszt (inserted among the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_), or strolling
+in the flower garden--"forgotten," she tells us, "by the whole world,
+and plunged into oblivion of the actualities of my own existence."
+
+Of her numerous letters of advice to her boy at school, we quote one
+written during this summer of 1835, when their future relations to each
+other were in painful uncertainty:--
+
+     Work, be strong and proud; despise the little troubles supposed to
+     belong to your age. Reserve your strength of resistance for deeds
+     and facts that are worth the effort. If I am here no longer, think
+     of me who worked and suffered cheerfully. We are like each other in
+     mind and in countenance. I know already from this day what your
+     intellectual life will be. I fear for you many and deep sorrows. I
+     hope for you the purest of joys. Guard within yourself that
+     treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to
+     lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness. Know how to
+     replace in your heart, by the happiness of those you love, the
+     happiness that may be wanting to yourself. Keep the hope of another
+     life. It is there that mothers meet their sons again. Love all
+     God's creatures. Forgive those who are ill-conditioned, resist
+     those who are unjust, and devote yourself to those who are great
+     through their virtue. Love me. I will teach you many, many things
+     if we live together. If that blessing (the greatest that can befall
+     me, the only one that makes me wish for a long life) is not to be,
+     you must pray for me, and from the grave itself, if anything
+     remains of me in the universe, the spirit of your mother will watch
+     over you.
+
+In the autumn, 1835, Madame Dudevant, under legal advice, and supported
+by the approval of friends of both parties, determined to apply to the
+courts for a judicial separation from her husband, on the plea of
+ill-treatment. She had sufficient grounds to allege for her claim, and
+had then every reason to hope that her demand would not even be
+contested by M. Dudevant, who, on former occasions, had voluntarily
+signed but afterwards revoked the agreement she hereby only desired to
+make valid and permanent, and which, ensuring to him a certain
+proportion of her income, gave her Nohant for a place of habitation, and
+established the children under her care.
+
+Pending the issue of this suit, which, unexpectedly protracted, dragged
+on until the summer of the next year, she availed herself of the
+hospitality of a family at La Châtre, friends of old standing, and from
+under whose roof she awaited, as from a neutral ground, the decision of
+her judges. During this year she saw little of Paris, and less of
+Nohant, except for a brief visit which, profiting by a moment when its
+walls were absolutely deserted by every other human being, she paid to
+her house--not knowing then whether she would ever, so to speak, inhabit
+it again in her own right.
+
+On the result of the legal proceedings depended her future home and the
+best part of her happiness. Sooner than be parted from her children, she
+contemplated the idea, in case of the decision going against her, of
+escaping with them to America! Yet, in the midst of all this suspense,
+we find her industrious as ever, joining in the daytime in the family
+life of the household with which she was domesticated, helping to amuse
+the children among them, retiring to her room at ten at night, to work
+on at her desk till seven in the morning, according to her wont. A more
+cheerful tone begins to pervade her effusions. The clouds were slowly
+breaking on all sides at once, and a variety of circumstances combining
+to restore to her mind its natural tone--faith, hope, and charity to her
+heart, and harmony to her existence. She began to perceive what she was
+enabled afterwards more fully to acknowledge as follows:--
+
+     As to my religion, the ground of it has never varied. The forms of
+     the past have vanished, for me as for my century, before the light
+     of study and reflection. But the eternal doctrine of believers, of
+     God and His goodness, the immortal soul and the hopes of another
+     life, this is what, in myself, has been proof against all
+     examination, all discussion, and even intervals of despairing
+     doubt.
+
+It is significant that during these months, spent for the most part at
+La Châtre, we find her rewriting _Lélia_, trying, as she expressed her
+intention, "to transform this work of anger into a work of gentleness."
+_Engelwald_, a novel of some length on which she was engaged, was
+destined never to see the light.
+
+To the Comtesse d'Agoult, better known by her _nom de plume_ of Daniel
+Stern, whose acquaintance she had recently made in Paris, she writes in
+May, 1836:--
+
+     I am still at La Châtre, staying with my friends, who spoil me like
+     a child of five years old. I inhabit a suburb, built in terraces
+     against the rock. At my feet lies a wonderfully pretty valley. A
+     garden thirty feet square and full of roses, and a terrace
+     extensive enough for you to walk along it in ten steps, are my
+     drawing-room, my study, and gallery. My bed-room is rather
+     large--it is decorated with a red cotton curtained bed--a real
+     peasant's bed, hard and flat, two straw chairs, and a white wooden
+     table. My window is situated six feet above the terrace. By the
+     trellised trees on the wall I can get out and in, and stroll at
+     night among my thirty feet of flowers without having to open a door
+     or wake anyone.
+
+     Sometimes I go out riding alone, at dusk. I come in towards
+     midnight. My cloak, my rough hat, and the melancholy trot of my
+     nag, make me pass in the darkness for a commercial traveller, or a
+     farm-boy.
+
+     One of my grand amusements is to watch the transition from night to
+     day; it effects itself in a thousand different manners. This
+     revolution, apparently so uniform, has every day a character of its
+     own.
+
+The summer that had set in was unusually hot and sultry. Writing to
+Madame d'Agoult, July 10, 1836, she thus describes her enjoyment of a
+season that allowed of some of the pleasures of primitive existence:--
+
+     I start on foot at three in the morning, fully intending to be back
+     by eight o'clock; but I lose myself in the lanes; I forget myself
+     on the banks of the river; I run after butterflies; and I get home
+     at midday in a state of torrefaction impossible to describe.
+
+Another time the sight of the cooling stream is more than she can
+resist, and she walks into the Indre fully dressed; but a few minutes
+more and the sun has dried her garments, and she proceeds on her walk of
+ten or twelve miles--"Never a cockchafer passes but I run after it."
+
+     You have no idea of all the dreams I dream during my walks in the
+     sun. I fancy myself in the golden days of Greece. In this happy
+     country where I live you may often go for six miles without meeting
+     a human creature. The flocks are left by themselves in pastures
+     well enclosed by fine hedges; so the illusion can last for some
+     time. One of my chief amusements when I have got out to some
+     distance, where I don't know the paths, is to fancy I am wandering
+     over some other country with which I discover some resemblance. I
+     recollect having strolled in the Alps, and fancied myself for hours
+     in America. Now I picture to myself an Arcadia in Berry. Not a
+     meadow, not a cluster of trees which, under so fine a sun, does not
+     appear to me quite Arcadian.
+
+We give these passages because they seem to us very forcibly to portray
+one side, and that the strongest and most permanent, of the character of
+George Sand: the admixture of a child's simplicity of tastes, a poet's
+fondness for reverie, and that instinctive independence of habits--an
+instinct stronger than the restraints of custom--which her individuality
+seemed to demand.
+
+In the letter last quoted to Madame d'Agoult, the new ideal which was
+arising out of these contemplations is thus resumed:--
+
+     To throw yourself into the lap of mother nature: to take her really
+     for mother and sister; stoically and religiously to cut off from
+     your life what is mere gratified vanity; obstinately to resist the
+     proud and the wicked; to make yourself humble with the unfortunate,
+     to weep with the misery of the poor; nor desire another consolation
+     than the putting down of the rich; to acknowledge no other God than
+     Him who ordains justice and equality upon men; to venerate what is
+     good, to judge severely what is only strong, to live on very
+     little, to give away nearly all, in order to re-establish primitive
+     equality and bring back to life again the Divine institution: that
+     is the religion I shall proclaim in a little corner of my own, and
+     that I aspire to preach to my twelve apostles under the lime-trees
+     in my garden.
+
+The judgment of the court, first pronounced in February, 1836, and given
+in her favor by default, no opposition having been raised to her claims
+to the proposed partition of property by the defendant, placed her in
+legal possession of her house and her children. Appeal was made,
+however, prolonging and complicating the case, but without affecting its
+termination. In the war of mutual accusations thus stirred up, M.
+Dudevant's _rôle_ as accuser, yet objecting in the same breath to the
+separation, had an appearance of insincerity that could not fail to
+withdraw sympathy from his side, irrespective of any judgment that might
+be held on the conduct of the wife, whose absence and complete
+independence he had authorized or acquiesced in. Before the actual
+conclusion of the law-suit his appeal was withdrawn. As a result, the
+previous judgment in favor of Madame Dudevant was virtually confirmed,
+and the details were settled by private agreement.
+
+It is almost impossible to overrate the importance to George Sand of a
+conclusion that gave her back her old home of Nohant, and secured to her
+the permanent companionship of her children. The present pecuniary
+arrangement left M. Dudevant some hold over Maurice and his education,
+concerning which his parents had long disagreed, and which for another
+year remained a source of contention.
+
+The affair thus concluded, Madame Sand entered formally into possession
+of Nohant; and early in September she started with her two children for
+Switzerland, where they spent the autumn holidays in a long-contemplated
+visit to her friend the Comtesse d'Agoult, then at Geneva. This tour is
+fancifully sketched in a closing number of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_,
+a volume which stands as a sort of literary memorial of two years of
+unsettled, precarious existence, material and spiritual--a time of trial
+now happily at an end.
+
+_Simon_, a tale dedicated to Madame d'Agoult, and published in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1836--a graceful story, of no high
+pretentions--is noticeable as marking the commencement of a decided and
+agreeable change in the tone of George Sand's fiction. Hitherto the
+predominant note struck had been most often one of melancholy, if not
+despair--the more hopelessly painful the subject, the more fervent,
+apparently, the inspiration to the writer. In _Indiana_ she had
+portrayed the double victim of tyranny and treachery; in _Valentine_, a
+helpless girl sacrificed to family ambition and social prejudice; in
+_Lélia_ and _Jacques_, the incurable _Weltschmerz_, heroism unvalued and
+wasted; in _Leone Leoni_, the infatuation of a weak-minded woman for a
+phenomenal scoundrel; in _André_, the wretchedness which a timid,
+selfish character, however amiable, may bring down on itself and on all
+connected with it. Henceforward she prefers themes of a pleasanter
+nature. In _Simon_ she paints the triumph of true and patient love over
+social prejudice and strong opposition. In _Mauprat_,[B] written in
+1837, at Nohant, she exerts all the force of her imagination and
+language to bring before us vividly the gradual redemption of a noble
+but degraded nature, through the influence of an exclusive, passionate
+and indestructible affection. The natural optimism of her temperament,
+not her incidental misfortunes, began and continued to color her
+compositions.
+
+From Switzerland she returned for part of the winter to Paris. She had
+given up her "poet's garret," and occupied for a while a suite of rooms
+in the Hôtel de France, where resided also Madame d'Agoult. The _salon_
+of the latter was a favorite _rendezvous_ of cosmopolitan artistic
+celebrities, whose general _rendezvous_ just then was Paris. A very
+Pantheon must have been an intimate circle that included, among others,
+George Sand, Daniel Stern, Heine, the Polish poet Mickiewicz, Eugène
+Delacroix, Meyerbeer, Liszt, Hiller, and Frédéric Chopin.
+
+The delicate health of her son forced Madame Sand to leave with him
+shortly for Berry, where he soon became convalescent. Later in the
+season, some of the same party of friends that had met in Paris met
+again at Nohant. It was during this summer that George Sand wrote for
+her child the well-known little tale, _Les Maîtres Mosaïstes_, in which
+the adventures of the Venetian mosaic-workers are woven into so charming
+a picture. "I do not know why, but it is seldom that I have written
+anything with so much pleasure," she tells us. "It was in the country,
+in summer weather, as hot as the Italian climate I had lately left. I
+have never seen so many birds and flowers in my garden. Liszt was
+playing the piano on the ground floor, and the nightingales, intoxicated
+with music and sunshine, were singing madly in the lilac-trees around."
+
+The party was abruptly dispersed upon the intelligence that reached
+Madame Sand of her mother's sudden, and, as it proved, fatal illness.
+She hurried to Paris, and remained with Madame Maurice Dupin during her
+last days. The old fond affection between them, though fitful in its
+manifestations on the part of the mother, had never been impaired, and
+the breaking of this old link with the past was very deeply felt by
+Madame Sand.
+
+Before returning to Nohant, she spent a few weeks at Fontainebleau with
+her son, from whom she never liked to separate. They passed their days
+in exploring the forest, then larger and wilder than now, botanizing and
+butterfly-hunting. At night she sat up writing, when all was quiet in
+the inn. Just as, whilst at Venice, her fancy flew back to the scenes
+and characters of French provincial life, and _André_ was the result, so
+here, amid the forest landscapes of her own land, her imagination rushed
+off to Venice and the shores of the Brenta, and produced _La Dernière
+Aldini_.
+
+This constant industry, which had now become her habit of life, was more
+of a practical necessity than ever. Nohant, as already mentioned, barely
+repaid the owner the expenses of keeping it up. Madame Sand, who desired
+to be liberal besides, to travel occasionally, to gratify little
+artistic fancies as they arose, must look to her literary work to
+furnish the means.
+
+"Sometimes," she writes from Nohant, in October, 1837, to Madame
+d'Agoult, then in Italy, "I am tempted to realize my capital, and come
+and join you; but out there I should do no work, and the galley-slave is
+chained up. If Buloz lets him go for a walk it is on _parole_, and
+_parole_ is the cannon-ball the convict drags on his foot."
+
+Nor was it for herself only that she worked in future, but for her
+children, the whole responsibility of providing for both of whose
+education she was now about definitely to take on her own shoulders. The
+power of interference left to M. Dudevant by the recent legal decision
+had been exercised in a manner leading to fresh vexatious contention,
+and continual alarm on Madame Sand's part lest the boy should be taken
+by force from her side. These skirmishes included the actual abduction
+of Solange from Nohant by M. Dudevant during her mother's absence at
+Fontainebleau; a foolish and purposeless trick, by which nothing was to
+be gained, except annoyance and trouble to Madame Sand, whose right to
+the control of her daughter had never been contested. A final settlement
+entered into between the parties, in 1838, placed these matters
+henceforward on a footing of peace, fortunately permanent. By this
+agreement Madame Sand received back from M. Dudevant--who had lately
+succeeded to his father's estate--some house property that formed part
+of her patrimony, and paid down to him the sum of £2,000; he ceding to
+her the remnant of his paternal rights; she freeing him from all charges
+for Maurice's education, her authority over which, in future, was
+recognized as complete.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+SOLITUDE, SOCIETY AND SOCIALISM.
+
+
+The charge of both children now resting entirely in her hands, Madame
+Sand was enabled to fulfill her desire of permanently removing her boy,
+now fourteen years of age, from the college Henri IV. Not only was she
+opposed to the general _régime_ and educational system pursued in French
+public schools of this type, she felt persuaded of its special
+unsuitability to her son, whose tastes and temperament were artistic,
+like her own, and whose classical studies had been repeatedly
+interrupted by illness. His delicate health determined her to spend the
+winter of 1838-9 abroad with her family. Having heard the climate and
+scenery of Majorca highly praised, she selected the island for their
+resort; tempted herself by the prospect of a few months absolute quiet,
+where, with neither letters to answer, nor newspapers to read, she would
+enjoy some rare leisure, which she proposed to spend in studying history
+and teaching French to her children.
+
+Just at this time her friend and ardent admirer, Frédéric Chopin, was
+recovering from a chest attack, the first presage of the illness that
+caused his early death. The eminent pianist and composer had also been
+recommended to winter in the South, and greatly needed repose and change
+of air to recruit him from the fatigues of the Parisian season. It was
+arranged that the convalescent should make one of the expedition to
+Majorca. He joined Madame Sand and her children at Perpignan, and they
+embarked for Barcelona, whence the sea-voyage to the island was safely
+accomplished, the party reaching Palma, the capital, in magnificent
+November weather, and never suspecting how soon they would have cause to
+repent their choice of a retreat.
+
+But their practical information about the island proved lamentably
+insufficient. With the scenery, indeed, they were enraptured. "We
+found," says Madame Sand in her little volume, _Un Hiver à Majorque_,
+published the following year, "a green Switzerland under a Calabrian
+sky, with all the solemnity and stillness of the East." But though a
+painter's Elysium, Majorca was wanting in the commonest comforts of
+civilized life. Inns were non-existent, foreigners viewed and treated
+with suspicion. The party thought themselves fortunate in securing a
+villa some miles from Palma, furnished, though scantily. "The country,
+nature, trees, sky, sea, and mountains surpass all my dreams," she
+writes in the first days, "it is the promised land; and as we have
+succeeded in housing ourselves pretty well, we are delighted."
+
+The delight was of brief duration. That Madame Sand's manuscripts took a
+month to reach the editor of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_; that the piano
+ordered from Paris for Chopin took two months to get to Majorca, were
+the least among their troubles. A rainy season of exceptional severity
+set in, and the villa quickly became uninhabitable. It was not
+weatherproof. Chopin fell alarmingly ill. Good food and medical
+attendance were hardly to be procured for him; and finally, the villa
+proprietor, having heard that his tenant was suffering from
+consumption--an illness believed to be infectious by the Majorcans--gave
+the whole party notice to quit. The invalid improving somewhat, though
+still too weak to attempt the return journey to France, Madame Sand
+transported her ambulance, as she styled it, to some tolerable quarters
+she had already discovered in the deserted Carthusian monastery of
+Valdemosa--"a poetical name and a poetical abode," she writes; "an
+admirable landscape, grand and wild, with the sea at both ends of the
+horizon, formidable peaks around us, eagles pursuing their prey even
+down to the orange-trees in our garden, a cypress walk winding from the
+top of our mountain to the bottom of the gorge, torrents over-grown with
+myrtles, palm-trees below our feet, nothing could be more magnificent
+than this spot."
+
+Parts of the old monastic buildings were dilapidated; the rest were in
+good order, being frequented as a summer retreat by the inhabitants of
+Palma. Now, in December, the Chartreuse was entirely abandoned, except
+by a housekeeper, a sacristan and a lone monk, the last offshoot of the
+community--a kind of apothecary, whose stock-in-trade was limited to
+guimauve and dog-grass.
+
+The rooms into which the travellers moved had just been vacated by a
+Spanish family of political refugees departing for France. These
+lodgings were at least provided with doors, window-panes, and decent
+furniture; but the luxury of chimneys was unknown, and a stove, which
+had to be manufactured at an enormous price on purpose for the party, is
+described as "a sort of iron cauldron, that made our heads ache and
+dried up our throats." Continuous stormy weather having suspended steam
+traffic with the mainland, the visitors had no choice but to remain
+prisoners some two months more, during which the deluge went on with
+little intermission.
+
+Still, to young and romantic imaginations the island and life in the
+ex-monastery offered considerable charm. Madame Sand and her children
+were delighted with the unfamiliar vegetation, the palms, aloes, olives,
+almond and orange trees, the Arab architecture, and picturesque
+costumes. Valdemosa itself was splendidly situated among the mountains,
+in a stone-walled garden surrounded with cypress trees and planted with
+palms and olives. In the morning, Madame Sand gave lessons to the
+children; in the afternoon, they ran wild out of doors whilst she
+wrote--when the invalid musician was well enough to be left. In the
+evenings she and the young people went wandering by moonlight through
+the cloisters, exploring the monkish cells and chapels. Maurice had
+fortunately recovered his health completely, but poor Chopin's state,
+aggravated by the damp weather and privations--for the difficulties in
+obtaining a regular supply of provisions were immense--remained
+throughout their stay a constant and terrible cause of anxiety and
+responsibility to Madame Sand. From the islanders no sort of help or
+even sympathy was forthcoming, and thievish servants and extortionate
+traders were not the least of the annoyances with which the strangers
+had to contend. In a letter to François Rollinat she gives a graphic
+account of their misfortunes:--
+
+     It has rightly been laid down as a principle that where nature is
+     beautiful and generous, men are bad and avaricious. We had all the
+     trouble in the world to procure the commonest articles of food,
+     such as the island produces in abundance; thanks to the signal
+     dishonesty, the plundering spirit of the peasants, who made us pay
+     for everything three times what it was worth, so that we were at
+     their mercy under the penalty of dying of hunger. We could get no
+     one to serve us, because we were not _Christians_ [the travellers
+     passed for being "sold to the Devil" because they did not go to
+     Mass], and, besides, nobody would attend on a consumptive invalid.
+     However, for better for worse, we were established.... The place
+     was incomparably poetical; we did not see a living soul, nothing
+     disturbed our work; after waiting two months, and paying three
+     hundred francs extra, Chopin had at last received his piano, and
+     delighted the vaults of his cell with his melodies. Health and
+     strength were visibly returning to Maurice; as for me, I worked as
+     tutor seven hours a day: I sat up working on my own account half
+     the night; Chopin composed masterpieces, and we hoped to put up
+     with the remainder of our discomforts by the aid of these
+     compensations.
+
+It was in the cells of Valdemosa that Madame Sand completed her novel of
+Monastic life, _Spiridion_, then publishing in the _Revue des Deux
+Mondes_. "For heaven's sake not so much mysticism!" prayed the editor of
+her, now and then; and assuredly those readers for whom George Sand was
+simply a purveyor of passionate romances, those critics who set her down
+in their minds as exclusively a glorifier of mutinous emotion and the
+apologist of lawless love, must have been taken aback by these pages, in
+which she had devoted her most fervent energies to tracing the spiritual
+history, _peu récréatif_, as she dryly observes, of a monk who, in the
+days of the decadence of the monastic orders, retained earnestness and
+sincerity; whose mind, revolted by the hypocrisy and worldliness around
+him, passes through the successive stages of heresy and philosophic
+doubt, and to whom is finally revealed an eternal gospel, which lies at
+the core of his old religion, but which later growths have stifled, and
+which outlasts all shocks and changes, and is to generate the religion
+of the future.
+
+The compositions of Chopin above alluded to, include the finest of his
+well-known Preludes, which may easily be conceived of as suggested by
+the strange mingling of contrasting impressions in the Chartreuse.
+"Several of these Preludes," writes Madame Sand, "represent the visions
+that haunted him of deceased monks, the sounds of funeral chants;
+others are soft and melancholy; these came to him in his hours of
+sunshine and health, at the sound of the children's laughter beneath the
+window, the distant thrum of guitars and the songs of the birds under
+the damp foliage; at the sight of the pale little roses in bloom among
+the snow."
+
+The loneliness and melancholy beauty of the spot, however congenial to
+the romance writer or inspiring to the composer, were not the right
+tonics for the nerves of the over-sensitive, imaginative invalid. The
+care and nursing of Madame Sand made amends for much, and by her good
+sense she saved him from being doctored to death by local practitioners.
+But his fortitude, which bore up heroically against his personal danger,
+was not proof against the dreary influences of Valdemosa in bad weather,
+the fogs, the sound of the hurricane sweeping through the valley, and
+bringing down portions of the dilapidated building, the noise of the
+torrents, the cries of the scared sea-birds and the roar of the sea.
+
+The elevation of the Chartreuse made the climate peculiarly disagreeable
+at this season. She writes on:--
+
+     We lived in the midst of clouds, and for fifty days were unable to
+     get down into the plains; the roads were changed to torrents, and
+     we saw nothing more of the sun. I should have thought it all
+     beautiful if poor Chopin could only have got on. Maurice was none
+     the worse. The wind and the sea sung sublimely as they beat against
+     the rocks. The vast and empty cloisters cracked over our heads. If
+     I had been there when I wrote the portion of _Lélia_ that takes
+     place in the convent, I should have made it finer and truer. But my
+     poor friend's chest got worse and worse. The fine weather did not
+     return.... A maid I had brought over from France, and who so far
+     had resigned herself, on condition of enormous wages, to cook and
+     do the housework, began to refuse attendance, as too hard. The
+     moment was coming when after having wielded the broom and managed
+     the _pot au feu_, I was ready to drop with fatigue--for besides my
+     work as tutor, besides my literary labor, besides the continual
+     attention necessitated by the condition of my invalid, I had
+     rheumatism in every limb.
+
+The return of spring was hailed as offering a tardy release from their
+island. The steamers were running again, and the party determined to
+leave at all risks; for though Chopin's state was more precarious than
+ever, nothing could be worse for him than to remain. They departed,
+feeling, she admits, as though they were escaping from the tender
+mercies of Polynesian savages, and once safely on board a French vessel
+at Barcelona, they thankfully welcomed the day that restored them to
+comfort and civilization, and saw the end of an expedition that had
+turned out in most respects so disastrous a _fiasco_.
+
+They remained throughout April at Marseilles, where Chopin, in the hands
+of a good doctor, became convalescent. From Marseilles they made a short
+tour in Italy, visiting Genoa and the neighborhood, and returning to
+France in May, Chopin apparently on the high road to complete recovery.
+It was in the following year that his illness returned in a graver form,
+and unmistakable symptoms of consumption showed themselves. The life of
+a fashionable pianist in Paris, the constant excitement, late hours, and
+heavy strain of nervous exertion, were fatal to his future chances of
+preserving his health; but it was a life to which he had now become
+wedded, and which he never willingly left, except for his long annual
+visits to Nohant.
+
+Madame Sand repeatedly contemplated settling herself entirely in the
+country. She had no love for Paris. "Parisian life strains our nerves
+and kills us in the long run," she writes from Nohant to one of her
+correspondents. "Ah, how I hate it, that centre of light! I would never
+set foot in it again, if the people I like would make the same
+resolution." And again, speaking of her "Black Valley, so good and so
+stupid," she adds, "Here I am always more myself than at Paris, where I
+am always ill, in body and in spirit."
+
+Paris, however, afforded greater facilities for her children's
+education. She had a strong desire to see her son an artist, and he was
+already studying painting in Delacroix's studio. Also her income at this
+moment did not suffice to enable her to live continuously at Nohant
+where, she frankly confessed, she had not yet found out how to live
+economically, expected as she was to keep open house, regarded as
+grudging and unneighborly if she did not maintain her establishment on a
+scale to which her resources as yet were unequal. Her expenses in the
+country she calculated as double those in Paris, where, as she writes to
+M. Chatiron,--
+
+     Everyone's independence is admirable. You invite whom you like, and
+     when you don't wish to receive anyone you let the porter know you
+     are not at home. Yet I hate Paris in all other respects. There I
+     grow stout, and my mind grows thin. You know how quiet and retired
+     my life there is, and I do not understand why you tell me, as they
+     say in the provinces, that glory keeps me there. I have no glory, I
+     have never sought for it, and I don't care a cigarette for it. I
+     want to breath fresh air and live in peace. I am succeeding, but
+     you see and you know on what conditions.
+
+Her Paris residence, a few seasons later, she fixed in the Cour
+d'Orléans Rue St. Lazare, in a block of buildings one-third of which
+was occupied by herself and her family; another belonged to her friend,
+Madame Marliani, wife of the Spanish Consul, the third to Frédéric
+Chopin.
+
+With respect to Chopin's long and deep attachment to Madame Sand, and
+its requital, concerning which so much has been written, there can
+surely be no greater misstatement than to speak of her as having
+blighted his life. This last part of his life was indeed blighted, but
+by ill-health and consequent nervous irritability and suffering; but
+such mitigation as was possible he found for eight years in the womanly
+devotion and genial society of Madame Sand--real benefits to one whose
+strange and delicate individuality it was not easy to befriend--and
+which the breach that took place between them shortly before his death
+should not allow us to forget.
+
+"Chopin," observes Eugène Delacroix, "belongs to the small number of
+those whom one can both esteem and love." Madame Sand joined a
+sympathetic appreciation of the refinement of his nature, and an
+enthusiastic admiration of his genius--feelings she shared with his
+numberless female worshippers--to a strength of character that lent the
+support no other could perhaps so fully have given, or that he would
+accept from no other, to the fragile, nervous, suffering tone-poet. Her
+sentiments towards him seem to resolve themselves into a great
+tenderness rather than a passionate fervor--a placid affection for
+himself, and an adoration for his music.
+
+All the time their existences, so far from having been united, flowed in
+different, nay divergent channels. Chopin, the idol of Paris society,
+moved constantly in the aristocratic and fashionable world, from which
+Madame Sand lived aloof. She for her part had heavy domestic cares and
+anxieties that did not touch him, and with the political party which was
+absorbing more and more of her energies he had no sympathy whatever.
+Whether the cause were the false start she had made at the outset by her
+marriage, forbidding her the realization of a woman's ideal, the
+non-separation of the gift of her heart from that of her whole life, or
+whether that her masculine strength of intellect created for her serious
+public interests and occupations, beside which personal pleasures and
+pains are apt to become of secondary moment, certain it appears that
+with George Sand, as with many an eminent artist of the opposite sex,
+such _affaires de coeur_ were but ripples on the sea of a large and
+active existence.
+
+The year after her return from Majorca was marked by her first
+appearance before the public as a dramatic author. Although it was a
+line in which she afterwards obtained successes, as will be seen in a
+future chapter, the result of this initial effort, _Cosima_, a five-act
+drama, was not encouraging. It was acted at the Théâtre Français in the
+spring of 1840, and proved a failure. It betrays no insufficient sense
+of dramatic effect, nor lack of the means for producing it, but decided
+clumsiness in the adaptation of these means to that end. The plot and
+personages recall those of _Indiana_, with the important differences
+that the _beau rôle_ of the piece falls to the husband, and that the
+scene is transported back to Florence in the Middle Ages--an undoubted
+error, as giving to a play essentially modern and French in its
+complexities of sentiment and motive a strong local coloring of a past
+time and another people, making the whole seem unreal. It has a
+psychological subject which Emile Augier or Dumas _fils_ would know how
+to handle dramatically; but as treated by George Sand, we are
+perpetually being led to anticipate too much in the way of action, to
+have our expectations dissipated the next moment. A wet blanket of
+disappointment on this head dampens any other satisfaction that the
+merits of the play might otherwise afford.
+
+Hitherto she had continued to write regularly for the _Revue des Deux
+Mondes_. As her revolutionary opinions became more pronounced, they
+began to find utterance in her romances. Her conversion by Michel had
+not only been complete, but the disciple had outstripped the master. The
+study of the communistic theories of Pierre Leroux had familiarized her
+with the speculations in social science of those who at this time were
+devoting their attention to criticising the existing social
+organization, and seeking, and sometimes imagining they had found, the
+secret of creating a better. George Sand's strong admiration for the
+writings of Leroux, always praised by her in the highest terms, strikes
+us now as extravagant, but was shared to some extent by not a few
+leading men of the time, such as Sainte-Beuve and Lamartine. Her
+intellect had eagerly followed this bold and earnest pioneer in
+new-discovered worlds of thought; "I do not say it is the last word of
+humanity, but, so far, it is its most advanced expression," she states
+of his philosophy. The study of it had brought a clearness into her own
+views, due, probably, much more to the action of her own mind upon the
+novel ideas suggested than to the lucidity of a system of social science
+as yet undetermined in some of its main points.
+
+She writes, when looking back on this period from a long distance of
+time,--
+
+     After the despairs of my youth, I was governed by too many
+     illusions. Morbid scepticism was succeeded in me by too much
+     kindliness and ingenuousness. A thousand times over I was duped by
+     dreams of an archangelic fusion of the opposing forces in the great
+     strife of ideas.
+
+Her novel _Horace_, written for the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, was
+rejected--as subversive of law and order--by the editor, except on
+condition of alterations which she declined to make.
+
+After this temporary rupture with Buloz, Madame Sand's services were
+largely appropriated by the _Revue Indépendante_, a new journal founded
+in 1840 by her friends Pierre Leroux and Louis Viardot, in conjunction
+with whose names hers appears on the title page as leading contributor.
+For this periodical no theories could be too advanced, no fictitious
+illustrations too audacious, and to its pages accordingly was _Horace_
+transferred. Among the secondary characters in this novel figure a young
+couple, immaculate otherwise in principle and in conduct, but who as
+converts to St. Simonism have dispensed with the ordinary legal sanction
+to their union. Perhaps a more solid objection to its insertion in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_ was the picture introduced of the _émcute_ of
+June 1832, painted in heroic colors. Both these features, however, are
+purely incidental. The main interest and the real strength of the book
+lie in a remarkable study of character-development--that of the chief
+personage, Horace. It is a cleverly painted portrait of a type that
+reappears, with slight modifications, in all ages; a moral charlatan,
+who half imposes on himself, and entirely for a while on other people. A
+would-be hero, genius, and chivalrous lover, he has none of the genuine
+qualities needed for sustaining the parts. Nonchalant and inert of
+temperament, he is capable of nothing beyond a short course of
+successful affectation. The imposition breaking down at last, he sinks
+helplessly into the unheroic mediocrity of position and pretension for
+which alone he is fit.
+
+A veritable attempt at a Socialist novel is the _Compagnon du Tour de
+France_ written in the course of 1840, which must surely be ranked as
+one of the weakest of George Sand's productions. Exactly the converse of
+_Horace_ may be said of this book. In the former, those most repelled by
+the revolutionary doctrines flashing out here and there, will yet be
+struck and interested by the masterly piece of character-painting that
+makes of the novel a success. The utmost fanaticism for the ideas
+ventilated in the _Compagnon du Tour de France_ can reconcile no reader
+to the dullness and unreality of the story which make of it a failure.
+For her socialism itself, as set forth in her writings, dispassionate
+examination of what she actually inculcated, leaves but little warrant,
+in the state of progress now reached, for echoing the mighty outcry
+raised against it at the time. No doubt she thought that a complete
+reorganization of society on a new basis was eminently to be desired.
+But what she definitely advocated was, first, free education for the
+poor, and secondly, some fairer adjustment of the relations to each
+other of capital and labor. As to the first, authority has already
+sanctioned her opinion; the second question, if unsettled, has become a
+first preoccupation with statesmen and philosophers of all denominations
+in the present day.
+
+With regard to the complete solution of the problem, she leaves her
+socialist heroes, as she herself felt, in doubt and perplexity. There
+was something in the schemes and doctrines she conscientiously approved,
+irreconcilable with her artist-nature--a materialistic tendency which
+clashed with her poetical instincts. When the stern demagogue Michel
+denounced the whole tribe of artists as a corrupting influence,
+enervating to the courage and will of a nation, she rose up
+energetically in defense of the confraternity to which she was born:--
+
+     Will you tell me, pray, what you mean, with your declamations
+     against artists? Cry out against them as much as you please, but
+     respect art. Oh, you Vandal! I like that stern sectarian who wants
+     to dress Taglioni in a stuff-gown and _sabots_, and set Liszt's
+     hands to turn the machinery of a wine-press, and who yet, as he
+     lies on the grass, finds the tears come into his eyes at the least
+     linnet's song, and who makes a disturbance in the theatre to stop
+     Othello from murdering Malibran! The austere citizen would suppress
+     artists as social excrescences that absorb too much of the sap; but
+     this gentleman is fond of vocal music, and so will spare the
+     singers. Let us hope that painters will find one among your strong
+     heads who appreciates painting, and won't wall up all studio
+     windows. And as for the poets, they are your cousins; and you don't
+     despise their forms of language and their rhythmical mechanism when
+     you want to make an impression on the idle crowd. You will go to
+     them to take lessons in metaphor, and how to make use of it.
+
+     Unfortunately for the cause of the superiority of antiquity,
+     whenever you go to hear Berlioz's _Funeral March_, the least that
+     can happen to you will be to confess that this music is rather
+     better than what they used to give us in Sparta, when we served
+     under Lycurgus; you will think that Apollo, displeased to see us
+     sacrificing to Pallas exclusively, has played us a trick in giving
+     lessons to that _Babylonian_, so that by the exercise of a magnetic
+     and disastrous power over us, he may lead our spirits astray.
+
+And she would prove to the demagogue, out of his own mouth, that
+everything cannot be reduced to "bread and shoes all round," as the
+grand desideratum. Give these to men, it will not suffice. The eloquent
+orator instinctively seeks besides to impart "hallowed emotions and
+mystic enthusiasm to those who toil and sweat--he teaches them to hope,
+to dream of God, to take courage and lift themselves above the sickening
+miseries of human conditions by the thought of a future, chimerical it
+may be, but strengthening and sublime."
+
+For a period, however, she was too fascinated by the new ideas to judge
+them, and she straightway sought in her art a means of popularizing
+them. "These ideas," she writes in a later preface to her socialist
+novel, _Le Péché de M. Antoine_, "at which, as yet but a small number of
+conservative spirits had taken alarm, had, as yet, only really begun to
+sprout in a small number of attentive, laborious minds. The government,
+so long as no actual form of political application was assumed, was not
+to be disquieted by theories, and let every man make his own, put forth
+his dream, and innocently construct his city of the future, by his own
+fire-side, in the garden of his imagination."
+
+She was aware that her readers thought her novels getting more and more
+tedious, in proportion as she communicated to her fictitious heroes and
+heroines the pre-occupations of her brain, and that she was thus
+stepping out of the domain of art. But she affirmed she could never help
+writing of whatever was absorbing her thoughts and feelings at the
+moment, and must take her chance of boring the public. Fortunately for
+_Le Péché de M. Antoine_, nature and human nature are here allowed to
+claim the larger share of our attention, and philosophy is a secondary
+feature. The scene is laid in the picturesque Marche country on the
+confines of Berry, a day's journey from Nohant, and we are glad to
+linger with her along the rocky banks of the Creuse, or among the ruined
+castles of Crozant and Châteaubrun. The novel contains much that is
+original and admirable in the drawing of characters of the most opposite
+classes.
+
+Finally, in _Le Meunier d'Angibault_,[C] written as was the
+last-mentioned work some four or five years later (1844-45), but which
+may be named here, as making up with _Le Compagnon du Tour de France_
+the trio of "socialist" novels, the _Tendenz_ does not interfere to the
+detriment of the artistic plan of the book. In it the romantic elements
+of the remote country nook she inhabited are cleverly brought together,
+without departing too widely from probability. The dilapidated castle,
+the picturesque mill, the traditions of brigandage two generations ago,
+all these were realities familiar to her notice. The painting of the
+country and country people is masterly; and there is not a passage in
+the book to offend the taste of the most scrupulous reader. Nor can it
+be justly impugned on the ground of inculcating disturbing political
+principles. The personages, in their preference of poverty and obscurity
+to rank and wealth, may, in the judgment of some, think and conduct
+themselves like chimerical dreamers, but their actions, however
+quixotic, concern themselves alone.
+
+But, previous to either of the two novels last named, she had presented
+the world with a more ambitious work, whose merit was to compel
+universal acknowledgment--the most important, in fact, she had produced
+for eight years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+CONSUELO--HOME LIFE AT NOHANT.
+
+
+CONSUELO first appeared in the _Revue Indépendante_, 1842-43. This noble
+book might not be inaptly described as,
+
+    --a whole which, irregular in parts,
+    Yet left a grand impression on the mind.
+
+Its reckless proportions naturally "shocked the connoisseurs" among
+literary critics, especially in her own land; but nevertheless it
+became, and deservedly, one of her most popular productions, and did
+more than any other single novel she ever wrote to spread her popularity
+abroad. If _Indiana_, _Valentine_, and _Lélia_ had never been written to
+create the fame of George Sand, _Consuelo_ would have done so, and may
+be said to have established it over again, on a better and more lasting
+basis. Upon so well-known a work lengthened comment here would be
+superfluous. Originally intended for a novelette,--the opening chapters
+appear in the _Revue_ under the modest heading, _Consuelo_,
+_conte_,--the beginning was so successful that the author was urged to
+extend her plan beyond its first proposed limits. The novel is an
+ephemeral form of art, no doubt, but it is difficult to conceive of a
+stage of social and intellectual progress when the first part of
+_Consuelo_ will cease to be read with interest and delight.
+
+The heroine once transported from the lagunes of Venice to the frontier
+of Bohemia and the castle of Rudolstadt, the character of the story
+becomes less naturalistic; the storyteller loses herself somewhat in
+subterranean passages and the mazes of adventure generally. She wrote
+on, she acknowledges, at hap-hazard, tempted and led away by the new
+horizons which the artistic and historical researches her work required
+kept opening to her view. But the powerful contrast between the two
+pictures,--of bright, sunshiny, free, sensuous, careless Venetian
+folk-life, and of the stern gloom of the mediæval castle, where the more
+spiritual consolations of existence come into prominence--is singularly
+effective and original. So also is the charming way in which an incident
+in the boyhood of young Joseph Haydn is treated by her fancy, in the
+episode of Consuelo's flight from the castle, when he becomes her
+fellow-traveller, and their adventures across country are told with
+such zest and _entrain_, in pages where life-sketches of character, such
+as the good-natured, self-indulgent canon, the violent, abandoned
+Corilla, make us forget the wildest improbabilities of the fiction
+itself. The concluding portion of the book, again entirely different in
+frame, with its delineation of art-life in a fashionable capital,
+Vienna, is as true as it is brilliant. It teems with suggestive ideas on
+the subject of musical and dramatic art, and with excellently drawn
+types. The relations of professional and amateur, the contradictions and
+contentions to which, in a woman's nature, the rival forces of love and
+of an artistic vocation may give rise, have never been better portrayed
+in any novel. The heroine, Consuelo, is of course an ideal character:
+her achievements partake of the marvellous; and there are digressions in
+the book which are diffuse in the extreme; but nowhere is the author's
+imagination more attractively displayed and her style more engaging. The
+tone throughout is noble and pure. To look on _Consuelo_ as an agreeable
+story merely is to overlook the elevation of the moral standard of the
+book, in which much of its power resides. It marks more strongly than
+_Mauprat_ the change that had come over the spirit of George Sand's
+compositions.
+
+In the continuation, _La Comtesse de Rodolstadt_, which followed
+immediately in the _Revue Indépendante_, 1843, the novelist strays
+further and further from reality--the _terra firma_ on which her fancy
+improvises such charming dances. Here she only touches the ground now
+and then, and between whiles her imagination asks ours to accompany it
+on the most extraordinary flights. As a novel of adventure, it is
+written with unflagging spirit; and in the rites and doctrines of the
+_Illuminati_, an idealization of the feature of the secret sects of the
+last century, she found a new medium of expression for her sentiments
+regarding the present abuses of society and the need of thorough
+renovation. Secret societies, at that time, were extremely numerous and
+active among the Republican workers in France. Madame Sand seems
+thoroughly to have appreciated their dangers, and has expressly stated
+that she was no advocate of such sects; that though under a tyranny,
+such as that which oppressed Germany in the times of which she wrote,
+they may be a necessity, elsewhere they are an abuse if not a crime.
+"The custom indeed I have never regarded as applicable for good in our
+time and our country; I have never believed that it can bring forth
+anything in future but a dictatorship, and the dictatorial principle is
+one I have never accepted." (_Histoire de ma Vie._)
+
+But the romance of the subject was irresistibly tempting to her
+inventive faculty. "Tell Leroux to send me some more books on
+freemasonry, if he can find any," she writes to a correspondent at Paris
+whilst working at the _Comtesse de Rudolstadt_ at Nohant; "I am plunged
+into it over head and ears. Tell him also that he has there thrown me
+into an abyss of follies and absurdities, but that I am dabbling about
+courageously though prepared to extract nothing but nonsense."
+
+For the musical miracles which it is given to Madame Sand's heroes and
+heroines to perform at a trifling cost, she may well at this time have
+come to regard them as almost in the natural order. She had received her
+second, and her best musical education through the contemplation of
+original musical genius, of the rarest quality, among her most intimate
+friends, her constant guests at Paris and Nohant. The vocal and
+instrumental feats of Consuelo and Count Albert themselves are not more
+astonishing than the actual recorded achievements of Liszt, pronounced a
+perfect _virtuoso_ at twelve years old--and no wonder! The boy had so
+carried away his accompanyists, the band of the Italian opera at Paris,
+by his performance of the solo in an orchestral piece, that when the
+moment came for them to strike in, one and all forgot to do so, but
+remained silent, petrified with amazement. And Liszt when in the full
+development of his genius, had, as we have seen, been the art-comrade of
+George Sand; he had spent the whole of the summer season of 1837 at
+Nohant, transcribing Beethoven's symphonies for the piano-forte whilst
+she wrote her romances; she was familiar with his marvellous
+improvisations. In her "Trip to Chamounix" (_Lettres d'un Voyageur_, No.
+VI.) she has drawn a vivid picture of their extraordinary effect,
+describing his unrehearsed organ recital in the Cathedral of Freibourg
+to his little party of travelling companions. Nor was the charm of
+Chopin's gift less magical. The well-known anecdotes related on this
+subject are like so many glimpses into a musical paradise. Madame Sand
+has given us an amusing one herself. It is evening in her _salon_ at
+Paris. At the piano is Chopin; and she, her son, Eugène Delacroix, and
+the Polish poet Mickiewicz sit listening whilst the composer, in an
+inspired mood, is extemporizing in the sublimest manner to the little
+circle. All are in silent raptures; when the servant breaks in with the
+alarm--the house is on fire. They rush to the room where the flames are,
+and succeed after a time in extinguishing them. Then they perceive that
+the poet Mickiewicz is missing. On returning to the _salon_ they find
+him as they left him, rapt, entranced, unconscious of the stir around
+him, of the scare that had driven all the rest from the room. "He did
+not even know we had gone and left him alone. He was listening to
+Chopin, he had continued to hear him." Nor could the bewitched poet be
+brought down from the clouds that evening. He remained deaf to their
+banter, to Madame Sand's laughing admonition, "Next time I am with you
+when the house takes fire, I must begin by putting you into a safe
+place, for I see you would get burnt like a mere faggot, before you knew
+what was going on."
+
+Eugène Delacroix, one of Madame Sand's earliest and most valued friends
+in the artist-world, and one of the many with whom she enjoyed along and
+unclouded friendship, gives in his letters some agreeable pictures of
+life at Nohant, during his visits there in the successive summers of
+1845 and 1846:--
+
+     When not assembled together with the rest for dinner, breakfast, a
+     game of billiards, or a walk, you are in your room reading, or
+     lounging on your sofa. Every moment there come in through the
+     window open on the garden, "puffs of music" from Chopin, working
+     away on one side, which mingle with the song of nightingales and
+     the scent of the roses.
+
+He describes a quiet, monastic-like existence, simple and studious: "We
+have not even the distraction of neighbors and friends around. In this
+country everybody stays at home, to look after his oxen and his land.
+One would become a fossil in a very short time."
+
+The greatest event for the visitor was a village-festival--a wedding or
+a Saint's day--when the rustic dances went on under the tall elms to the
+roaring of the bagpipes. Peasant youths and peasant maids joined hands
+in the _bourrée_, the characteristic dance of the country; now, we fear,
+surviving in tradition only, but then still popular. The great artist
+was fired to paint a "Ste. Anne," patron-saint of Nohant, in honor of
+the place, but his work progressed but slowly. He writes in August,
+1846:--"I am frightfully lazy, I can do nothing, I hardly read; and yet
+the days pass too quickly, for I must soon renounce this _vie de
+chanoine_, and return into the furnace of stirring ideas, good and bad.
+In Berry they have very few ideas, but they do just as well without."
+Then he adds, "Chopin has been playing Beethoven to me divinely well.
+That is worth all æstheticism."
+
+Little theatrical entertainments of an original kind, presided over by
+Madame Sand, and carried out by herself, her children, and their young
+friends, became in time a prominent feature of life at Nohant. She thus
+describes their nature and commencements:--
+
+     During the long evenings I took it into my head to devise for my
+     family theatricals on the old Italian pattern--_commedia
+     dell'arte_--plays in which the dialogue, itself extemporized, yet
+     follows the outlines of a written plan, placarded behind the
+     scenes. It is something like the charades acted in society, the
+     development of which depends on the talent contributed by the
+     actors. It was with these that we began, but little by little the
+     word of the charade disappeared. We acted wild _saynètes_,
+     afterwards comedies of plot and intrigue, finally dramas of event
+     and emotion.
+
+     All began with pantomime; and this was Chopin's invention. He sat
+     at the piano and extemporized, whilst the young people acted scenes
+     in dumb show and danced comic ballets. These charming
+     improvisations turned the children's heads and made their legs
+     nimble. He led them just as he chose, making them pass, according
+     to his fancy, from the amusing to the severe, from burlesque to
+     solemnity--now graceful, now impassioned. We invented all kinds of
+     costumes, so as to play different characters in succession. No
+     sooner did the artist see them appear than he adapted his theme and
+     rhythm to the parts wonderfully. This would be repeated for two or
+     three evenings; after which the _maestro_, departing for Paris,
+     would leave us quite excited, exalted, determined not to let the
+     spark be lost with which he had electrified us.
+
+Chopin was possessed of much dramatic talent himself, and was an
+admirable mimic. When a boy it had been said of him that he was born to
+be a great actor. His capacity for facial expressions was something
+extraordinary; he often amused his friends by imitations of
+fellow-musicians, reproducing their manner and gestures to the life; so
+well as actually on more than one occasion to take in the spectator.
+
+Madame Sand thus gives account of the even tenor of her way, in a letter
+of September, 1845:--
+
+     I have been in Paris till June, and since then am at Nohant until
+     the winter, as usual; for henceforward my life is ruled as
+     regularly as music paper. I have written two or three novels, one
+     of which is just going to appear.
+
+     My son is still thin and delicate, but otherwise well. He is the
+     best being, the gentlest, most equable, industrious, simple-minded,
+     and straightforward ever seen. Our characters, like our hearts,
+     agree so well that we can hardly live a day apart. He is entering
+     his twenty-third year, Solange her eighteenth. We have our ways of
+     merriment, not noisy, but sustained, which bring our ages nearer
+     together, and when we have been working hard all the week we allow
+     ourselves, by way of a grand holiday, to go and eat our cake out of
+     doors some way off, in a wood or an old ruin, with my brother, who
+     is like a sturdy peasant, full of fun and good nature, and who
+     dines with us every day, seeing that he lives not two miles off.
+     Such are our grand pranks.
+
+Sometimes these little outings would originate a novel, as with the
+_Meunier d'Angibault_, which she ascribes to "a walk, a discovery, a day
+of leisure, an hour of idleness." On a ramble with her children she came
+upon what she calls "a nook in a wild paradise;" a mill, whose owner
+had allowed everything to grow around the sluices that chose to spring
+up, briar and alder, oaks and rushes. The stream, left to follow its
+devices, had forced its way through the sand and the grass in a network
+of little waterfalls, covered below in the summer time with thick tufts
+of aquatic plants.
+
+It was enough; the seed was sown and the fruit resulted. "The apple
+falling from the tree led Newton to the discovery of one of the grand
+laws of the universe.... In scientific works of genius, reflection
+derives the causes of things from a single fact. In art's humbler
+fancies, that isolated fact is dressed and completed in a dream."
+
+The picture given by Madame Sand and her guests of these years of her
+life is charming enough, and in certain ways seems an ideal kind of
+existence, amid beloved children, friends, pleasant and calm
+surroundings, and the sweets of successful literary activity. But if it
+had its bright lights, it had also its deep shadows. For every fresh
+pleasure and interest crowded into her existence, there entered a fresh
+source of anxiety and trouble. Age, in bringing her more power of
+endurance, had not blunted her sensibilities. As usual with the
+strongest natures in their hours of depression--and none so strong as
+to escape these--she could then look for no help except from herself.
+Those accustomed, like her, to shirk no responsibility, no burden, to
+invite others to lean on them, and to ask no support, if their fortitude
+gives way find the allowance, help and sympathy so easily accorded to
+their weaker fellow-creatures nowhere ready for them. The exclamation
+wrung from one of the characters in a later work of Madame Sand's, may
+be but a faithful echo of the cry of her own nature in some moment of
+mental torment. "Let me be weak; I have been seeming to be strong for so
+long a time!"
+
+Chopin, though the study of his genius had freshly inspired her own, and
+greatly extended her comprehension of musical art, was a being to whom
+the burden of his own life was too painful to allow him to lighten the
+troubles of another; a partial invalid, a prey to nervous irritation, he
+was dependent on her to soothe and cheer him at the best of times, and
+to be nurse and secretary besides when he was prostrated by illness or
+despondency. One is loth to call selfish a nature so attractive in its
+refinement, so unhappy in its over-susceptibility. But it is obvious
+that such a one might easily become a trial to those he loved. With all
+its vigor her nervous system could not escape the exhaustion and
+disturbance that attend on incessant brain-work. "Those who have nothing
+to do," she remarks, "when they see artists produce with facility, are
+ready to wonder at how few hours, how few instants, these can reserve
+for themselves. For such do not know how these gymnastics of the
+imagination, if they do not affect your health, yet leave an excitation
+of your nerves, an obsession of mental pictures, a languor of spirit,
+that forbid you to carry on any other kind of work."
+
+Although her constitution was even stronger than in her youth, she had
+for some years been subject to severe attacks of neuralgia. "Madame Sand
+suffers terribly from violent headaches and pain in her eyes," remarks
+Delacroix, in one of the letters above quoted, "which she takes upon
+herself to surmount as far as possible, with a great effort, so as not
+to distress us by what she goes through." Her habit of writing
+principally at night and contenting herself with the least possible
+allowance of repose, few could have persisted in for so long without
+breaking down. For many years she never took more than four hours sleep.
+The strain began to tell on her eye-sight at last, and already in a
+letter of 1842 she speaks of being temporarily compelled to suspend this
+practice of night-work, to her great regret, as in the daylight hours
+she was never secure from interruption. Only her abnormal power of
+activity and of bearing fatigue could have enabled her to fulfill so
+strenuously the responsibilities she had undertaken to her children, her
+private friends, and the public. The pressure of literary work was
+incessant, and whatever her dislike to accounts and arithmetic she is
+said to have fulfilled her engagements to editors and publishers with
+the regularity and punctuality of a notary. Her large acquaintance,
+relations with various classes, various projects, literary, political,
+and philanthropical, involved an immense amount of serious
+correspondence in addition to that arising from the postal persecution
+from which no celebrity escapes. Ladies wrote to consult her on
+sentimental subjects--to inquire of her, as of an oracle, whether they
+should bestow their heart, their hand, or both, upon their suitors;
+poets, to solicit her patronage and criticism. In the course of a single
+half-year, 153 manuscripts were sent her for perusal! She replied when
+it seemed fit, conscientiously and ungrudgingly; but experience had made
+her less expansive than formerly to those whose overtures she felt to be
+prompted by curiosity or some such idle motive, in the absence of any
+sympathy for her ways of thinking. "I am not to be caught in my words
+with indifferent persons," she writes to M. Charles Duvernet,
+describing how, when in her friend Madame Marliani's _salon_ in Paris
+she heard herself and her political allies or their opinions attacked,
+she was not to be provoked into argument or indignant denial, but went
+on quietly with her work of hemming pocket-handkerchiefs. "To such
+people one speaks through the medium of the Press. If they will not
+attend, no matter."
+
+Her sex, her anomalous position, her freedom of expression and action,
+exposed her to an extent quite exceptional, even for a public character,
+to the shafts of malice and slander. Accustomed to have to brave the
+worst from such attacks, she might and did arrive at treating them with
+an indifference that was not, however, in her nature, which shrank from
+the observation and personal criticism of the vulgar.
+
+To a young poet of promise in whose welfare she took interest, she
+writes, August, 1842:--
+
+     Never show my letters except to your mother, your wife, or your
+     greatest friend. It is a shy habit, a mania I have to the last
+     degree. The idea that I am not writing for those alone to whom I
+     write, or for those who love them thoroughly, would freeze my heart
+     and my hand directly. Everyone has a fault. Mine is a misanthropy
+     in my outward habits--for all that I have no passion left in me but
+     the love of my fellow-creatures; but with the small services that
+     my heart and my faith can render in this world, my personality has
+     nothing to do. Some people have grieved me very much,
+     unconsciously, by talking and writing about me personally and my
+     doings, even though favorably, and meaning well. Respect this
+     malady of spirit.
+
+Madame Sand, being naturally undemonstrative, was commonly more or less
+tongue-tied and chilled in the presence of a stranger, and she had a
+frank dread of introductions and first interviews, even when the
+acquaintance was one she desired to make. Sometimes she asks her friends
+to prepare such new comers for receiving an unfavorable first
+impression, and to beg them not to be unduly prejudiced thereby. Such a
+one would find the persecution of lion-hunters intolerable, and now and
+then this drove her to extremities. Great must, indeed, have been the
+wrath of one of these irrepressibles, who, more obstinate than the rest,
+failing by fair means to get an introduction to George Sand, calmly
+pushed his way into Nohant unauthorized by anyone, whereupon her friends
+conspired to serve him the trick it must be owned he deserved; and which
+we give in the words of Madame Sand, writing to the Comtesse d'Agoult.
+The story is told also by Liszt in his letters:--
+
+     M. X. is ushered into my room. A respectable-looking person there
+     receives him. She was about forty years of age, but you might give
+     her sixty at a pinch. She had had beautiful teeth, but had got
+     none left. All passes away! She had been rather good-looking, but
+     was so no longer. All changes! Her figure was corpulent, and her
+     hands were soiled. Nothing is perfect!
+
+     She was clad in a gray woolen gown spotted with black, and lined
+     with scarlet. A silk handkerchief was negligently twisted round her
+     black hair. Her shoes were faulty, but she was thoroughly
+     dignified. Now and then she seemed on the point of putting an _s_
+     or a _t_ in the wrong place, but she corrected herself gracefully,
+     talked of her literary works, of her excellent friend M. Rollinat,
+     of the talents of her visitor which had not failed to reach her
+     ears, though she lived in complete retirement, overwhelmed with
+     work. M. G. brought her a foot-stool, the children called her
+     mamma, the servants Madame.
+
+     She had a gracious smile, and much more distinguished manners than
+     that fellow George Sand. In a word X. was happy and proud of his
+     visit. Perched in a big chair, with beaming aspect, arm extended,
+     speech abundant, there he stayed for a full quarter of an hour in
+     ecstasies, and then took leave, bowing down to the ground
+     to--Sophie!
+
+It was the maid that had thus been successfully passed off as the
+mistress, who with her whole household enjoyed a long and hearty laugh
+at the expense of the departed unbidden guest. "M. X. has gone off to
+Châteauroux," she concludes, "on purpose to give an account of his
+interview with me, and to describe me personally in all the _cafés_."
+
+This anecdote however belongs to a much earlier period of her life, the
+year 1837. Of her cordiality and kindliness to those who approached her
+in a right spirit of sincerity and simplicity, many have spoken. For
+English readers we cannot do better than quote Mr. Matthew Arnold's
+interesting account, given in the _Fortnightly_, 1877, of his visit to
+her in August, 1846. Desirous of seeing the green lanes of Berry, the
+rocky heaths of Bourbonnais, the descriptions of which in _Valentine_
+and _Jeanne_ had charmed him so strongly, the traveller chose a route
+that brought him to within a few miles of her home:--"I addressed to
+Madame Sand," he tells us, "the sort of letter of which she must in her
+lifetime have had scores--a letter conveying to her, in bad French, the
+youthful and enthusiastic homage of a foreigner who had read her works
+with delight." She responded by inviting him to call at Nohant. He came
+and joined a breakfast-party that included Madame Sand and her son and
+daughter, Chopin, and other friends--Mr. Arnold being placed next to the
+hostess. He says of her:--
+
+     As she spoke, her eyes, head, bearing were all of them striking,
+     but the main impression she made was one of simplicity, frank,
+     cordial simplicity. After breakfast she led the way into the
+     garden, asked me a few kind questions about myself and my plans,
+     gathered a flower or two and gave them to me, shook hands heartily
+     at the gate, and I saw her no more.
+
+During the eight years of successful literary activity, lying between
+Madame Sand's return from Majorca and the Revolution of February, 1848,
+the profits of her work had, after the first, enabled her freely to
+spend the greater part of the year at Nohant, and to provide a
+substantial dowry for her daughter. But the amassing of wealth suited
+neither her taste nor her principles. She writes to her poet-protégé M.
+Poncy, in September, 1845:--
+
+     We are in easy circumstances, which enables us to do away with
+     poverty in our own neighborhood, and if we feel the sorrow of being
+     unable to do away with that which desolates the world--a deep
+     sorrow, especially at my age, when life has no intoxicating
+     personality left, and one sees plainly the spectacle of society in
+     its injustices and frightful disorder--at least we know nothing of
+     _ennui_, of restless ambition and selfish passions. We have a sort
+     of relative happiness, and my children enjoy it with the simplicity
+     of their age.
+
+     As for me, I only accept it in trembling, for all happiness is like
+     a theft in this ill-regulated world of men, where you cannot enjoy
+     your ease or your liberty, except to the detriment of your
+     fellow-creatures--by the force of things, the law of inequality,
+     that odious law, those odious combinations, the thought of which
+     poisons my sweetest domestic joys and revolts me against myself at
+     every moment. I can only find consolation in vowing to go on
+     writing as long as I have a breath of life left in me, against the
+     infamous maxim, "_Chacun chez soi, chacun pour soi_." Since all I
+     can do is to make this protest, make it I shall, in every key.
+
+Her republican friends in Berry had founded in 1844 a local journal for
+the spread of liberal ideas--such as Lamartine at the time was
+supporting at Macon. Madame Sand readily contributed her services to a
+cause where she labored for the enlightenment of the masses on all
+subjects--truth, justice, religion, liberty, fraternity, duties, and
+rights. The government of Louis Philippe, so long as such utterances
+attacked no definite institution, allowed an almost illimitable freedom
+in expression of opinion. The result was that thought had advanced so
+far ahead of action that social philosophers had grown to argue as
+though practical obstacles had no existence--to be rudely reminded of
+their consequence, when brought to the front in 1848, and acting
+somewhat too much as if on that supposition.
+
+It is impossible not to make concerning Madame Sand, the reflection made
+on other foremost workers in the same cause of organic social
+reform--namely, that her character and her instincts were in curious
+opposition to her ideas. What was said by Madame d'Agoult of Louis Blanc
+applies with even greater force to George Sand: "The sentiment of
+personality was never stronger than in this opposer of individualism,
+communist theories had for their champion one most unfit to be absorbed
+into the community." For no length of time was the idea of "communism"
+accepted, and never was it advocated by her except in the most
+restricted sense. The land-hunger, or rather land-greed, of the small
+proprietors in her neighborhood had, it is true, given her a certain
+disgust for these contested possessions. But from the preference of a
+small child for a garden of its own however small, to another's however
+large, she characteristically infers the instinct of property as a law
+of nature it were preposterous to disallow, and furthermore she lays
+down as an axiom that, "in treating the communistic idea it is necessary
+first to distinguish what is essential in liberty and work to the
+complete existence of the individual, from what is collective." When
+forced by actual experience to point out what she holds to be the
+rightful application of the idea, she limits it to voluntary
+association; and she hoped great things from the co-operative principle,
+as tending to eliminate the ills of extreme inequalities in the social
+structure, and to preserve everything in it that is worth preserving.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+NOVELIST AND POLITICIAN.
+
+
+By her novels classed as "socialistic," Madame Sand had, as we have
+seen, incurred the public hostility of those whom her doctrines alarmed.
+And yet her "communist" heroes and heroines are the most pacific and
+inoffensive of social influences. They merely aspire to isolate
+themselves, and personally to practice principles and virtues of the
+highest order; unworldliness such as, if general, might indeed turn the
+earth into the desired Utopia. Nothing can be said against their
+example, unless that it is too good, and that there is little hope of
+its being widely followed.
+
+Charges of another sort, no less bitter, and though exaggerated,
+somewhat better founded, assailed her after the appearance in 1847 of
+_Lucrezia Floriani_, a novel of character-analysis entirely, but into
+which she was accused of having introduced an unflattering portrait of
+Frédéric Chopin, whose long and long-requited attachment to her entitled
+him to better treatment at her hands.
+
+With respect to the general question of such alleged fictitious
+reproductions, few novelists escape getting into trouble on this head.
+It has been aptly observed by Mr. Hamerton that the usual procedure of
+the reading public in such cases is to fix on some real personage as
+distinctly unlike the character in the book as possible, for the
+original, and then to complain of the unfaithfulness of the resemblance.
+Madame Sand's taste and higher art-instincts would have revolted against
+the practice--now unfortunately no longer confined to inferior
+writers--of forcing attention to a novel by making it the gibbet of
+well-known personalities, with little or no disguise; and Chopin
+himself, morbidly sensitive and fanciful though he was, read her work
+without perceiving in it any intention there to portray their relations
+to each other, which, indeed, had differed essentially from those of the
+personages in the romance.
+
+_Lucrezia Floriani_ is a _cantatrice_ of genius, who, whilst still
+young, has retired from the world, indifferent to fame, and effectually
+disenchanted--so she believes--with passion. Despite an experience
+strange and stormy, even for a member of her Bohemian profession,
+Lucrezia has miraculously preserved intact her native nobility of soul,
+and appears as a meet object of worship to a fastidious young prince on
+his travels, who becomes passionately enamored of her. He over-persuades
+Lucrezia into trusting that they will find their felicity in each other.
+Their happiness is of the briefest duration, owing to the unreasonable
+character of the prince, who leads the actress a miserable life; his
+love taking the form of petty tyranny and retrospective jealousy. After
+long years of this material and moral captivity, the heroic Lucrezia
+fades and dies.
+
+Not content with identifying the intolerable, though it must be owned
+severely-tested, Prince Karol with Chopin, imaginative writers have gone
+so far as to assert that the book was conceived and written from an
+express design on the novelist's part to bring about the breach of a
+link she was beginning to find irksome!
+
+Madame Sand has described how it was written--as are all such works of
+imagination--in response to a sort of "call"--some striking yet
+indefinable quality in one idea among the host always floating through
+the brain of the artist, that makes him instantly seize it and single it
+out as inviting to art-treatment. It would be preposterous to doubt her
+statement. But whether the inspiration ought not to have been sacrificed
+is another question. Her gift was her good angel and her evil angel as
+well, but in any case something of her despot. Here, assuredly, it
+ruled her ill. It is indisputable that, as she had pointed out, the sad
+history of the attachment of Lucrezia the actress and Karol the prince
+deviates too widely from that which was supposed to have originated it
+for just comparisons to be drawn between the two, that Karol is not a
+genius, and therefore has none of the rights of genius--including, we
+presume, the right to be a torment to those around him--that to talk of
+a portrait of Chopin without his genius is a contradiction in terms,
+that he never suspected the likeness assumed until it was insinuated to
+him, and so forth. But there remains this, that in the work of
+imagination she here presented to the public there was enough of reality
+interwoven to make the world hasten to identify or confound Prince Karol
+with Chopin. This might have been a foregone conclusion, as also that
+Chopin, the most sensitive of mortals, would be infinitely pained by the
+inferences that would be drawn. Perhaps if only as a genius, he had the
+right to be spared such an infliction; and one must wish it could have
+appeared in this light to Madame Sand. It seems as though it were
+impossible for the author to put himself at the point of view of the
+reader in such matters. The divine spark itself, that quickens certain
+faculties, deadens others. When Goethe, in _Werther_, dragged the
+private life of his intimate friends, the Kestners, into publicity, and
+by falsifying the character of the one and misrepresenting the conduct
+of the other, in obedience to the requisitions of art, exposed his
+beloved Charlotte and her husband to all manner of annoyances, it never
+seems to have entered into his head beforehand but that they would be
+delighted by what he had done. Nor could he get over his surprise that
+such petty vexations on their part should not be merged in a proud
+satisfaction at the literary memorial thus raised by him to their
+friendly intercourse! This seems incredible, and yet his sincerity
+leaves no room for doubt.
+
+Madame Sand's transgressions on this head, though few, have obtained
+great notoriety, on account of the extraordinary celebrity of two of the
+personages that suggested characters she has drawn. To the supposed
+originals, however obscure, the mortification is the same. But what
+often passes uncommented on when the individuals said to be traduced are
+unknown to fame, sets the whole world talking when one of the first
+musicians or poets of the century is involved; so that Madame Sand has
+incurred more censure than other novelists, though she has deserved it
+more rarely. But regret remains that for the sake of _Lucrezia
+Floriani_, one of the least pleasant though by no means the least
+powerful of her novels, she should have exposed herself to the charge of
+unkindness to one who had but a short while to live.
+
+Other causes had latterly been combining to lead to differences of which
+it would certainly be unfair to lay the whole blame on Madame Sand. The
+tie of personal attachment between Chopin and herself was not associated
+by identity of outward interests or even of cares and family affections,
+such as, in the case of husband and wife, make self-sacrifice possible
+under conditions which might otherwise be felt unbearable, and help to
+tide over crises of impatience or wrong. Madame Sand's children were now
+grown up; cross-influences could not but arise, hard to conciliate.
+Without accrediting Chopin with the self-absorption of Prince Karol, it
+is easy to see here, in a situation somewhat anomalous, elements of
+probable discord. It was impossible that he should any longer be a first
+consideration; impossible that he should not resent it.
+
+For some years his state of health had been getting worse and worse, and
+his nervous susceptibilities correspondingly intensified. Madame Sand
+betrayed some impatience at last of what she had long borne
+uncomplainingly, and their good understanding was broken. As was
+natural, the breach was the more severely felt by Chopin, but that it
+was of an irreparable nature, one is at liberty to doubt. He bitterly
+regretted what he had lost, for which not all the attentions showered on
+him by his well-wishers could afford compensation, as his letters
+attest.
+
+But outward circumstances prolonged the estrangement till it was too
+late. They met but once after the quarrel, and that was in company in
+March, 1848. Madame Sand would at once have made some approach, but
+Chopin did not then respond to the appeal; and the reconciliation both
+perhaps desired was never to take place. Political events had intervened
+to widen the gap between their paths. Chopin had neither part nor lot in
+the revolutionary movement that just then was throwing all minds and
+lives into a ferment, and which was completely to engross Madame Sand's
+energies for many months to come. It drove him away to England, and he
+only returned to Paris, in 1849, to die.
+
+In May, 1847, the tranquility of life at Nohant had been varied by a
+family event, the marriage of Madame Sand's daughter Solange with the
+sculptor Clésinger. The remainder of the twelvemonth was spent in the
+country, apparently with very little anticipation on Madame Sand's part
+that the breaking of the political storm, that was to draw her into its
+midst, was so near.
+
+The new year was to be one of serious agitations, different to any that
+had yet entered into her experience. Political enterprise for the time
+cast all purely personal interests and emotions into the background. "I
+have never known how to do anything by halves," she says of herself very
+truly; and whatever may be thought of the tendency of her political
+influence and the manner of its exertion, no one can tax her with
+sparing herself in a contest to which, moreover, she came disinterested;
+vanity and ambition having, in one of her sex, nothing to gain by it.
+But in political matters it seems hard for a poet to do right. If, like
+Goethe, he holds aloof in great crises, he is branded for it as a
+traitor and a bad patriot. The battle of Leipzig is being fought, and he
+sits tranquilly writing the epilogue for a play. If, like George Sand,
+he throws the whole weight of his enthusiastic eloquence into what he
+believes to be the right scale, it is ten to one that his power, which
+knows nothing of caution and patience, may do harm to the cause he has
+at heart.
+
+Madame Sand rested her hopes for a better state of things, for the
+redemption of France from political corruption, for the amelioration of
+the condition of the working classes, and reform of social institutions
+in general, on the advent to power of those placed at the head of
+affairs by the collapse of the government of Louis Philippe, a crisis
+long threatened, long prepared, and become inevitable.
+
+"The whole system," wrote Heine prophetically of the existing monarchy,
+five years before its fall, "is not worth a charge of powder, if indeed
+some day a charge of powder does not blow it up." February, 1848, saw
+the explosion, the flight of the Royal Family, and the formation of a
+Provisional Government, with Lamartine at its head.
+
+It is hard to realize in the present day, when we contemplate these
+events through the sobering light of the deplorable sequel, how immense
+and wide-spreading was the enthusiasm that at this particular juncture
+seemed to put the fervent soul of a George Sand or an Armand Barbès into
+the most lukewarm and timid. "More than one," writes Madame d'Agoult,
+"who for the last twenty years had been scoffing at every grand thought,
+let himself be won by the general emotion." The prevailing impression
+can have fallen little short of the conviction that a sort of millennium
+was at hand for mankind in general and the French in particular, and
+that all human ills would disappear because a bad government had been
+got rid of, and that without such scenes of blood and strife as had
+disfigured previous revolutions.
+
+The first task was firmly to establish a better one in its place. Madame
+Sand, though with a strong perception of the terrible difficulties
+besetting a ministry which, to quote her own words, would need, in order
+to acquit itself successfully, "the genius of a Napoleon and the heart
+of Christ," never relaxed an instant in the enforcement, both by example
+and exhortation, of her conviction that it was the duty of all true
+patriots and philanthropists to consecrate their energies to the cause
+of the new republic.
+
+"My heart is full and my head on fire," she writes to a fellow-worker in
+the same cause. "All my physical ailments, all my personal sorrows are
+forgotten. I live, I am strong, active, I am not more than twenty years
+old." The exceptional situation of the country was one in which,
+according to her opinion, it behooved men to be ready not only with
+loyalty and devotion, but with fanaticism if needed. She worked hard
+with her son and her local allies at the ungrateful task of
+revolutionizing Le Berry, which, she sighs, "is very drowsy." In March
+she came up to Paris and placed her services as journalist and partizan
+generally at the disposal of Ledru-Rollin, Minister of the Interior
+under the new Government. "Here am I already doing the work of a
+statesman," she writes from Paris to her son at Nohant, March 24. Her
+indefatigable energy, enabling her as it did to disdain repose, was
+perhaps the object of envy to the statesmen themselves. At their disgust
+when kept up all night by the official duties of their posts, she laughs
+without mercy. Night and day her pen was occupied, now drawing up
+circulars for the administration, now lecturing the people in political
+pamphlets addressed to them. To the _Bulletin de la République_, a
+government journal started with the laudable purpose of preserving a
+clear understanding between the mass of the people in the provinces and
+the central government, she became a leading contributor. For the festal
+invitation performances given to the people at the "Théâtre de la
+République," where Rachel sang the Marseillaise and acted in _Les
+Horaces_, Madame Sand wrote a little "occasional" prologue, _Le Roi
+Attend_, a new and democratic version of Molière's _Impromptu de
+Versailles_. The outline is as follows:--Molière is discovered impatient
+and uneasy; the King waits, and the comedians are not ready. He sinks
+asleep, and has a vision, in which the muse emerges out of a cloud,
+escorted by Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Shakespeare, and
+Beaumarchais, to each of whom are assigned a few lines--where possible,
+lines of their own--in praise of equality and fraternity. They vanish,
+and Molière awakes; his servant announces to him that the King
+waits--but the King this time is, of course, the people, to whom Molière
+now addresses his flattering speech in turn.
+
+But the fervor of heroism that fired everybody in the first days of
+successful revolution, that made the leaders disinterested, the masses
+well-behaved, reasonable, and manageable, was for the majority a flash
+only; and the dreamed-of social ideal, touched for a moment was to
+recede again into the far distance. It was Madame Sand's error, and no
+ignoble one, to entertain the belief that a nation could safely be
+trusted to the guidance of a force so variable and uncontrollable as
+enthusiasm, and that the principle of self-devotion could be relied upon
+as a motive power. The divisions, intrigues, and fatal complications
+that quickly arose at head-quarters confirmed her first estimation of
+the practical dangers ahead. She clung to her belief in the sublime
+virtues of the masses, and that they would prove themselves grander,
+finer, more generous than all the mighty and the learned ones upon
+earth. But each of the popular leaders in turn was pronounced by her
+tried and found wanting. None of the party chiefs presented the
+desirable combination of perfect heroism and political genius. Michel,
+the apostle who of old had converted her to the cause, she had long
+scorned as a deserter. Leroux, in the moment of action, was a nonentity.
+Barbès "reasons like a saint," she observes, "that is to say, very ill
+as regards the things of this world." Lamartine was a vain trimmer;
+Louis Blanc, a sectarian; Ledru-Rollin, a weathercock. "It is the
+characters that transgress," she complains naïvely as one after the
+other disappointed her. Her own shortcomings on the score of patience
+and prudence were, it must be owned, no less grave. Her
+clear-sightedness was unaccompanied by the slightest dexterity of
+action. Years before, in one of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_, she had
+passed a criticism on herself as a political worker, the accuracy of
+which she made proof of when carried into the vortex. "I am by nature
+poetical, but not legislative, warlike, if required, but never
+parliamentary. By first persuading me and then giving me my orders some
+use may be made of me, but I am not fit for discovering or deciding
+anything."
+
+Such an influence, important for raising an agitation, was null for
+controlling and directing the forces thus set in motion. In the
+application of the theories she had accepted she was as weak and obscure
+as she was emphatic and eloquent in the preaching of them. Little help
+could she afford the republican leaders in dealing with the momentous
+question how to fulfill the immense but confused aspirations they had
+raised, how to show that their principles could answer the necessities
+of the moment.
+
+The worst, perhaps, that can be said of Madame Sand's political
+utterances is that they encouraged the people in their false
+belief--which belief she shared--that the social reforms so urgently
+needed could be worked rapidly by the Government, providing only it were
+willing. Over-boldness of expression on the part of advanced sections
+only increased the timidity and irresolution of action complained of in
+the administration. As the ranks of the Ministry split up into factions,
+Madame Sand attached herself to the party of Ledru-Rollin--in whom at
+that time she had confidence,--a party that desired to see him at the
+head of affairs, and that included Jules Favre, Étienne Arago, and
+Armand Barbès. No more zealous political partizan and agent than Madame
+Sand. The purpose in view was to preserve a cordial _entente_ between
+these trusted chiefs and the masses whose interests they represented and
+on whose support they relied. To this end she got together meetings of
+working-men at her temporary Parisian abode, addressing them in speech
+and in print, and seemingly blind in the heat of the struggle to the
+enormous danger of playing with the unmanageable, unreasoning instincts
+of the crowd. She still cherished the chimera dear to her
+imagination--the prospective vision of the French people assembling
+itself in large masses, and deliberately and pacifically giving
+expression to its wishes.
+
+Into the _Bulletin de la République_ there crept soon a tone of
+impatience and provocation, improper and dangerous in an official organ.
+The 16th number, which appeared on April 16, at a moment when the
+pending general elections seemed likely to be overruled by
+reactionaries, contained the startling declaration that if the result
+should thus dissatisfy the Paris people, these would manifest their will
+once more, by adjourning the decision of a false national
+representation.
+
+This sentence, which came from the pen of Madame Sand, was interpreted
+into a threat of intimidation from the party that would make
+Ledru-Rollin dictator, and created a considerable stir. There was,
+indeed, no call for a fresh brand of discord in the republican ranks.
+Almost simultaneously came popular demonstrations of a menacing
+character. Ledru-Rollin disavowed the offending _Bulletin_; but the
+growing uneasiness of the _bourgeoisie_, the unruly discontent among the
+workmen, the Government, embarrassed and utterly disorganized, was
+powerless to allay. Madame Sand began to perceive that the republic of
+her dreams, the "republican republic," was a forlorn hope, though still
+unconscious that even heavier obstacles to progress existed in the
+governed many than in the incapacity or personal ambition of the
+governing few. She writes to her son from Paris, April 17:--
+
+     I am sad, my boy. If this goes on, and in some sense there should
+     be no more to be done, I shall return to Nohant to console myself
+     by being with you. I shall stay and see the National Assembly,
+     after which I think I shall find nothing more here that I can do.
+
+At the _Fête de la Fraternité_, April 20th, the spectacle of a million
+of souls putting aside and agreeing to forget all dissensions, all
+wrongs in the past and fears for the future, and uniting in a burst of
+joyous exultation, filled her with enthusiasm and renewed hope. But the
+demonstration of the 15th of May, of which she was next a spectator,
+besides its mischievous effect in alarming the quiet classes and
+exciting the agitators afresh, gave fatal evidence of the national
+disorganization and uncontrollable confusion everywhere prevailing, that
+had doomed the republic from the hour of its birth.
+
+Madame Sand, though she strenuously denied any participation or sympathy
+with this particular manifestation, was closely associated in the
+public mind with those who had aided and abetted the uprising. During
+the gathering of the populace, which she had witnessed, mingling
+unrecognized among the crowd, a female orator haranguing the mob from
+the lower windows of a _café_ was pointed out to her, and she was
+assured that it was George Sand. During the repressive measures the
+administration was led to take she felt uncertain whether the arrest of
+Barbès might not be followed by her own. Some of her friends advised her
+to seek safety in Italy, where at that time the partisans of liberty
+were more united and sanguine. She turned a deaf ear. But she was
+severed now from all influential connection with those in authority.
+Before the end of May she left for Nohant, with her hopes for the rapid
+regeneration of her country on the wane. "I am afraid for the future,"
+she writes to the imprisoned Barbès, shortly after these events. "I
+suffer for those who do harm and allow harm to be done without
+understanding it.... I see nothing but ignorance and moral weakness
+preponderating on the face of the globe."
+
+Through the medium of the press, notably of the journal _La Vraie
+République_, she continued to give plain expression to her sentiments,
+regardless of the political enmities she might excite, and of the
+personal mortification to which she was exposed, even at Nohant, which
+with its inmates had recently become the mark for petty hostile
+"demonstrations." Alluding to these, she writes:--
+
+     Here in this Berry, so romantic, so gentle, so calm and good, in
+     this land I love so tenderly, and where I have given sufficient
+     proof to the poor and uneducated that I know my duties towards
+     them, I myself in particular am looked upon as the enemy of the
+     human race; and if the Republic has not kept its promises, it is I,
+     clearly, who am the cause.
+
+The term "communist," caught up and passed from mouth to mouth, was
+flung at Madame Sand and her son by the peasants, whose ideas as to its
+significance were not a little wild. "A pack of idiots," she writes to
+Madame Marliani, "who threaten to come and set fire to Nohant. Brave
+they are not, neither morally nor physically; and when they come this
+way and I walk through the midst of them they take off their hats; but
+when they have gone by they summon courage to shout, 'Down with the
+communists.'"
+
+The ingratitude of many who again and again had received succor from her
+and hers, she might excuse on account of their ignorance, but the extent
+of their ignorance was an obstacle to immediate progress whose weight
+she had miscalculated.
+
+"I shall keep my faith," she writes to Joseph Mazzini at this
+crisis--"the idea, pure and bright, the eternal truth will ever remain
+for me in my heaven, unless I go blind. But hope is a belief in the near
+triumph of one's faith. I should not be sincere if I said that this
+state of mind had not been modified in me during these last months."
+
+The terrible insurrection of June followed, and overwhelmed her for the
+time. It was not only that her nature, womanly and poetical, had the
+greatest horror of bloodshed. The spectacle of the republicans
+slaughtering each other, of the evil passions stirred, the frightful
+anarchy, ended but at a frightful cost, the complete extinction of all
+hopes,--nothing left rampant but fear, rancor and distrust,--was
+heart-rendering to her whose heart had been thrown into the national
+troubles. Great was the panic in Berry, an after-clap of the
+disturbances in the capital. Madame Sand's position became more
+unpleasant than ever. She describes herself as "_blasée d
+outrages_--threatened perpetually by the coward hatreds and imbecile
+terrors of country places." But to all this she was well-nigh insensible
+in her despair over the public calamities oppressing her nation--the end
+of all long-struggling aspirations in "frightful confusion, complete
+moral anarchy, a morbid condition, in most which the courageous of us
+lost heart and wished for death.
+
+"You say that the _bourgeoisie_ prevails," she writes to Mazzini, in
+September, 1848, "and that thus it is quite natural that selfishness
+should be the order of the day. But why does the _bourgeoisie_ prevail,
+whilst the people is sovereign, and the principle of its sovereignty,
+universal suffrage, is still standing? We must open our eyes at last,
+and the vision of reality is horrible. The majority of the French people
+is blind, credulous, ignorant, ungrateful, wicked, and stupid; it is
+_bourgeoisie_ itself!"
+
+Under no conceivable circumstances is it likely that Madame Sand would
+not very soon have become disgusted with active politics, for which her
+temperament unfitted her in every respect. Impetuous and
+uncompromisingly sincere, she was predestined to burn her fingers; proud
+and independent, to become something of a scape-goat, charged with all
+the follies and errors which she repudiated, as well as with those for
+which she was more or less directly responsible.
+
+For some time to come she remained in comparative seclusion at Nohant.
+She had not ceased her propaganda, though obliged to conduct it with
+greater circumspection. After the horrors of civil warfare, had come the
+cry for order at any price, and France had declared for the rule of
+Louis Bonaparte. During the course of events that consolidated his
+power, Madame Sand withdrew more and more from the strife of political
+parties. She had been, and we shall find her again, inclined to hope for
+better things for France from its new master than time showed to be in
+store. Other republicans besides herself had been disposed to build high
+their hopes of this future "saviour of society" in his youthful days of
+adversity and mysterious obscurity. When in confinement at the fortress
+of Ham, in 1844, Louis Napoleon sent to George Sand his work on the
+Extinction of Pauperism. She wrote back a flattering letter in which,
+however, with characteristic sincerity, she is careful to remind him
+that the party to which she belonged could never acknowledge any
+sovereign but the people; that this they considered to be incompatible
+with the sovereignty of one man; that no miracle, no personification of
+popular genius in a single individual, could prove to them the right of
+that individual to sovereign power.
+
+Since then she had seen the people supreme, and been forced to own that
+they knew not what they wanted, nor whither they were going, divided in
+mind, ferocious in action. Among the leaders, she had seen some
+infatuated by the allurements of personal popularity, and the rest
+showing, by their inability to cope with the perplexities of
+administrative government, that so far philosophical speculations were
+of no avail in the actual solution of social problems.
+
+The result of her disenchantment was in no degree the overthrow of her
+political faith. A conviction was dawning on her that her social ideal
+was absolutely impracticable in any future that she and her friends
+could hope to live to see. But the belief on which she founded her
+social religion was one in which she never wavered; a certainty that a
+progress, the very idea of which now seemed chimerical, would some day
+appear to all as a natural thing; nay, that the stream of tendency would
+carry men towards this goal in spite of themselves.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+PASTORAL TALES.
+
+
+"So you thought," wrote Madame Sand to a political friend, in 1849,
+"that I was drinking blood out of the skulls of aristocrats. Not I! I am
+reading Virgil and learning Latin." And her best propaganda, as by and
+by she came to own, was not that carried on in journals such as _La
+Vraie République_ and _La Cause du Peuple_. Through her works of
+imagination she has exercised an influence more powerful and universal,
+if indirect.
+
+Among the more than half a hundred romances of George Sand, there stands
+out a little group of three, belonging to the period we have now
+reached--the _mezzo cammin_ of her life--creations in a special style,
+and over which the public voice, whether of fastidious critics or
+general readers, in France or abroad, has been and remains unanimous in
+praise.
+
+In these, her pastoral tales, she hit on a new and happy vein which she
+was peculiarly qualified to work, combining as she did, intimate
+knowledge of French peasant life with sympathetic interest in her
+subject and lively poetic fancy. Here she affronts no prejudices,
+advances no startling theories, handles no subtle, treacherous social
+questions, and to these compositions in a perfectly original _genre_ she
+brought the freshness of genius which "age cannot wither," together with
+the strength and finish of a practiced hand.
+
+Peasants had figured as accessories in her earlier works. The rustic
+hermit and philosopher, Patience, and Marcasse the rat-catcher, in
+_Mauprat_, are note-worthy examples. In 1844 had appeared _Jeanne_, with
+its graceful dedication to Françoise Meillant, the unlettered
+peasant-girl who may have suggested the work she could not read--one of
+a family of rural proprietors, spoken of by Madame Sand in a letter of
+1843 as a fine survival of a type already then fast vanishing--of
+patriarchally constituted family-life, embodying all that was grand and
+simple in the forms of the olden time.
+
+In _Jeanne_, Madame Sand had first ventured to make a peasant-girl the
+central figure of her novel, though still so far deferring to the
+received notions of what was essential in order to interest the "gentle"
+reader as to surround her simple heroine with personages of rank and
+education. Jeanne herself, moreover, is an exceptional and a highly
+idealized type--as it were a sister to Joan of Arc, not the inspired
+warrior-maid, but the visionary shepherdess of the Vosges. Yet the
+creation is sufficiently real. The author had observed how favorable was
+the life of solitude and constant communion with nature led by many of
+these country children in their scattered homesteads, to the development
+of remarkable and tenacious individuality. So with the strange and
+poetical Jeanne, too innately refined to prosper in her rough human
+environment, yet too fixedly simple to fare much better in more
+cultivated circles. She is the victim of a sort of celestial stupidity
+we admire and pity at once. In this study of a peasant heroine resides
+such charm as the book possesses, and the attempt was to lead on the
+author to the productions above alluded to, _La Mareau Diable_,
+_François le Champi_, and _La Petite Fadette_. Of this popular trio the
+first had been published already two years before the Revolution, in
+1846; the second was appearing in the Feuilleton of the _Journal des
+Débats_ at the very moment of the breaking of the storm, which
+interrupted its publication awhile. When those tumultuous months were
+over, and Madame Sand, thrown out of the hurly-burly of active politics,
+was brought back by the course of events to Nohant, she seems to have
+taken up her pen very much where she had laid it down. The break in her
+ordinary round of work made by the excitements of active statesmanship
+was hardly perceptible, and in 1849 _Le Champi_ was followed by _La
+Petite Fadette_.
+
+_La Mare au Diable_, George Sand's first tale of exclusively
+peasant-life, is usually considered her masterpiece in this _genre_. It
+was suggested to her, she tells us, by Holbein's dismal engraving of
+death coming to the husbandman, an old, gaunt, ragged, over-worked
+representative of his tribe--grim ending to a life of cheerless poverty
+and toil!
+
+Here was the dark and painful side of the laborer's existence--a true
+picture, but not the whole truth. There was another and a bright side,
+which might just as allowably be represented in art as the dreary one,
+and which she had seen and studied. In Berry extreme poverty was the
+exception, and the agriculturist's life appeared as it ought to be,
+healthy, calm, and simple, its laboriousness compensated by the soothing
+influences of nature, and of strong home affections.
+
+This little gem of a work is thoroughly well-known. The ploughing-scene
+in the opening--ploughing as she had witnessed it sometimes in her own
+neighborhood, fresh, rough ground broken up for tillage, the plough
+drawn by four yoke of young white oxen new to their work and but
+half-tamed, has a simplicity and grandeur of effect not easy to parallel
+in modern art. The _motif_ of the tale is that you often go far to
+search for the good fortune that lies close to your door. Never was so
+homely an adage more freshly and prettily illustrated; yet how slight
+are the materials, how plain is the outline! Germain, the well-to-do,
+widowed laborer, in the course of a few miles' ride, a journey
+undertaken in order to present himself and his addresses to the rich
+widow his father desires him to woo, discovers the real life-companion
+he wants in the poor girl-neighbor, whom he patronizingly escorts on her
+way to the farm where she is hired for service. It all slowly dawns upon
+him, in the most natural manner, as the least incidents of the journey
+call out her good qualities of head and heart--her helpfulness in
+misadventure, forgetfulness of self, unaffected fondness for children,
+instinctively recognized by Germain's little boy, who, with his
+unconscious childish influence, is one of the prettiest features in the
+book. Germain, by his journey's end, has his heart so well engaged in
+the right quarter that he is proof against the dangerous fascinations of
+the coquettish widow.
+
+There is a breath of poetry over the picture, but no denaturalization
+of the uncultured types. Germain is honest and warm-hearted, but not
+bright of understanding; little Marie is wise and affectionate, but as
+unsentimentally-minded as the veriest realist could desire. The native
+caution and mercenary habit of thought of the French agricultural class
+are indicated by many a humorous touch in the pastorals of George Sand.
+
+Equally pleasing, though not aiming at the almost antique simplicity of
+the _Mare au Diable_, is the story of _François le Champi_, the
+foundling, saved from the demoralization to which lack of the softening
+influences of home and parental affection predestine such unhappy
+children, through the tenderness his forlorn condition inspires in a
+single heart--that of Madeline Blanchet, the childless wife, whose own
+wrongs, patiently borne, have quickened her commiseration for the wrongs
+of others. Her sympathy, little though it lies in her power to manifest
+it, he feels, and its incalculable worth to him, which is such that the
+gratitude of a whole life cannot do more than repay it.
+
+Part of the narrative is here put into the mouth of a peasant, and told
+in peasant language, or something approaching to it. Over the propriety
+of this proceeding, adopted also in _Les Maîtres Sonneurs_, French
+critics are disagreed, though for the most part they regret it. It is
+not for a foreigner to decide between them. One would certainly regret
+the absence of some of the extremely original and expressive words and
+turns of speech current among the rural population, forms which such a
+method enabled her to introduce into the narrative as well as into the
+dialogue.
+
+_La Petite Fadette_ is not only worthy of its predecessors but by many
+will be preferred to either. There is something particularly attractive
+in the portraits of the twin brothers--partly estranged by character,
+wholly united by affection,--and in the figure of Fanchon Fadet, an
+original in humble life, which has made this little work a general
+favorite wherever it is known.
+
+These prose-idylls have been called "The Georgics of France." It is
+curious that in a country so largely agricultural, and where nature
+presents more variety of picturesque aspect than perhaps in any other in
+Europe, the poetic side of rural life should have been so sparingly
+represented in her imaginative literature. French poets of nature have
+mostly sought their inspiration out of their own land, "In France,
+especially," observes Théophile Gautier, "all literary people live in
+town, that is in Paris the centre, know little of what is unconnected
+with it, and most of them cannot tell wheat from barley, potatoes from
+beetroot." It was a happy inspiration that prompted Madame Sand to fill
+in the blank, in a way all her own, and her task as we have seen was
+completed, revolutions notwithstanding. She owns to having then felt the
+attraction experienced in all time by those hard hit by public
+calamities, "to throw themselves back on pastoral dreams, all the more
+naïve and childlike for the brutality and darkness triumphant in the
+world of activity." Tired of "turning round and round in a false circle
+of argument, of accusing the governing minority, but only to be forced
+to acknowledge after all that they were put there by the choice of the
+majority," she wished to forget it all: and her poetic temperament which
+unfitted her for success in politics assisted her in finding consolation
+in nature.
+
+Moreover a district like Le Berry, singularly untouched by corruptions
+of the civilization, and preserving intact many old and interesting
+characteristics, was a field in which she might draw from reality many
+an attractive picture. She was as much rallied by town critics about her
+shepherdesses as though she had invented them. And yet she saw them
+every day, and they may be seen still by any wanderer in those lanes,
+and at every turn, Fanchons, Maries, Nanons, as she described them,
+tending their flock of from five to a dozen sheep, or a few geese, a
+goat and a donkey, all day long between the tall hedgerows, or on the
+common, spinning the while, or possibly dreaming. A certain refinement
+of cast distinguishes the type. Eugène Delacroix, in a letter describing
+a village festival at Nohant, remarks that if positive beauty is rare
+among the natives, ugliness is a thing unknown. A gentle, passive cast
+of countenance prevails among the women: "They are all St. Annes," as
+the artist expresses it. The inevitable changes brought about by
+steam-communication, which have as yet only begun to efface the local
+habits and peculiarities, must shortly complete their work. George
+Sand's pastoral novels will then have additional value, as graphic
+studies of a state of things that has passed away.
+
+It does not appear that the merit of these stories was so quickly
+recognized as that of _Indiana_ and _Valentine_. The author might
+abstract herself awhile from passing events and write idylls, but the
+public had probably not yet settled down into the proper state of mind
+for fully enjoying them. Moreover Madame Sand's antagonists in politics
+and social science, as though under the impression that she could not
+write except to advance some theory of which they disapproved,
+pre-supposed in these stories a set purpose of exalting the excellence
+of rustic as compared with polite life--of exaggerating the virtues of
+the poor, to throw into relief the vices of the rich. The romances
+themselves do not bear out such a supposition. In them the author
+chooses exactly the same virtues to exalt, the same vices to condemn, as
+in her novels of refined society. She shows us intolerance, selfishness,
+and tyranny of custom marring or endangering individual happiness among
+the working-classes, as with their superiors. There are Philistines in
+her thatched cottages, as well as in her marble halls. Germain, in _La
+Mare au Diable_, has some difficulty to discover for himself, as well as
+to convince his family and neighbors, that in espousing the penniless
+Marie he is not marrying beneath him in every sense. François le Champi
+is a pariah, an outcast in the estimation of the rustic world. Fanchon
+Fadet, by her disregard of appearances and village etiquette,
+scandalizes the conservative minds of farmers and millers very much as
+Aurore Dupin scandalized the leaders of society at La Châtre. Most
+prominence is given to the more pleasing characters, but the existence
+of brutality and cupidity among the peasant classes is nowhere kept out
+of sight. Her long practical acquaintance with these classes indeed was
+fatal to illusions on the subject. The average son of the soil was as
+far removed as any other living creature from her ideal of humanity, and
+at the very time when she penned _La Petite Fadette_ she was
+experiencing how far the ignorance, ill-will, and stupidity of her
+poorer neighbors could go.
+
+Thus she writes from Nohant to Barbès at Vincennes, November 1848:
+"Since May, I have shut myself up in prison in my retreat, where, though
+without the hardships of yours, I have more to suffer than you from
+sadness and dejection, ... and am less in safety." Threatened by the
+violence and hatred of the people, she had painfully realized that she
+and her party had their most obstinate enemies among those whom they
+wished and worked to save and defend.
+
+Her profound discouragement finds expression in many of her letters from
+1849 to 1852. The more sanguine hopes of Mazzini and other of her
+correspondents she desires, but no longer expects, to see fulfilled. She
+compares the moral state of France to the Russian retreat; the soldiers
+in the great army of progress seized with vertigo, and seeking death in
+fighting with each other.
+
+To her son, who was in Paris at the time of the disturbances in May,
+1849, she writes:--
+
+     Come back, I implore you. I have only you in the world, and your
+     death would be mine. I can still be of some small use to the cause
+     of truth, but if I were to lose you it would be all over with me. I
+     have not got the stoicism of Barbès and Mazzini. It is true they
+     are men, and they have no children. Besides, in my opinion it is
+     not in fight, not by civil war, that we shall win the cause of
+     humanity in France. We have got universal suffrage. The worse for
+     us if we do not know how to avail ourselves of it, for that alone
+     can lastingly emancipate us, and the only thing that would give us
+     the right to take up arms would be an attempt on their part to take
+     away our right to vote.
+
+During the two years preceding the _coup d'état_ of December, 1851, life
+at Nohant had resumed its wonted cheerfulness of aspect. Madame Sand was
+used to surround herself with young people and artistic people; but now,
+amid their light-heartedness, she had for a period to battle with an
+extreme inward sadness, confirmed by the fresh evidence brought by these
+years of the demoralization in all ranks of opinion. "Your head is not
+very lucid when your heart is so deeply wounded," she had remarked
+already, after the disasters of 1848, "and how can one help suffering
+mortally from the spectacle of civil war and the slaughter among the
+people?"
+
+To that was now added a loss of faith in the virtues of her own party,
+as well as of the masses. It is no wonder if she fell out of love for
+awhile with the ideals of romance, with her own art of fiction, and the
+types of heroism that were her favorite creations. But if the shadow of
+a morbid pessimism crept over her mind, she could view it now as a
+spiritual malady which she had yet the will and the strength to live
+down; as years before she had surmounted a similar phase of feeling
+induced by personal sorrow.
+
+Already, in 1847, she had begun to write her _Memoirs_, and reverting to
+them now, she found there work that suited her mood, as dealing with the
+past, more agreeable to contemplate just then than the present or the
+future.
+
+However, in September, 1850, we find her writing to Mazzini,--after
+dwelling on the present shortcomings of the people, and the mixture of
+pity and indignation with which they inspired her: "I turn back to
+fiction and produce, in art, popular types such as I see no longer; but
+as they ought to be and might be." She alludes to a play on which she
+was engaged, and continues: "The dramatic form, being new to me, has
+revived me a little of late; it is the only kind of work into which I
+have been able to throw myself for a year."
+
+The events of December, 1851, surprised her during a brief visit to
+Paris. Her hopes for her country had sunk so low, that she owns herself
+at the moment not to have regarded the _coup d'état_ as likely to prove
+more disastrous to the cause of progress than any other of the violent
+ends which threatened the existing political situation. She left the
+capital in the midst of the cannonade, and with her family around her at
+Nohant awaited the issue of the new dictatorship.
+
+The wholesale arrests that followed immediately, and filled the country
+with stupefaction, made havoc on all sides of her. Among the victims
+were comrades of her childhood, numbers of her friends and acquaintance
+and their relatives--as well in Berry as in the capital--many arrested
+solely on suspicion of hostility to the President's views, yet none the
+less exposed to chances of death, or captivity, or exile.
+
+The crisis drove Madame Sand once more to quit the privacy of her
+country life, but this time in the capacity of intercessor with the
+conqueror for his victims. She came up to Paris, and on January 20,
+1852, addressed a letter to the President, imploring his clemency for
+the accused generally in an admirably eloquent appeal to his sentiments
+as well of justice as of generosity. The plea she so forcibly urged,
+that according to his own professions mere opinion was not to be
+prosecuted as a crime, whereas the so-called "preventive measures" had
+involved in one common ruin with his active opponents those who had been
+mere passive spectators of late events, was, of course, unanswerable.
+The future Emperor granted her two audiences within a week at the
+Elysée, in answer to her request, and he succeeded on the first occasion
+in convincing her that the acts of iniquity and intimidation perpetrated
+as by his authority were as completely in defiance of his public
+intentions as of his private principles. As a personal favor to herself,
+he readily offered her the release of any of the political prisoners
+that she choose to name, and promised that a general amnesty should
+speedily follow. She left him, reassured to some extent as to the fate
+in store for her country. The second interview she had solicited in
+order to plead the cause of one of her personal friends, condemned to
+transportation. The mission was a delicate one, for her client would
+engage himself to nothing for the future, and Madame Sand, in
+petitioning for his release, saw no better course open to her than as
+expressed by herself, frankly to denounce him to the President as his
+"incorrigible personal enemy." Upon this the President granted her the
+prisoner's full pardon at once. Madame Sand was naturally touched by
+this ready response of the generous impulse to which she had trusted. To
+those who cast doubts on the sincerity of any good sentiment in such a
+quarter, she very properly replied that it was not for her to be the
+first to discredit the generosity she had so successfully appealed to.
+
+But between her republican friends, loth to owe their deliverance to the
+tender mercies of Louis Napoleon, and her own desire to save their lives
+and liberties, and themselves and their families from ruin and despair,
+she found her office of mediator a most unthankful one. She persisted
+however in unwearying applications for justice and mercy, addressed both
+to the dictator directly, and through his cousin, Prince Napoleon
+(Jerome), between whom and herself there existed a cordial esteem. She
+clung as long as she could to her belief in the public virtue of the
+President, or Emperor as he already began to be called here and there.
+But the promised clemency limited itself to a number of particular cases
+for whom she had specially interceded.
+
+The subsequent conditions of France precluded all free emission of
+socialist or republican opinions, but Madame Sand desired nothing better
+than to send in her political resignation; and it is impossible to share
+the regret of some of her fellow-republicans at finding her again
+devoting her best energies to her art of fiction, and in November, 1853,
+writing to Mazzini such words of wisdom as these:--
+
+     You are surprised that I can work at literature. For my part, I
+     thank God that he has let me preserve this faculty; for an honest
+     and clear conscience like mine still finds, apart from all debate,
+     a work of moralization to pursue. What should I do if I relinquish
+     my task, humble though it be? Conspire? It is not my vocation; I
+     should make nothing of it. Pamphlets? I have neither the wit nor
+     the wormwood required for that. Theories? We have made too many,
+     and have fallen to disputing, which is the grave of all truth and
+     all strength. I am, and always have been, artist before everything
+     else. I know that mere politicians look on artists, with great
+     contempt, judging them by some of those mountebank-types which are
+     a disgrace to art. But you, my friend, you well know that a real
+     artist is as useful as the _priest_ and the _warrior_, and that
+     when he respects what is true and what is good, he is in the right
+     path where the divine blessing will attend him. Art belongs to all
+     countries and to all time, and its special good is to live on when
+     all else seems to be dying. That is why Providence delivers it from
+     passions too personal or too general, and has given to its
+     organization patience and persistence, an enduring sensibility, and
+     that contemplative sense upon which rests invincible faith.
+
+Her novel, _Les Maîtres Sonneurs_, the first-fruits of the year 1853, is
+what most will consider a very good equivalent for party pamphlets and
+political diatribes.
+
+When composing _La Mare au Diable_, in 1846, Madame Sand looked forward
+to writing a series of such peasant tales, to be collectively entitled
+_Les Veillées du Chanvreur_, the hemp-beaters being, as will be
+recollected, the Scheherazades of each village. Their number was never
+to be thus augmented, but the idea is recalled by the chapter-headings
+of _Les Maîtres Sonneurs_, in which Étienne Despardieu, or Tiennet, the
+rustic narrator, tells, in the successive _veillées_ of a month, the
+romance of his youth. It is a work of a very different type to the rural
+tales that had preceded it, and should be regarded apart from them. It
+is longer, more complex in form and sentiment, more of an ideal
+composition. _Les Maîtres Sonneurs_, is a delightful pastoral, woodland
+fantasy, standing by itself among romances much as stands a kindred work
+of imagination, "As You Like It," among plays, yet thoroughly
+characteristic of George Sand, the nature-lover, the seer into the
+mysteries of human character, and the imaginative artist. The agreeable
+preponderates in the story, but it has its tragic features and its
+serious import. A picturesque and uncommon setting adds materially to
+its charm. Every thread tells in this delicate piece of fancy-work, and
+the weaver's art is indescribable. But one may note the ingenuity with
+which four or five interesting yet perfectly natural types are brought
+into a group and contrasted; improbable incidents so handled as not to
+strike a discordant note, the characteristics of the past introduced
+without ever losing hold of the links, the points of identity between
+past and present. The scene is the hamlet of Nohant itself; the time is
+a century ago, when the country, half covered with forest, was wilder,
+the customs rougher, the local coloring stronger than even Madame Sand
+in her childhood had known them. The personages belong to the rural
+proprietor class. The leading characters are all somewhat out of the
+common, but such exist in equal proportions in all classes of society,
+and there is ample evidence besides George Sand's of notable examples
+among the French peasantry. The plot and its interest lie in the
+development of character and the fine tracing of the manner in which the
+different characters are influenced by circumstances and by each other.
+If the beauty of rustic maidens, and of rustic songs and dance-music, as
+here described, seem to transcend probability, it must be remembered it
+is a peasant who speaks of these wonders, and as wonders they might
+appear to his limited experience. As a musical novel, it has the
+ingenious distinction of being told from the point of view of the sturdy
+and honest, but unartistic and non-musical Tiennet; a typical
+Berrichon. Madame Sand was of opinion that during the long occupation of
+Berry by the English the two races had blended extensively, and she
+would thus account for some of the heavier, more inexpansive qualities
+of our nation having become characteristic of this French province.
+
+More than one English reader of _Les Maîtres Sonneurs_ may have been
+struck by the picture there presented of peasant-folk in a state of
+peace and comfort, such as we do not suppose to have been common in
+France before the Revolution. Madame Sand has elsewhere explained how,
+as a fact, Nohant, and other estates in the region round about, had
+enjoyed some immunity from the worst abuses of the _ancien régime_.
+Several of these properties, as it happened, had fallen to women or
+minors--widows, elderly maiden ladies, who, and their agents, spared the
+holders and cultivators of the soil the exactions which, by right or by
+might, its lords were used to levy. "So the peasants," she writes, "were
+accustomed not to put themselves to any inconvenience; and when came the
+Revolution they were already so well relieved virtually from feudal
+bonds that they took revenge on nobody." A new _seigneur_ of Nohant,
+coming to take possession, and thinking to levy his utmost dues, in
+cash and in kind, found his rustic tenants turn a deaf ear to his
+summons. Ere he could insist the storm burst, but it brought no
+convulsion, and merely confirmed an independence already existing.
+
+_Les Maîtres Sonneurs_, whilst illustrating some of the most striking
+merits of George Sand, is free from the defects often laid to her
+charge; and although of all her pastorals it must suffer the most when
+rendered in any language but the original, it is much to be regretted
+that some good translation of this work should not put it within the
+reach of all English readers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+PLAYS AND LATER NOVELS.
+
+
+There are few eminent novelists that have not tried their hands at
+writing for the stage; and Madame Sand had additional inducements to do
+so, beyond those of ambition satiated with literary success, and tempted
+by the charm of making fresh conquest of the public in a more direct and
+personal fashion.
+
+From early childhood she had shown a strong liking for the theatre. The
+rare performances given by travelling acting-companies at La Châtre had
+been her greatest delight when a girl. At the convent-school she had
+arranged Molière from memory for representation by herself and her
+school-fellows, careful so to modify the piece as to avoid all
+possibility of shocking the nuns. Thus the Sisters applauded _Le Malade
+Imaginaire_ without any suspicion that the author was one whose works,
+for them, were placed under a ban, and whose very name they held in
+devout abhorrence. She inherited from her father a taste for acting,
+which she transmitted to her children. We have seen her during her
+literary novitiate in Paris, a studious observer at all theatres, from
+the classic boards of the Français down to the lowest of popular stages,
+the Funambules, where reigned at that time a real artist in pantomime,
+Débureau. His Pierrot, a sort of modified Pulchinello, was renowned; and
+attracted more fastidious critics to his audience than the Paris
+artisans whose idol he was. Since then Madame Sand had numbered among
+her personal friends such leading dramatic celebrities as Madame Dorval,
+Bocage, and Pauline Garcia. "I like actors," she says playfully, "which
+has scandalized some austere people. I have also been found fault with
+for liking the peasantry. Among these I have passed my life, and as I
+found them, so have I described them. As these, in the light of the sun,
+give us our daily bread for our bodies, so those by gaslight give us our
+daily bread of fiction, so needful to the wearied spirit, troubled by
+realities." Peasants and players seem to be the types of humanity
+farthest removed from each other, and it is worthy of remark that George
+Sand was equally successful in her presentation of both.
+
+Her preference for originality and spontaneity before all other
+qualities in a dramatic artist was characteristic of herself, though
+not of her nation. Thus it was that Madame Dorval, the heroine of
+_Antony_ and _Marion Delorme_, won her unbounded admiration. Even in
+Racine she clearly preferred her to Mlle. Mars, as being a less studied
+actress, and one who abandoned herself more to the inspiration of the
+moment. The effect produced, as described by Madame Sand, will be
+understood by all keenly alive, like herself, to the enjoyment of
+dramatic art. "She" (Madame Dorval) "seemed to me to be myself, more
+expansive, and to express in action and emotion all that I seek to
+express in writing." And compared with such an art, in which conception
+and expression are simultaneous, her own art of words and phrases would
+at such moments appear to her as but a pale reflection.
+
+Bocage, the great character actor of his time, was another who likewise
+appealed particularly to her sympathies, as the personation, on the
+boards, of the protest of the romantic school against the slavery of
+convention and tradition. Her acquaintance with him dated from the first
+representation of Hugo's _Lucrèce Borgia_, February, 1833, when Bocage
+and the author of _Indiana_, then strangers to each other, chanced to
+sit side by side. In their joint enthusiasm over the play they made the
+beginning of a thirty years' friendship, terminated only by Bocage's
+death in 1862. "It was difficult not to quarrel with him," she says of
+this popular favorite; "he was susceptible and violent; it was
+impossible not to be reconciled with him quickly. He was faithful and
+magnanimous. He forgave you admirably for wrongs you had never done him,
+and it was as good and real as though the pardon had been actual and
+well-founded, so strong was his imagination, so complete his good
+faith."
+
+The assistance of Madame Dorval, added to the strength of the Comédie
+Française company, did not, however, save from failure Madame Sand's
+first drama, _Cosima_, produced, as will be remembered, in 1840. She
+allowed nearly a decade to elapse before again seriously competing for
+theatrical honors, by a second effort in a different style, and more
+satisfactory in its results.
+
+This, a dramatic adaptation by herself of her novel, _François le
+Champi_, was produced at the Odéon in the winter of 1849. Generally
+speaking, to make a good play out of a good novel, the playwright must
+begin by murdering the novel; and here, as in all George Sand's dramatic
+versions of her romances, we seem to miss the best part of the original.
+However, the curious simplicity of the piece, the rustic scenes and
+personages, here faithfully copied from reality, unlike the conventional
+village and villager of opera comique, and the pleasing sentiment that
+runs through the tale, were found refreshing by audiences upon whom the
+sensational incidents and harrowing emotions of their modern drama were
+already beginning to pall. The result was a little stage triumph for
+Madame Sand. It helped to draw to her pastoral tales the attention they
+deserved, but had not instantly won in all quarters. Théophile Gautier
+writes playfully of this piece: "The success of _François le Champi_ has
+given all our vaudeville writers an appetite for rusticity. Only let
+this go on a little, and we shall be inundated by what has humorously
+been called the 'ruro-drama.' Morvan hats and Berrichon head-dresses
+will invade the scenes, and no language be spoken but in dialect."
+
+Madame Sand was naturally encouraged to repeat the experiment. This was
+done in _Claudie_ (1851) and _Le Pressoir_ (1853), ruro-dramas both, and
+most favorably received. The first-named has a simple and pathetic
+story, and, as usual with Madame Sand's plays, it was strengthened at
+its first production by the support of some of the best acting talent in
+Paris--Fechter, then a rising _jeune premier_, and the veteran Bocage
+ably representing, respectively, youth and age. Old Berrichon airs were
+introduced with effect, as also such picturesque rustic festival customs
+as the ancient harvest-home ceremony, in which the last sheaf is brought
+on a wagon, gaily decked out with poppies, cornflowers and ribbons, and
+receives a libation of wine poured by the hand of the oldest or youngest
+person present.
+
+"But what the theatre can never reproduce," laments Madame Sand, "is the
+majesty of the frame--the mountain of sheaves solemnly approaching,
+drawn by three pairs of enormous oxen, the whole adorned with flowers,
+with fruit, and with fine little children perched upon the top of the
+last sheaves."
+
+Henceforward a good deal of her time and interest continued to be
+absorbed by these dramatic compositions. But though mostly eliciting
+during her lifetime a gratifying amount of public favor and applause,
+the best of them cannot for an instant be placed in the same high rank
+as her novels. For with all her wide grasp of the value of dramatic art
+and her exact appreciation of the strength and weakness of the acting
+world, her plays remain, to great expectations, uniformly disappointing.
+Her specialty in fiction lies in her favorite art of analyzing and
+putting before us, with extreme clearness, the subtlest ramifications,
+the most delicate intricacies of feeling and thought. A stage audience
+has its eyes and ears too busy to give its full attention to the finer
+complications of sentiment and motive; or, at least, in order to keep
+its interest alive and its understanding clear, an accentuation of
+outline is needed, which she neglects even to seek.
+
+Her assertion, that the niceties of emotion are sufficient to found a
+good play upon, no one now will dream of disputing. But for this an art
+of execution is needed of which she had not the instinct. The action is
+insufficient, or rather, the sense of action is not conveyed. The
+slightness of plot--a mere thread in most instances--requires that the
+thread shall at least be never allowed to drop. But she cuts or slackens
+it perpetually, long arguments and digressions intervening, and the
+dialogue, whose monotony is unrelieved by wit, nowhere compensates for
+the limited interest of the action. Awkward treatment is but half felt
+when subject and situations are dramatically strong; but plays with so
+airy and impalpable a basis as these need to be sustained by the utmost
+perfection of construction, concision and polish of dialogue.
+
+Her novel _Mauprat_ has many dramatic points, and she received a score
+of applications for leave to adapt it to the stage. She preferred to
+prepare the version herself, and it was played in the winter of 1853-4,
+with moderate success. But it suffers fatally from comparison with its
+original. An extreme instance is _Flaminio_ (1854), a protracted drama,
+drawn by Madame Sand from her novelette _Teverino_. This is a
+fantasy-piece whose audacity is redeemed, as are certain other
+blemishes, by the poetic suggestiveness of the figure of Madeline, the
+bird-charmer; whilst the picturesque sketch of Teverino, the idealized
+Italian bohemian, too indolent to turn his high natural gifts to any
+account, has proved invaluable to the race of novelists, who are not yet
+tired of reproducing it in large. The work is one addressed mainly to
+the imagination.
+
+In the play we come down from the clouds; the poetry is gone, taste is
+shocked, fancy uncharmed, the improbabilities become grotesque, and the
+whole is distorted and tedious. Madame Sand's personages are never weary
+of analyzing their sentiments. Her flowing style, so pleasant to read,
+carries us swiftly and easily through her dissertations in print, before
+we have time to tire of them. On the stage such colloquies soon appear
+lengthy and unnatural. The climax of absurdity is reached in _Flaminio_,
+where we find the adventurer expatiating to the man of the world on
+"the divinity of his essence."
+
+There is scarcely a department of theatrical literature in which Madame
+Sand does not appear as an aspirant. She was a worshipper of
+Shakespeare, acknowledging him as the king of dramatic writers. For her
+attempt to adapt "As You Like It" to suit the tastes of a Parisian
+audience, she disarms criticism by a preface in the form of a letter to
+M. Régnier, of the Comédie Française, prefixed to the printed play. Here
+she says plainly that to resolve to alter Shakespeare is to resolve to
+murder, and that she aims at nothing more than at giving the French
+public some idea of the original. In "As You Like It" the license of
+fancy taken is too wide for the piece to be safely represented to her
+countrymen, since it must jar terribly on "that French reason which,"
+remarks Madame Sand, "we are so vain of, and which deprives us of so
+many originalities quite as precious as itself." The fantastic, which
+had so much attraction for her (possibly a result of her part German
+origin), is a growth that has hard work to flourish on French soil. The
+reader will remember the fate of Weber's _Freischütz_, outrageously
+hissed when first produced at Paris in its original form. Nine days
+later it was reproduced, having been taken to pieces and put together
+again by M. Castil-Blaze, and thus as _Robin des Bois_ it ran for 357
+nights. The reckless imagination that distinguishes the Shakespearian
+comedy and does not shrink before the introduction of a lion and a
+serpent into the forest of Arden, and the miraculous and instantaneous
+conversion of the wretch Oliver into a worthy suitor for Celia, needed
+to be toned down for acceptance by the Parisians. But Madame Sand was
+less fortunate than M. Castil-Blaze. Her version, produced at the
+Théâtre Français, in 1856, failed to please, although supported by such
+actors as Delaunay, Arnold-Plessy, and Favart. Macready, who had made
+Madame Sand's acquaintance in 1845, when he was giving Shakespearian
+performances in Paris, and whom she greatly admired, dedicating to him
+her little theatrical romance _Le Château des Désertes_, was present at
+this representation and records it as a failure. But of her works for
+the stage, which number over a score, few like her _Comme il vous
+plaira_ missed making some mark at the time, the prestige of her name
+and the exceptionally favorable circumstances under which they were
+produced securing more than justice for their intrinsic merit. It was
+natural that she should over-estimate their value and continue to add to
+their number. These pieces would be carefully rehearsed on the little
+stage in the house at Nohant, often with the aid of leading professional
+actors; and there, at least, the success was unqualified.
+
+Her ingenious novel _Les Beaux Messieurs Bois Doré_, dramatized with the
+aid of Paul Meurice and acted in 1862, was a triumph for Madame Sand and
+her friend Bocage. The form and spirit of this novel seem inspired by
+Sir Walter Scott, and though far from perfect, it is a striking instance
+of the versatility of her imaginative powers. The leading character of
+the septuagenarian Marquis, with his many amiable virtues, and his one
+amiable weakness, a longing to preserve intact his youthfulness of
+appearance as he has really preserved his youthfulness of heart, is both
+natural and original, comic and half pathetic withal. The part in the
+play seemed made for Bocage, and his heart was set upon undertaking it.
+But his health was failing at the time, and the manager hesitated about
+giving him the rôle. "Take care, my friend," wrote Bocage to Madame
+Sand; "perhaps I shall die if I play the part; but if I play it not, I
+shall die of that, to a certainty." She insisted, and play it he did, to
+perfection, she tells us. "He did not act the Marquis de Bois Doré; he
+was the personage himself, as the author had dreamt him." It was to be
+his last achievement, and he knew it. "It is my end," he said one
+night, "but I shall die like a soldier on the field of honor." And so he
+did, continuing to play the rôle up till a few days before his death.
+
+More lasting success has attended Madame Sand in two of the lightest of
+society comedies, _Le Mariage de Victorine_ and _Le Marquis de
+Villemer_, which seem likely to take a permanent place in the
+_répertoire_ of the French stage. The first, a continuation that had
+suggested itself to her of Sedaine's century-old comedy, _Le Philosophe
+sans le savoir_, escapes the ill fate that seems to attend sequels in
+general. It is of the slightest materials, but holds together, and is
+gracefully conceived and executed. First produced at the Gymnase in
+1851, it was revived during the last year of Madame Sand's life in a
+manner very gratifying to her, being brought out with great applause at
+the Comédie Française, preceded on each occasion by Sedaine's play, and
+the same artists appearing in both.
+
+The excellent dramatic version of her popular novel _Le Marquis de
+Villemer_, first acted in 1864, is free from the defects that weaken
+most of her stage compositions. It is said that in preparing it she
+accepted some hints from Alexander Dumas the younger. Whatever the
+cause, the result is a play where characters, composition and dialogue
+leave little to be desired.
+
+_L'autre_, her latest notable stage success, brings us down to 1870,
+when it was acted at the Gymnase, Madame Sarah Bernhardt impersonating
+the heroine. This not very agreeable play is derived, with material
+alterations, from Madame Sand's agreeable novel _La Confession d'une
+jeune Fille_, published in 1864.
+
+If, however, her works for the stage, which fill four volumes, added but
+little, in proportion to their quantity, to her permanent fame, her
+dramatic studies added fresh interest and variety to her experience,
+which brought forth excellent fruit in her novels. Actors, their art and
+way of life have fared notoriously badly in fiction. Such pictures have
+almost invariably fallen into the extreme of unreality or that of
+caricature, whether for want of information or want of sympathy in those
+who have drawn them.
+
+The subject, always attractive for Madame Sand, is one in which she is
+always happy. Already in the first year of her literary career her keen
+appreciation of the art and its higher influences had prompted her
+clever novelette _La Marquise_. Here she illustrates the power of the
+stage as a means of expression--of the truly inspired actor, though his
+greatness be but momentary, and his heroism a semblance, to strike a
+like chord in the heart of the spectator--and, in a corrupt and
+artificial age, to keep alive some latent faith in the ideal. Since
+then the stage and players had figured repeatedly in her works.
+Sometimes she portrays a perfected type, such as Consuelo, or Impéria in
+_Pierre qui roule_, but always side by side with more earthly and faulty
+representatives such as Corilla and Anzoleto, or Julia and Albany, in
+Narcisse, incarnations of the vanity and instability that are the chief
+dangers of the profession, drawn with unsparing realism. In _Le Château
+des Désertes_ we find further many admirable theories and suggestive
+ideas on the subject of the regeneration of the theatre. But it fared
+with her theatrical as with her political philosophy: she failed in its
+application, not because her theories were false, but for want of
+practical aptitude for the craft whose principles she understood so
+well.
+
+It is impossible here to do more than cast a rapid glance over the
+literary work accomplished by George Sand during the first decade of the
+empire. It includes more than a dozen novels, of unequal merit, but of
+merit for the most part very high. The _Histoire de ma Vie_ was
+published in 1855. It is a study of chosen passages out of her life,
+rather than a connected autobiography. One out of the four volumes is
+devoted to the story of her father's life before her birth; two more to
+the story of her childhood and girlhood. The fourth rather indicates
+than fully narrates the facts of her existence from the time of her
+marriage till the Revolution of 1848. It offers to her admirers
+invaluable glimpses into her life and mind, and is a highly interesting
+and characteristic composition, if a most irregular chronicle. It has
+given rise to two most incompatible-sounding criticisms. Some have been
+chiefly struck by its amazing unreserve, and denounced the
+over-frankness of the author in revealing herself to the public. Others
+complain that she keeps on a mask throughout, and never allows us to see
+into the recesses of her mind. Her passion for the analysis of sentiment
+has doubtless led her here, as in her romances, to give very free
+expression to truths usually better left unspoken. But her silence on
+many points about which her readers, whether from mere curiosity or some
+more honorable motive, would gladly have been informed, was then
+inevitable. It could not have been broken without wounding the
+susceptibilities of living persons, which she did right in respecting,
+at the cost of disappointment to an inquisitive public.
+
+In January, 1855, a terrible domestic sorrow befell her in the loss of
+her six-years-old grandchild, Jeanne Clésinger, to whom she was devoted.
+It affected her profoundly. "Is there a more mortal grief," she
+exclaims, "than to outlive, yourself, those who should have bloomed upon
+your grave?" The blow told upon her mentally and physically; she could
+not rally from its effects, till persuaded to seek a restorative in
+change of air and scene, which happily did their work.
+
+"I was ill," she says, when writing of these events to a lady
+correspondent, later in the same year; "my son took me away to Italy....
+I have seen Rome, revisited Florence, Genoa, Frascati, Spezia,
+Marseilles. I have walked a great deal, been out in the sun, the rain,
+the wind, for whole days out of doors. This, for me, is a certain
+remedy, and I have come back cured."
+
+Those who care to follow the mind of George Sand on this Italian journey
+may safely infer from _La Daniella_, a novel written after this tour,
+and the scene of which is laid in Rome and the Campagna, that the
+author's strongest impression of the Eternal City was one of
+disillusion. Her hero, a Berrichon artist on his travels, confesses to a
+feeling of uneasiness and regret rather than of surprise and admiration.
+The ancient ruins, stupendous in themselves, seemed to her spoilt for
+effect by their situation in the center of a modern town. "Of the Rome
+of the past not enough exists to overwhelm me with its majesty; of the
+Rome of the present not enough to make me forget the first, and much too
+much to allow me to see her."
+
+But the Baths of Caracalla, where the picture is not set in a frame of
+hideous houses, awakened her native enthusiasm. "A grandiose ruin," she
+exclaims, "of colossal proportions; it is shut away, isolated, silent
+and respected. There you feel the terrific power of the Cæsars, and the
+opulence of a nation intoxicated with its royalty over the world."
+
+So in the Appian Way, the road of tombs, the fascination of
+desolation--a desolation there unbroken and undisfigured by modern
+buildings or otherwise--she felt to the full. But whatever came under
+her notice she looked on with the eye of the poet and artist, not of the
+archæologist, and approved or disapproved or passed over it accordingly.
+
+The beauties of nature, at Tivoli and Frascati, appealed much more
+surely to her sympathies. But of certain sites in the Campagna much
+vaunted by tourists and hand-books she remarks pertinently: "If you were
+to pass this village" (Marino) "on the railway within a hundred miles of
+Paris, you would not pay it the slightest attention." Such places had
+their individuality, but she upheld that there is not a corner in the
+universe, "however common-place it may appear, but has a character of
+its own, unique in this world, for any one who is disposed to feel or
+comprehend it." In one of her village tales a sagacious peasant
+professes his profound contempt for the man who cannot like the place he
+belongs to.
+
+Neither the grottoes and cascades of Tivoli, the cypress and ilex
+gardens of Frascati and Albano, nor the ruins of Tusculum, were ever so
+pleasant to her eyes as the poplar-fringed banks of the Indre, the
+corn-land sand hedgerows of Berry, and the rocky borders of the Creuse
+at Crozant and Argenton. She had not ceased making fresh picturesque
+discoveries in her own neighborhood. Of these she records an instance in
+her pleasant _Promenades autour d'un village_, a lively sketch of a few
+days' walking-tour on the banks of the Creuse, undertaken by herself and
+some naturalist friends in June, 1857. In studying the interesting and
+secluded village of Gargilesse, with its tenth-century church and crypt
+with ancient frescoes, its simple and independent-minded population, in
+following the course of a river whose natural wild beauties, equal to
+those of the Wye, are as yet undisfigured here by railroad or the hand
+of man, lingering on its banks full of summer flowers and butterflies,
+exploring the castles of Châteaubrun and La Prugne au Pot, George Sand
+is happier, more herself, more communicative than in Rome, "the museum
+of the universe."
+
+The years 1858 to 1861 show her to us in the fullest conservation of her
+powers and in the heyday of activity. The group of novels belonging to
+this period, the climax of what may be called her second career, is
+sufficiently remarkable for a novelist who was almost a sexagenarian,
+including _Elle et Lui_, _L'Homme de Neige_, _La Ville Noire_,
+_Constance Verrier_, _Le Marquis de Villemer_ and _Valvèdre_. _Elle et
+Lui_, in which George Sand at last broke silence in her own defense on
+the subject of her rupture with Alfred de Musset, first appeared in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1859. Though many of the details are
+fictitious, the author here told the history of her relations with the
+deceased poet much too powerfully for her intention to be mistaken or to
+escape severe blame. That a magnanimous silence would have been the
+nobler course on her part towards the child of genius whose good genius
+she had so signally failed to be, need not be disputed. It must be
+remembered, however, that De Musset on his side had not refrained during
+his lifetime from denouncing in eloquent verse the friend he had
+quarreled with, and satirizing her in pungent prose. Making every
+possible allowance for poetical figures of speech, he had said enough to
+provoke her to retaliate. It is impossible to suppose that there was not
+another side to such a question. But Madame Sand could not defend
+herself without accusing her lost lover. She often proved herself a
+generous adversary--too generous, indeed, for her own advantage--and in
+this instance it was clearly not for her own sake that she deferred her
+apology.
+
+It is even conceivable that the poet, when in a just frame of mind, and
+not seeking inspiration for his _Nuit de Mai_ or _Histoire d'un Merle
+blanc_, would not have seen in _Elle et Lui_ a falsification of the
+spirit of their history. The theorizing of the outside world in such
+matters is of little worth; but the novel bears, conspicuously among
+Madame Sand's productions, the stamp of a study from real life, true in
+its leading features. And the conduct of the heroine, Therèse, though
+accounted for and eloquently defended, is by no means, as related,
+ideally blameless. After an attachment so strong as to induce a
+seriously-minded person, such as she is represented, to throw aside for
+it all other considerations, the hastiness with which, on discovering
+her mistake, she entertains the idea of bestowing her hand, if not her
+heart, on another, is an exhibition of feminine inconsequence which no
+amount of previous misconduct on the part of her lover, Laurent, can
+justify. Further, Therèse is self-deceived in supposing her passion to
+have died out with her esteem. She breaks with the culprit and engages
+her word to a worthier man. But enough remains over of the past to
+prevent her from keeping the promise she ought never to have made. When
+she sacrifices her unselfish friend to return to the lover who has made
+her miserable, she is sincere, but not heroic. She is too weak to shake
+off the influence of the fatal infatuation and shut out Laurent from her
+life, nor yet can she accept her heart's choice for better or worse,
+even when experience has left her little to learn with regard to
+Laurent. Clearly both friend and lover, out of a novel, would feel
+wronged. Therèse's excuse lies in the extremely trying character of her
+companion, whose vagaries may be supposed to have driven her beside
+herself at times, just as her airs of superiority and mute reproach may
+have driven him not a little mad. Those who wish to know in what spirit
+Madame Sand met the attacks upon her provoked by this book, will find
+her reply in a very few words at the conclusion of her preface to _Jean
+de la Roche_, published the same year.
+
+Most readers of _Elle et Lui_ have been so preoccupied with the
+question of the rights and wrongs of the originals in their behavior to
+each other, so inclined to judge of the book according to its supposed
+accuracy or inaccuracy as a matter of history, that its force, as a
+study of the attraction that so often leads two exceptional but
+hopeless, irreconcilable spirits to seek in each other a refuge from the
+isolation in which their superiority places them, has been somewhat
+overlooked. Laurent, whether a true portrait or not, is only too true to
+nature; excessive in his admirable powers and in his despicable
+weakness. Therèse is an equally faithful picture of a woman not quite up
+to the level of her own principles, which are so high that any lapse
+from them on her part brings down more disasters on herself and on
+others than the misdemeanors of avowedly unscrupulous persons.
+
+Within a few months of _Elle et Lui_ had appeared _L'Homme de Neige_,[D]
+a work of totally different but equally characteristic cast. The
+author's imagination had still all its old zest and activity, and
+readers for whom fancy has any charm will find this Scandinavian romance
+thoroughly enjoyable. The subject of the marionette theater, here
+introduced with such brilliant and ingenious effect, she had studied
+both historically and practically. She and her son found it so
+fascinating that, years before this time, a miniature stage had been
+constructed by the latter at Nohant, over which he presided, and which
+they and their friends found an endless source of amusement. Madame Sand
+wrote little dramas expressly for such representations, and would sit up
+all night, making dresses for the puppets. In an agreeable little
+article she has devoted to the subject, she describes how from the
+crudest beginnings they succeeded in elaborating their art to a high
+pitch; the _répertoire_ of their lilliputian theater including more than
+twenty plays, their "company" over a hundred marionettes.
+
+To the next year, 1860, belong the pleasant tale of artisan life, _La
+Ville Noire_, and the well-known and popular _Marquis de Villemer_,
+notable as a decided success in a _genre_ seldom adopted by her, that of
+the purely society novel.
+
+Already Madame Sand had outlived the period of which she was so
+brilliant a representative. After the Romantic movement had spent its
+force, a reaction had set in that was influencing the younger school of
+writers, and that has continued to give the direction to successful
+talent until the present day. Of the so-called "realism," Madame Sand
+said that it was nothing new. She saw there merely another form of the
+same revolt of nature against affectation and convention which had
+prompted the Romantic movement, whose disciples had now become guilty of
+affectation in their turn. _Madame Bovary_ she pronounced with truth to
+be but concentrated Balzac. She was ready to perceive and do justice to
+the great ability of the author, as to original genius in any school;
+thus of Tourguénief she speaks with enthusiasm: "Realist to see all,
+poet to beautify all, great heart to pity and understand all." But she
+deplored the increasing tendency among artists to give the preference
+among realities to the ugliest and the most painful. Her personal
+leanings avowedly were towards the other extreme; but she was too
+large-minded not to recognize that truth in one form or another must
+always be the prime object of the artist's search. The manner of its
+presentation will vary with the age.
+
+     Let the realists, if they like, go on proclaiming that all is
+     prose, and the idealists that all is poesy. The last will have
+     their rainy days, the first their days of sunshine. In all arts the
+     victory remains with a privileged few, who go their own ways; and
+     the discussions of the "schools" will pass away like old fashions.
+
+On the generation of writers that George Sand saw growing up, any
+opinion pronounced must be premature. But with regard to herself, it
+should now be possible to regard her work in a true perspective. As with
+Byron, Dickens, and other popular celebrities, a phase of infinite
+enthusiasm for her writings was duly succeeded by a phase of determined
+depreciation. The public opinion that survives when blind friendship and
+blind enmity have done their worst is likely to be the judgment of
+posterity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+ARTIST AND MORALIST.
+
+
+On what, in the future, will the fame of George Sand mainly rest?
+According to some critics, on her gifts of fertile invention and fluent
+narration alone, which make her novels attractive in spite of the
+chimerical theories, social, political and religious, everywhere
+interwoven. According to other judges again, her fictions transcend and
+are likely to outlive other fictions by virtue of certain eternal
+philosophic verities which they persistently set forth, and which give
+them a serious interest the changes in novel-fashions cannot effect.
+
+The conclusion seems inevitable that whilst the artistic strength of
+George Sand's writings is sufficient to command readers among those most
+out of harmony with her views, to minds in sympathy with her own these
+romances, because they express and enforce with earnestness, sincerity
+and fire, the sentiments of a poetic soul, a generous heart, and an
+immense intelligence, on subjects of consequence to humanity, have a
+higher value than can attach to skillful development of plot and
+intrigue, mere display of literary cleverness, or of the storings of
+minute observation.
+
+Her opinions themselves have been widely misapprehended, perhaps because
+her personality--or rather that imaginary personage, the George Sand of
+the myths--has caused a confusion in people's minds between her ideal
+standard and her individual success in keeping up to it. We would not
+ignore the importance of personal example in one so famous as herself.
+We may pass by eccentricities not inviting to imitation; for if any of
+her sex ever thought to raise themselves any nearer to the level of
+George Sand by smoking or wearing men's clothes, such puerility does not
+call for notice. Still, the influence she strenuously exerted for good
+as a writer for the public would have worked more clearly had she never
+seemed to swerve from the high principles she expressed, or been led
+away by the disturbing forces of a nature calm only on the surface.
+Nothing is more baffling than the incomplete revelations of a very
+complex order of mind, with its many-sided sympathies and its apparent
+contradictions. The self-justification she puts forward for her errors
+is sometimes sophistical, but not for that insincere. She is not trying
+to make us her dupes; she is the dupe herself of her dangerous
+eloquence. But her moral worth so infinitely outweighed the alloy as to
+leave but little call, or even warrant, for dwelling on the latter. "If
+I come back to you," said her old literary patron Delatouche, into whose
+disfavor she had fallen awhile, when he came years after to ask for the
+restitution of the friendship he had slighted, "it is that I cannot help
+myself, and your qualities surpass your defects."
+
+To pass from herself to her books, no one has made more frank, clear and
+unchanging confession of their heart's faith or their head's principles.
+Her creed was that which has been, and ever will be in some guise, the
+creed of minds of a certain order. She did not invent it. Poets,
+moralists, theologians, have proclaimed it before her and after her. She
+found for it a fresh mode of expression, one answering to the needs of
+the age to which she belonged.
+
+It is in the union of rare artistic genius with an almost as rare and
+remarkable power of enthusiasm for moral and spiritual truth that lies
+her distinguishing strength. Most of her novels--all her best
+novels--share this characteristic of seeming to be prompted by the
+double and equal inspiration of an artistic and a moral purpose.
+Wherever one of these preponderates greatly, or is wanting altogether,
+the novel falls below her usual standard.
+
+For in several qualities reckoned important her work is open to
+criticism. "Plan, or the want of it," she acknowledges, with a sort of
+complacency, "has always been my weak point." Thus whilst in many of her
+compositions, especially the shorter novels, the construction leaves
+little to be desired, _Consuelo_ is only one among many instances in
+which all ordinary rules of symmetry and proportion are set at naught.
+Sometimes the leading idea assumed naturally and easily a perfect form;
+if simple, as in _André_ and her pastorals, it usually did so; but if
+complex, she troubled herself little over the task of symmetrical
+arrangement. M. Maxime Du Camp reports that she said to him: "When I
+begin a novel I have no plan; it arranges itself whilst I write, and
+becomes what it may." This fault shocks less in England, where genius is
+apt to rebel against the restrictions of form, and such irregularity has
+been consecrated, so to speak, by the masterpieces of the greatest among
+our imaginative writers. And even the more precise criticism of her
+countrymen has owned that this carelessness works by no means entirely
+to her disadvantage. In fictions more faultless as literary compositions
+the reader, whilst struck with admiration for the art with which the
+whole is put together, is apt to lose something of the illusion--the
+impression of nature and conviction. The faults of no writer can be more
+truly defined as the _défauts de ses qualités_ than those of George
+Sand. Shorn of her spontaneity, she would indeed be shorn of her
+strength. We are carried along by the pleasant, easy stream of her
+musical eloquence, as by an orator who knows so well how to draw our
+attention that we forget to find him too long. Her stories may be read
+rapidly, but to be enjoyed should be read through. Dipped into and their
+parts taken without reference to the whole, they can afford
+comparatively but little pleasure.
+
+In translation no novelist loses more than George Sand,--who has so much
+to lose! The qualities sacrificed, though almost intangible, are
+essential to the force of her charm. The cement is taken away and the
+fabric coheres imperfectly; and whilst the beauties of her manner are
+blurred, its blemishes appear increased; the lengthiness, over-emphasis
+of expression, questionable taste of certain passages, become more
+marked. Although nevertheless many of her tales remain pleasant reading,
+they suffer as much as translated poetry, and only a very inadequate
+impression of her art as a novelist can be arrived at from any rendering
+of it in a foreign tongue.
+
+Her dialogue has neither brilliancy nor variety. Her characters
+characterize themselves by the sentiments they express; their manner of
+expression is somewhat uniform--it is the manner of George Sand; and
+although pleasant humor and good-natured fun abound in her pages, these
+owe none of their attractions to witty sayings, being curiously bare of
+a _bon mot_ or an epigram.
+
+But we find there the rarer merits of a poetic imagination, a vast
+comprehension of nature, admirable insight into human character and
+power of clear analysis; a whole science of sentiment and art of
+narrative, and a charm of narrative style that soothes the nerves like
+music.
+
+She has given us a long gallery of portraits of extraordinary variety.
+It is true that her creations for the most part affect us rather as
+masterly portraits than as living, walking men and women. This is
+probably owing to the above-noted sameness of style of dialogue, and the
+absence generally of the dramatic quality in her novels. On the other
+hand they are extremely picturesque, in the highest sense, abounding in
+scenes and figures which, without inviting to the direct illustration
+they are too vivid to need, are full of suggestions to the artist. The
+description in _Teverino_ of Madeleine, the bird-charmer, kneeling at
+prayer in the rude mountain chapel, or outside on the rocks, exercising
+her natural magic over her feathered friends; in _Jeanne_, of the
+shepherd-girl discovered asleep on the Druidical stones; the noon-day
+rest of the rustic fishing-party in _Valentine_--Benedict seated on the
+felled ash-tree that bridges the stream, Athenaïs gathering
+field-flowers on the banks, Louise flinging leaves into the current,
+Valentine reclining dreamily among the tall river-reeds,--are a few
+examples taken at random, which it would be easy to multiply _ad
+infinitum_.
+
+Any classification of her works in order of time that professes to show
+a progressive change of style, a period of super-excellence or of
+distinct decadence, seems to us somewhat fanciful. From _Indiana_ and
+its immediate successors, denounced by so many as fraught with peril to
+the morals of her nation, down to _Nanon_ (1872), which might certainly
+carry off the prize of virtue in a competition in any country, George
+Sand can never be said to have entirely abandoned one "manner" for
+another, or for any length of time to have risen above or sunk below a
+certain level of excellence. _André_, extolled by her latest critics as
+"a delicious eclogue of the fields," was contemporary with the
+bombastic, false Byronism of _Jacques_; the feeble narrative of _La Mare
+au Diable_ with the passion-introspection of _Lucrezia Floriani_. The
+ever-popular _Consuelo_ immediately succeeded the feeble _Compagnon du
+Tour de France_. _La Marquise_, written in the first year of her
+literary life, shows a power of projection out of herself, and of
+delicate analysis, hardly to be surpassed; but _Francia_, of forty
+years' later date, is an equally perfect study. From the time of
+_Indiana_ onwards she continued to produce at the rate of about two
+novels a year; and at intervals, rare intervals, the product was a
+failure. But we shall find her when approaching seventy still writing
+on, without a trace of the weakness of old age.
+
+The charge of "unreality" so commonly brought against her novels it may
+be well briefly to examine. Such little fantasy-pieces in Hoffmann's
+manner as _Le Château des Désertes_, _Teverino_, and others, making no
+pretense to be exact studies of nature, cannot fairly be censured on
+this head. Like fairy tales they have a place of their own in art. One
+of the prettiest of these is _Les Dames Vertes_, in which the fable
+seems to lead us over the borders of the supernatural; but the secret of
+the mystification, well kept till the last, is itself so pleasing and
+original that the reader has no disappointing sense as of having had a
+hoax played upon his imagination.
+
+In character drawing no one can, on occasion, be a more uncompromising
+realist than George Sand. André, Horace, Laurent in _Elle et Lui_,
+Pauline, Corilla, Alida in _Valvèdre_, might be cited as examples. But
+her theory was unquestionably not the theory which guides the modern
+school of novel writers. She wrote, she states explicitly, for those
+"who desire to find in a novel a sort of ideal life." She made this her
+aim, but without depreciation of the widely different aims of other
+authors. "You paint mankind as they are," she said to Balzac; "I, as
+they ought to be, or might become. You write the comedy of humanity. I
+should like to write the eclogue, the poem, the romance of humanity."
+She has been taxed with flattering nature and human nature because her
+love of beauty--defined by her as the highest expression of
+truth--dictated her choice of subjects. An artist who paints roses
+paints from reality as entirely as he who paints mud. Her principle was
+to choose among realities those which seemed best worth painting.
+
+The amount of idealization in her peasant sketches was naturally
+over-estimated by those who, never having studied the class, could not
+conceive of a peasant except conventionally, as a drunken boor. The very
+just portrait of Cecilia Boccaferri, the conscientious but obscure
+artist in _Le Château des Désertes_, might seem over-flattered to such
+as imagine that all opera-singers must be persons of riotous living. The
+types she prefers to present, if exceptional, are not impossible or
+non-existent. An absolutely faultless heroine, such as Consuelo, she
+seldom attempts to bring before us; an ideal hero; never.
+
+Further, even when the idealism is greatest the essence is true. Her
+most fanciful conceptions, most improbable combinations, seem more
+natural than do every-day scenes and characters treated by inferior
+artists. This is only partly due to the inimitable little touches of
+nature that renew the impression of reality at every page. Her
+imagination modified her material, but only in order the more vividly to
+illustrate truths positive and everlasting. So did Shakespeare when he
+drew Prospero and Miranda, Caliban and Ariel. Art, as regarded by George
+Sand, is a search for ideal truth rather than a study of positive
+reality. This principle determined the spirit of her romances. She was
+the highest in her _genre_; let the world decide which _genre_ is the
+highest.
+
+When, after the publication of _Indiana_, _Valentine_, _Lélia_ and
+_Jacques_, the moral tendency of her works was so sharply attacked, it
+was contended on her behalf by some friendly critics that art and
+social morality have no necessary connection--a line of defense she
+would have been the last to take up for herself. In the present day her
+judges complain rather of her incessant moralizing, and on the whole
+with more reason. She indignantly denied that her novels had the evil
+tendencies imputed to them. Certainly the supposition of the
+antagonistic spirit of her writings to Christianity and marriage
+vanishes in proportion to the reader's acquaintance with her works. But
+against certain doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church
+which she believed to be pernicious in their influence, she from the
+first declared war, and by her frank audacity made bitter enemies. M.
+Renan relates that when he was a boy of fifteen his ecclesiastical
+superiors showed him George Sand, emblematically portrayed for the
+admonition of the youth under their care, as a woman in black trampling
+on a cross! Now, it is not merely that her own faith was eminently
+Christian in character, and that the Christian ideal seemed to her the
+most perfect that has yet presented itself to the mind of man; but if
+unable to accept for herself the doctrine of revelation as commonly
+interpreted, she is utterly without the aggressiveness of spirit, the
+petty flippancy, that often betray the intellectual bigot under the
+banner of free thought. She was too large-minded to incline to ridicule
+the serious convictions of earnest seekers for truth, and she respected
+all sincerity of belief--all faith that produced beneficence in action.
+
+The alleged hostility of her romances to marriage resumes itself into a
+declared hostility to the conventional French system of match-making.
+Much that she was condemned for venturing to put forward we should
+simply take for granted in England, where--whichever system work the
+best in practice--to the strictest Philistine's ideas of propriety there
+is nothing unbecoming in a love-match. The aim and end of true love in
+her stories is always marriage, whether it be the simple attachment of
+Germain, the field-laborer, for the rustic maiden of his choice, the
+romantic predilection of the rich young widow in _Pierre qui roule_ for
+the handsome actor Laurence, or the worship of Count Albert for the
+_cantatrice_ Consuelo. Her ideal of marriage was, no doubt, a high one,
+"the indissoluble attachment of two hearts fired with a like love;" a
+love "great, noble, beautiful, voluntary, eternal." Among French
+novelists she should rather be noted for the extremely small proportion
+of her numerous romances that have domestic infelicity for a theme.
+
+Her remark that their real offense was that they were a great deal too
+moral for some of their critics, hit home, inasmuch as in her attack on
+the ordinary marriage system of France she struck directly at the
+fashionable immorality which is its direct result, and which she saw,
+both in life and in literature, pass free of censure. It is the selfish
+intriguer who meets with least mercy in her pages, and who is there held
+up, not only to dislike, but to ridicule.
+
+Persons perplexed by the fact that particular novels of hers which,
+judged by certain theories, ought to be morally hurtful, do yet produce
+a very different effect, have accounted for it in different ways. One
+explains it by saying that if there is poison on one page there is
+always the antidote on the next. Another observes that a certain
+morality of misfortune is never absent from her fictions. In other
+words, she nowhere presents us with the spectacle of real happiness
+reaped at the expense of a violation of conscience. And in the rare
+cases where the purpose of the novel seems questionable, she defeats her
+own end. For truth always preponderates over error in her conceptions,
+and the result is a moral effect.
+
+The want of delicacy that not unfrequently disfigures her pages and
+offends us, offends also as an artistic fault. As a fact it is taste
+rather than conscience that she is thus apt to shock. For the almost
+passing coarseness of expression or thought is nothing more than the
+overflow, the negligent frankness of a rich and active but healthy
+nature, not the deliberate obliquity of a corrupt fancy or perverted
+mind. Such unreserve, unfortunately, has too commonly been the
+transgression of writers of superabundant energy. But her sins are
+against outward decorum rather than against the principles upon which
+the rules of decorum are based. No one was better capable of
+appreciating and indicating with fine touches, delicacy and niceties of
+taste and feeling in others. Her sympathy with such sensitiveness is a
+corrective that should render harmless what might vitiate taste if that
+qualification were absent. And her stories, though including a very few
+instances where the subject chosen seems to most English minds too
+repulsive to admit of possible redemption, and the frequent incidental
+introduction of situations and frank discussion of topics inadmissible
+in English fiction of that period--an honorable distinction it seems in
+some danger of losing in the present--can hardly be censured from the
+French standpoint, as fair critics now admit. It is inconceivable that a
+public could be demoralized by _Indiana_ and _Valentine_, at a time when
+no subject seemed wicked and morbid enough to satisfy popular taste.
+The art of George Sand in the main was sound and healthy, and in flat
+opposition to the excesses both of the ultra-romantic and ultra-realist
+schools.
+
+Clear-sighted critics, perceiving that the impression produced by her
+works is not one to induce men and women to defy the laws of their
+country, nor likely to undermine their religious faith, have gone more
+to the heart of the matter. The dangerous tendency is more insidious,
+they say, and more general. Virtue, and not vice, is made attractive in
+her books; but it is an easy virtue, attained without self-conquest. All
+her characters, good and bad, act alike from impulse. Those who seek
+virtue seek pleasure in so doing, and her philosophy of life seems to be
+that people should do as they like. The morality she commends to our
+sympathy and admiration is a morality of instinct and emotion, not of
+reason and principle. Self-renunciation, immolation of desire in
+obedience to accepted precept, is ignored. Sentiment is supreme. Duty,
+as a motive power, is set aside.
+
+George Sand, who as a writer from first to last appeared as a crusader
+against the evil, injustice and vice that darken the world, did
+undoubtedly choose rather to speak out of her heart to our hearts, than
+out of her head to our heads, and considered moreover that such was the
+more effectual way. Her idea of virtue lay not in the curbing of evil
+instincts, but in their conversion or modification by the evoking of
+good impulses, that "guiding and intensifying of our emotions by a new
+ideal" which has been called the great work of Christianity.
+
+It is not--or not in the first place--that people should do as they
+like, but that they should like to do right; and further, that human
+nature in that ideal life the sentiment of which pervades her works, and
+in which she saw "no other than the normal life as we are called to know
+it," does not desire what is hurtful to it.
+
+The goodness that consists in doing right or refraining from doing wrong
+reluctantly, or in obedience to prescribed rules, or from mechanical
+habit, had for her no life or charm. The object to be striven for should
+be nothing less than the "perfect harmony of inward desire and outward
+obligation."
+
+Virtue should be chosen, though we seem to sacrifice happiness; but that
+the two are in the beginning identical, that, as expressed by Mr.
+Herbert Spencer, "whether perfection of nature, virtuousness of action,
+or rectitude of motive, be assigned as the proper aim, the definition of
+perfection, virtue, rectitude, brings us down to happiness experienced
+in some form, at some time, by some person as the fundamental idea," is
+a philosophic truth of which a large _aperçu_ is observable in the works
+of George Sand. Self-sacrifice should spring from direct desire,
+altruism be spontaneous--a need--becoming a second and better nature;
+not won by painful effort, but through the larger development of the
+principle of sympathy. Strong in her own immense power of sympathy, she
+applied herself to the task of awakening and extending such sympathies
+in others. This she does by the creation of agreeable, interesting and
+noble types, such as may put us out of conceit with what is mean and
+base. Goodness, as understood and portrayed by her, must recommend
+itself not only to the judgment but to the heart. She worked to
+popularize high sentiments, and to give shape and reality to vague ideas
+of human excellence. Her idea of virtue as a motive, not a restraint,
+not the controlling of low and evil desires, but the precluding of all
+temptations to yield to these, by the calling out of stronger, higher
+desires, so far from being a low one, is indeed the very noblest; yet
+not on that account a chimera to those who hold, like her, to the
+conviction that "what now characterizes the exceptionally high may be
+expected eventually to characterize all. For that which the highest
+human nature is capable of is within the reach of human nature at
+large." "We gravitate towards the ideal," she writes, "and this
+gravitation is infinite, as is the ideal itself." And her place remains
+among those few great intelligences who can be said to have given
+humanity an appreciable impulse in the direction of progress.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+LATER YEARS.
+
+
+When, in 1869, Madame Sand was applied to by M. Louis Ulbach--a literary
+friend who proposed to write her biography--for some account of her life
+from that time onwards where her memoirs break off, she replied, in a
+letter now appended to those memoirs, as follows:--
+
+     For the last five-and-twenty years there is nothing more that is of
+     interest. It is old age, very quiet and very happy, _en famille_,
+     crossed by sorrows entirely personal in their nature--deaths,
+     defections, and then the general state of affairs in which we have
+     suffered, you and I, from the same causes. My time is spent in
+     amusing the children, doing a little botany, long walks in
+     summer--I am still a first-rate pedestrian--and writing novels,
+     when I can secure two hours in the daytime and two in the evening.
+     I write easily and with pleasure. This is my recreation, for my
+     correspondence is numerous, and there lies work indeed! If one had
+     none but one's friends to write to! But how many requests, some
+     touching, some impertinent! Whenever there is anything I can do, I
+     reply. Those for whom I can do nothing I do not answer. Some
+     deserve that one should try, even with small hope of succeeding.
+     Then one must answer that one will try. All this, with private
+     affairs to which one must really give attention now and then, makes
+     some ten letters a day.
+
+The old age of George Sand, brighter, fuller and more active than the
+youth of most men and women, was in itself a most signal proof of the
+stability and worth of her mental organization. Life, which deteriorates
+a frail character, told with a perfecting and elevating power upon hers.
+
+Of her earlier personal beauty few traces remained after middle age
+except a depth of expression in her eyes, the features having become
+thickened by age. Some among those who, like Dickens, first saw her in
+her later years and still looked for the semblance of a heroine of
+romance, failed to find the muse Lélia of their imaginations under the
+guise of a middle-aged _bourgeoise_. But such impressions were
+superficial. Her portrait in black and white by Couture, engraved by
+Manceau, seems to reconcile these apparent discrepancies. Beauty is not
+here, but the face is so powerful and comprehensive that we perceive
+there at once the mirror of a mind capable of embracing both the prose
+and the poetry of life; and by many this portrait is preferred to the
+earlier likenesses.
+
+Nor is there anything more remarkable in her correspondence than the
+extremely interesting series of letters, extending from February, 1863,
+to within three months of her death in 1876, and addressed to Gustave
+Flaubert, at this period her familiar friend. The intercourse of two
+minds of so different an intellectual and moral order as those of the
+authors of _Consuelo_ and of _Madame Bovary_ offers to all a curious
+study. To the admirers of George Sand these letters are invaluable, both
+from a literary point of view and as a record of her inner life from
+that time onwards, when, as expressed by herself, she resolutely buried
+youth, and owned herself the gainer by an increasing calm within. The
+secret of her future happiness she found in living for her children and
+her friends. That she retained her zest for intellectual pleasures she
+ascribed to the very fact that she never allowed herself to be absorbed
+for long in these and in herself.
+
+"Artists are spoilt children," she writes to Flaubert, "and the best of
+them are great egoists. You tell me I love them too well; I love them as
+I love woods and fields, all things, all beings that I know a little and
+make my constant study. In the midst of it all I pursue my calling; and
+how I love that calling of mine, and all that nourishes and renovates
+it!"
+
+We must now take up the thread of outward events again, which we have
+slightly anticipated.
+
+In the autumn of 1860 Madame Sand had a severe attack of typhoid fever.
+She was then on the point of beginning her little tale, _La Famille de
+Germandre_; "_le roman de ma fièvre_," she playfully terms it
+afterwards, when retracing the circumstances in a letter to her old
+friend François Rollinat:--
+
+     The day before that upon which I was suddenly taken very seriously
+     ill, I had felt quite well. I had scribbled the beginning of a
+     novel; I had placed all my personages; I knew them thoroughly; I
+     knew their situations in the world, their characters, tendencies,
+     ideas, relations to each other. I saw their faces. All that
+     remained to be known was what they were going to do, and I did not
+     trouble my head about that, having time to think it over to-morrow.
+
+Struck down on the morrow, she was for many days in a precarious
+condition; and in the confused fancies of fever found herself wandering
+with _La Famille de Germandre_ about the country, alighting in ruined
+castles, and encountering the most whimsical adventures in flood and
+field.
+
+It would have been an easy death, she remarked afterwards, had she died
+then, as she might, in her dream; but she came to herself to find her
+son and friends in such anxiety on her account, so overjoyed at her
+convalescence, that she could not but be glad of the life that was given
+back to her. Early in 1861 we find her recruiting her forces by a stay
+at Tamaris, near Toulon, completing the novel interrupted by illness;
+resuming her long walks and botanic studies, and thoroughly enjoying the
+sense of returning vital powers.
+
+She stood always in great dread of the idea of possibly losing her
+activity as she advanced in years. The infirmities of old age, however,
+she was happily to be spared, preserving her energy and mental
+faculties, as will be seen, till just before her death. But though she
+was restored to health and strength, this illness seems to have left its
+traces on her constitution.
+
+Her son's marriage to Mdlle. Calamatta, spoken of by Madame Sand as a
+heart's desire of hers at length fulfilled, took place in 1862, not many
+months after his return from half a year of travel in Africa and
+America, in the company of Prince Napoleon. The event proved a fresh
+source of the purest happiness to her, and was not to separate her from
+her son. The young people settled at Nohant, which remained her
+head-quarters. There a few years later we find her residing almost
+exclusively, except when called by matters of business to her
+_pied-à-terre_ in Paris, where she never lingered long. To the two
+little grand-daughters, Aurore and Gabrielle, whom she saw spring up in
+her home, she became passionately devoted. Most of her compositions
+henceforward are dated from Nohant, where, indeed, more than fifty years
+of her life were spent.
+
+As regards decorum of expression and temperance of sentiments, the later
+novels of George Sand have earned more praise than censure; but some
+readers may feel that in fundamental questions of taste the comparison
+between them and their forerunners is not always entirely to their
+advantage. The fervor of youth has a certain purifying power to redeem
+from offense matter, even though over-frankly treated, which becomes
+disagreeable in cold analysis, however sober the wording, and clear and
+admirable the moral pointed.
+
+_Mademoiselle La Quintinie_, which appeared in 1863, was suggested by M.
+Octave Feuillet's _Sibille_. The point of M. Feuillet's novel is, that
+Sibille, an ardent Catholic, stifles her love, and renounces her lover
+on account of his heterodox opinions. Madame Sand gives us the
+reverse--a heroine who is reflectively rather than mystically inclined,
+and whose lover by degrees succeeds in effecting her conversion to his
+more liberal views. Here, as elsewhere, the author's mind shows a
+sympathetic comprehension of the standpoint of enlightened Protestantism
+curiously rare among those who, like herself, have renounced Romanism
+for the pursuit of free thought and speculation. But even those who
+prefer the _dénoûment_ of George Sand's novel to that of M. Feuillet's
+will not rank _Mademoiselle La Quintinie_ very high among the author's
+productions. It is colorless, and artistically weak, however
+controversially strong.
+
+Madame Sand, according to her own reckoning in 1869, had made at least
+£40,000 by her writings. Out of this she had saved no fortune. She had
+always preferred to live from day to day on the proceeds of her work,
+regulating her expenses accordingly, trusting her brain to answer to any
+emergency and bring her out of the periodical financial crises in which
+the uncertainty of literary gains and the liberality of her expenditure
+involved her. She continued fond of travelling, especially of exploring
+the nooks and corners of France, felt by her to be less well known than
+they deserve, and fully as picturesque as the spots tourists go far to
+visit. Here she sought fresh frames for her novels. "If I have only
+three words to say about a place," she tells us, "I like to be able to
+refer to it in my memory so as to make as few mistakes as possible."
+
+In January, 1869, we find her writing of herself in a playful strain to
+her friend Flaubert:--
+
+     The individual called George Sand is quite well, enjoying the
+     marvelous winter now reigning in Berry, gathering flowers, taking
+     note of interesting botanic anomalies, stitching at dresses and
+     mantles for her daughter-in-law, costumes for the marionettes,
+     dressing dolls, reading music, but, above all, spending hours with
+     little Aurore, who is a wonderful child. There is not a being on
+     earth more tranquil and happier in his home than this old
+     troubadour retired from business, now and then singing his little
+     song to the moon, singing well or ill he does not particularly
+     care, so long as he gives the _motif_ that is running in his
+     head.... He is happy, for he is at peace, and can find amusement in
+     everything.
+
+M. Plauchut, another literary friend and a visitor at Nohant during this
+last decade of her lifetime, gives a picture of the order of her day; it
+is simplicity itself.
+
+Nine o'clock, in summer and in winter alike, was her hour of waking.
+Letters and newspapers would then occupy her until noon, when she came
+down to join the family _déjeûner_. Afterwards she would stroll for an
+hour in the garden and the wood, visiting and tending her favorite
+plants and flowers. At two o'clock she would come indoors to give a
+lesson to her grandchildren in the library, or work there on her own
+account, undistracted by the romps around her. Dinner at six was
+followed by a short evening walk, after which she played with the
+children, or set them dancing indoors. She liked to sit at the piano,
+playing over to herself bits of music by her favorite Mozart, or old
+Spanish and Berrichon airs. After a game of dominoes or cards she would
+still sit up so late, occupying herself with water-color painting or
+otherwise, that sometimes her son was obliged to take away the lights.
+These long evenings, the same writer bears witness, sometimes afforded
+rare opportunities of hearing Madam Sand talk of the events and the men
+of her time. In the absolute quiet of the country, among a small circle
+of responsive minds, she, so silent otherwise, became expansive. "Those
+who have never heard George Sand at such hours," he concludes, "have
+never known her. She spoke well, with great elevation of ideas, charming
+eloquence, and a spirit of infinite indulgence." When at length she
+retired, it was to write on until the morning hours according to her old
+habit, only relinquished when her health made this imperative.
+
+She had allowed her son and her daughter-in-law to take the cares of
+household management off her hands. This left her free, as she
+expressed it, to be a child again, to hold aloof from things immediate
+and transitory, reserving her thoughts and contemplations for what is
+general and eternal. She found a poet's pleasure in abstracting herself
+from human life, saying: "There are hours when I escape from myself,
+when I live in a plant, when I feel myself grass, a bird, a tree-top, a
+cloud, a running stream." Shaking off, as it were, the sense of
+personality, she felt more freely and fully the sense of kinship with
+the life and soul of the universe.
+
+It was her habit every evening to sum up in a few lines the impressions
+of the day, and this journal, for the conspicuous absence of incident in
+its pages, she compares to the log-book of a ship lying at anchor. But
+one terrible and little anticipated break in its tranquil monotony was
+yet to come.
+
+George Sand lived to see her country pass through every imaginable
+political experience. Born before the First Republic had expired, she
+had witnessed the First Empire, the restored Monarchy, the Revolution of
+1830, the reign of Louis Philippe, the convulsions of 1848, the
+presidency of Louis Bonaparte, and the Second Empire. She was still to
+see and outlive its fall, the Franco-German War, the Commune, and to
+die, as she was born, under a republic.
+
+To some of her friends who had reproached her with showing too much
+indulgence for the state of things under Imperial rule, she replied that
+the only change in her was that she had acquired more patience in
+proportion as more was required. The _régime_ she condemned--and amid
+apparent prosperity had foretold the corrupting influence on the nation
+of the established ideal of frivolity, and that a crash of some kind
+must ensue. Her judgment on the Emperor, after his fall, is worth
+noting, if only because it is dispassionate. Since his elevation to the
+Imperial dignity she had lost all old illusions as to his public
+intentions. With regard to these, on the occasion of her interviews with
+him at the Elysée, he had completely deceived her, and designedly, she
+had at first thought. Nor had she concealed her disgust.
+
+     I left Paris, and did not come to an appointment he had offered me.
+     They did not tell me "The King might have had to wait!" but they
+     wrote "The Emperor waited." However, I continued to write to him,
+     whenever I saw hopes of saving some victim, to ponder his answers
+     and watch his actions; and I became convinced that he did not
+     intentionally impose upon any one. He imposed on himself and on
+     everybody else.... In private life he had genuine qualities. I
+     happened to see in him a side that was really generous and sincere.
+     His dream of grandeur for France was not that of a sound mind, but
+     neither of an ordinary mind. Really France would have sunk too low
+     if she had submitted for twenty years to the supremacy of a
+     _crétin_, working only for himself. One would then have to give her
+     up in despair for ever and ever. The truth is that she mistook a
+     meteor for a star, a silent dreamer for a man of depth. Then seeing
+     him sink under disasters he ought to have foreseen, she took him
+     for a coward.
+
+George Sand's _Journal d'un Voyageur pendant la guerre_ has a peculiar
+and painful interest. It is merely a note-book of passing impressions
+from September, 1870, to January, 1871; but its pages give a most
+striking picture of those effects of war which have no place in military
+annals.
+
+The army disasters of the autumn were preceded by natural calamities of
+great severity. The heat of the summer in Berry had been tremendous, and
+Madame Sand describes the havoc as unprecedented in her experience--the
+flowers and grass killed, the leaves scorched and yellowed, the baked
+earth under foot literally cracking in many places; no water, no hay, no
+harvest, but destructive cattle-plague, forest-fires driving scared
+wolves to seek refuge in the courtyard of Nohant itself--the remnant of
+corn spared by the sun, ruined by hail-storms. She and all her family
+had suffered from the unhealthiness of the season. Thus the political
+catastrophe found her already weakened by anxiety and fatigue, and
+feeling greatly the effort to set to work again. Finally, an outbreak of
+malignant small-pox in the village forced her to take her little
+grandchildren and their mother from Nohant out of reach of the
+infection. September and October were passed at or in the neighborhood
+of Boussac, a small town some thirty miles off. Sedan was over, and the
+worst had begun; the protracted suspense, the long agony of hope.
+
+Those suffered most perhaps who, like herself, had to wait in enforced
+inaction, amid the awful dead calm that reigned in the provinces, yet
+forbidden to forget their affliction for a moment. The peasant was gone
+from the land--only the old and infirm were left to look after the
+flocks, to till and sow the field. Madame Sand notes, and with a kind of
+envy, the stolid patience and industry, the inextinguishable confidence,
+of poor old Jacques Bonhomme when things are at the worst. "He knows
+that in one way or another it is he who will have to pay the expenses of
+the war; he knows next winter will be a season of misery and want, but
+he believes in the spring"--in the bounty of nature to repair war's
+ravages.
+
+During this time of unimaginable trouble some of the strongest minds
+were unhinged. It is no small honor to George Sand that hers should
+have preserved its balance. The pages of this journal are distinguished
+throughout by a wonderful calm of judgment and an equitable tone--not
+the calm of indifference, but of a broad and penetrating intelligence,
+no longer to be blinded by the wild excitement and passions of the
+moment, or exalted by childish hopes one hour to be thrust into the
+madness of despair the next.
+
+Although tempted now and then to regret that she had recovered from her
+illness ten years ago, surviving but to witness the abasement of France,
+she was not, like others, panic-struck at the prospect of invasion, as
+though this meant the end of their country. "It will pass like a squall
+over a lake," she said.
+
+But it was a time when they could be sure of nothing except of their
+distress. The telegraph wires were cut; rumors of good news they feared
+to believe would be succeeded by tales of horror they feared to
+discredit. Tidings would come that three hundred thousand of the enemy
+had been disposed of in a single engagement and King William taken
+prisoner; then of fatal catastrophes befallen to private
+friends--stories which often proved equally unfounded.
+
+She had friends shut up in Paris of whom she knew not whether they were
+alive or dead. The strain of anxiety and painful excitement made sleep
+impossible to her except in the last extremity of fatigue. Yet she had
+her little grandchildren to care for; and when they came around her,
+clamoring for the fairy tales she was used to supply, she contented them
+as well as she could and gave them their lessons as usual, anxious to
+keep them from realizing the sadness the causes of which they were too
+young to understand.
+
+It was the first time that she had known a distress that forbade her to
+find a solace in nature. She describes how one day, walking out with
+some friends and following the course of the river Tarde, she had half
+abandoned herself to the enjoyment of the scene--the cascade, the
+dragon-flies skimming the surface, the purple scabious flowers, the
+goats clambering on the boulders of rock that strewed the borders and
+bed of the stream--when one of the party remarks: "Here's a retreat
+pretty well fortified against the Prussians."
+
+And the present, forgotten for an instant in reverie, came back upon her
+with a shock.
+
+Letters in that district took three or four days to travel thirty miles.
+Newspapers were rarely to be procured; and when procured, made up of
+contradictions, wild suggestions, and the pretentious speeches of
+national leaders, meant to be reassuring, but marked by a vagueness and
+violence from which Madame Sand rightly augured ill.
+
+The red-letter days were those that brought communications from their
+friends in Paris by the aerial post. On October 11, two balloons,
+respectively called "George Sand" and the "Armand Barbès," left the
+capital. "My name," she remarks, "did not bring good luck to the
+first--which suffered injuries and descended with difficulty, yet
+rescued the Americans who had gone up in it." The "Barbès" had a
+smoother but a more famous flight; alighting and depositing M. Gambetta
+safely at Tours.
+
+As the autumn advanced Madame Sand and her family were enabled to return
+to Nohant. But what a return was that! The enemy were quartered within
+forty miles, at Issoudun; the fugitives thence were continually seen
+passing, carrying off their children, their furniture and their
+merchandise to places of security. Already the enemy's guns were said to
+have been heard at La Châtre. Madame Sand walked in her garden daily
+among her marigolds, snapdragon and ranunculus, making curious
+speculations as to what might be in store for herself and her
+possessions. She remarks:--
+
+     You get accustomed to it, even though you have not the consolation
+     of being able to offer the slightest resistance.... I look at my
+     garden, I dine, I play with the children, whilst waiting in
+     expectation of seeing the trees felled roots upwards; of getting no
+     more bread to eat, and of having to carry my grandchildren off on
+     my shoulders; for the horses have all been requisitioned. I work,
+     expecting my scrawls to light the pipes of the Prussians.
+
+But the enemy, though so near, never passed the boundaries of the "Black
+Valley." The department of the Indre remained uninvaded, though
+compassed on all sides by the foreign army; and George Sand was able to
+say afterwards that she at least had never seen a Prussian soldier.
+
+A sad Christmas was passed. On the last night of 1870 a meeting of
+friends at Nohant broke up with the parting words, "All is lost!"
+
+"The execrable year is out," writes Madame Sand, "but to all appearances
+we are entering upon a worse."
+
+On the 15th of January, 1871, her little drama _François le Champi_,
+first represented in the troublous months of 1849, was acted in Paris
+for the benefit of an ambulance. She notes the singular fate of this
+piece to be reproduced in time of bombardment. A pastoral!
+
+The worst strain of suspense ended January 29, with the capitulation of
+Paris. Here the _Journal d'un Voyageur_ breaks off. It would be sad
+indeed had her life, like that of more than one of her compeers, closed
+then over France in mourning. Although it was impossible but that such
+an ordeal must have impaired her strength, she outlived the war's
+ending, and the horrible social crisis which she had foreseen must
+succeed the political one. Happier than Prosper Mérimée, than Alexandre
+Dumas, and others, she saw the dawn of a new era of prosperity for her
+country, whose vital forces, as she had also foretold, were to prevail
+in the end over successive ills--the enervation of corruption, of
+military disaster, and the "orgie of pretended renovators" at home, that
+signalized the first months of peace abroad.
+
+In January, 1872, we again find her writing cheerily to Flaubert:--
+
+     Mustn't be ill, mustn't be cross, my old troubadour. Say that
+     France is mad, humanity stupid, and that we are unfinished animals
+     every one of us, you must love on all the same, yourself, your
+     race, above all, your friends. I have my sad hours. I look at my
+     blossoms, those two little girls smiling as ever, their charming
+     mother, and my good, hard-working son, whom the end of the world
+     will find hunting, cataloguing, doing his daily task, and yet as
+     merry as Punch in his rare leisure moments.
+
+In a later letter she writes in a more serious strain:--
+
+     I do not say that humanity is on the road to the heights; I believe
+     it in spite of all, but I do not argue about it, which is useless,
+     for every one judges according to his own eyesight, and the general
+     outlook at the present moment is ugly and poor. Besides, I do not
+     need to be assured of the salvation of our planet and its
+     inhabitants in order to believe in the necessity of the good and
+     the beautiful; if our planet departs from this law it will perish;
+     if its inhabitants discard it they will be destroyed. As for me, I
+     wish to hold firm till my last breath, not with the certainty or
+     the demand to find a "good place" elsewhere, but because my sole
+     pleasure is to maintain myself and mine in the upward way.
+
+The last five years of her life saw her pen in full activity. In the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, _Malgrétout_, the novel of 1870, was succeeded
+by _Flamarande_ and _Les Deux Frères_--compositions executed with
+unflagging energy and animation of style; _La Tour de Percemont_, and a
+series of graceful fairy-stories entitled _Contes d'une grand'mère_.
+_Nanon_ (1872), a rustic romance of the First Revolution, is a highly
+remarkable little work, possibly suggested by her recent experiences of
+the effect of public disturbances on remote country places.
+
+She was also a constant contributor to the newspaper _Le Temps_. A
+critical notice by her hand of M. Renan's _Dialogues et Fragments
+Philosophiques_, reprinted from those columns, bears date May, 1876,
+immediately before she succumbed to the illness which in a few days was
+to cut short her life.
+
+At the beginning of this year she had written on this subject to
+Flaubert, in the brave spirit she would fain impart to her weaker
+brethren:--
+
+     Life is perhaps eternal, and work in consequence eternal. If so,
+     let us finish our march bravely. If otherwise, if the individual
+     perish utterly, let us have the honor of having done our task. That
+     is duty, for our only obvious duties are to ourselves and our
+     fellow-creatures. What we destroy in ourselves we destroy in them.
+     Our abasement abases them; our falls drag them down; we owe to them
+     to stand fast, to save them from falling. The desire to die early
+     is a weakness, as is the desire to live long.
+
+George Sand, like most persons of an exceptional constitution, had
+little faith in the efficacy for herself of medical science. She was
+persuaded that the prescribed remedies did her more harm than good, and
+on more than one occasion, when her health had caused her children
+uneasiness, they had had to resort to an affectionate _ruse_ to induce
+her to take advice. Her habit of disregarding physical ailments,
+fighting against them as a weakness, and working on in their despite,
+led her to neglect for too long failing health that should have been
+attended to. During the whole of May, 1876, Madame Sand, though
+suffering from real illness, continued to join in the household routine
+and to proceed with her literary work as usual. Not till the last days
+of the month did she, unable any longer to make light of her danger, at
+length consent to send for professional advice. It was then too late.
+She was suffering from internal paralysis. The medical attention which,
+sought earlier, might, in the opinion of the doctors, have prolonged her
+life for years, could now do nothing to avert the imminent fatal
+consequences of her illness. "It is death," she said; "I did not ask for
+it, but neither do I regret it." For beyond the sorrow of parting it had
+no particular terrors for her; she had viewed and could meet it in
+another spirit. "Death is no more," she had written; "it is life renewed
+and purified."
+
+She lingered for a week, in great suffering, but bearing all with
+fortitude and an unflinching determination not to distress those around
+her by painful complaining. Up to her last hour she preserved
+consciousness and lucidity. The words, "_Ne touchez pas à la verdure_,"
+among the last that fell from her lips, were understood by her children,
+who knew her wish that the trees should be undisturbed under which, in
+the village cemetery, she was soon to find a resting-place--a wish that
+had been sacredly respected.
+
+Her suffering ceased a short while before death, which came to her so
+quietly that the transition was almost imperceptible to the watchers by
+her side. It was on the morning of the 8th of June. She was within a
+month of completing her seventy-second year. Although her life's work
+had long since been mainly accomplished, yet the extinction of that
+great intelligence was felt by many--as fitly expressed by M.
+Renan--"like a diminution of humanity."
+
+Two days later she was buried in the little cemetery of Nohant, that
+adjoins her own garden wall. The funeral was conducted with extreme
+simplicity, in accordance with her taste and spirit. The scene was none
+the less a memorable one. The rain fell in torrents, but no one seemed
+to regard it; the country-people flocking in from miles around, old men
+standing bare-headed for hours, heedless of the deluge. The peasant and
+the prince, Parisian leaders of the world of thought and letters, and
+the humblest and most unlearned of her poorer neighbors, stood together
+over her grave.
+
+Six peasants carried the bier from the house to the church, a few paces
+distant. The village priest came, preceded by three chorister-boys and
+the venerable singing-clerk of the parish, to perform the ceremony. A
+portion of the little churchyard, railed off from the rest and planted
+with evergreen-trees, contains the graves of her grandmother, her
+father, and the two little grandchildren she had lost. A plain granite
+tomb in their midst now marks the spot where George Sand was laid,
+literally buried in flowers.
+
+A great spirit was gone from the world; and a good spirit, it will be
+generally acknowledged: an artist in whose work the genuine desire to
+leave those she worked for better than she found them, is one inspiring
+motive. Such endeavor may seem to fail, and she affirmed: "A hundred
+times it does fail in its immediate results. But it helps,
+notwithstanding, to preserve that tradition of good desires and of good
+deeds, without which all would perish."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[A] The biography of Alfred De Musset, by Paul De Musset, translated
+from the French by Harriet W. Preston. Boston, Roberts Brothers.
+
+[B] Mauprat, translated by Miss Vaughan. Boston, Roberts Brothers.
+
+[C] The Miller of Angibault. Translated by M. E. Dewey. Boston, Roberts
+Brothers.
+
+[D] The "Snow Man," translated by Virginia Vaughan. Boston: Roberts
+Brothers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+GEORGE SAND'S NOVELS.
+
+
+  I. MAUPRAT. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+ II. ANTONIA. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+III. MONSIEUR SYLVESTRE. Translated by FRANCIS GEORGE SHAW.
+
+ IV. THE SNOW MAN. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+  V. THE MILLER OF ANGIBAULT. Translated by MARY E. DEWEY.
+
+ VI. MY SISTER JEANNIE. Translated by S. R. CROCKER.
+
+_A standard Library Edition, uniformly bound, in neat 16mo volumes. Each
+volume sold separately. Price $1.50._
+
+
+SOME NOTICES OF "MAUPRAT."
+
+"An admirable translation. As to 'Mauprat,' with which novel Roberts
+Brothers introduce the first of French novelists to the American public,
+if there were any doubts as to George Sand's power, it would for ever
+set them at rest.... The object of the story is to show how, by her
+(Edmée's) noble nature, he (Mauprat) is subsequently transformed from a
+brute to a man; his sensual passion to a pure and holy love."--_Harper's
+Monthly._
+
+"The excellence of George Sand, as we understand it, lies in her
+comprehension of the primitive elements of mankind. She has conquered
+her way into the human heart, and whether it is at peace or at war, is
+the same to her; for she is mistress of all its moods. No woman before
+ever painted the passions and the emotions with such force and fidelity,
+and with such consummate art. Whatever else she may be, she is always an
+artist.... Love is the key-note of 'Mauprat,'--love, and what it can
+accomplish in taming an otherwise untamable spirit. The hero, Bernard
+Mauprat, grows up with his uncles, who are practically bandits, as was
+not uncommon with men of their class, in the provinces, before the
+breaking out of the French Revolution. He is a young savage, of whom the
+best that can be said is, that he is only less wicked than his
+relatives, because he has somewhere within him a sense of generosity and
+honor, to which they are entire strangers. To sting this sense into
+activity, to detect the makings of a man in this brute, to make this
+brute into a man, is the difficult problem, which is worked out by
+love,--the love of Bernard for his cousin Edmée, and hers for him,--the
+love of two strong, passionate, noble natures, locked in a
+life-and-death struggle, in which the man is finally overcome by the
+unconquerable strength of womanhood. Only a great writer could have
+described such a struggle, and only a great artist could have kept it
+within allowable limits. This George Sand has done, we think; for her
+portrait of Bernard is vigorous without being coarse, and her situations
+are strong without being dangerous. Such, at least, is the impression we
+have received from reading 'Mauprat,' which, besides being an admirable
+study of character, is also a fine picture of French provincial life and
+manners."--_Putnam's Monthly._
+
+"Roberts Brothers propose to publish a series of translations of George
+Sand's better novels. We can hardly say that all are worth appearing in
+English; but it is certain that the 'better' list will comprise a good
+many which are worth translating, and among these is 'Mauprat,'--though
+by no means the best of them. Written to show the possibility of
+constancy in man, a love inspired before and continuing through
+marriage, it is itself a contradiction to a good many of the popular
+notions respecting the author,--who is generally supposed to be as
+indifferent to the sanctities of the marriage relation as was her
+celebrated ancestor, Augustus of Saxony.... The translation is
+admirable. It is seldom that one reads such good English in a work
+translated from any language. The new series is inaugurated in the best
+possible way, under the hands of Miss Vaughan, and we trust that she may
+have a great deal to do with its continuance. It is not every one who
+can read French who can write English so well."--_Old and New._
+
+_Sold everywhere. Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price,
+by the Publishers_,
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS. BOSTON.
+
+_Messrs. Roberts Brothers' Publications._
+
+
+FAMOUS WOMEN SERIES.
+
+
+EMILY BRONTË.
+
+BY A. MARY F. ROBINSON.
+
+One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.
+
+"Miss Robinson has written a fascinating biography.... Emily Brontë is
+interesting, not because she wrote 'Wuthering Heights,' but because of
+her brave, baffled, human life, so lonely, so full of pain, but with a
+great hope shining beyond all the darkness, and a passionate defiance in
+bearing more than the burdens that were laid upon her. The story of the
+three sisters is infinitely sad, but it is the ennobling sadness that
+belongs to large natures cramped and striving for freedom to heroic,
+almost desperate, work, with little or no result. The author of this
+intensely interesting, sympathetic, and eloquent biography, is a young
+lady and a poet, to whom a place is given in a recent anthology of
+living English poets, which is supposed to contain only the best poems
+of the best writers."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+"Miss Robinson had many excellent qualifications for the task she has
+performed in this little volume, among which may be named, an
+enthusiastic interest in her subject and a real sympathy with Emily
+Brontë's sad and heroic life. 'To represent her as she was,' says Miss
+Robinson, 'would be her noblest and most fitting monument.' ... Emily
+Brontë here becomes well known to us and, in one sense, this should be
+praise enough for any biography."--_New York Times._
+
+"The biographer who finds such material before him as the lives and
+characters of the Brontë family need have no anxiety as to the interest
+of his work. Characters not only strong but so uniquely strong, genius
+so supreme, misfortunes so overwhelming, set in its scenery so forlornly
+picturesque, could not fail to attract all readers, if told even in the
+most prosaic language. When we add to this, that Miss Robinson has told
+their story _not_ in prosaic language, but with a literary style
+exhibiting all the qualities essential to good biography, our readers
+will understand that this life of Emily Brontë is not only as
+interesting as a novel, but a great deal more interesting than most
+novels. As it presents most vividly a general picture of the family,
+there seems hardly a reason for giving it Emily's name alone, except
+perhaps for the masterly chapters on 'Wuthering Heights,' which the
+reader will find a grateful condensation of the best in that powerful
+but somewhat forbidding story. We know of no point in the Brontë
+history--their genius, their surroundings, their faults, their
+happiness, their misery, their love and friendships, their
+peculiarities, their power, their gentleness, their patience, their
+pride,--which Miss Robinson has not touched upon with conscientiousness
+and sympathy."--_The Critic._
+
+"'Emily Brontë' is the second of the 'Famous Women Series,' which
+Roberts Brothers, Boston, propose to publish, and of which 'George
+Eliot' was the initial volume. Not the least remarkable of a very
+remarkable family, the personage whose life is here written, possesses a
+peculiar interest to all who are at all familiar with the sad and
+singular history of herself and her sister Charlotte. That the author,
+Miss A. Mary F. Robinson, has done her work with minute fidelity to
+facts as well as affectionate devotion to the subject of her sketch, is
+plainly to be seen all through the book."--_Washington Post._
+
+Sold by all Booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the Publishers,
+
+
+MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS'
+
+Classic Series.
+
+
+A collection of world-renowned works selected from the literatures of
+all nations, printed from new type in the best manner, and neatly and
+durably bound. Handy books, convenient to hold, and an ornament to the
+library shelves.
+
+READY AND IN PREPARATION.
+
+SIR WALTER SCOTT'S "LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL," "MARMION," and "THE
+LADY OF THE LAKE." The three poems in one volume.
+
+"There are no books for boys like these poems by Sir Walter Scott. Every
+boy likes them, if they are not put into his hands too late. _They
+surpass everything for boy reading._"--_Ralph Waldo Emerson._
+
+OLIVER GOLDSMITH'S "THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD." With Illustrations by
+Mulready.
+
+DEFOE'S "ROBINSON CRUSOE." With Illustrations by Stothard.
+
+BERNARDIN DE SAINT-PIERRE'S "PAUL AND VIRGINIA." With Illustrations
+by Lalauze.
+
+SOUTHEY'S "LIFE OF NELSON." With Illustrations by Birket Foster.
+
+VOLTAIRE'S "LIFE OF CHARLES THE TWELFTH." With Maps and Portraits.
+
+MARIA EDGEWORTH'S "CLASSIC TALES." With a biographical Sketch by
+Grace A. Oliver.
+
+LORD MACAULAY'S "LAYS OF ANCIENT ROME." With a Biographical Sketch
+and Illustrations.
+
+BUNYAN'S "PILGRIM'S PROGRESS." With all of the original
+Illustrations in fac-simile.
+
+CLASSIC HEROIC BALLADS. Edited by the Editor of "Quiet Hours."
+
+CLASSIC TALES. By Anna Letitia Barbauld. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.
+
+CLASSIC TALES. By Ann and Jane Taylor. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.
+
+AND OTHERS.
+
+MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS' PUBLICATIONS.
+
+Famous Women Series.
+
+GEORGE ELIOT.
+
+BY MATHILDE BLIND.
+
+One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.
+
+"Messrs. Roberts Brothers begin a series of Biographies of Famous
+Women with a life of George Eliot, by Mathilde Blind. The idea of
+the series is an excellent one, and the reputation of its
+publishers is a guarantee for its adequate execution. This book
+contains about three hundred pages in open type, and not only
+collects and condenses the main facts that are known in regard to
+the history of George Eliot, but supplies other material from
+personal research. It is agreeably written, and with a good idea of
+proportion in a memoir of its size. The critical study of its
+subject's works, which is made in the order of their appearance, is
+particularly well done. In fact, good taste and good judgment
+pervade the memoir throughout."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"Miss Blind's little book is written with admirable good taste and
+judgment, and with notable self-restraint. It does not weary the
+reader with critical discursiveness, nor with attempts to search
+out high-flown meanings and recondite oracles in the plain 'yea'
+and 'nay' of life. It is a graceful and unpretentious little
+biography, and tells all that need be told concerning one of the
+greatest writers of the time. It is a deeply interesting if not
+fascinating woman whom Miss Blind presents," says the New York
+_Tribune_.
+
+"Miss Blind's little biographical study of George Eliot is written
+with sympathy and good taste, and is very welcome. It gives us a
+graphic if not elaborate sketch of the personality and development
+of the great novelist, is particularly full and authentic
+concerning her earlier years, tells enough of the leading motives
+in her work to give the general reader a lucid idea of the true
+drift and purpose of her art, and analyzes carefully her various
+writings, with no attempt at profound criticism or fine writing,
+but with appreciation, insight, and a clear grasp of those
+underlying psychological principles which are so closely interwoven
+in every production that came from her pen."--_Traveller._
+
+"The lives of few great writers have attracted more curiosity and
+speculation than that of George Eliot. Had she only lived earlier
+in the century she might easily have become the centre of a mythos.
+As it is, many of the anecdotes commonly repeated about her are
+made up largely of fable. It is, therefore, well, before it is too
+late, to reduce the true story of her career to the lowest terms,
+and this service has been well done by the author of the present
+volume."--_Philadelphia Press._
+
+Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the publishers,
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.
+
+A SELECTION FROM
+
+Messrs. ROBERTS BROTHERS'
+
+Latest New Publications.
+
+
+FIGURES OF THE PAST. From the Leaves of Old Journals. By Josiah Quincy
+(Class of 1821, Harvard College). 16mo. Price, $1.50
+
+"There are chapters on life in the Academy at Andover, on Harvard
+Sixty Years Ago, on Commencement Day in 1821, the year of the
+author's graduation, and on visits to and talks with John Adams,
+with reminiscences of Lafayette, Judge Story, John Randolph,
+Jackson and other eminent persons, and sketches of old Washington
+and old Boston society. The kindly pen of the author is never
+dipped in gall--he remembers the pleasing aspects of character, and
+his stories and anecdotes are told in the best of humor and leave
+no sting. The book is of a kind which we are not likely to have
+again, for the men of Mr. Quincy's generation, those at least who
+had his social opportunities, are nearly all gone. These pictures
+of old social and political conditions are especially suggestive as
+reminding us that a single life, only lately closed, linked us with
+days, events and men that were a part of our early history and
+appear remote because of the multitude of changes that have
+transformed society in the interval."--_Boston Journal._
+
+
+WHIST, OR BUMBLEPUPPY? By Pembridge.
+
+From the Second London Edition. 16mo. Cloth. Price, .50
+
+DEFINITION OF BUMBLEPUPPY--Bumblepuppy is persisting to play whist,
+either in utter ignorance of all its known principles, or in
+defiance of them, or both.
+
+"'Whist, or Bumblepuppy?' is one of the most entertaining, and at
+the same time one of the soundest books on whist ever written. Its
+drollery may blind some readers to the value of its advice; no man
+who knows anything about whist, however, will fail to read it with
+interest, and few will fail to read it with advantage. Upon the
+ordinary rules of whist, Pembridge supplies much sensible and
+thoroughly amusing comment. The best player in the world may gain
+from his observations, and a mediocre player can scarcely find a
+better counsellor. There is scarcely an opinion expressed with
+which we do not coincide."--_London Sunday Times._
+
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. By T. Hall Caine. With
+Portrait. One vol. 8vo. Cloth, gilt. Price, $3.00
+
+"Mr. Caine's 'Recollections of Rossetti' throws light upon many
+events in Rossetti's life over which there hung a veil of
+mystery.... A book that must survive."--_London Athenæum._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+PHYLLIS BROWNE. A Story. By Flora L. Shaw. Author of "Castle Blair" and
+"Hector." 16mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price, $1.00
+
+"'Castle Blair' and 'Hector' are such good stories that a third, by
+the same author, Flora L. Shaw, will be equally welcomed. 'Hector'
+was one of the most charming books ever written about a boy.
+'Phyllis Browne' is the new story. She is evidently the author's
+ideal girl, as Hector was her ideal boy, and a noble, splendid girl
+she is. Yet the book is not a child's book; it is _about_ children,
+but not for them. The story is far more interesting than most
+novels are, and far more exciting. The rash generosity of the
+children is beautiful; their free, trustful lives are noble and
+sweet; but when they undertake to right social wrongs, and
+gallantly set their brave hearts and childish inexperience against
+the established wrongs of society, they come to grief, but in no
+common-place way. Their dangers are as unusual and on as large a
+scale as their characters and courage are. The book is full of
+tender and loving things; it makes the heart larger, and brings
+back the splendid dreams of one's own youth," says the Boston
+correspondent of the _Worcester Spy_.
+
+
+THE MARQUIS OF CARABAS. A Romance. By Harriet Prescott Spofford, author
+of "The Amber Gods," "The Thief in the Night," etc. 16mo. Cloth. Price,
+$1.00
+
+"This is the latest offering of the author of 'The Amber Gods,' and
+it is as odd as striking, and as impressive in its shadowy
+implication as anything she has ever written. Handled differently,
+the incidents would seem theatrical; as told by Mrs. Spofford, the
+story is like the vivid passages of a drama from which, once seen,
+you cannot escape. Pleasant or unpleasant they force themselves
+upon the consideration and lay hold of the imagination. So it is
+with 'The Marquis of Carabas.'"--_Chicago Inter-Ocean._
+
+"'The Marquis of Carabas,' by Harriet Prescott Spofford, is a work
+of unique quality, being really a poem in the guise of a prose
+novel. The thought is tense and sublimated, and the style glowing,
+musical and polished. There is abundant invention in the story, and
+nothing of common-place and indolent imitation which in the case of
+ordinary raconteurs contributes so largely to swell the bulk of
+results. The narrative fascinates one, but the fascination is not
+of a stream flowing largely and naturally through the landscape; it
+is rather that of silver bells, whose clear, finely modulated
+chimes touch the finer issues of feeling, but not without some
+obtrusive sense of study and premeditation."--_Home Journal._
+
+
+LANDOR'S IMAGINARY CONVERSATIONS. With a portrait. A new edition. 5
+volumes. 16mo.
+
+Cloth. Oxford style. Price, $5.00
+Imitation half calf,    6.25
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+PEARLS OF THE FAITH; or, Islam's Rosary; being the "Ninety-nine
+Beautiful Names of Allah." By Edwin Arnold. 16mo. Cloth. Uniform with
+"The Light of Asia." Price, $1.00
+
+"Mr. Edwin Arnold has finished his Oriental trilogy. The first part
+is 'The Light of Asia.' The second part is 'The Indian Song of
+Songs,' The trilogy is completed by 'Pearls of the Faith,' in which
+the poet tells the beads of a pious Moslem. The Mohammedan has a
+chaplet of three strings, each string containing 33 beads, each
+bead representing one of the 'Ninety-nine beautiful names of Allah.
+These short poems have no connection; they vary in measure, but are
+all simple and without a touch of obscurity. All the legends and
+instructions inculcate the gentle virtues that make life
+lovely--courtesy, humility, hospitality, care for the poor and the
+ill, kindness to dumb animals, perfect manners in social
+intercourse. Many of the poems are suitable for Christian
+Sunday-schools.... The view of Mohammedanism given by these poems
+is very pleasant; the precepts for life here are sweet and noble;
+the promises for heaven are definite; they appeal directly to the
+love of what is known as pleasure in this life, and that must be
+renounced in this life, but in the next it may be enjoyed to the
+uttermost without evil consequences."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+
+ART AND NATURE IN ITALY. By Eugene Benson. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00
+
+"Mr. Benson's long residence in that country has operated to imbue
+his mind with the spirit of the region. He treats _con amore_ of
+its art in its historical and in its modern aspects, and he
+presents its scenes of nature in their most fascinating form. Mr.
+Benson is not only one of the most appreciative of students and
+observers, but he has a rare grace of manner as well. He writes
+little of late, but his productions are always acceptable to
+cultivated people."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"This book is a record of impressions and reflections on art and
+nature in Italy. The great beauty and the historic associations of
+the country are set forth in very pleasing language by one who
+fully appreciates them. He particularly describes those portions of
+that beautiful land in which its most distinguished artists have
+lived, showing how its natural features, its enchanting scenery,
+must have had a molding influence upon their tastes and their
+works. His estimates of art and artists and his criticisms are, in
+the main, just and satisfactory."--_Western Christian Advocate._
+
+
+NORSE STORIES, RETOLD FROM THE EDDAS. By Hamilton W. Mabie. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.00
+
+"Is one of the most charming little books for children I have ever
+seen. The myths are splendidly told, and every household in America
+ought to have a copy of the book."--_Prof. R. B. Anderson._
+
+"The old Norse stories bear being told again and again. Mr. Mabie
+keeps their freshness, fascination and simplicity in his new
+version of them, and one reads with unabated pleasure of Odin's
+search for wisdom, of the wooing of Gerd, and of all the strange
+adventures of Thor, of the beautiful Balder, of the wicked Loke,
+and, best of all, of the new earth that was created after long
+years of darkness, in which there was no sun, no moon, no stars, no
+Asgard, no Hel, no Jotunheim; in which gods, giants, monsters and
+men were all dead--the earth upon which the gods look lovingly,
+upon which men are industrious and obedient, and know that the
+All-Father helps them."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+THE WISDOM OF THE BRAHMIN. A Didactic Poem. Translated from the German
+of Friedrich Rückert. By Chas. T. Brooks. Six cantos. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25
+
+"The Brahmin," says the translator, "is a poem of vast range,
+expressing the world-wisdom which the author had been for years
+storing up in his large heart, and evolving out of his creative
+soul." Says Dr. Beyer, in his Life of Rückert: "'The Wisdom of the
+Brahmin' is a poetic house-treasure of which our nation may justly
+be proud. So much has been said and sung of late years of 'The
+Light of Asia,' the 'Sympathy of Religions,' and the like, that the
+present seemed to be an auspicious moment to venture a volume of
+Rückert's greatest work."
+
+"'These twenty books are a sea of thoughts and contemplations full
+of Brahminic tranquility and German depth and fullness, in simple
+gnomes, sentences, epigrams, parables, fables and tales.'
+Gottsschall declares the work to be 'a poetic treasure of which the
+German nation may justly be proud.' The translator, speaking of his
+own experiences, says the poem has affected him as 'a sparkling
+flood of heart-searching and soul-lifting thought and sentiment,
+such as no other work within our knowledge has ever
+presented.'"--_Home Journal._
+
+
+SOCRATES. The Apology and Crito of Plato, and the Phædo of Plato.
+Uniform with "Marcus Aurelius," "Imitation of Christ," etc. 18mo.
+Flexible cloth, red edges. Price, 50 cents each. Two series in one
+volume. Cloth, red edges. Price, 75 cents.
+
+"If, as is strongly asserted, there may be found in the writings of
+Plato all the wisdom and learning of the ancients, as well as the
+treasure-house from which all succeeding writers have borrowed
+their best ideas, then are these little books worth their weight in
+gold, for they contain some of the choicest gems to be found in the
+collected works of the famous Greek philosopher. They are companion
+volumes, the text being taken unabridged from Professor Jewett's
+revised translation of Plato. They tell the whole story of the
+trial, imprisonment and death of Socrates. The Apology gives the
+defense, the Crito relates the offer of escape, the Phædo describes
+the last hours. The more studiously and the more frequently these
+books are read the more keen will be the appreciation of their
+intellectual and moral excellence."--_Providence Journal._
+
+
+JEAN INGELOW'S NOVELS. Off the Skelligs; Fated to be Free; Sarah de
+Berenger; Don John. A new edition. 4 vols. 16mo. Imitation half calf.
+Price, $5.00
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+THE JEAN INGELOW BIRTHDAY BOOK. With red-line border and divisions, 12
+illustrations and portrait.
+
+16mo. Cloth, gilt and illuminated. Price, $1.00
+Full calf or morocco, $3.50
+
+"This is a dainty little volume having a selection from Jean
+Ingelow for each day of the year. The extracts are of both prose
+and verse. There are graceful illustrations for each month suited
+in subject to the season. The book will be welcomed by admirers of
+this writer and must prove a popular gift-book for the birthday
+season."--_Chicago Advance._
+
+"We have seen no more tasteful book this year than 'The Jean
+Ingelow Birthday Book,' which Messrs. Roberts Brothers publish. It
+is somewhat larger in form than are the birthday books with which
+the public is familiar, is printed on very fine paper, and has a
+page with the usual quotations and the usual blanks, the whole
+encircled with a carmine line border, the date of the days of the
+months being printed in the same color. The work is illustrated
+with handsome engravings, and has a steel-engraved portrait of Jean
+Ingelow. The binding is a real gem. Nothing could well be more
+attractive in the way of cloth ornament than is its combination of
+design and color."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+
+UNDER THE SUN. By Phil. Robinson, the new English Humorist. With a
+Preface by Edwin Arnold, author of "The Light of Asia." 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.50
+
+This is a volume of essays, humorous and pathetic, of incidents, scenes,
+and objects grouped under the heads: Indian Sketches, The Indian
+Seasons, Unnatural History, Idle Hours under the Punkah.
+
+"Under the Sun," by Phil. Robinson, is one of the most delightful
+of recent books. The style is fascinating in its strength and
+picturesqueness, and there is now and then a delicious quaintness
+that recalls Charles Lamb. A volume such as this is rare in our
+day, when the art of essay writing is almost lost and forgotten.
+Freshness, vigor, humor, pathos, graphic power, a keen love for
+nature, a gentle love for animals, and a pleasing originality are
+among the more charming characteristics of this work, which may be
+read again and again with renewed satisfaction. Its scenes are laid
+in India, and whether the author discourses of the elephant, the
+rhinoceros, some bird that has attracted his attention, a tree, or
+a flower; whether he describes an exciting hunt, or tells a
+marvellous story; whether he moralizes or gives free rein to his
+fancy, he is always brilliant, fascinating, vivacious and masterly.
+It is difficult to write of this remarkable book without
+superlatives; but it is not too much to insist that it is
+impossible to exaggerate its peculiar merits, or to bestow too
+large a share of praise upon it. It is not a book for the few, but
+for the many, and all will find delight in its perusal."--_Saturday
+Evening Gazette._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+A LITTLE PILGRIM. Reprinted from Macmillan's Magazine. 16mo. Cloth. Red
+edges. Price, $ .75
+
+"An exquisitely written little sketch is found in that remarkable
+production, 'The Little Pilgrim,' which is just now attracting much
+attention both in Europe and America. It is highly imaginative in
+its scope, representing one of the world-worn and weary pilgrims of
+our earthly sphere as entering upon the delights of heaven after
+death. The picture of heaven is drawn with the rarest delicacy and
+refinement, and is in agreeable contrast in this respect to the
+material sketch of this future home furnished in Miss Stuart
+Phelps's well-remembered 'Gates Ajar.' The book will be a balm to
+the heart of many readers who are in accord with the faith of its
+author; and to others its reading will afford rare pleasure from
+the exceeding beauty and affecting simplicity of its almost perfect
+literary style."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"The life beyond the grave, when the short life in this world is
+ended, is to many a source of dread--to all a mystery. 'A Little
+Pilgrim' has apparently solved it, and, indeed, it seems on reading
+this little book as if there were a great probability about it. A
+soft, gentle tone pervades its every sentence, and one cannot read
+it without feeling refreshed and strengthened."--_The Alta
+California._
+
+
+THE GREAT EPICS OF MEDIÆVAL GERMANY. An Outline of their Contents and
+History. By George Theodore Dippold, Professor at Boston University and
+Wellesley College. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.50
+
+Professor Francis J. Child, of Harvard College, says: "It is an
+excellent account of the chief German heroic poems of the Middle
+Ages, accompanied with spirited translations. It is a book which
+gives both a brief and popular, and also an accurate, account of
+this important section of literature, and will be very welcome here
+and at other colleges."
+
+"No student of modern literature, and above all no student who aims
+to understand the literary development of Europe in its fullest
+range, can leave this rich and ample world of early song
+unexplored. To all such Professor Dippold's book will have the
+value of a trustworthy guide.... It has all the interest of a
+chapter in the growth of the human mind into comprehension of the
+universe and of itself, and it has the pervading charm of the vast
+realm of poetry through which it moves."--_Christian Union._
+
+
+MY HOUSEHOLD OF PETS. By Théophile Gautier. Translated from the French
+by Susan Coolidge. With illustrations by Frank Rogers. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25
+
+"This little book will interest lovers of animals, and the quaint
+style in which M. Gautier tells of the wisdom of his household pets
+will please every one. The translator, too, is happy in her work,
+for she has succeeded in rendering the text into English without
+loss of the French tone, which makes it fascinating. These
+household pets consisted of white and black cats, dogs, chameleons,
+lizards, magpies, and horses, each of which has a character and
+story of its own. Illustrations and a pretty binding add to the
+attractions of the volume."--_Worcester Spy._
+
+"The ease and elegance of Théophile Gautier's diction is wonderful,
+and the translator has preserved the charm of the French author
+with far more than the average fidelity. 'My Household of Pets' is
+a book which can be read with pleasure by young and old. It is a
+charming volume.--_St. Louis Spectator._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Famous Women.
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+_The next volumes in the Famous Women Series will be_:
+
+MARGARET FULLER. By Julia Ward Howe.
+
+MARIA EDGEWORTH. By Miss Zimmern.
+
+_Already published_:
+
+GEORGE ELIOT. By Miss Blind.
+
+EMILY BRONTË. By Miss Robinson.
+
+GEORGE SAND. By Miss Thomas.
+
+MARY LAMB. By Mrs. Gilchrist.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS WOMEN: GEORGE SAND ***
+
+***** This file should be named 28209-8.txt or 28209-8.zip *****
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Famous Women: George Sand
+
+Author: Bertha Thomas
+
+Release Date: February 27, 2009 [EBook #28209]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS WOMEN: GEORGE SAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Delphine Lettau, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
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+</pre>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+<p class="c"><img src="images/001.png" width="550"
+height="165" alt="Famous Women." /></p>
+
+
+<h1 class="space"><span class="ltr">G</span>EORGE <span class="ltr">S</span>AND.</h1>
+
+<p class="c">BY</p>
+
+<h3 class="top5 space">BERTHA THOMAS.</h3>
+
+<p class="c top15">
+BOSTON:<br />
+ROBERTS BROTHERS.<br />
+1883.</p>
+
+<p class="c">
+<i>Copyright, 1883</i>,<br />
+<span class="smcap">By Roberts Brothers</span>.<br />
+<br />
+<span class="smcap">University Press</span>:<br />
+<span class="smcap">John Wilson and Son, Cambridge</span>.<br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<h3>PREFATORY NOTE.</h3>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> authentic materials available for an account of the life of George
+Sand, although lately increased by the publication of a large part of
+her correspondence, are still incomplete. Her memoirs by her own hand,
+dealing fully with her early life alone, remain unsupplemented by any
+entire and detailed biography, for which, indeed, the time seems hardly
+yet come. Hence one among many obvious difficulties in the way of this
+attempt to prepare for English readers a brief sketch that shall at
+least indicate all the more salient features of a life of singularly
+varied aspect.</p>
+
+<p>Much, though of interest in itself, must here be omitted, as beyond the
+scope of the present study. There are points again into which, as
+touching persons still living or quite recently deceased, it would be
+premature to enter. But none seem of such importance as to forbid the
+endeavor, by a careful review of those facts in the life of George Sand
+which most justly represent her character as a whole, and were the
+determining influences on her career and on her work, to arrive at truth
+and completeness of general outline, the utmost it is possible to hope
+to accomplish in this little volume.</p>
+
+<p class="r smcap">Bertha Thomas.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3 class="space">CONTENTS.</h3>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Early Years</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Girlhood and Married Life</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Début in Literature</p>
+
+<p class="c"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Lélia&mdash;Italian Journey</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Mental Development</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Solitude, Society and Socialism</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Consuelo&mdash;Home Life at Nohant</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Novelist and Politician</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Pastoral Tales</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Plays and Later Novels</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Artist and Moralist</p>
+
+<p class="toc"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a></p>
+
+<p class="c smcap">Later Years</p>
+
+
+<h1 class="top15 space">GEORGE SAND.</h1>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">EARLY YEARS.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">In</span> naming George Sand we name something more exceptional than even a
+great genius. Her rise to eminence in the literature of her century, is,
+if not without a parallel, yet absolutely without a precedent, in the
+annals of women of modern times.</p>
+
+<p>The origin of much that is distinctive in the story of her life may be
+traced in the curious story of her lineage.</p>
+
+<p>George Sand was of mixed national descent, and in her veins ran the
+blood of heroes and of kings. The noble and the artist, the
+<i>bourgeoisie</i> and the people, all had their representatives among their
+immediate ancestors. Her grandmother, the guardian of her girlhood, was
+the child of Maurice, Marshal Saxe, that favorite figure in history and
+romance, himself son of the famous Augustus II., Elector of Saxony, and
+King of Poland, and the Swedish Countess Aurora von Königsmark. The
+Marshal's daughter Aurore, though like her father of illegitimate
+birth&mdash;her mother, who was connected with the stage, passed by her
+professional name of Mlle. Verrieres&mdash;obtained after the Marshal's death
+the acknowledgment and protection of his relatives in high places,
+notably of his niece, the Dauphin of France, grand-daughter of Augustus
+of Poland, and mother of the three kings&mdash;Louis XVI., Louis XVIII., and
+Charles X.</p>
+
+<p>Carefully educated at St. Cyr, Mlle. de Saxe was married, when little
+more than a child, to the Count de Horn, who was also of partly royal
+but irregular origin. He very shortly afterward fell in a duel. His
+widow, at thirty, became the wife of M. Dupin de Franceuil, an old
+gentleman of good provincial family and some fortune. Maurice, their
+only child, was the father of George Sand.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Dupin (the suffix de Franceuil was afterwards dropped by her
+husband) appears to have inherited none of the adventurous and erratic
+tendencies of her progenitors. Aristocratic in her sympathies,
+philosophic in her intellect, and strictly decorous in her conduct,
+throughout the whole of her long and checkered life she was regarded
+with respect. Left a widow again, ten years after her second marriage,
+she concentrated her hopes and affections on her handsome and amiable
+son Maurice. Though fondly attached to her, he was yet to be the cause
+of her heaviest sorrows, by his more than hazardous marriage, and by his
+premature and tragical fate.</p>
+
+<p>His strongest natural leanings seem to have been towards art in general,
+music and the drama in particular, and of his facile, buoyant, artist
+temperament there is ample evidence; but the political conditions of
+France under the Directory in 1798 left him no choice but to enter the
+army, where he served under Dupont, winning his commission on the field
+of Marengo in 1800. It was during this Italian campaign that the young
+officer met with the woman who, four years later, became his wife, and
+the mother of his illustrious child.</p>
+
+<p>Mademoiselle Sophie Victorie Delaborde, was, emphatically speaking, a
+daughter of the people. Her father had been a poor bird-seller at Paris,
+where she herself had worked as a milliner. Left unprotected at a very
+early age, thoroughly uneducated and undisciplined, gifted with
+considerable beauty, and thrown on the world at a time when the very
+foundations of society seemed to be collapsing, she had been exposed to
+extreme dangers, and without any of the ordinary safeguards against
+them. That she proved herself not undeserving of the serious attachment
+with which she inspired Maurice Dupin, her least favorable judges were
+afterwards forced to admit; though, at the time this infatuation of the
+lieutenant of six-and-twenty for one four years his senior, and of the
+humblest extraction, and whose life hitherto had not been blameless, was
+naturally regarded as utterly disastrous by his elders.</p>
+
+<p>The devoted pair were married secretly at Paris in 1804; and on the 5th
+of July in the same year&mdash;the last of the French Republic and the first
+of the Empire&mdash;their daughter entered the world, receiving the name of
+Amantine-Lucile-Aurore.</p>
+
+<p>The discovery of the <i>mésalliance</i> she had been dreading for some time,
+and which her son had not dared to confess to her, was a heavy blow to
+old Madame Dupin. However, she schooled herself to forgive what was
+irrevocable, and to acknowledge this most unwelcome daughter-in-law, the
+infant Aurore helping unconsciously to effect the reconciliation. But
+for more than three years M. Dupin's mother and his wife scarcely ever
+met. Madame Dupin <i>mère</i> was living in a retired part of the country, in
+the very centre of France, on the little property of Nohant, which she
+had bought with what the Revolution had left her out of her late
+husband's fortune. Maurice, now Captain Dupin and <i>aide-de-camp</i> to
+Murat, resided, when not on service, in Paris, where he had settled with
+his wife and child. The union, strange though it may seem, continued to
+be a happy one. Besides a strong attachment there existed a real
+conformity of disposition between the two. The mother of George Sand was
+also, in her way, a remarkable woman. She has been described by her
+daughter as "a great artist lost for want of development"; showing a
+wonderful dexterity in whatever she put her hand to, no matter if
+practiced in it or not. "She tried everything, and always
+succeeded"&mdash;sewing, drawing, tuning the piano&mdash;"she would have made
+shoes, locks, furniture, had it been necessary." But her tastes were
+simple and domestic. Though married out of her rank, she was entirely
+without any vain ambition to push herself into fashionable society, the
+constraint of which, moreover, she could not bear. "She was a woman for
+the fire-side, or for quick, merry walks and drives. But in the house or
+out of doors, what she wanted was intimacy and confidence, complete
+sincerity in her relations with those around her, absolute liberty in
+her habits and the disposal of her time. She always led a retired life,
+more anxious to keep aloof from tiresome acquaintance than to seek such
+as might be advantageous. That was just the foundation of my father's
+character; and in this respect never was there a better-assorted couple.
+They could never be happy except in their own little <i>ménage</i>.
+Everywhere out of it they had to stifle their melancholy yawns, and they
+have transmitted to me that secret shyness which has always made the gay
+world intolerable, and home a necessity to me."</p>
+
+<p>In a modest <i>bourgeois</i> habitation in the Rue Meslay, afterwards
+transferred to the Rue Grange-Batelière, Aurore Dupin's infancy passed
+tranquilly away, under the wing of her warmly affectionate mother who,
+though utterly illiterate, showed intuitive tact and skill in fostering
+the child's intelligence. "Mine," says her daughter, "made no
+resistance; but was never beforehand with anything, and might have been
+very much behindhand if left to itself."</p>
+
+<p>Aurore was not four years old when adventures began for her in earnest.
+In the spring of 1808, her father was at Madrid, in attendance upon
+Murat; and Madame Maurice Dupin, becoming impatient of prolonged
+separation from her husband, started off with her little girl to join
+him. The hazards and hardships of the expedition, long mountain drives
+and wild scenery, strange fare and strange sights, could not fail
+vividly to impress the child, whose imagination from her cradle was
+extraordinarily active. Her mother ere this had discovered that Aurore,
+then little more than a baby, and pent up within four chairs to keep her
+out of harm's way, would make herself perfectly happy, plucking at the
+basket-work and babbling endless fairy tales to herself, confused and
+diluted versions of the first fictions narrated to her. A picturesque
+line in a nursery song was enough to bring before her a world of
+charming wonders; the figures, birds, and flowers on a Sèvres china
+candelabrum would call up enchanting landscapes; and the sound of a
+flageolet played from some distant attic start a train of melodious
+fancies and throw her into musical raptures. Her daily experiences,
+after reaching Madrid with her mother, continued to be novel and
+exciting in the extreme. The palace of the Prince de la Paix, where
+Murat and his suite had their quarters, was to her the realization of
+the wonder-land of Perrault and d'Aulnoy; Murat, the veritable Prince
+Fanfarinet. She was presented to him in a fancy court-dress, devised for
+the occasion by her mother, an exact imitation of her father's uniform
+in miniature, with spurs, sword, and boots, all complete. The Prince
+was amused by the jest, and took a fancy to the child, calling her his
+little <i>aide-de-camp</i>. After a residence of several weeks in this abode,
+whose splendor was alloyed by not a little discomfort and squalor, the
+return-journey had to be accomplished in the height of summer, amid
+every sort of risk; past reeking battle-fields, camps, sacked and
+half-burnt villages and beleaguered cities. Captain Dupin succeeded,
+however, in escorting his family safely back into France again, the
+party halting to recruit awhile under his mother's roof.</p>
+
+<p>Nohant, a spot that has become as famous through its associations as
+Abbotsford, lies about three miles from the little town of La Châtre, in
+the department of the Indre, part of the old province of Berry. The
+manor is a plain gray house with steep mansard roofs, of the time of
+Louis XVI. It stands just apart from the road, shaded by trees, beside a
+pleasure ground of no vast extent, but with its large flower-garden and
+little wood allowed to spread at nature's bidding, quite in the English
+style. Behind the house cluster a score of cottages of the scattered
+hamlet of Nohant; in the centre rises the smallest of churches, with a
+tiny cemetery hedged around and adjoining the wall of the manor garden.</p>
+
+<p>At this country home the tired travellers gladly alighted; but they had
+barely a few weeks in which to recover from the fatigues of their
+Spanish campaign, when a terrible calamity overwhelmed the household.
+Maurice Dupin, riding home one night from La Châtre, was thrown from his
+horse and killed on the spot.</p>
+
+<p>The story of Aurore Dupin's individual life opens at once with the death
+of her father&mdash;a loss she was still too young to comprehend, but for
+which she was soon to suffer through the strange, the anomalous
+position, in which it was to place her. Maurice Dupin's patrician mother
+and her plebeian daughter-in-law, bereft thus violently of him who had
+been the only possible link between them, found themselves hopelessly,
+actively, and increasingly at variance. Their tempers clashed, their
+natures were antipathetic, their views contradictory, their positions
+irreconcilable. Aurore was not only thrust into an atmosphere of strife,
+but condemned to the apple of discord. She was to grow up between two
+hostile camps, each claiming her obedience and affection.</p>
+
+<p>The beginning was smooth, and the sadness which alone kept the peace was
+not allowed to weigh on the child. She ran wild in the garden, the
+country air and country life strengthening a naturally strong
+constitution; and her intelligence, though also allowed much freedom in
+its development, was not neglected. A preceptor was on the spot in the
+person of the fourth inmate of Nohant, an old pedagogue, Deschartres by
+name, formerly her father's tutor, who had remained in Madame Dupin's
+service as "intendant." The serio-comic figure of this personage, so
+graphically drawn by George Sand herself in the memoirs of her early
+life, will never be forgotten by any reader of those reminiscences.
+Pedant, she says, was written in every line of his countenance and every
+movement that he made. He was possessed of some varied learning, much
+narrow prejudice, and a violent, crotchety temper, but had proved during
+the troubles of the Revolution his sincere and disinterested devotion to
+the family he served, and Aurore and "the great man," as she afterwards
+nicknamed her old tutor, were always good friends.</p>
+
+<p>Before she was four years old she could read quite well; but she remarks
+that it was only after learning to write that what she read began to
+take a definite meaning for her. The fairy-tales perused but half
+intelligently before were re-read with a new delight. She learnt grammar
+with Deschartres, and from her grandmother took her first lessons in
+music, an art of which she became passionately fond; and it always
+remained for her a favourite source of enjoyment, though she never
+acquired much proficiency as a musical performer. The educational
+doctrines of Rousseau had then brought into fashion a <i>régime</i> of
+open-air exercise and freedom for the young, such as we commonly
+associate with English, rather than French, child-life; and Aurore's
+early years&mdash;when domestic hostilities and nursery tyrannies, from
+which, like most sensitive children, she suffered inordinately, were
+suspended&mdash;were passed in the careless, healthy fashion approved in this
+country. A girl of her own age, but of lower degree, was taken into the
+house to share her studies and pastimes. Little Ursule was to become, in
+later years, the faithful servant of her present companion, who had then
+become lady of the manor, and who never lost sight of this humble
+friend. Aurore had also a boy playmate in a <i>protégé</i> of her
+grandmother's, five years her senior, who patronised and persecuted her
+by turns, in his true fraternal fashion. This boy, Hippolyte, the son of
+a woman of low station, was in fact Aurore's half-brother, adopted from
+his birth and brought up by Madame Dupin the elder, whose indulgence,
+where her son was concerned, was infinite. With these, and the children
+of the farm-tenants and rural proprietors around, Aurore did not want
+for companions. But the moment soon arrived when the painful family
+dispute of which she was the object, was to become the cause of more
+distress to the child than to her elders. There were reasons which stood
+in the way of Madame Maurice Dupin's fixing her residence permanently
+under her mother-in-law's roof. But the mind of the latter was set on
+obtaining the guardianship of her grand-daughter, the natural heir to
+her property, and on thus assuring to her social and educational
+privileges of a superior order. The child's heart declared unreservedly
+for her mother, whose passionate fondness she returned with the added
+tenderness of a deeper nature, and all attempts to estrange the two had
+only drawn them closer together. But the pecuniary resources of Maurice
+Dupin's widow were of the smallest, and the advantages offered to her
+little girl by the proposed arrangement so material, that the older lady
+gained her point in the end. Madame Maurice settled in Paris. Aurore
+grew up her grandmother's ward, with Nohant for her home; a home she was
+to keep, knowing no other, till the end of her life.</p>
+
+<p>The separation was brought about very gradually to the child. The first
+few winters were spent in Paris, where her grandmother had an
+establishment. Then she could pass whole days with her mother, who, in
+turn, spent summers at Nohant, and Aurore for years was buoyed up by the
+hope that a permanent reunion would still be brought about. But meantime
+domestic jealousy and strife, inflamed by the unprincipled meddling of
+servants, raged more fiercely than ever, and could not but be a source
+of more than ordinary childish misery to their innocent object. It was
+but slowly that she became attached to her grandmother, whose
+undemonstrative temper, formal habits and condescending airs were little
+calculated to win over her young affections, or fire her with gratitude
+for the anxiety displayed by this guardian to form her manners and
+cultivate her intellect. Nay, the result was rather to implant in her a
+premature dislike and distrust for conventional ideals. From the
+standard of culture and propriety, from the temptations of social rank
+and wealth held up for her preference, she instinctively turned to the
+simple, unrestrained affection of the despised mother, and the greater
+freedom and expansion enjoyed in such company. In vain did disdainful
+lady's-maids try to taunt her into precocious worldly wisdom, asking if
+she could really want to go and eat beans in a little garret. Such a
+condition, naturally, she began to regard as the equivalent of a noble
+and glorious existence!</p>
+
+<p>Meantime, throughout all these alternations of content and distress,
+Nohant and its surroundings were perforce becoming dear to her, as only
+the home of our childhood can ever become. The scenery and
+characteristics of that region are familiar to all readers of the works
+of George Sand; a quiet region of narrow, winding, shady lanes, where
+you may wander long between the tall hedges without meeting a living
+creature but the wild birds that start from the honey-suckle and
+hawthorn, and the frogs croaking among the sedges; a region of
+soft-flowing rivers with curlew-haunted reed beds, and fields where
+quails cluck in the furrows; the fertile plain studded with clumps of
+ash and alder, and a rare farm-habitation standing amid orchards and
+hemp-fields, or a rarer hamlet of a dozen cottages grouped together. The
+country is flat, and, viewed from the rail or high road, unimpressive.
+But those fruitful fields have a placid beauty, and it needs but to
+penetrate the sequestered lanes and explore the thicket-bound courses of
+the streams, to meet with plenty of those pleasant solitudes after a
+poet's own heart, whose gift is to seize and perpetuate transient
+effects, and to open the eyes of duller minds to charms that might pass
+unnoticed. In this sense only can George Sand be said to have idealized
+for us the landscapes she loved.</p>
+
+<p>The thoughtful, poetic side of her temperament showed itself early,
+leading her to seek long intervals of solitude, when she would bury
+herself in books or dreams, to satisfy the cravings of her intellect and
+imagination. On the other hand, her vigorous physical organization kept
+alive her taste for active amusements and merry companionship. So the
+child-squire romped on equal terms with the little rustics of Nohant,
+sharing their village sports and the occupations of the seasons as they
+came round: hay-making and gleaning in summer; in winter weaving
+bird-nets to spread in the snowy fields for the wholesale capture of
+larks; anon listening with mixed terror and delight to the picturesque
+legends told by the hemp-beaters, as they sat at their work out of doors
+on September moonlight evenings&mdash;to all the traditional ghost-stories of
+the "Black Valley," as she fancifully christened the country round
+about. Tales were these of fantastic animals and goblins, the
+<i>grand'-bête</i> and the <i>levrette blanche</i>, Georgeon, that imp of
+mischief, night apparitions of witches and charmers of wolves, singing
+Druidical stones and mysterious portents&mdash;a whole fairy mythology, then
+firmly believed in by the superstitious peasantry.</p>
+
+<p>As a signal contrast to this way of life came for a time the annual
+visits to Paris&mdash;suspended after she was ten years old. There liberty
+ended, and the girl was transported into a novel and most uncongenial
+sphere. Her grandmother's friends and relatives were mostly old people,
+who clung to antiquated modes and customs; and distinguished though such
+circles might be, the youngest member only found out that they were
+intolerably dull. The wrinkled countesses with their elaborate toilettes
+and ceremonious manners, the <i>abbés</i> with their fashionable
+tittle-tattle and their innumerable snuff-boxes, the long dinners, the
+accomplishment-lessons, notably those in dancing and deportment, were
+repugnant to the soul of the little hoyden. She made amends to herself
+by observing these new scenes and characters narrowly, with the acute
+natural perception that was one of her leading gifts. From this
+artificial atmosphere of constraint, it was inevitable that she should
+welcome hours of escape into her mother's unpretending domestic circle;
+and already at ten years old she had pronounced the lot of a
+scullery-maid enviable, compared to that of an old <i>marquise</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless the fact of her having, at an age when impressions are
+strongest, and most lasting, mixed freely and on equal terms with the
+upper classes of society, was a point in her education not without its
+favorable action on her afterwards as a novelist. Despite her firm
+republican sympathies, emphatic disdain for mere rank and wealth, and
+her small mercy for the foibles of the fashionable world, she can enter
+into its spirit, paint its allurements without exaggeration, and
+indicate its shortcomings with none of that asperity of the outsider
+which always suggests some unconscious envy lurking behind the scorn.</p>
+
+<p>The despised accomplishment-lessons, in themselves tending only to so
+much agreeable dabbling, proved useful to her indirectly by creating new
+interests, and as an intellectual stimulus. There seems to have been
+little or no method about her early education. The study of her own
+language was neglected, and the time spent less profitably, she
+considered in acquiring a smattering of Latin with Deschartres. She took
+to some studies with avidity, while others remained wholly distasteful
+to her. For mere head-work she cared little. Arithmetic she detested;
+versification, no less. Her imagination rebelled against the
+restrictions of form. Nowhere, perhaps, except in the free-fantasia
+style of the novel, could this great prose-poet have found the right
+field in which to do justice to her powers. The dry <i>technique</i> in music
+was a stumbling-block of which she was impatient. History and literature
+she enjoyed in whatever they offered that was romantic, heroic, or
+poetically suggestive. In her Nohant surroundings there was nothing to
+check, and much to stimulate, this dominant, imaginative faculty. Her
+youthful attempts at original composition she quickly discarded in
+disgust; but it seemed almost a law of her mind that whatever was
+possessing it she must instinctively weave into a romance. Thus in
+writing her history-epitome she must improve on the original, when too
+dry, by exercising her fancy in the description of places and
+personages. The actual political events of that period were of the most
+exciting character; Napoleon's Russian campaign, abdication, retreat to
+Elba, the Hundred Days, Waterloo, the Restoration, following each other
+in swift succession. Old Madame Dupin was an anti-Bonapartist, but
+Aurore had caught from her mother something of the popular infatuation
+for the emperor, and her fancy would create him over again, as he might
+have been had his energies been properly directed. Her day-dreams were
+often so vivid as to effect her senses with all the force of realities.</p>
+
+<p>Such a visionary life might have been most dangerous and mentally
+enervating had her organization been less robust, and the tendency to
+reverie not been matched by lively external perception and plentiful
+physical activity. As it was, if at one moment she was in a cloud-land
+of her own, or poring over the stories of the Iliad, the classic
+mythologies, or Tasso's <i>Gerusalemme</i>, the next would see her scouring
+the fields with Ursule and Hippolyte, playing practical jokes on the
+tutor, and extemporizing wild out-of-door games and dances with her
+village companions.</p>
+
+<p>Of serious religious education she received none at all. Here, again,
+the authorities were divided. Her mother was pious in a primitive way,
+though holding aloof from priestly influences. The grandmother, a
+disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of Voltaire, had renounced the
+Catholic creed, and was what was then called a Deist. But beyond
+discouraging a belief in miraculous agencies she preserved a neutrality
+with her ward on the subject, and Aurore was left free to drift as her
+nature should decide. Instinctively she felt more drawn toward her
+mother's unreasoning, emotional faith than toward a system of
+philosophic, critical inquiry. But on both sides what was offered her to
+worship was too indefinite to satisfy her strong religious instincts.
+Once more she filled in the blank with her imagination, which was
+forthwith called upon to picture a being who should represent all
+perfections, human and divine; something that her heart could love, as
+well as her intelligence approve.</p>
+
+<p>This ideal figure, for whom she devised the name <i>Corambé</i>, was to
+combine all the spiritual qualities of the Christian ideal with the
+earthly grace and beauty of the mythological deities of Greece. For very
+many years she cherished this fantasy, finding there the scope she
+sought for her aspirations after superhuman excellence. It is hardly too
+much to say that the Christianity which had been expressly left out in
+her teaching she invented for herself. She erected a woodland altar in
+the recesses of a thicket to this imaginary object of her adoration, and
+it is a characteristic trait that the sacrifices she chose to offer
+there were the release of birds and butterflies that had been taken
+prisoners&mdash;as a symbolical oblation most welcome to a divinity whose
+essential attributes were infinite mercy and love. It will be remembered
+that a somewhat similar anecdote is related of the youthful Goethe.</p>
+
+<p>Aurore, as the years went on, had grown sincerely fond of Madame Dupin;
+but her mother still held the foremost place in her heart, and she had
+never ceased to cherish the belief that if they two could live together
+she would be perfectly happy. The discovery of this deeply irritated her
+grandmother, who at length was provoked to intimate to the girl
+something of the real motive for insisting on this separation&mdash;namely,
+that her mother's antecedents were such as, in the eyes of Aurore's
+well-wishers, rendered it desirable to establish the daughter's
+existence apart from that of her parent. Sooner or later such a
+revelation must have been made; but made as it was, thus precipitately,
+in a moment of jealous anger, the chief result was of necessity to cause
+a painful and dangerous shock to the sensitive young mind. It brought
+about an unnatural discord in her moral nature, forbidden all at once to
+respect what she had loved most, and must continue to love, in spite of
+all. On the injurious effects of the over-agitation to which she was
+subjected in her childhood she has laid much stress in her remarkable
+work, "The Story of My Life." Much of this book, written when she was
+between forty and fifty, reads like a romance; and had a certain amount
+of retrospective imagination entered into the treatment of these
+reminiscences it would not be surprising. The tendency to impart
+poetical color and significance to whatever was capable of taking it was
+her mastering impulse, and may sometimes have led her to lose the
+distinction between fancy and reality, especially as by her own
+confession her memory was never her strong point. But she had an
+excellent memory for impressions, and no reader whose own recollections
+of childhood have not grown faint, but will feel the profound truth of
+the spirit of the narrative, which is of a kind that occasional
+exaggerations in the letter cannot depreciate in value as a
+psychological history. For an account of her early life it must always
+remain the most important source.</p>
+
+<p>Aurore was now thirteen, and though she had read a good deal of
+miscellaneous literature her instruction had been mostly of a desultory
+sort; she was behindhand in the accomplishments deemed desirable for
+young ladies; and her country manners, on the score of etiquette, left
+something to be desired. To school, therefore, it was decided that she
+must go; and her grandmother selected that held by the nuns of the
+"English convent" at Paris, as the most fashionable institution of the
+kind.</p>
+
+<p>This <i>Convent des Anglaises</i> was a British community, first established
+in the French capital in Cromwell's time. It has now been removed, and
+its site, the Rue St. Victor, has undergone complete transformation. In
+1817, however, it was in high repute among conventual educational
+establishments. To this retreat Aurore was consigned and there spent
+more than two years, an untroubled time she has spoken of as in many
+respects the happiest of her life. There is certainly nothing more
+delightful in her memoirs than the vivid picture there drawn of the
+convent-school interior, drawn without flattery or malice, and with
+sympathy and animation.</p>
+
+<p>The nunnery was an extensive building of rambling construction&mdash;with
+parts disused and dilapidated&mdash;quite a little settlement, counting some
+150 inmates, nuns, pupils and teachers; with cells and dormitories, long
+corridors, chapels, kitchens, distillery, spiral staircases and
+mysterious nooks and corners; a large garden planted with chestnut
+trees, a kitchen garden, and a little cemetery without gravestones,
+over-grown with evergreens and flowers. The sisters were all English,
+Irish, or Scotch, but the majority of the pupils and the secular
+mistresses were French. Of the nuns the ex-scholar speaks with respect
+and affection, but their religious exercises left them but the smaller
+share of their time and attention to devote to the pupils. The girls
+almost without exception were of high social rank, the <i>bourgeois</i>
+element as yet having scarcely penetrated this exclusive seminary.
+Aurore formed warm friendships with many of her school-fellows, and
+seems to have been decidedly popular with the authorities as well, in
+spite of the high spirits which amid congenial company found vent in
+harmless mischief and a sort of organized playful insubordination. The
+school had two parties: the <i>sages</i> or good girls, and the <i>diables</i>,
+their opposites. Among the latter Aurore conscientiously enrolled
+herself and became a leader in their escapades, acquiring the sobriquet
+of "Madcap." These outbreaks led to nothing more heinous than playing
+off tricks on a tyrannical mistress, or making raids on the forbidden
+ground of the kitchen garden. But the charm that held together the
+confraternity of <i>diables</i> was a grand, long-cherished design, to which
+their best energy and ingenuity were devoted&mdash;a secret, heroic-sounding
+enterprise, set forth as "the deliverance of the victim." A tradition
+existed among them that a captive was kept languishing miserably in some
+remote cell, and they had set themselves the task of discovering and
+liberating this hapless wretch.</p>
+
+<p>It is needless to say that prisoner and dungeon existed in their
+girlishly romantic brains alone, but easy to see how such a legend might
+possess itself of their imaginations, and to what bewitching exploits it
+might invite firm believers. The supervision was not so very strict but
+that a <i>diable</i> of spirit might sometimes play truant from the
+class-room unnoticed. The truants would then start on an exciting
+journey of discovery through the tortuous passages, exploring the
+darkest recesses of the more deserted portions of the convent; now
+penetrating into the vaults, now adventuring on the roofs, regardless
+of peril to life or limb. This sublimely ridiculous undertaking,
+half-sport, half-earnest, so fascinated Aurore as to become the most
+important occupation of her mind!</p>
+
+<p>The teaching provided for the young ladies appears to have been of the
+customary superficial order&mdash;of everything a little; a little music, a
+little drawing, a little Italian. With English she had the opportunity
+of becoming really conversant, as it was the language commonly spoken in
+the convent, where also she could not fail to acquire some insight into
+the English character. This she has treated more fairly than England for
+long was to treat her. Few of her gifted literary countrymen have done
+such justice to the sterling good qualities of our nation. Even when, in
+delineating the Briton, she caricatures those peculiarities with which
+he is accredited abroad, her blunders seem due to incomplete knowledge
+rather than to any inability to comprehend the spirit of a people with
+whom, indeed, she had many points of sympathy. She could penetrate that
+coldness and constraint of manner so repelling to French natures, and
+has said of us, with unconventional truth, that our character is in
+reality more vehement than theirs; but with less mastery over our
+emotions themselves, we have more mastery over the expression of our
+emotions. Among her chosen school-comrades were several English girls,
+but on leaving the convent their paths separated, and in her after life
+she had but rare opportunities for renewing these early friendships.</p>
+
+<p>Some eighteen months had elapsed in this fashion when Aurore began to
+tire of <i>diablerie</i>. The victim remained undiscoverable. The store of
+practical jokes was exhausted. Her restless spirit, pent up within those
+convent walls, was thirsting for a new experience,&mdash;something to fill
+her heart and life.</p>
+
+<p>It came in the dawn of a religious enthusiasm&mdash;different from her
+mystical dream of <i>Corambé</i>, which however poetical was out of harmony
+with the spirit and ritual of a Catholic convent. But monastic life had
+its poetical aspects also; and through these it was that its
+significance first successfully appealed to her. An evening in the
+chapel, a Titian picture representing Christ on the Mount of Olives, a
+passage chanced upon in the "Lives of the Saints," brought impressions
+that awoke in her a new fervor, and inaugurated a period of ardent
+Catholicism. All vagueness was gone from her devotional aspirations,
+which now acquired a direct personal import. The change brought a
+revolution in her general behavior. She was understood to have been
+"converted." "Madcap" was now nicknamed "Sainte Aurore" by her profane
+school-fellows, and she formed the serious desire and intention of
+becoming a nun.</p>
+
+<p>The sisters, a practical-minded community, behaved with great good sense
+and discretion. Without distressing the youthful proselyte by casting
+doubts on her "vocation," they reminded her that the consideration was a
+distant one, as for years to come her first duty would be to her
+relatives, who would never sanction her present determination. Her
+confessor, the Abbé Prémord, a Jesuit and man of the world, was likewise
+kindly discouraging; and perceiving that her zeal was leading her to
+morbid self-accusation and asceticism of mood, he shrewdly enjoined upon
+her as a penance to take part in the sports and pastimes with the rest
+as heretofore, much to her dismay. But she soon found her liking for
+these return, and with it her health of mind. Unshaken still in her
+private belief that she would take the veil in due time, she was content
+to wait, and in the interval to be a useful and agreeable member of
+society. No more insubordination, no more mischievous freaks, yet
+"Sainte Aurore" remained the life and soul of all recreations recognized
+by authority, which even included little theatrical performances now and
+then.</p>
+
+<p>She had become more regular in her studies since her mind had taken a
+serious turn, but her heart was less in them than ever. Considering
+this, and the deficiencies in the system of instruction itself, it is
+hardly surprising that when, in the spring of 1820, her grandmother
+fearing that the monastic idea was taking hold of Aurore in good earnest
+decided to remove her from the <i>Couvent des Anglaises</i>, she knew little
+more than when first she had entered it.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">GIRLHOOD AND MARRIED LIFE.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Aurore Dupin</span> was now fifteen, and so far, though somewhat peculiarly
+situated, she and her life had presented no very extraordinary features,
+nor promise of the same. Her energies had flowed into a variety of
+channels, and manifestly clever and accustomed to take the lead though
+she might be, no one, least of all herself, seems to have thought of
+regarding her as a wonder. The Lady Superior of the <i>Couvent des
+Anglaises</i>, who called her "Still Waters," had perhaps an inkling of
+something more than met the eye, existent in this pupil. But a dozen
+years were yet to elapse before the moment came when she was to start
+life afresh for herself, on a footing of independence and literary
+enterprise, and by her first published attempts raise her name at once
+above the names of the mass of her fellow-creatures.</p>
+
+<p>Old Madame Dupin, warned by failing health that her end was not far off,
+would gladly have first assured a husband's protection for her ward,
+whom she had now succeeded in really dissociating from her natural
+guardian. The girl's bringing-up, and an almost complete separation for
+the last five years, had made a gap&mdash;in habits of mind and feeling&mdash;such
+as could hardly be quite bridged over, between her mother and herself.
+But though beginning to be sadly aware of this and of the increasing
+violence and asperities of poor Madame Maurice Dupin's temper, which
+made peace under one roof with her a matter of difficulty, Aurore hung
+back from the notion of marriage, and clearly was much too young to be
+urged into taking so serious a step. So to Nohant she returned from the
+convent in the spring of 1820. There she continued to strike that
+judicious compromise between temporal and spiritual duties and pleasures
+enjoined on her by her clerical adviser. Still bent on choosing a
+monastic life, when free to choose for herself, she was reconciled in
+the meantime to take things as they came, and to make herself happy and
+add to the happiness of her grandmother in the ordinary way. So we find
+her enjoying the visit of one of her school friends, getting up little
+plays to amuse the elders, practicing the harp, receiving from her
+brother Hippolyte&mdash;now a noisy hussar&mdash;during his brief visit home, her
+first initiation into the arts of riding&mdash;for the future her favorite
+exercise&mdash;and of pistol-shooting; and last, but not least, beginning to
+suspect that she had learned nothing whatever while at school, and
+setting to work to educate herself, as best she could, by miscellaneous
+reading.</p>
+
+<p>In the spring of the following year Madame Dupin's health and mental
+faculties utterly broke down. But she lived on for another ten months.
+Aurore for the time was placed in a most exceptional position for a
+French girl of sixteen. She was thrown absolutely on herself and her own
+resources, uncontrolled and unprotected, between a helpless, half
+imbecile invalid, and the eccentric, dogmatic pedagogue, Deschartres.
+Highly susceptible to influences from without, her mind, during their
+sudden and complete suspension, seemed as it were invited to discover
+and take its own bent.</p>
+
+<p>Piqued by the charge of dense ignorance flung at her by her ex-tutor,
+and aware that there was truth in it, she would now sit up all night
+reading, finding her appetite for the secular knowledge she used to
+despise grow by what it fed upon. The phase of religious exaltation she
+had recently passed through still gave the tone to her mind, and it was
+with the works of famous philosophers, metaphysicians, and Christian
+mystics that she began her studies. Comparing the "Imitation of Christ"
+with Châteaubriand's "Spirit of Christianity," and struck here and
+elsewhere with the wide discrepancies and contradictions of opinion
+manifest between great minds ranging themselves under one theological
+banner, she was led on to speculations that alarmed her conscience, and
+she appealed to her spiritual director, the Abbé Prémord, for advice,
+fearing lest her faith might be endangered if she read more. He
+encouraged her to persevere, telling her in no wise to deny herself
+these intellectual enjoyments. But her rigid Catholicism was doomed from
+that hour. Hers was that order of mind which can never give ostensible
+adhesion to a creed whilst morally unconvinced; never accept that refuge
+of the weak from the torment of doubt, in abdicating the functions of
+reason and conscience, shifting the onus of responsibility on to others,
+and agreeing to believe, as it were, by proxy. She had plunged
+fearlessly and headlong into Aristotle, Bacon, Locke, Condillac, Mably,
+Leibnitz, Bossuet, Pascal, Montaigne, Montesquieu; beginning to call
+many things in question, and, through the darkness and confusion into
+which she was sometimes thrown, trying honestly and sincerely to feel
+her way to some more glorious faith and light.</p>
+
+<p>In the convent she had been familiarized with Romanism under its most
+attractive aspects. The moral refinement, the mystery, the seclusion,
+and picturesque beauties of that abode had a poetic charm that had
+carried her irresistibly away. But, confronted with the system in its
+practical working, she was staggered by many of its features. In the
+country churches around her she saw the peasantry encouraged in their
+grossest superstitions, and the ritual, carelessly hurried through,
+degenerate often into mere mockery. The practice of confession,
+moreover&mdash;her ultimate condemnation of which, as an institution whose
+results for good are scanty, its dangers excessive, will be endorsed by
+most persons in this country&mdash;and the Church's denial of the right of
+salvation to all outside its pale, revolted her; and she caught at the
+teaching of those who claimed liberty of conscience. "Reading Leibnitz,"
+she observes, "I became a Protestant without knowing it." That purer and
+more liberal Christianity she dreamed of had, she discovered, been the
+ideal of many great men. The step brought her face to face with fresh
+and grave problems of which, she truly observes, the solutions were
+beyond her years, and beyond that era. There came to her rare moments of
+celestial calm and concord, but she owed them to other and indirect
+sources of inspiration. The study of philosophy, indeed, was not much
+more congenial to her at sixteen than arithmetic had been at six. In
+what merely exercised memory and attention she took comparatively but
+languid interest. Instruction, to bring her its full profit, must be
+conveyed through the medium of moral emotion, but the mysterious power
+of feeling to stimulate intellect was with her immense. She turned now
+to the poets&mdash;Shakespeare, Byron, Dante, Milton, Virgil, Pope. A poet
+herself, she discovered that these had more power than controversialists
+to strengthen her religious convictions, as well as to enlarge her mind.
+Above all, the writings of the poet-moralist, Jean-Jacques Rousseau,
+helped her towards resolving the question that occupied her, of her true
+vocation in life, now that her determination to take the veil was not a
+little shaken.</p>
+
+<p>The midnight student was by turns Amazon and sick-nurse as well. From
+the fatigue of long watches over her books or by the invalid's bedside,
+she found a better and more invigorating refreshment than sleep in
+solitary morning rides across country. Her fearlessness on horseback was
+madness in the eyes of the neighbors. Riding, then and there, was almost
+unheard of for ladies, a girl in a riding-habit regarded as simply a
+Cossack in petticoats, and Mademoiselle Dupin's delight in
+horse-exercise sufficed to stamp her as eccentric and strong-minded in
+the opinion of the country gentry and the towns-folk of La Châtre. They
+had heard of her studies, too, and disapproved of them as unlady-like in
+character. Philosophy was bad enough, but anatomy, which she had been
+encouraged to take up by Deschartres, himself a proficient in medical
+science, was worse&mdash;sacrilegious, for a person understood to be
+professedly of a devotional turn of mind. She went game-shooting with
+the old tutor; he had a mania for the sport, which she humored though
+she did not share. But when quails were the object, she owns to have
+enjoyed her part in the chase, which was to crouch in the furrows among
+the green corn, imitating the cry of the birds to entice them within
+gunshot of the sportsman. Lastly, finding in the feminine
+costume-fashions of that period a dire impediment to out-door enterprise
+of the sort, in a region of no roads, or bad roads, of rivers
+perpetually in flood, turning the lanes into water-courses for
+three-fourths of the year, of miry fields and marshy heaths, she
+procured for herself a suit of boy's clothes, donning blouse and gaiters
+now and then without compunction for these rough country walks and
+rambles.</p>
+
+<p>Here, indeed, was more than enough to raise a hue-and-cry at La Châtre,
+a small provincial town, probably neither better nor worse than the rest
+of its class, a class never yet noted for charity or liberality of
+judgment. The strangest stories began to be circulated concerning her,
+stories for the most part so false and absurd as to inspire her with a
+sweeping contempt for public opinion. By a very common phenomenon, she
+was to incur throughout her life far more censure through freaks,
+audacious as breaches of custom, but intrinsically harmless, nor likely
+to set the fashion to others, than is often reserved for errors of a
+graver nature. The conditions of ordinary middle-class society are
+designed, like ready-made clothes, to fit the vast majority of human
+beings, who live under them without serious inconvenience. For the
+future George Sand to confine her activities within the very narrow
+restrictions laid down by the social code of La Châtre was, it must be
+owned, hardly to be expected. It was perhaps premature to throw down the
+gauntlet at sixteen, but her inexperience and isolation were complete.
+The grandmother in her dotage was no counsellor at all. Deschartres, an
+oddity himself, cared for none of these things. Those best acquainted
+with her at La Châtre, families the heads of which had known her father
+well and whose younger members had fraternized with her from childhood
+upwards, liked her none the less for her unusual proceedings, and
+defended her stoutly against her detractors.</p>
+
+<p>"You are losing your best friend," said her dying grandmother to her
+when the end came, in December, 1821. Aurore was, indeed, placed in a
+difficult and painful situation. She had inherited all the property of
+the deceased, who, in her will, expressed her desire that her own
+nearest relations by her marriage with M. Dupin, a family of the name of
+de Villeneuve, well-off and highly connected, should succeed her as
+guardians to her ward. But it was impossible to dispute the claims of
+Madame Maurice Dupin to the care of her own daughter if she chose to
+assert them, which she quickly did, bearing off the girl with her to
+Paris&mdash;Nohant being left under the stewardship of Deschartres&mdash;and by
+her unconciliatory behavior further alienating the other side of the
+family from whom Aurore, through no fault of her own, was virtually
+estranged at the moment when she stood most in need of a friend. Twenty
+years later they came forward to claim kinship and friendship again: it
+was then with George Sand, the illustrious writer, become one of the
+immortals.</p>
+
+<p>Thus her lot was cast for her in her mother's home and plebeian circle
+of acquaintance. So much the worse, it was supposed, for her prospects,
+social and matrimonial. This did not distress her, but none the less was
+the time that followed an unhappy one. The mother whom she had idolized,
+and of whom she always remained excessively fond, appears to have been
+something of a termagant in her later years. The heavy troubles of her
+life had aggravated one of those irascible and uncontrollable tempers
+that can only be soothed by superior violence. Aurore, saddened, gentle,
+and submissive, only exasperated her. Her fitful affection and fitful
+rages combined to make her daughter's life miserable, and to incline the
+girl unconsciously to look over-favorably on any recognized mode of
+escape that should present itself.</p>
+
+<p>A long visit to the country-house of some friends near Melun, was hailed
+as a real relief by both. Here there were young people, and plenty of
+cheerful society. Aurore became like one of the family, and her mother
+was persuaded to allow her to prolong her stay indefinitely. Among the
+new acquaintance she formed whilst on this visit was one that decided
+her future.</p>
+
+<p>M. Casimir Dudevant was a young man on terms of intimacy with her hosts,
+the Duplessis family. From the first he was struck by Mlle. Dupin, who
+on his further acquaintance was not otherwise than pleased with him.
+The sequel, before long, came in an offer of marriage on his part, which
+she accepted with the approval of her friends.</p>
+
+<p>He was seven-and-twenty, had served in the army, and studied for the
+law; but had expectations which promised an independence. His father,
+Colonel Dudevant, a landed proprietor in Gascony, whose marriage had
+proved childless, had acknowledged Casimir, though illegitimate, and
+made him his heir. It was reckoned not a brilliant <i>parti</i> for the
+<i>châtelaine</i> of Nohant, but a perfectly eligible one. It was not a
+<i>mariage de convenance</i>; the young people had chosen freely. Still less
+was it a love match. Romantic sentiment&mdash;counted out of place in such
+arrangements by the society they belonged to&mdash;seems not to have been
+dreamed of on either side. But they had arranged it for themselves,
+which to Aurore would naturally seem, as indeed it was, an improvement
+on the usual mode of procedure, according to which the burden of choice
+would have rested with her guardians. It was a <i>mariage de raison</i>
+founded, as she and he believed, on mutual friendliness; in reality on a
+total and fatal ignorance of each other's characters, and probably, on
+Aurore's side, of her own as well. She was only just eighteen, and had a
+wretched home.</p>
+
+<p>The match was sanctioned by their parents, respectively. In September,
+1822, Aurore Dupin became Madame Dudevant, and shortly afterwards she
+and her husband established themselves at Nohant, there to settle down
+to quiet country life.</p>
+
+<p>If tranquillity did not bring all the happiness that was expected, it
+was at least unbroken by such positive trials as those to come, and
+whatever was lacking to Madame Dudevant's felicity she forgot for a
+while in her joy over the birth of her son Maurice, in the summer of
+1823&mdash;a son for whom more than ordinary treasures of maternal affection
+were in store, and who, when his childhood was past, was to become and
+remain until the time of her death a sure consolation and compensation
+to her for the troubles of her life.</p>
+
+<p>The first two years after her marriage were spent almost without
+interruption in the still monotony of Nohant. "We live here as quietly
+as possible," she writes to her mother in June, 1825, "seeing very few
+people, and occupying ourselves with rural cares." That absolute
+dependence on each other's society that might have had its charm for a
+really well-assorted couple was, however, not calculated to prolong any
+illusions that might exist as to the perfect harmony of their
+dispositions. Already in the summer of 1824 the Dudevants had sought a
+change from seclusion in a long visit to their friends the Duplessis,
+after which they rented a villa in the environs of Paris for a short
+while. The spring found them back at Nohant, and the summer of 1825 was
+marked by a tour to the Pyrenees, undertaken in concert with some old
+school-fellows of Aurore's, two sisters, who with their father were
+starting for Cauterets. The pleasure of girlish friendships renewed gave
+double charm to the trip, and her delight in the mountain scenery knew
+no bounds.</p>
+
+<p>"I am in such a state of enthusiasm about the Pyrenees," she writes to
+her mother, "that I shall dream and talk of nothing but mountains and
+torrents, caves and precipices, all the rest of my life." She joined
+eagerly in every excursion on foot and horseback, but even moderate
+feats of mountaineering, such as are now expected of the quietest
+English lady-tourists by their husbands and brothers, were then deemed
+startlingly eccentric, and got her into fresh trouble on this head.</p>
+
+<p>Her letters and the fragments of her journal kept during this time, and
+in which she tried to commit to paper her impressions, whilst fresh and
+vivid, of the Pyrenees, show the same peculiar descriptive power that
+distinguished her novels&mdash;that art of seizing grand general effects
+together with picturesque detail, and depicting them in a simple and
+straightforward manner, in which she was an adept. It must be added that
+the diffuseness which characterizes her fiction, also pervades her
+correspondence. Neither can be adequately represented by extracts. Her
+composition is like a gossamer web, that must be shown in its entirety,
+as to split it up is to destroy it.</p>
+
+<p>The ensuing winter and spring were passed agreeably in visits with her
+husband to his family at Nérac, Gascony, and to friends in the
+neighborhood. In the summer of 1826 their wanderings ended. Once more
+they settled down at Nohant, where Madame Dudevant, except for a few
+brief absences on visits to friends, or to health resorts in the
+vicinity, remained stationary for the next four years, during which her
+after-destiny was unalterably shaping itself.</p>
+
+<p>It is perfectly idle to speculate on what might have happened had her
+lot in marriage turned out a fortunate one, or had she married for love,
+or had the moral character of the partner of her life preserved any
+solid claim on her respect, since the contrary was unhappily the case.
+Their situation, no doubt, was anomalous. In the young girl of barely
+eighteen, country-bred and intellectually immature, whom M. Dudevant had
+chosen to marry, who could have discerned one of the greatest poetical
+geniuses and most powerful minds of the century? Some commiseration
+might <i>à priori</i> be felt for the petty squire's son who had taken the
+hand of the pretty country-heiress, promising himself, no doubt, a
+comfortable jog-trot existence in the ordinary groove, to discover in
+after years that he was mated with the most remarkable woman that had
+made herself heard of in the literary world since Sappho! But he
+remained fatally blind to the nature of the development that was taking
+place under his eyes, preserving to the last the serenest contempt for
+his wife's intelligence. Her large mind and enthusiastic temperament
+sought in vain for moral sympathy from a narrow common spirit, and in
+proportion as her faculties unfolded, increasing disparity between them
+brought increasing estrangement. Such a strong artist-nature may require
+for its expansion an amount of freedom not easily compatible with
+domestic happiness. But of real domestic happiness she never had a fair
+chance, and for a time the will to make the best of her lot as it was
+cast appears not to have been wanting.</p>
+
+<p>The Dudevants, after their return home in 1826, began to mix more freely
+in such society as La Châtre and the environs afforded, and at certain
+seasons there was no lack of provincial gayeties. Aurore Dudevant all
+her life long was quite indifferent to what she has summarily dismissed
+as "the silly vanities of finery"&mdash;"<i>Souffrir pour être belle</i>" was what
+from her girlhood she declined to do. Regard for the brightness of her
+eyes, her complexion, the whiteness of her hands, the shape of her foot,
+never made her sacrifice her midnight study, her walks in the sunshine,
+or her good country sabots for the rough lanes of Berry. "To live under
+glass, in order not to get tanned, or chapped, or faded before the time,
+is what I have always found impossible," she for her part has
+acknowledged. And she cared very moderately for general society. She
+writes to her mother in spring, 1826: "It is not the thing of all others
+that reposes, or even that amuses me best; still there are obligations
+in this life, which one must take as they come." She was not yet
+two-and-twenty, and carnival-tide with its social "obligations" in the
+form of balls and receptions was not unwelcome. They snatched her away
+from her increasing depression. She writes of these diversions to her
+mother in a lively strain, describing how one ball was kept up till nine
+o'clock the next day, how every Sunday morning the <i>curé</i> preaches
+against dancing, but in the evening the dance goes on in despite of
+him&mdash;how this cross <i>curé</i> is not their own parish <i>curé</i> of St.
+Chartier,&mdash;a very old friend and a "character" who, when Madame Dudevant
+was five-and-thirty, used to say of her, "Aurore is a child I have
+always been fond of." "As for him, if only he were sixty years younger,"
+she adds, "I would undertake to make him dance himself if I set about
+it." Then follows an amusing sketch of a rustic bridal, the double
+marriage of two members of the Nohant establishment:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The wedding-feast came off in our coach-houses&mdash;there was dinner in
+one, dancing in the other. The splendor was such as you may
+imagine; three tallow candle-ends by way of illumination, lots of
+home-made wine for refreshment; the orchestra consisting of a
+bagpipe and a hurdy-gurdy, the noisiest and, therefore, the best
+appreciated in the country side. We invited some friends over from
+La Châtre, and made fools of ourselves in a hundred thousand ways;
+as, for instance, dressing up as peasants in the evening and
+disguising ourselves so well as not to recognize each other. Madame
+Duplessis was charming in a red petticoat; Ursule, in a blue blouse
+and a big hat was a most comical fellow; Casimir, got up as a
+beggar, had some halfpence given him in all good faith; Stephane,
+whom I think you know, as a spruce peasant, made believe to have
+been drinking, stumbled against our <i>sous-prèfet</i> and accosted
+him&mdash;he is a nice fellow, and was just going to depart when all of
+a sudden he recognized us. Well, it was a most farcical evening,
+and would have amused you I will engage. Perhaps you, too, would
+have been tempted to put on the country-cap, and I will answer for
+it that there would not have been a pair of black eyes to compete
+with yours.</p></div>
+
+<p>In other letters written in a vein of charming good humor, her facility
+and spirit are shown in her treatment of trivial incidents, or sketches
+of local characters, as this, for example, of an ancient female servant
+in her employ:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The strangest old woman in the world&mdash;active, industrious, clean
+and faithful, but an unimaginable grumbler. She grumbles by day,
+and I think by night, when asleep. She grumbles whilst making the
+butter, she grumbles when feeding the poultry, she grumbles even at
+her meals. She grumbles at other people, and when she is alone she
+grumbles at herself. I never meet her without asking her how her
+grumbling is getting on, and she grumbles away more than ever.</p></div>
+
+<p>And elsewhere she has her fling at the little squabbles and absurdities
+of provincial society, the "sets" and petty distinctions, giving a
+humorous relation of the collapse of her well-meaning efforts, in
+conjunction with friends at the <i>sous-prèfecture</i>, to do away with some
+of these caste prejudices, of the horror and indignation created in the
+oligarchy of La Châtre by the apparition of an inoffensive music-master
+and his wife at the <i>sous-prèfet's</i> reception, horror so great that on
+the next occasion, the <i>salon</i> of the official was unfurnished with
+guests, except for the said music-master and the Dudevants themselves.
+She wrote a poetical skit to commemorate the incident, which created
+great amusement among her friends.</p>
+
+<p>In the autumn, 1828, her daughter Solange was born. The care of her two
+children, to whom she was devoted, occupied her seriously. Maurice's
+education was beginning, a fresh inducement to her to study that she
+might be better able to superintend his instruction. His least
+indisposition put her into a fever of anxiety. Her own health during all
+these years had repeatedly given cause for alarm. Symptoms of
+chest-disease showed themselves, but afterwards disappeared, her
+constitutional vigor triumphing in the end over complaints which seem to
+a great extent to have been of a nervous order. Meantime her domestic
+horizon was becoming overcast at many points.</p>
+
+<p>Her brother, Hippolyte Chatiron, now married, came with his family to
+settle in the neighborhood, and spent some time at Nohant. He had fallen
+into the fatal habit of drinking, in which he was joined by M. Dudevant
+to the degradation of his habits and, it would be charitable to suppose,
+to the confusion of his intelligence. This grave ill came to make an
+open break in the household calm, hitherto undisturbed on the surface.
+Low company and its brutalizing influences were tending to bring about a
+state of things to which the most patient of wives might find it hard to
+submit. A rôle of complete self-effacement was not one it was in her
+power long to sustain, and the utter moral solitude into which she was
+thrown consolidated those forces inclining her to the extreme of
+self-assertion. For together with trials without came the growing sense
+of superiority, the <i>ennui</i> and unrest springing from mental faculties
+with insufficient outlet, and moreover, denied the very shadow of
+appreciation at home, where she saw the claim to her deference and
+allegiance co-exist with a repudiation she resented of all idea of the
+reciprocity of such engagements.</p>
+
+<p>She had voluntarily handed over the management of her property&mdash;the
+revenue of which was hardly proportionate to the necessary expenses and
+required careful economy&mdash;to her husband, an arrangement which left her,
+even for pocket money, dependent on him. She now set herself to devise
+some means of adding to her resources by private industry. The more
+ambitious project of securing by her own exertions a separate
+maintenance for herself and her children would at this time have seemed
+chimerical, but it haunted her as a dream long before it took definite
+shape.</p>
+
+<p>It was not in literature that she first fancied she saw her way to
+earning an independent income. She had begun to make amateur essays in
+novel-writing, but was as dissatisfied with them as with the
+compositions of her childhood, and with a religious novelette she had
+produced whilst in the convent, and speedily committed to the flames.
+Again, alluding to her attempts, in 1825, at descriptions of the
+Pyrenees, she says: "I was not capable then of satisfying myself by what
+I wrote, for I finished nothing, and did not even acquire a taste for
+writing."</p>
+
+<p>But she had dabbled in painting, and remained fond of it. "The finest of
+the arts," she calls it, writing to her mother in 1830, "and the most
+pleasant, as a life-occupation, whether taken up for a profession, or
+for amusement merely. If I had real talent, I should consider such a lot
+the finest in the world." But neither did the decoration of fans and
+snuff-boxes nor the production of little water-color likenesses of her
+children and friends, beyond which her art did not go, promise anything
+brilliant in the way of remuneration.</p>
+
+<p>In her circle of friends at La Châtre&mdash;old family friends who had known
+her all her life&mdash;were those who had recognized and admired her superior
+ability. Here, too, she met more than one young spirit with literary
+aspirations, and one, at least, M. Jules Sandeau, who was afterwards to
+achieve distinguished literary success. The desire to go and do
+likewise came and took hold of her, together with the conviction of her
+capability to make her mark. However discontented with her essays in
+novel-writing hitherto, she began to be conscious she was on the right
+track. The Revolution of July, 1830, had just been successfully
+accomplished, and new hopes and ambitions for the world in general, and
+their own country in particular, lent a stimulus to the intellectual
+activity of the youth of France&mdash;a movement too strong not to make
+itself felt, even in Berry.</p>
+
+<p>The state of things at Nohant for the last two years had, as we have
+seen, been tending rather to stifle than to keep alive any hesitation or
+compunction Madame Dudevant might have felt at breaking openly from her
+present condition. In a letter, dated October, 1830, to her son's
+private tutor, M. Boucoiran, who had then been a year under their roof
+in that capacity, she remarks, significantly:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>You often wonder at my mobility of temper, my flexible character.
+What would become of me without this power of self-distraction? You
+know all in my life, and you ought to understand that but for that
+happy turn of mind which makes me quickly forget a sorrow, I should
+be disagreeable and perpetually withdrawn into myself, useless to
+others, insensible to their affection.</p></div>
+
+<p>The distance between herself and her husband had, indeed, been widening
+until now the sole real link between them was their joint love for the
+children. No pretence of mutual affection existed any longer. Madame
+Dudevant's feeling seems to have been of indifference merely; M.
+Dudevant's of dislike, mingled, probably, with a little fear. It appears
+that he committed to paper his sentiments on the subject, and that this
+document, ostensibly intended by him not to be opened till after his
+death, was found and perused by his wife. It was the provocation thus
+occasioned her, and the certainty thus acquired of her husband's
+aversion to her society, that brought matters to a climax; so, at least,
+she asserted in the heat of the moment. But nothing, we imagine, could
+long have deferred her next step, strange and venturesome though it was.
+Violent in acting on a determination when taken, after the manner, as
+she observes, of those whose determinations are slow in forming, she
+declared her intentions to her husband, and obtained his consent to her
+plan.</p>
+
+<p>According to this singular arrangement she was to be permitted to spend
+every alternate three months in Paris, where she proposed to try her
+fortune with her pen. She looked forward to having her little girl to be
+there with her as soon as she was comfortably settled, supposing the
+experiment to succeed. For half the year she would continue to reside,
+as hitherto, at Nohant, so as not to be long separated from her son, who
+was old enough to miss her, and to part from whom, on any terms, cost
+her dear. But he was to be sent to school in two years, and for the
+meantime she had secured for him the care and services of M. Boucoiran,
+whom she thoroughly trusted.</p>
+
+<p>Her husband was to allow her £120 a year out of her fortune, and on
+condition that the allowance should not be exceeded, he left her at
+liberty to get on as she chose, abstaining from further interference.</p>
+
+<p>It seems obvious that this compromise, whilst postponing, could only
+render more inevitable a future separation on less amicable terms,
+though neither appear to have realized it at the time. Madame Dudevant
+can have had no motive to blind her in the matter beyond her desire, in
+detaching herself from her present position, not to disconnect her life
+from that of her children. The freedom she demanded it was probably too
+late to deny. Those about her, her husband and M. Chatiron, who, with
+his family, was temporarily domesticated at Nohant, and who so far
+supported her as to offer her the loan of rooms held by him in Paris,
+for the first part of her stay, thought her resolution but a caprice.
+And viewed by the light of her subsequent success it is hard now to
+realize the boldness of an undertaking whose consequences, had it
+failed, must have been humiliating and disastrous. She had no practical
+knowledge of the world, had received no artistic training, and enjoyed
+none of the advantages of intellectual society. But she had
+extraordinary courage, spirit, and energy, springing no doubt from a
+latent sense of extraordinary powers, almost matured, though as yet but
+half-manifest. So much she knew of herself, and states modestly: "I had
+discovered that I could write quickly, easily, and for long at a time
+without fatigue; that my ideas, torpid in my brain, woke up and linked
+themselves together deductively in the flow of the pen; that in my life
+of seclusion, I had observed a good deal, and understood pretty well the
+characters I had chanced to come across, and that, consequently, I knew
+human nature well enough to describe it." A most moderate estimate, in
+which, however, she had yet to convince people that she was not
+self-deceived.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">DÉBUT IN LITERATURE.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">In</span> the first days of January 1831, the Rubicon was passed. The step,
+though momentous in any case to Madame Dudevant, was one whose ultimate
+consequences were by none less anticipated than by herself, when to town
+she came, still undecided whether her future destiny were to decorate
+screens and tea-caddies, or to write books, but resolved to give the
+literary career a trial.</p>
+
+<p>For actual subsistence she had her small fixed allowance from home; for
+credentials she was furnished with an introduction or two to literary
+men from her friends in the country who had some appreciation, more or
+less vague, of her intellectual powers. Though courageous and
+determined, she was far from self-confident; she asked herself if she
+might not be mistaking a mere fancy for a faculty, and her first step
+was to seek the opinion of some experienced authority as to her talent
+and chances.</p>
+
+<p>M. de Kératry, a popular novelist, to whom she was recommended, spoke
+his mind to her without restraint. It was to the crushing effect that a
+woman ought not to write at all. Her sex, Madame Dudevant was informed,
+can have no proper place in literature whatsoever. M. Delatouche,
+proprietor of the <i>Figaro</i>, poet and novelist besides, and cousin of her
+old and intimate friends the Duvernets, of La Châtre, was a shade more
+encouraging, even so far committing himself as to own that, if she would
+not let herself be disgusted by the struggles of a beginner, there might
+be a distant possibility for her of making some sixty pounds a year by
+her pen. Such specimens of her fiction as she submitted to him he
+condemned without appeal, but he encouraged her to persevere in trying
+to improve upon them, and advised her well in advising her to avoid
+imitation of any school or master, and fearlessly to follow her own
+bent.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime he took her on to the staff of his paper, then in its infancy
+and comparative obscurity. Journalism however was the department of
+literature least suited to her capabilities, and her
+fellow-contributors, though so much less highly gifted than Madame
+Dudevant, excelled her easily in the manufacture of leaders and
+paragraphs to order. To produce an article of a given length, on a given
+subject, within a given time, was for her the severest of ordeals; here
+her exuberant facility itself was against her. She would exhaust the
+space allotted to her, and find herself obliged to break off just at the
+point when she felt herself "beginning to begin." But she justly valued
+this apprenticeship as a professional experience, bringing her into
+direct relations with the literary world she was entering as a perfect
+stranger. Once able to devote herself entirely to composition and to
+live for her work, she found her calling begin to assert itself
+despotically. In a letter to a friend, M. Duteil, at La Châtre, dated
+about six weeks after her arrival in Paris, she writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>If I had foreseen half the difficulties that I find, I should not
+have undertaken this enterprise. Well, the more I encounter the
+more I am resolved to proceed. Still, I shall soon be returning
+home again, perhaps without having succeeded in launching my boat,
+but with hopes of doing better another time, and with plans of
+working harder than ever.</p></div>
+
+<p>Three weeks later we find her writing to her son's tutor, M. Boucoiran,
+in the same strain:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I am more than ever determined to follow the literary career. In
+spite of the disagreeables I often meet with, in spite of days of
+sloth and fatigue that come and interrupt my work, in spite of the
+more than humble life I lead here, I feel that henceforth my
+existence is filled. I have an object, a task, better say it at
+once, a passion. The profession of a writer is a violent one, and
+so to speak, indestructible. Once let it take possession of your
+wretched head, you cannot stop. I have not been successful; my work
+was thought too unreal by those whom I asked for advice.</p></div>
+
+<p>But still she persisted, providing, as best she could, "copy" for the
+<i>Figaro</i>, at seven francs a column, and trying the experiment of
+literary collaboration, working at fictions and magazine articles, the
+joint productions of herself and her friend and fellow-student, Jules
+Sandeau, who wrote for the <i>Revue de Paris</i>. It was under his name that
+these compositions appeared, Madam Dudevant, in these first
+trial-attempts, being undesirous to bring hers before the public.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no time to write home," she pleads, petitioning M. Boucoiran for
+news from the country, "but I like getting letters from Nohant, it rests
+my heart and my head."</p>
+
+<p>And alluding to her approaching temporary return thither, in accordance
+with the terms of her agreement with M. Dudevant, she writes to M.
+Charles Duvernet:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I long to get back to Berry, for I love my children more than all
+besides, and, but for the hopes of becoming one day more useful to
+them with the scribe's pen than with the housekeeper's needle, I
+should not leave them for so long. But in spite of innumerable
+obstacles I mean to take the first steps in this thorny career.</p></div>
+
+<p>In her case it was really the first step only that cost dear; whilst
+against the annoyances with which, as a new comer, she had to contend,
+there was ample compensation to set in the novel interests of the
+intellectual, political, and artistic world stirring around her. Country
+life and peasant life she had had the opportunity of studying from her
+youth up; of middle-class society she had sufficient experience; she
+counted relatives and friends among the <i>noblesse</i>, and had moved in
+those charmed circles; but the republic of art and letters, to which by
+nature and inclination she emphatically belonged, was a land of promise
+first opened up to her now. She was eager and impatient to
+deprovincialize herself.</p>
+
+<p>In the art galleries of the Louvre, at the theatre and the opera, in the
+daily interchange of ideas on all kinds of topics with her little circle
+of intelligent acquaintance, her mind grew richer by a thousand new
+impressions and enjoyments, and rapidly took fresh strength together
+with fresh knowledge. The heavy practical obstacles that interfere with
+such self-education on the part of one of her sex were seriously
+aggravated in her case by her narrow income. How she surmounted them is
+well known; assuming on occasion a disguise which, imposing on all but
+the initiated, enabled her everywhere to pass for a collegian of
+sixteen, and thus to go out on foot in all weathers, at all hours, alone
+if necessary, unmolested and unobserved, in theatre or restaurant,
+boulevard or reading-room. In defense of her adoption of this strange
+measure, she pleads energetically the perishable nature of feminine
+attire in her day,&mdash;a day before double-soles or ulsters formed part of
+a lady's wardrobe,&mdash;its incompatibility with the incessant going to and
+fro which her busy life required, the exclusion of her sex from the best
+part of a Paris theatre, and so forth; the ineffable superiority of a
+costume which, economy and comfort apart, secured her equal independence
+with her men competitors in the race, and identical advantages as to the
+rapid extension of her field of observation. The practice, though never
+carried on by her to such an extent as very commonly asserted, was one
+to which she did not hesitate to resort now and then in later years, as
+a mere measure of convenience&mdash;a measure the world will only tolerate in
+the Rosalinds and Violas of the stage. The career of George Sand was,
+like her nature, entirely exceptional, and any attempt to judge it in
+any other light lands us in hopeless moral contradictions. She had
+extraordinary incentives to prompt her to extraordinary actions, which
+may be condemned or excused, but which there could be no greater
+mistake than to impute to ordinary vulgar motives. It must also be
+remembered that fifty years ago, the female art student had no
+recognized existence. She was shut out from that modicum of freedom and
+of practical advantages it were arbitrary to deny, and which may now be
+enjoyed by any earnest art aspirant in almost any great city. However
+unjustifiable the proceeding resorted to for a time by George Sand and
+Rosa Bonheur may be held to be, it cannot possibly be said they had no
+motive for it but a fantastic one.</p>
+
+<p>Writing to her mother from Nohant, whither she had returned in April for
+a length of time as agreed, Madam Dudevant speaks out characteristically
+in defense of her love of independence:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I am far from having that love of pleasure, that need of amusement
+with which you credit me. Society, sights, finery, are not what I
+want,&mdash;you only are under this mistake about me,&mdash;it is liberty. To
+be all alone in the street and able to say to myself, I shall dine
+at four or at seven, according to my good pleasure; I shall go to
+the Tuileries by way of the Luxembourg instead of going by the
+Champs Elysées; this is what amuses me far more than silly
+compliments and stiff drawing-room assemblies.</p></div>
+
+<p>Such audacious self-emancipation, she was well aware, must estrange her
+from her friends of her own sex in the upper circles of Parisian
+society, and she anticipated this by making no attempt to renew such
+connections. For the moment she thought only of taking the shortest,
+and, as she judged, the only way for a "torpid country wife," like
+herself, to acquire the freedom of action and the enlightenment she
+needed. Those most nearly related to her offered no opposition. It was
+otherwise with her mother-in-law, the <i>baronne</i> Dudevant, with whom she
+had a passage-of-arms at the outset on the subject of her literary
+campaign, here disapproved <i>in toto</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"Is it true," enquired this lady, "that it is your intention to <i>print
+books</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, madame."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I call that an odd notion!"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, madame."</p>
+
+<p>"That is all very good and very fine, but I hope you are not going to
+put the name that I bear on the <i>covers of printed books</i>?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, certaintly not, madame, there is no danger."</p>
+
+<p>The liberty to which other considerations were required to give way was
+certainly complete enough. The beginning of July found her back at work
+in the capital. On the Quai St. Michel&mdash;a portion of the Seine
+embankment facing the towers of Notre Dame, the Sainte Chapelle, and
+other picturesque monuments of ancient Paris&mdash;she had now definitely
+installed herself in modest lodgings on the fifth story. Accepted and
+treated as a comrade by a little knot of fellow <i>literati</i> and
+colleagues on the <i>Figaro</i>, two of whom&mdash;Jules Sandeau and Félix
+Pyat&mdash;were from Berry, like herself; and with Delatouche, also a
+Berrichon, for their head-master, she served thus singularly her brief
+apprenticeship to literature and experience;&mdash;sharing with the rest both
+their studies and their relaxations, dining with them at cheap
+restaurants, frequenting clubs, studios, and theatres of every degree;
+the youthful effervescence of her student-friends venting itself in such
+collegians' pranks as parading deserted quarters of the town by
+moonlight, in the small hours, chanting lugubrious strains to astonish
+the shopkeepers. The only great celebrity whose acquaintance she had
+made was Balzac, himself the prince of eccentrics. Although he did not
+encourage Madame Dudevant's literary ambition, he showed himself kindly
+disposed towards her and her young friends, and she gives some amusing
+instances that came under her notice of his oddities. Thus, once after a
+little Bohemian dinner at his lodgings in the Rue Cassini, he insisted
+on putting on a new and magnificent dressing-gown, of which he was
+exceedingly vain, to display to his guests, of whom Madame Dudevant was
+one; and not satisfied therewith, must needs go forth, thus accoutred,
+to light them on their walk home. All the way he continued to hold forth
+to them about four Arab horses, which he had not got yet, but meant to
+get soon, and of which, though he never got them at all, he firmly
+believed himself to have been possessed for some time. "He would have
+escorted us thus," says Madame Dudevant, "from one extremity of Paris to
+another, if we had let him."</p>
+
+<p>Twice again before the end of the year, faithful to her original
+intentions, we find her returning to her place as mistress of the house
+at Nohant, occupying herself with her children, and working at the novel
+<i>Indiana</i>, which was to create her reputation the following year.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, a novelette, <i>La Prima Donna</i>, the outcome of the literary
+collaboration with Jules Sandeau, had found its way into a magazine, the
+<i>Revue de Paris</i>; and was followed by a longer work of fiction, of the
+same double authorship, entitled <i>Rose et Blanche</i>, published under
+Sandeau's <i>nom de plume</i> of Jules Sand.</p>
+
+<p>This literary partnership was not to last long, and to-day the novel
+will be found omitted in the list of the respective works of its
+authors. Its perusal will hardly repay the curious. The powerful genius
+of Madame Dudevant, the elegant talent of the author of <i>Mlle. de la
+Seiglière</i>, are mostly conspicuous by their absence in <i>Rose et
+Blanche</i>, or <i>La Comédienne et la Réligieuse</i>, an imitative attempt, and
+not a happy one, in the style of fiction then in vogue.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Dudevant had stepped into the literary world at the moment of the
+most ardent activity of the Romantic movement. The new school was on the
+point of achieving its earliest signal triumphs. Victor Hugo's first
+poems had just been followed by the dramas <i>Hernani</i> and <i>Marion
+Delorme</i>. Dumas' <i>Antony</i> was drawing crowded and enthusiastic houses. A
+few months before the publication of <i>Rose et Blanche</i> appeared <i>Notre
+Dame de Paris</i>. The passion for innovation which had seized on all the
+younger school of writers was leading many astray. The strange freaks of
+Hugo's genius had, to quote Madame Dudevant's own expression, excited a
+"ferocious appetite" for whatever was most outrageous, and set taste,
+precedent, and probability most flatly at defiance. From those
+aberrations into which the great master's imitators had been betrayed
+Madame Dudevant's fine art-instincts were calculated to preserve her;
+but she had not yet learned to trust to them implicitly.</p>
+
+<p><i>Rose et Blanche</i>, though containing many clever passages&mdash;waifs and
+strays of shrewd observation, description and character analysis,&mdash;is in
+the main ill-conceived, ill-constructed, and unreal. The two authors
+have sacrificed their individualities in a mistaken effort to follow the
+fashion's lead, resulting in a most ineffective compound of tameness and
+sensationalism. Amazing adventures are undergone by each heroine before
+she is one-and-twenty. Angels of innocence, they are doomed to have
+their existences crushed out by the heartless conduct of man, Blanche
+expiring of dismay almost as soon as she is led from the altar, Rose
+burying herself and her despair in a convent. The then favorite heroes
+of romance were of the French Byronic type&mdash;young men of fortune who
+have exhausted life before they are five-and-twenty, whose minds are
+darkened by haunting memories of some terrific crime, but who are none
+the less capable of all the virtues and great elevation of sentiment on
+occasion. None of these requisitions are left unfulfilled by the
+unamiable hero of <i>Rose et Blanche</i>, a work which did little to advance
+the fortunes of its authors, and whose intrinsic merits offer little
+warrant for dragging it out of the oblivion into which it has been
+suffered to drop.</p>
+
+<p>To escape the influences of the literary revolution everywhere then
+triumphant was of course impossible. To make them serve her individual
+genius instead of enslaving her individuality was all Madame Dudevant
+needed to learn. Her friend Balzac had done this for himself, suiting
+his genius to the period without any sacrifice of originality. Although
+not yet at the height of his fame he had produced many most successful
+works, and Madame Dudevant, according to her own account, derived great
+profit from the study of his method, although with no inclination to
+follow in his direction. Yet he afterwards observed to her, "Our two
+roads lead to the same goal."</p>
+
+<p><i>Rose et Blanche</i>, though little noticed by the public, brought a
+publisher to the door, one Ernest Dupuy, with an order for another novel
+by the same authors. <i>Indiana</i> was ready-written, and came in response
+to the demand. But as Sandeau had had no hand whatever in this
+composition, the signature had of course to be varied. The publisher
+wishing to connect the new novel with its predecessor it was decided to
+alter the prefix only. She fixed on George, as representative of Berry,
+the land of husbandmen; and George Sand thus became pseudonym of the
+author of <i>Indiana</i>, a pseudonym whose origin imaginative critics have
+sought far afield and some have discovered in her alleged sympathy with
+Kotzebue's murderer, Karl Sand, and political assassination in general!
+Its assumption was to inaugurate a new era in her life.</p>
+
+<p>In the last days of April, 1832, appeared <i>Indiana</i>, by George Sand. "I
+took," says Madame Dudevant, in her account of the transaction, "the
+1,200 francs paid me by the publisher, which to me were a little
+fortune, hoping he would see his money back again." She had recently
+returned from one of her periodical visits to Nohant, accompanied this
+time by her little girl, whom the progress already achieved enabled her
+now to take into her charge, and was living very quietly and studiously
+in her humble establishment on the Quai St. Michel, when she awoke to
+find herself famous.</p>
+
+<p>Her success, for which indeed there had been nothing to prepare
+her&mdash;neither flattery of friends, nor vain-glorious ambition within
+herself&mdash;was immediate and conclusive. Whatever differences of opinion
+might exist about the book, critics agreed in recognizing there the
+revelation of a new writer of extraordinary power. "One of those masters
+who have been gifted with the enchanter's wand and mirror," wrote
+Sainte-Beuve, a few months later, when he did not hesitate to compare
+the young author to Madame de Staël. The novel of sentimental analysis,
+a style in which George Sand is unsurpassed, was then a fresh and
+promising field. <i>Indiana</i>, without the aid of marvellous incidents,
+startling crimes, or iniquitous mysteries, riveted the attention of its
+readers as firmly as the most thrilling tales of adventure and horror.
+It is a "soul's tragedy," and that is all&mdash;the love-tragedy vulgarized
+since by repeated treatment by inferior novelists, of a romantic,
+sensitive, passionate, high-natured girl, hopelessly ill-mated with a
+somewhat tyrannical and stupid, yet not entirely ill-disposed old
+colonel, and exposed to the seductions of a Lovelace&mdash;the truth about
+whose unloveable character, in its profound and heartless egoism, first
+bursts upon her at the moment when, maddened by brutal insult, she is
+driven to claim the generous devotion he has proffered a thousand times.
+Side by side with the ideal of selfishness, Raymon stands in contrast
+with the ideally chivalrous Ralph, Indiana's despised cousin, who,
+loving her disinterestedly and in silence, has watched over her as a
+guardian-friend to the last, and does save her ultimately. The florid
+descriptions, the high-flown strains of emotion, which now strike as
+blemishes in the book, were counted beauties fifty years since; and even
+to-day, when reaction has brought about an extreme distaste for
+emotional writing, they cannot conceal the superior ability of the
+novelist. The sentiment, however extravagantly worded, is genuine and
+spontaneous, and has the true ring of passionate conviction. The
+characters are vividly, if somewhat closely drawn and contrasted, the
+scenes graphic; every page is colored by fervid imagination, and despite
+some violations of probability in the latter portion, out of keeping
+artistically with the natural character of the rest of the book, the
+whole has the strength of that unity and completeness of conception
+which is the distinguishing stamp of a genius of the first order. The
+<i>entrain</i> of the style is irresistible. It was written, she tells us,
+<i>tout d'un jet</i>, under the force of a stimulus from within. Ceasing to
+counterfeit the manner of anyone, or to consult the exigencies of the
+book-market, she for the first time ventures to be herself responsible
+for the inspiration and the mode of expression adopted.</p>
+
+<p>The papers spoke of the new novel in high tones of praise, the public
+read it with avidity. The authorship, for a time, continued to perplex
+people. In spite of the masculine pseudonym, certain feminine qualities,
+niceties of perception and tenderness, were plainly recognized in the
+work, but the possibility that so vigorous and well-executed a
+composition could come from a feminine hand was one then reckoned
+scarcely admissible. Even among those already in the secret were
+sceptics who questioned the author's power to sustain her success,
+since nearly everybody, it is said, can produce one good novel.</p>
+
+<p>"The success of <i>Indiana</i> has thrown me into dismay," writes Madame
+Dudevant, in July, 1832, to M. Charles Duvernet, at La Châtre. "Till
+now, I thought my writing was without consequence, and would not merit
+the slightest attention. Fate has decreed otherwise. The unmerited
+admiration of which I have become the object must be justified." And
+<i>Valentine</i> was already in progress; and its publication, not many
+months after <i>Indiana</i>, to be a conclusive answer to the challenge.</p>
+
+<p>The season of 1832, in which George Sand made her <i>début</i> in literature,
+was marked, in Paris, by public events of the most tragic character. In
+the spring, the cholera made its appearance, and struck panic into the
+city. Six people died in the house where Madame Dudevant resided, but
+neither she nor any of her friends were attacked. She was next to be a
+witness of political disturbances equally terrible. The disappointment
+felt by the Liberals at the results of the Revolution of 1830, and of
+the establishment of Louis Philippe's Government, upon which such high
+hopes had been founded, was already beginning to assert itself in secret
+agitation, and in the sanguinary street insurrections, such as that of
+June, 1832, sanguinarily repressed. Madame Dudevant at this time had no
+formulated political creed, and political subjects were those least
+attractive to her. But though born in the opposite camp she felt all her
+natural sympathies incline to the Republican side. They were further
+intensified by the scenes of which she was an eye-witness, and which
+roused a similar feeling even among anti-revolutionists. Thus Heine, in
+giving an account of the struggle mentioned above, and speaking of the
+enthusiasts who sacrificed their lives in this desperate demonstration,
+exclaims: "I am, by God! no Republican. I know that if the Republicans
+conquer they will cut my throat, and all because I don't admire all they
+admire; but yet the tears came into my eyes as I trod those places still
+stained with their blood. I had rather I, and all my fellow-moderates,
+had died than those Republicans."</p>
+
+<p>Amid such disturbing influences it is not surprising that we find her
+complaining in the letter last quoted that her work makes no progress;
+but the lost time was made up for by redoubled industry during her
+summer visit to Nohant.</p>
+
+<p>In the autumn appeared <i>Valentine</i>. This second novel not only confirmed
+the triumph won by the first, but was a surer proof of the writer's
+calibre, as showing what she could do with simpler materials. Here,
+encouraged by success, she had ventured to take her stand entirely on
+her own ground&mdash;dispensing even with an incidental trip to the tropics,
+which, in <i>Indiana</i>, strikes as a misplaced concession to the prevalent
+craze for Oriental coloring&mdash;and to lay the scene in her own obscure
+province of Berry, her first descriptions of which show her rare
+comprehension of the poetry of landscape. Like <i>Indiana</i>, <i>Valentine</i> is
+a story of the affections; like <i>Indiana</i>, it is a domestic tragedy, of
+which the girl-heroine is the victim of a pernicious system that makes
+of marriage, in the first instance, a mere commercial speculation.
+Indeed, the extreme painfulness of the story would render the whole too
+repulsive but for the charm of the setting, which relieves it not a
+little, and a good deal of humor in the treatment of the minor
+characters, notably the eighteenth century <i>marquise</i>, and the Lhéry
+family of peasant-<i>parvenus</i>. The personages are drawn with more finish
+than those in <i>Indiana</i>; the tone is more natural in its pitch. It is
+the work of one who finds in every-day observation, as well as in such
+personal emotions as come but once in a lifetime, the inspiration that
+smaller talents can derive from the latter alone.</p>
+
+<p>In both her consummate art, or rather natural gift of the art of
+narrative, is the mainstay of the fabric her imagination has reared.
+That incomparable style of hers is like some magic fairy-ring, that
+bears the wearer, safe and victorious, through manifold perils&mdash;perils
+these of prolixity, exaggeration, and disdain of careful construction.
+Both <i>Indiana</i> and <i>Valentine</i>, moreover, contain scenes and passages
+offensive to English taste, but it is impossible fairly to criticise the
+fiction of a land where freer expression in speech and in print than
+with us is habitually recognized and practiced, from our own standpoint
+of literary decorum. It was not for this feature that French criticism
+had already begun to charge her books with dangerous tendencies (thus
+contributing largely to noise her fame abroad), as breathing rebellion
+against the laws of present society; charges which, so far as <i>Indiana</i>
+and <i>Valentine</i> are concerned, had, as is now generally admitted, but
+little foundation. Each is the story of an unhappy marriage, but there
+is no attempt whatever to throw contempt on existing institutions, or to
+propound any theory, unless it be the idea&mdash;no heresy or novelty in
+England at least&mdash;that marriage, concluded without love on either side,
+is fraught with special dangers to the wife, whose happiness is bound up
+with her affections. It was the bold and uncompromising manner in which
+this plain fact was brought forward, the energy of the protest against
+a real social abuse, which moved some critics to sound a war-cry for
+which, as yet, no just warrant had been given.</p>
+
+<p>Besides these two novels, containing full proof of her genius, if not of
+its highest employment, there appeared, late in 1832, that remarkable
+novelette, <i>La Marquise</i>, revealing fresh qualities of subtle
+penetration and clear analysis. The flexibility of her imagination, the
+variety in her modes of its application, form an essential
+characteristic of her work. Not by any single novel, nor, indeed by
+half-a-dozen taken at random, can she be adequately represented.</p>
+
+<p>When in the winter of 1832 Madame Sand returned with her little girl to
+Paris after spending the autumn, as usual, at Nohant, it was to rather
+more comfortable quarters, on the Quai Malplaquet. The rapid sale of her
+books was placing her in comparatively easy circumstances, and giving
+fresh spur to her activity. But her situation was transforming itself
+fast; the freedom of obscurity was lost to her for ever from the day
+when the unknown personage, George Sand, became the object of general
+curiosity&mdash;of curiosity redoubled in Paris by the rumors current there
+of her exceptional position, eccentric habits, and interesting
+personality.</p>
+
+<p>The celebrated portrait of her by Eugène Delacroix was painted in the
+year 1833. It is a three-quarter view, and represents her wearing her
+<i>quasi</i> masculine <i>redingote</i>, with broad <i>revers</i> and loosely knotted
+silk neck-tie. Of somewhat later date is a highly interesting drawing by
+Calamatta, well-known by engravings; but of George Sand in her first
+youth no likeness unfortunately has been left to the world. She has been
+most diversely described by her different contemporaries. But that at
+this time she possessed real beauty is perfectly evident; for all that
+she denies it herself, and that, unlike most women, and nearly all
+French women, she scorned to enhance it by an elaborated toilette.
+Heine, though he never professed himself one of her personal adorers,
+compares the beauty of her head to that of the Venus of Milo, saying,
+"It bears the stamp of ideality, and recalls the noblest remaining
+examples of Greek art." Her figure was somewhat too short, but her hands
+and feet were very small and beautifully shaped. His acquaintance with
+her dates from the early years of her literary triumphs, and his
+description is in harmony with Calamatta's presentation. She had dark
+curling hair, a beauty in itself, falling in profusion to her shoulders,
+well-formed features, pale olive-tinted complexion, the countenance
+expressive, the eyes dark and very fine, not sparkling, but mild and
+full of feeling. The face reminds us of the character of "Still Waters,"
+attributed to the Aurore Dupin of fifteen by the Lady Superior of the
+English convent. Her voice was soft and muffled, and the simplicity of
+her manner has been remarked on by those who sought her acquaintance, as
+a particular charm. Yet, like all reserved natures, she often failed to
+attract strangers at a first meeting. In general conversation she
+disappointed people, by not shining. Men and women, immeasurably her
+inferiors, surpassed her in ready wit and brilliant repartee. Her
+taciturnity in society has been somewhat ungenerously laid to a <i>parti
+pris</i>. She was one, it is said, who took all and gave nothing. That she
+was intentionally chary of her passing thoughts and impressions to those
+around her, is, however, sufficiently disproved by her letters. Here she
+shows herself lavish of her mind to her correspondents. Conversation and
+composition necessitate a very different brain action, and her
+marvellous facility in writing seems really to have been accompanied
+with no corresponding readiness of speech and reply. Probably it was
+only, as she herself states, when she had a pen in her hand that her
+lethargic ideas would arise and flow in order as they should. And the
+need of self-expression felt by all those who have not the gift of
+communicating themselves fully and easily in speech or manner, a strong
+need in her case, from her having so much to express, was the spur that
+drove her to seek and find the mode of so doing in art.</p>
+
+<p>Her silence in company certainly did not detract from her fascination
+upon a closer acquaintance. Of those who fell under the spell, the more
+fortunate came at once to terms of friendship with her, which remained
+undisturbed through life. Thus, of one among this numerous brotherhood,
+François Rollinat, with whom she would congratulate herself on having
+realized the perfection of such an alliance of minds, she could write
+when recording their friendship, then already a quarter of a century
+old, that it was still young as compared with some that she counted, and
+that dated from her childhood.</p>
+
+<p>Others fell in love with her, and found her unresponsive. With some of
+these, jealousies and misunderstandings arose, and led to estrangements,
+for the most part but temporary. Yet the winner of her heart was
+scarcely to be envied. She was apt&mdash;she has herself thus expressed
+it&mdash;to see people through a prism of enthusiasm, and afterwards to
+recover her lucidity of judgment. Great, no doubt, was her power of
+self-illusion; it betrayed her into errors that have been unsparingly
+judged. For her power of calm and complete disillusion she was perhaps
+unique among women, and it is no wonder if mankind have found it hard to
+forgive.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">LÉLIA.&mdash;ITALIAN JOURNEY.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was less than two years since she had come up to the capital, to seek
+her fortunes there in literature. Aurore Dudevant, hereafter to be
+spoken of as George Sand (for she made her adopted name more her own
+than that she had borne hitherto, and became George Sand for her private
+friends as well as for the public,) found herself raised to eminence
+among the eminent. And it was at an exceptionally brilliant epoch in
+French imaginative literature that the distinction had been won. Such a
+burst of talent as that which signalized the opening years of Louis
+Philippe's reign is unexampled in French literary history. With Hugo,
+Dumas, De Musset, Balzac, not to mention lesser stars, the author of
+<i>Indiana</i> and <i>Valentine</i>, although a woman, was acknowledged as worthy
+to rank. The artist in her, a disturbing element in her inner life which
+had driven her out of the spiritual bondage and destitution of a petty
+provincial environment to secure for herself freedom and expansion, had
+justified the audacity of the move by a triumphant artistic success.
+From this time onward her artistic faculty dominated her life, often,
+probably, unknown to herself an invincible force of instinct she obeyed,
+whilst assigning, in all good faith, other motives for her course of
+action, and for real or apparent inconsequences, that have been
+constantly misrepresented and misunderstood.</p>
+
+<p>So sudden and abrupt a change would have turned all heads but the
+strongest. Publishers competed with one another to secure her next work.
+Buloz, proprietor of the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, engaged her to write
+regularly for his periodical, to which, for the next ten years, she
+never ceased to be a regular and extensive contributor. Although the
+scale of remuneration was not then very high she was clearly secure, so
+long as she allowed nothing to interfere with her literary work, of
+earning a sufficient income for her own needs. She had learnt the
+importance of pecuniary independence, and never pretended to despise the
+reward of her industry. To luxury she was indifferent, but the necessity
+of strict economy was a burden she was impatient of; she liked to have
+plenty to give away, and was always excessively liberal to the poor. Her
+little dwelling on the Quai Malplaquet was no longer the hermitage of
+an anonymous writer of no account. The great in art and letters,
+leading critics, such as Sainte-Beuve and Gustave Planche, came eager to
+seek her acquaintance, and delighting to honor the obscure student of a
+year ago.</p>
+
+<p>Writing to M. Boucoiran after her return to Paris in December, 1832, she
+describes her altered position:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>All day long I am beset with visitors, who are not all
+entertaining. It is a calamity of my profession, which I am partly
+obliged to bear. But in the evening I shut myself up with my pens
+and ink, Solange, my piano, and a fire. With all these I pass some
+right pleasant hours. No noise but the sounds of a harp, coming I
+know not whence, and of the playing of a fountain under my window.
+This is highly poetical&mdash;pray don't make game of me!</p></div>
+
+<p>There was another side to her success. Fame brought trials and
+annoyances that fell with double severity on her as a woman. Her door
+was besieged by a troop of professional beggars, impostors, impertinent
+idlers, and inquisitive newsmongers. Jealousy and ill-will, inevitably
+attendant on sudden good fortune such as hers, busied themselves with
+direct calumny and insidious misrepresentation. No statement so
+unfounded, so wildly improbable about her, but it obtained circulation
+and credit. Till the end of her life she remained the centre of a cloud
+of myths, many, to the present day, accepted as gospel. People insisted
+on identifying her with the heroines of her novels. Incidents, personal
+descriptions, nay, whole letters extracted from these novels will be
+found literally transcribed into alleged biographies of herself and her
+friends, as her own statement of matters of fact. Now, though the spirit
+of her life is strongly and faithfully represented by her fiction taken
+as a whole, those who would read in any special novel the literal record
+of any of the special events of her existence cannot be too much on
+their guard. Whatever the material under treatment, George Sand must
+retouch, embellish, transform, artist-fashion, as her genius shall
+dictate, till often little resemblance is left between the original and
+the production it has done no more than suggest. Romance and reality are
+so fused together in these apparent outpourings of spirit that her
+nearest friends were at a loss how to separate them. As an actress into
+many a favorite part, so could she throw herself into her favorite
+characters; but seldom if ever will much warrant be found in actual fact
+for identifying these creations with their creatress.</p>
+
+<p>How, indeed, could so many-sided a nature as hers be truly represented
+in a single novel? Her rare physical and mental energies enabled her to
+combine a life of masculine intellectual activity with the more highly
+emotional life of a woman, and with vigilance in her maternal cares.
+Maurice was placed in the spring of 1833 at the College Henri IV., at
+Paris; thus she had now both son and daughter near her, and watched
+indefatigably over them, their childish illnesses and childish
+amusements, their moral and intellectual training absorbing a large
+share of her time and attention. Heine, a friendly visitor at her house,
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I have often been present for hours whilst she gave her children a
+lesson in French, and it is a pity that the whole of the French
+Academy could not have been present too, as it is quite certain
+that they might have derived great profit from it.</p></div>
+
+<p>Not all the distractions of fame and work, of passionate pleasure or
+passionate sorrow, ever relaxed her active solicitude for the present
+and future welfare of her two young children. "They give me the only
+real joys of my life," she repeats again and again.</p>
+
+<p><i>Lélia</i>, begun immediately after <i>Valentine</i> was published in the spring
+of 1833, and created an immense sensation. Hailed by her admirers as a
+sign of an accession of power, of power exerted in quite a new
+direction, it brought down on the writer's head a storm of hostile
+criticism, as a declared enemy of religion and domestic
+morality&mdash;enhancing her celebrity not a little.</p>
+
+<p><i>Lélia</i>, a lyrical novel&mdash;an outburst of poetical philosophy in prose,
+stands alone among the numerous productions of George Sand. Here she
+takes every sort of poetical license, in a work without the restrictions
+of poetic form, which are the true conditions of so much latitude.
+"Manfred" and "Alastor" are fables not further removed from real life
+than is <i>Lélia</i>. The personages are like allegorical figures, emblematic
+of spiritual qualities on a grand scale, the scenes like the
+paradisiacal gardens that visited the fancy of Aurore Dupin when a
+child. There is no action. The interest is not in the characters and
+what they do, but in what they say. The declamatory style, then so
+popular, is one the taste for which has so completely waned that <i>Lélia</i>
+will find comparatively few readers in the present day, fewer who will
+not find its perusal wearisome, none perhaps whose morality, however
+weak, will be seriously shaken by utterances ever and anon hovering on
+the perilous confines of the sublime and the ludicrous.</p>
+
+<p><i>Lélia</i>, a female Faust or Manfred, a mysterious muse-like heroine, who
+one night sleeps on the heathery mountain-side, the next displays the
+splendor of a queen in palaces and fairy-like villas; her sorely tried
+and hapless lover, Sténio, the poet, who pours forth odes to his own
+accompaniment on the harp, and lingers the night long among Alpine
+precipices brooding over the abyss; Trenmor, the returned gentleman
+convict and Apostle of the Carbonari, whose soul has been refreshed,
+made young and regenerated at the galleys; and the mad Irish priest,
+Magnus, are impossible personages, inviting to easy ridicule, and
+neither wisdom nor folly from their lips is likely to beguile the ears
+of the present generation.</p>
+
+<p>It is no novel, but a poetical essay, fantastically conceived and
+executed with the <i>sans gêne</i> of an improvisatore. For those who admire
+the genius of George Sand its interest as a psychological revelation
+remains unabated. Into <i>Lélia</i>, she owns, she put more of her real self
+than into any other of her books&mdash;of herself, that is, and her state of
+mind at the dawn of a period of moral disturbance and revolt. All must
+continue to recognize there an extraordinary exhibition of poetical
+power and musical style. As a work of art George Sand has herself
+pronounced it absurd, yet she always cherished for it a special
+predilection, and, as will be seen, took the trouble to rewrite it some
+years later, when in a happier and healthier frame of mind than that
+which inspired this unique and most characteristic composition.</p>
+
+<p>The note of despair struck in <i>Lélia</i>, the depth of bitter feeling, the
+capacity for mental and moral speculation and suffering it seemed to
+disclose, astounded many of her familiar acquaintance. "<i>Lélia</i> is a
+fancy-type," so writes to the author her friend and neighbor in Berry,
+Jules Néraud, an ardent naturalist, whose botanical and entomological
+pursuits she had often shared: "it is not like you&mdash;you who are merry,
+dance the <i>bourrée</i>, appreciate lepidoptera, do not despise puns, who
+are not a bad needlewoman, and make very good preserves. Is it possible
+you should have thought so much, felt so much, without anyone having any
+idea of it?"</p>
+
+<p><i>Lélia</i> was certainly the expression of a new phase in her mind's
+history, a moral crisis she could not escape, which was all the more
+severe for her having, as she remarks, reached her thirtieth year
+without having opened her eyes to the realities of life. Till the time
+of her coming to Paris, for very dearth of outward impressions, she had
+lived chiefly in dreams, the life of all others most favorable to the
+prolongation of ignorance and credulity. The liberty and activity she
+had enjoyed for the last two years were fatal to Utopian theories.</p>
+
+<p>It was not only the bitterness that springs from disenchantment in
+individuals, the sense of the miserable insufficiency of human love to
+satisfy her spiritual aspirations producing "that widely concluding
+unbelief which," as her sister in greatness has said, "we call knowledge
+of the world, but which is really disappointment in you and in me."
+George Sand was one to whom scepticism was intolerable. Pessimistic
+doctrines were fatal to her mind's equilibrium, and private experience
+and outward intellectual influences were driving her to distrust all
+objects of her previous worship, human and divine. The moment was one
+when the most fundamental social and religious principles were being
+called in question.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing in my old beliefs," she writes, "was sufficiently formulated in
+me, from a social point of view, to help me to struggle against this
+cataclysm; and in the religious and socialistic theories of the moment I
+did not find light enough to contend with the darkness." The poet's
+creed, with which her mind had hitherto rested satisfied, was shaken,
+and appeared to prove a false one. She was staggered by the infinity of
+evil, misery, and injustice, which dwellers in great cities are not
+allowed to forget, the problem of humanity, the eternal mystery of
+suffering and wrong predominant in a world on the beneficence of whose
+Supreme Power all her faiths were founded.</p>
+
+<p>Her mental revolt and suffering found vent in <i>Lélia</i>, which it was an
+immense relief to her to write. Characteristic as an exhibition of
+feeling and of mastery of language, it is not in the least typical of
+her fiction. Yet, but for <i>Lélia</i>, and its successor <i>Jacques</i>, it is
+impossible to point to a work of hers that would ever have lastingly
+stamped her, in the public mind, as an expounder of dangerous theories.
+In <i>Lélia</i>, however, which is strongly imbued with Byronic coloring, she
+had chosen to pose somewhat as the proud angel in rebellion; and the
+immediate effect of hostile criticism was to confirm her in the position
+taken up. Neither <i>Lélia</i> nor <i>Jacques</i> combined the elements of lasting
+popularity with those of instant success; but they roused a stir and
+strife which created an impression of her as a writer systematically
+inimical to religion and marriage&mdash;an impression almost ludicrously at
+variance with facts, taking her fiction as a whole, but which has only
+recently begun to give way, in this country, to a juster estimate of its
+tendencies.</p>
+
+<p>The morality of <i>Lélia</i>, which it is rather difficult to discuss
+seriously in the present day, both the personages and their environment
+being too preternatural for any direct application to be drawn from
+them, as reflecting modern society, found indiscreet champions as
+determined as its aggressors. Violently denounced by M. Capo de
+Feuillide, of the <i>Europe littéraire</i>, it was warmly defended by M.
+Gustave Planche, in the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>. The war of words grew
+so hot between them that a challenge and encounter were the
+result&mdash;surely unique in the annals of duelling. The swords of the
+critics fortunately proved more harmless than their words.</p>
+
+<p>From the morbid depression that had tormented her mind and imagination,
+and has its literary memorial in <i>Lélia</i>, she was to find a timely,
+though but a temporary rescue, in the charm of a new acquaintance&mdash;the
+delighting society of a poetic mind of an order not inferior to her own.</p>
+
+<p>It was in August, 1833, at a dinner given by Buloz to the staff of the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, that George Sand first made the personal
+acquaintance of Alfred de Musset, then in his twenty-third year, and
+already famous through his just published poem, <i>Rolla</i>, and his earlier
+dramas, <i>Andrea del Sarto</i> and <i>Les Caprices de Marianne</i>. He rapidly
+became enamored of the author of <i>Lélia</i>, who for her part felt
+powerfully the attraction of his many admirable qualities, mutual
+enchantment leading them so far as to believe they could be the hero and
+heroine of a happy love tale. In a letter of September 21, addressed to
+her friend and correspondent Sainte-Beuve, whom she had made the
+confidant of her previous depression and strange moods of gloom, she
+writes of herself as lifted out of such dangers by a happiness beyond
+any she had imagined, restoring youth to her heart&mdash;the happiness
+accorded her by the poet's society and his preference for her own. De
+Musset, at this time, would have given the world to have been able to
+make her his wife.</p>
+
+<p>The story of their short-lived infatuation and of the swift-following
+mutual disenchantment,&mdash;a story which, says Sainte-Beuve, has become
+part of the romance of the nineteenth century,&mdash;is perhaps of less
+consequence here than in the life of De Musset,<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> in whom the
+over-sensitiveness of genius was not allied with the extraordinary
+healthy vitality which enabled George Sand to come out of the most
+terrible mental experiences unembittered, with the balance of her mind
+unshaken, and her powers unimpaired. Yet that he acquired an empire over
+her no other ever acquired there is much to indicate. It took her from
+France for a while, from her children, her friends&mdash;and the breaking of
+the spell set her at war, not only with him, but for a while with
+herself, with life, and her fellow creatures.</p>
+
+<p>In the last days of 1833, she and the author of <i>Rolla</i> started on a
+journey to Italy, where George Sand spent six months, and where she has
+laid the scene of a number of her novels: the first and best part of
+<i>Consuelo</i>, <i>La Dernière Aldini</i>, <i>Leone</i>, <i>Leoni</i>, <i>La Daniella</i>, and
+others. The spirit of that land she has caught and reproduced perhaps
+more successfully than any other of the many novelists who have chosen
+it for a frame&mdash;of Italy as the artist's native country, that is&mdash;not
+the Italy of political history, nor of the Medici, but the Italy that is
+the second home of painters, poets, and musicians. Can anything be more
+enjoyable, and at the same time more vividly true, than George Sand's
+delineations of Venice; and, in the first of the <i>Lettres d'un
+Voyageur</i>, the pictures given of her wanderings on the shores of the
+Brenta, of Bassano, the Brenta valley, Oliero, Possagno, Asolo, a
+delicious land, till quite recently as little tourist-trodden as in
+1834? What a contrast to the purely imaginary descriptions in <i>Lélia</i>,
+written before those beauties had appeared to her except in dreams!</p>
+
+<p>From Genoa the travellers journeyed to Pisa, Florence, and thence to
+Venice, where first George Sand felt herself really at home in Italy.
+The architecture, the simplicity of Venetian life and manners, the
+theatres&mdash;from the opera-houses, where Pasta and Donzelli were singing,
+down to the national drama of Pulchinello&mdash;the pictures, the sea, the
+climate, combined to make of it a place of residence so perfectly to her
+mind, that again and again in her letters she expresses her wish that
+she could bring over her children and there fix her abode.</p>
+
+<p>"It is the only town I can love for its own sake," she says of it.
+"Other cities are like prisons, which you put up with for the sake of
+your fellow-prisoners." This Italian journey marks a fresh stage in her
+artistic development, quite apart from the attendant romantic
+circumstances, the alleged disastrous consequences to a child of genius
+less wise and fortunate than herself, which has given an otherwise
+disproportionate notoriety to this brief episode.</p>
+
+<p>George Sand was no doubt fatally in error when she persuaded herself,
+and even succeeded in persuading the poet's anxious mother, that she had
+it in her to be his guardian angel, and reform him miraculously in a
+short space of time; and that because he had fallen in love with her she
+would know how to make him alter a way of life he had no abiding desire
+to abandon. Such a task demands a readiness not merely for
+self-sacrifice, but for self-suppression; and her individuality was far
+too pronounced to merge itself for long in ministering to another's. She
+never seems to have possessed the slightest moral ascendancy over him,
+beyond the power of wounding him very deeply by the change in her
+sentiments, however much he might feel himself to blame for it.</p>
+
+<p>The history of the separation of the lovers&mdash;of De Musset's illness,
+jealousy, and departure from Venice alone&mdash;is a thrice-told tale. Like
+the subject of "The Ring and the Book," it has been set forth, by
+various persons, variously interested, with correspondingly various
+coloring. The story, as told by George Sand in her later novel, <i>Elle et
+Lui</i>, is substantially the same as one related by De Musset in his
+<i>Confession d'un Enfant du Siècle</i>, published two years after these
+events, and in which, if it is to be regarded as reflecting personal
+idiosyncrasies in the slightest degree, the poet certainly makes himself
+out as the most insupportable of human companions. None the less did the
+publication of <i>Elle et Lui</i>, a quarter of a century later, provoke a
+savage retort from the deceased poet's brother, in <i>Lui et Elle</i>.
+Finally, in <i>Lui</i>, a third novelist, Madame Colet, presented the world
+with a separate version of the affair from one who imagined she could
+have made up to the poet for what he had lost.</p>
+
+<p>But it needs no deep study of human nature, or yet of these novels, to
+understand the impracticability of two such minds long remaining
+together in unity. Genius, in private life, is apt to be a torment&mdash;its
+foibles demanding infinite patience, forbearance, nay, affectionate
+blindness, in those who would minister to its happiness, and mitigate
+the worst results of those foibles themselves. Certainly George Sand,
+for a genius, was a wonderfully equable character; her "satanic" moods
+showed themselves chiefly in pen and ink; her nerves were very strong,
+the balance of her physical and mental organization was splendidly even,
+as one imagines Shakespeare's to have been. But the very vigor of her
+character, its force of self-assertion, unfitted her to be the
+complement to any but a very yielding nature. The direct influence a
+passive, merely receptive spirit would have accepted, and gratefully,
+was soon felt as an intolerable burden by a mind in many ways different
+from her own, but with the same imperious instinct of freedom, and as
+little capable of playing anvil to another mind for long. He rebelled
+against her ascendancy, but suffered from the spell. She was no Countess
+Guiccioli, content to adore and be adored, and exercise an indirect
+power for good on a capricious lover. Her logical mind, energetic and
+independent, grew impatient of the seeming inconsistencies of her gifted
+companion; and when at last she began to perceive in them the fatal
+conditions of those gifts themselves, only compassion survived in her,
+as she thought, and compassion was cold.</p>
+
+<p>How could De Musset, with such an excellent example of prudence, regular
+hours, good sense, calm self-possession, and ceaseless literary industry
+as hers before his eyes, not be stirred up to emulate such admirable
+qualities? But her reason made him unreasonable; the indefatigability of
+her pen irritated his nerves, and made him idle out of contradiction;
+her homilies provoked only fresh imprudences&mdash;as though he wanted to
+make proof of his independence whilst secretly feeling her dominion&mdash;a
+phenomenon with which highly nervous people will sympathize not a
+little, but which was perfectly inexplicable to George Sand.</p>
+
+<p>His genius was of a more delicate essence than hers; he has struck, at
+times, a deeper note. But his nature was frailer, his muse not so easily
+within call, his character as intolerant of restraint as her own, but
+less self-sufficing; and the morbid taint of thought then prevalent, and
+which her natural optimism and better balanced faculties enabled her to
+throw off very shortly, had entered into him ineffaceably. Whether or
+not she brought a fresh blight on his mind, she certaintly failed to
+cure it.</p>
+
+<p>The spring had hardly begun when De Musset was struck down by fever.
+George Sand, who had previously been very ill herself, nursed him
+through his attack with great devotion; and in six weeks' time he was
+restored to health, if not to happiness. Theirs was at an end, as they
+recognized, and agreed to part&mdash;"for a time, perhaps, or perhaps for
+ever," she wrote,&mdash;with their attachment broken but not destroyed.</p>
+
+<p>It was early in April that De Musset started on his homeward journey.
+George Sand saw him on his way as far as Vicenza, and ere returning to
+Venice, made a little excursion in the Alps, along the course of the
+Brenta. "I have walked as much as four-and-twenty miles a day," she
+writes to M. Boucoiran, "and found out that this sort of exercise is
+very good for me, both morally and physically. Tell Buloz I will write
+some letters for the <i>Revue</i>, upon my pedestrian tours. I came back into
+Venice with only seven centimes in my pocket, otherwise I should have
+gone as far as the Tyrol; but the want of baggage and money obliged me
+to return. In a few days I shall start again, and cross over the Alps by
+the gorges of the Piave."</p>
+
+<p>And the spring's delights on the Alpine borders of Lombardy are
+described by her <i>con amore</i>, in the promised letters:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The country was not yet in its full splendor; the fields were of a
+faint green, verging on yellow, and the leaves only coming into bud
+on the trees. But here and there the almonds and peaches in flower
+mixed their garlands of pink and white with the dark clumps of
+cypress. Through the midst of this far-spreading garden the Brenta
+flowed swiftly and silently over her sandy bed, between two large
+banks of pebbles, and the rocky <i>débris</i> which she tears out of the
+heart of the Alps, and with which she furrows the plains in her
+days of anger. A semi-circle of fertile hills, overspread with
+those long festoons of twisting vine that suspend themselves from
+all the trees in Venetia, made a near frame to the picture; and the
+snowy mountain-heights, sparkling in the first rays of sunshine,
+formed an immense second border, standing, as if cut out in silver,
+against the solid blue of the sky.</p></div>
+
+<p>None of these excursions, however, were ever carried very far. For the
+next three months she remained almost entirely stationary at Venice, her
+head-quarters. She had taken apartments for herself in the interior of
+the city, in a little low-built house, along the narrow, green, and yet
+limpid canal, close to the Ponte dei Barcaroli. "There," she tells us,
+"alone all the afternoon, never going out except in the evening for a
+breath of air, working at night as well, to the song of the tame
+nightingales that people all Venetian balconies, I wrote <i>André</i>,
+<i>Jacques</i>, <i>Mattea</i>, and the first <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i>."</p>
+
+<p>None can read the latter and suppose that the suffering of the recent
+parting was all on one side. The poet continued to correspond with her,
+and the consciousness of the pain she had inflicted she was clearly not
+sufficiently indifferent herself to support. But neither De Musset nor
+any other in whom, through the "prism of enthusiasm," she may have seen
+awhile a hero of romance, was ever a primary influence on her life.
+These were two. Firstly, her children, who although at a distance were
+seldom absent from her thoughts. Of their well-being at school and at
+home respectively, she was careful to keep herself informed, down to the
+minutest particulars, by correspondents in Paris and at Nohant, whence
+no opposition whatever was raised by its occupier to her prolonged
+absence abroad. Secondly, her art-vocation. She wrote incessantly; and
+independently of the pecuniary obligations to do so which she put
+forward, it is obvious that she had become wedded to this habit of work.
+"The habit has become a faculty&mdash;the faculty a need. I have thus come to
+working for thirteen hours at a time without making myself ill; seven
+or eight a day on an average, be the task done better or worse," she
+writes to M. Chatiron, from Venice, in March. Sometimes, as with <i>Leone
+Leoni</i>, she would complete a novel in a week; a few weeks later it was
+in the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>. Such haste she afterward deprecated,
+and, like all other workers, she aspired to a year's holiday in which to
+devote herself to the study of the masterpieces of modern literature;
+but the convenient season for such suspension of her own productive
+activity never came. And whilst at Venice she found herself literally in
+want of money to leave it. Buloz had arranged with her that she should
+contribute thirty-two pages every six weeks to his periodical for a
+yearly stipend of £160. She had anticipated her salary for the expenses
+of her Italian journey, and must acquit herself of the arrears due
+before she could take wing.</p>
+
+<p><i>Jacques</i>, the longest of the novels written at Venice, afforded fresh
+grounds to those who taxed her works with hostility to social
+institutions. Without entering into the vexed question of the right of
+the artist in search of variety to exercise his power on any theme that
+may invite to its display, and of the precise bearing of ethical rules
+on works of imagination, it is permissible to doubt that <i>Jacques</i>,
+however bitter the sentiments of the author at that time regarding the
+marriage tie, ever seriously disturbed the felicity of any domestic
+household in the past or present day. It is too lengthy and too
+melancholy to attract modern readers, who care little to revel in the
+luxuries of woe, so relished by those of a former age. We cannot do
+better than quote the judgment pronounced by Madame Sand herself, thirty
+years later, on this work of pure sentimentalism&mdash;generated by an epoch
+thrown into commotion by the passionate views of romanticism&mdash;the epoch
+of René, Lara, Childe Harold, Werther, types of desperate men; life
+weary, but by no means weary of talking. "<i>Jacques</i>," she observes,
+"belonged to this large family of disillusioned thinkers; they had their
+<i>raison d'être</i>, historical and social. He comes on the scene in the
+novel, already worn by deceptions; he thought to revive through his
+love, and he does not revive. Marriage was for him only the drop of
+bitterness that made the cup overflow. He killed himself to bequeath to
+others the happiness for which he cared not, and in which he believed
+not."</p>
+
+<p><i>Jacques</i>, taken as a <i>plaidoyer</i> against domestic institutions,
+singularly misses its aim. As critics have remarked, some of the most
+eloquent pages are those that treat of married bliss. Our sympathies
+are entirely with the wronged husband against his silly little wife. It
+is a kindred work to <i>Lélia</i>, and its faults are the same; but whilst
+dealing ostensibly with real life and possible human beings it cannot,
+like <i>Lélia</i>, be placed apart, and retain interest as a literary
+curiosity.</p>
+
+<p><i>André</i> is a very different piece of work and a little masterpiece of
+its kind. The author, in her preface, tells us how, whilst mechanically
+listening to the incessant chatter of the Venetian sempstresses in the
+next room to her own, she was struck by the resemblance between the mode
+of life and thought their talk betrayed, and that of the same class of
+girls at La Châtre; and how in the midst of Venice, to the sound of the
+rippling waters stirred by the gondolier's oar, of guitar and serenade,
+and within sight of the marble palaces, her thoughts flew back to the
+dark and dirty streets, the dilapidated houses, the wretched moss-grown
+roofs, the shrill concerts of the cocks, cats, and children of the
+little French provincial town. She dreamt also of the lovely meadows,
+the scented hay, the little running streams, and the floral researches
+she had been fond of. This tenacity of her instincts was a safeguard she
+may have sometimes rebelled against as a chain; it was with her an
+essential feature, and, despite all vagaries, gave a great unity to her
+life.</p>
+
+<p>"Venice," she writes to M. Chatiron in June, "with her marble staircases
+and her wonderful climate, does not make me forget anything that has
+been dear to me. Be sure that nothing in me dies. My life has its
+agitations; destiny pushes me different ways, but my heart does not
+repudiate the past. Old memories have a power none can ignore, and
+myself less than another. I love on the contrary to recall them, and we
+shall soon find ourselves together again in the old nest at Nohant."
+<i>André</i> she considered the outcome of this feeling of nostalgia. In it
+she has put together the vulgar elements of inferior society in a
+common-place country town, and produced a poem, though one of the
+saddest. If the florist heroine, Genevieve, is a slightly idealized
+figure, the story and general character-treatment are realistic to a
+painful degree. There is more power of simple pathos shown here than is
+common in the works of George Sand. <i>André</i> is a refreshing contrast, in
+its simplicity and brevity, to the inflation of <i>Lélia</i> and <i>Jacques</i>.
+It was an initial essay, and a model one, in a style with better claims
+to enduring popularity.</p>
+
+<p>As the summer advanced, George Sand found herself free to depart, and
+started on her way back to France, famishing, as she tells us, for the
+sight of her children. Her grand anxiety was to reach her destination
+in time for the breaking-up day and distribution of prizes at the
+College Henri IV. "I shall be at Paris before then," she writes from
+Milan, to her son, "if I die on the way, and really the heat is such
+that one might die of it." From Milan she journeyed over the Simplon to
+the Rhone valley, Martigny, Chamounix, and Geneva, performing great part
+of the way on foot. She reached Paris in the middle of August, and a few
+days later started with her boy for Nohant, where Solange had spent the
+time during her mother's absence, and where they remained together for
+the holidays. Here too she was in the midst of a numerous circle of
+friends of both sexes, in whose staunch friendliness she found a solace
+of which she stood in real need.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">MENTAL DEVELOPMENT.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> period immediately following George Sand's return from Italy in
+August 1834, was a time of transition, both in her outer and inner life.
+If undistinguished by the production of any novel calculated to create a
+fresh sensation, it shows no abatement of literary activity. This, as we
+have seen, had become to her a necessity of nature. Neither vicissitudes
+without nor commotions within, though they might direct or stimulate,
+seem to have acted as a check on the flow of her pen.</p>
+
+<p>During the first twelvemonth she continued to reside alternately at
+Nohant, whither she came with her son and daughter for their
+holidays&mdash;Solange being now placed in a children's school kept by some
+English ladies at Paris,&mdash;and her "poet's garret," as she styled her
+third floor <i>appartement</i> on the Quai Malplaquet.</p>
+
+<p>This winter saw the ending for herself and De Musset of their hapless
+romance. An approach to complete reconciliation&mdash;for the existing
+partial estrangement had been discovered to be more unbearable than all
+besides&mdash;led to stormy scenes and violent discord, and resulted before
+very long in mutual avoidance, which was to be final. It is said that
+forgiveness is the property of the injured, and it should be remembered
+that whenever De Musset's name is mentioned by George Sand it is with
+the admiring respect of one to whom his genius made that name sacred,
+and who refused to the end of his life to use the easy weapon offered
+her by his notorious frailties for vindicating herself at his expense.
+And, however pernicious the much talked of effect on De Musset's mind,
+it is but fair to the poet to recollect that it is no less true of him
+than of George Sand that his best work, that with which his fame has
+come chiefly to associate itself, was accomplished after this painful
+experience.</p>
+
+<p>Into her own mental state&mdash;possibly at this time the least enviable of
+the two&mdash;we get some glimpses in the <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i> of the
+autumn 1834, and winter 1834-35. Here, again, we should be content with
+gathering a general impression, and not ingenuously read literal facts
+in all the self-accusations and recorded experiences of the
+"<i>voyageur</i>"&mdash;a semi-fictitious personage whose improvisations were,
+after all, only a fresh exercise which George Sand had invented for her
+imagination taking herself and reality for a starting-point merely, a
+suggestive theme.</p>
+
+<p>But the despair and disgust of life, to which both these and her private
+letters give such uncompromising and eloquent expression, indubitably
+reflect her feelings at this moral crisis&mdash;the feelings of one who
+having openly braved the laws of society, to become henceforward a law
+unto herself, recognizes that she has only found her way to fresh
+sources of misery. Never yet had she had such grave and deep causes of
+individual mental torment to blacken her views of existence, and incline
+her to abhor it as a curse. "Your instinct will save you, bring you back
+to your children," wrote a friend who knew her well. But her maternal
+love and solicitude themselves were becoming a source of added distress
+and apprehension.</p>
+
+<p>The extraordinary arrangement she and M. Dudevant had entered into four
+years before with regard to each other, was clearly one impossible to
+last. It will be recollected that she at that time had relinquished her
+patrimony to those who had thought it no dishonor to continue to enjoy
+it; and the terms of that agreement had since been nominally
+undisturbed. But besides that, the control of the children remained a
+constant subject of dissension. M. Dudevant was beginning to get into
+pecuniary difficulties in the management of his wife's estate. Sometimes
+he contemplated resigning it to her, and retiring to Gascony, to live
+with his widowed stepmother on the property which at her death would
+revert to him. But unfortunately he could not make up his mind to this
+course. No sooner had he drawn up an agreement consenting to a division
+of property, than he seemed to regret the sacrifice; upon which she
+ceased to press it.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime Madame Dudevant, whose position at Nohant was that of a visitor
+merely, and becoming untenable, felt her hold on her cherished home and
+her children becoming more precarious day by day.</p>
+
+<p>Some of her friends had strongly advised her to travel for a length of
+time, both as offering a mortal remedy, and as a temporary escape from
+the practical perplexities of the moment. Her rescue, however, was to be
+otherwise effected, and a number of new intellectual interests that
+sprang up for her at this time all tended to retain her in her own
+country.</p>
+
+<p>It was in the course of this spring that she made the acquaintance of M.
+de Lamennais, introduced to her by their common friend, the composer,
+Franz Liszt. The famous author of the <i>Paroles d'un Croyant</i> had
+virtually severed himself from the Church of Rome by his recent
+publication of this little volume, pronounced by the Pope, "small in
+size, immense in perversity!" The eloquence of the poet-priest, and the
+doctrines of the anti-Catholic and humanitarian Christianity of which he
+came forward as the expounder, could not fail powerfully to impress her
+intelligence. Here seemed the harbor of refuge her half-wrecked faiths
+were seeking, and what the abbé's antagonists denounced as the
+"diabolical gospel of social science," came to her as the teachings of
+an angel of light. Christianity as preached by him was a sort of
+realization of the ideal religion of Aurore Dupin&mdash;faith divorced from
+superstition and the doctrine of Romish infallibility. Complete identity
+of sentiments between herself and the abbé was out of the question. But
+his was the right mind coming to her mind at the right moment, and
+exercised a healing influence over her troubled spirits. For <i>Le Monde</i>,
+a journal founded by him shortly after this time, she wrote the <i>Lettres
+à Marcie</i>, an unfinished series, treating of moral and spiritual
+problems and trials. Finally, the position M. de Lamennais had taken up
+as the apostle of the people further enlisted her sympathies in his
+cause, which made religious one with social reform, and amalgamated the
+protest against moral enslavement with the liberation-schemes then
+fermenting in young and generous minds all over Europe.</p>
+
+<p>The belief in the possibility of their speedy realization was then
+wide-spread&mdash;a conviction that, as Heine puts it, some grand recipe for
+freedom and equality, invented, well drawn up, and inserted in the
+<i>Moniteur</i>, was all that was needed to secure those benefits for the
+world at large. If George Sand, led afterwards into searching for this
+empirical remedy for the wrongs and sufferings of the masses, believed
+the elixir to have been found in the establishment of popular
+sovereignty by universal suffrage, it was through the persuasive
+arguments of the leaders of the movement, with whom at this period she
+was first brought into personal relations. Her own unbiassed judgment,
+to which she reverted long years after, when she had seen these
+illusions perish sadly, was less sanguine in its prognostications for
+the immediate future, as appears in her own reflections in a letter of
+this time:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>What I see in the midst of the divergencies of all these reforming
+sects is a waste of generous sentiments and of noble thoughts, a
+tendency towards social amelioration, but an impossibility for the
+time to bring forth through the want of a head to that great body
+with a hundred hands, that tears itself to pieces, for not knowing
+what to attack. So far the struggles make only dust and noise. We
+have not yet come to the era that will construct new societies, and
+people them with perfected men.</p></div>
+
+<p>She had recently been introduced to a political and legal celebrity of
+his day, the famous advocate Michel, of Bourges. He was then at the
+height of his reputation, which, won by his eloquent and successful
+defense of political prisoners on various occasions, was considerable.
+Madame Sand had been advised to consult him professionally about her
+business affairs, and for this purpose went over one day with some of
+her Berrichon friends to see him at Bourges. But the man of law had, it
+appears, been reading <i>Lélia</i>, and instead of talking of business with
+his distinguished client, dashed at once into politics, philosophy, and
+social science, overpowering his listeners with the strength of his
+oratory. His sentiments were those of extreme radicalism, and he carried
+on a little private propaganda in the country around. The force of his
+character seems to have spent itself in oratorical effort. He could
+preach revolution, but not suggest reform; denounce existing abuses, but
+do nothing towards the remodelling of social institutions; and in after
+years he failed, as so many leading men in his profession have failed,
+to make any impression as a speaker in Parliament. The author of
+<i>Lélia</i> was overwhelmed, if not all at once converted, by the tremendous
+rhetorical power of this singular man. She was a proselyte worth the
+trouble of making, and Michel was bent on drawing her more closely into
+active politics, with which hitherto she had occupied herself very
+little. He began a correspondence, writing her long epistles, the sum of
+which, she says, may thus be resumed:&mdash;"Your scepticism springs from
+personal unhappiness. Love is selfish. Extend this solicitude for a
+single individual to the whole human race." He certainly succeeded in
+inspiring her with a strong desire to share his passion for politics,
+his faith, his revivifying hopes of a speedy social renovation, his
+ambition to be one of its apostles. To Michel, under the sobriquet of
+"Everard," are addressed several of the <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i> of the
+spring and summer of 1835, letters which she defines as "a rapid
+analysis of a rapid conversion."</p>
+
+<p>But Michel's work was a work of demolition only; and when his earnest
+disciple wanted new theories in place of the old forms so ruthlessly
+destroyed, he had none to offer. There were others, however, who could.
+She was soon to be put into communication with a number of the active
+workers for the republican cause throughout the country. They counted
+many of the best hearts and not the worst heads in France, and were
+naturally eager to enlist her energies on their side.</p>
+
+<p>Foremost, by right of the influence exercised over her awhile by his
+writings, was the philosopher Pierre Leroux, with whom her acquaintance
+dates from this same year. In spite of the wide divergence between her
+pre-eminently artistic spirit and a mind of the rougher stamp of this
+born iconoclast, he was to indoctrinate her with many new opinions. His
+disinterested character won her admiration; he was a practical
+philanthropist as well as a critical thinker, one whose life and
+fighting power were devoted to promoting the good of the working classes
+to whom he belonged, having been brought up as a printer. He was
+regarded as the apostle of communism, as then understood, or rather not
+understood&mdash;for the form under which it suggested itself to the social
+reformers of the period in question was entirely indefinite.</p>
+
+<p>Meantime the novelist's pen was far from idle. One or two pleasant
+glimpses she has given us into her manner of working belong to this
+year. In the summer the heat in her "poet's garret" becoming
+intolerable, she took refuge in a congenial solitude offered by the
+ground-floor apartments of the house, then in course of reconstruction,
+dismantled and untenanted. The works had been temporarily suspended,
+and Madame Sand took possession of the field abandoned by the builders
+and carpenters. The windows and doors opening into the garden had been
+taken away, and the place thus turned into an airy, cool retreat. Out of
+the apparatus of the workmen, left behind, she constructed her
+writing-establishment, and here, secure from interruption, denying
+herself to all visitors, never going out except to visit her children at
+their respective schools, she completed her novel with no companions but
+the spiders crawling over the planks, the mice running in and out of the
+corners, and the blackbirds hopping in from the garden; the deep sense
+of solitude enhanced by the roar of the city in the very heart of which
+she had thus voluntarily isolated herself.</p>
+
+<p>As an artistic experience she found it refreshing, and repeated it more
+than once. Soon after, a friend offered her the loan of an empty house
+at Bourges, a town that had been suggested to her as a desirable place
+of residence, should the circumstances at Nohant ever force her to
+abandon it entirely. As a home she saw and disapproved of Bourges, but
+she thoroughly enjoyed a brief retreat spent there in an absolutely
+deserted, vine-covered dwelling, standing in a garden enclosed by stone
+walls. Her meals were handed in through a wicket. A few friends came to
+see her in the evenings. The days, and often the nights, she passed in
+study and meditation, shut up in the library reading Lavater,
+expatiating on her impressions of his theories in a letter addressed to
+Franz Liszt (inserted among the <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i>), or strolling
+in the flower garden&mdash;"forgotten," she tells us, "by the whole world,
+and plunged into oblivion of the actualities of my own existence."</p>
+
+<p>Of her numerous letters of advice to her boy at school, we quote one
+written during this summer of 1835, when their future relations to each
+other were in painful uncertainty:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Work, be strong and proud; despise the little troubles supposed to
+belong to your age. Reserve your strength of resistance for deeds
+and facts that are worth the effort. If I am here no longer, think
+of me who worked and suffered cheerfully. We are like each other in
+mind and in countenance. I know already from this day what your
+intellectual life will be. I fear for you many and deep sorrows. I
+hope for you the purest of joys. Guard within yourself that
+treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to
+lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness. Know how to
+replace in your heart, by the happiness of those you love, the
+happiness that may be wanting to yourself. Keep the hope of another
+life. It is there that mothers meet their sons again. Love all
+God's creatures. Forgive those who are ill-conditioned, resist
+those who are unjust, and devote yourself to those who are great
+through their virtue. Love me. I will teach you many, many things
+if we live together. If that blessing (the greatest that can befall
+me, the only one that makes me wish for a long life) is not to be,
+you must pray for me, and from the grave itself, if anything
+remains of me in the universe, the spirit of your mother will watch
+over you.</p></div>
+
+<p>In the autumn, 1835, Madame Dudevant, under legal advice, and supported
+by the approval of friends of both parties, determined to apply to the
+courts for a judicial separation from her husband, on the plea of
+ill-treatment. She had sufficient grounds to allege for her claim, and
+had then every reason to hope that her demand would not even be
+contested by M. Dudevant, who, on former occasions, had voluntarily
+signed but afterwards revoked the agreement she hereby only desired to
+make valid and permanent, and which, ensuring to him a certain
+proportion of her income, gave her Nohant for a place of habitation, and
+established the children under her care.</p>
+
+<p>Pending the issue of this suit, which, unexpectedly protracted, dragged
+on until the summer of the next year, she availed herself of the
+hospitality of a family at La Châtre, friends of old standing, and from
+under whose roof she awaited, as from a neutral ground, the decision of
+her judges. During this year she saw little of Paris, and less of
+Nohant, except for a brief visit which, profiting by a moment when its
+walls were absolutely deserted by every other human being, she paid to
+her house&mdash;not knowing then whether she would ever, so to speak, inhabit
+it again in her own right.</p>
+
+<p>On the result of the legal proceedings depended her future home and the
+best part of her happiness. Sooner than be parted from her children, she
+contemplated the idea, in case of the decision going against her, of
+escaping with them to America! Yet, in the midst of all this suspense,
+we find her industrious as ever, joining in the daytime in the family
+life of the household with which she was domesticated, helping to amuse
+the children among them, retiring to her room at ten at night, to work
+on at her desk till seven in the morning, according to her wont. A more
+cheerful tone begins to pervade her effusions. The clouds were slowly
+breaking on all sides at once, and a variety of circumstances combining
+to restore to her mind its natural tone&mdash;faith, hope, and charity to her
+heart, and harmony to her existence. She began to perceive what she was
+enabled afterwards more fully to acknowledge as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>As to my religion, the ground of it has never varied. The forms of
+the past have vanished, for me as for my century, before the light
+of study and reflection. But the eternal doctrine of believers, of
+God and His goodness, the immortal soul and the hopes of another
+life, this is what, in myself, has been proof against all
+examination, all discussion, and even intervals of despairing
+doubt.</p></div>
+
+<p>It is significant that during these months, spent for the most part at
+La Châtre, we find her rewriting <i>Lélia</i>, trying, as she expressed her
+intention, "to transform this work of anger into a work of gentleness."
+<i>Engelwald</i>, a novel of some length on which she was engaged, was
+destined never to see the light.</p>
+
+<p>To the Comtesse d'Agoult, better known by her <i>nom de plume</i> of Daniel
+Stern, whose acquaintance she had recently made in Paris, she writes in
+May, 1836:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I am still at La Châtre, staying with my friends, who spoil me like
+a child of five years old. I inhabit a suburb, built in terraces
+against the rock. At my feet lies a wonderfully pretty valley. A
+garden thirty feet square and full of roses, and a terrace
+extensive enough for you to walk along it in ten steps, are my
+drawing-room, my study, and gallery. My bed-room is rather
+large&mdash;it is decorated with a red cotton curtained bed&mdash;a real
+peasant's bed, hard and flat, two straw chairs, and a white wooden
+table. My window is situated six feet above the terrace. By the
+trellised trees on the wall I can get out and in, and stroll at
+night among my thirty feet of flowers without having to open a door
+or wake anyone.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes I go out riding alone, at dusk. I come in towards
+midnight. My cloak, my rough hat, and the melancholy trot of my
+nag, make me pass in the darkness for a commercial traveller, or a
+farm-boy.</p>
+
+<p>One of my grand amusements is to watch the transition from night to
+day; it effects itself in a thousand different manners. This
+revolution, apparently so uniform, has every day a character of its
+own.</p></div>
+
+<p>The summer that had set in was unusually hot and sultry. Writing to
+Madame d'Agoult, July 10, 1836, she thus describes her enjoyment of a
+season that allowed of some of the pleasures of primitive existence:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I start on foot at three in the morning, fully intending to be back
+by eight o'clock; but I lose myself in the lanes; I forget myself
+on the banks of the river; I run after butterflies; and I get home
+at midday in a state of torrefaction impossible to describe.</p></div>
+
+<p>Another time the sight of the cooling stream is more than she can
+resist, and she walks into the Indre fully dressed; but a few minutes
+more and the sun has dried her garments, and she proceeds on her walk of
+ten or twelve miles&mdash;"Never a cockchafer passes but I run after it."</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>You have no idea of all the dreams I dream during my walks in the
+sun. I fancy myself in the golden days of Greece. In this happy
+country where I live you may often go for six miles without meeting
+a human creature. The flocks are left by themselves in pastures
+well enclosed by fine hedges; so the illusion can last for some
+time. One of my chief amusements when I have got out to some
+distance, where I don't know the paths, is to fancy I am wandering
+over some other country with which I discover some resemblance. I
+recollect having strolled in the Alps, and fancied myself for hours
+in America. Now I picture to myself an Arcadia in Berry. Not a
+meadow, not a cluster of trees which, under so fine a sun, does not
+appear to me quite Arcadian.</p></div>
+
+<p>We give these passages because they seem to us very forcibly to portray
+one side, and that the strongest and most permanent, of the character of
+George Sand: the admixture of a child's simplicity of tastes, a poet's
+fondness for reverie, and that instinctive independence of habits&mdash;an
+instinct stronger than the restraints of custom&mdash;which her individuality
+seemed to demand.</p>
+
+<p>In the letter last quoted to Madame d'Agoult, the new ideal which was
+arising out of these contemplations is thus resumed:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>To throw yourself into the lap of mother nature: to take her really
+for mother and sister; stoically and religiously to cut off from
+your life what is mere gratified vanity; obstinately to resist the
+proud and the wicked; to make yourself humble with the unfortunate,
+to weep with the misery of the poor; nor desire another consolation
+than the putting down of the rich; to acknowledge no other God than
+Him who ordains justice and equality upon men; to venerate what is
+good, to judge severely what is only strong, to live on very
+little, to give away nearly all, in order to re-establish primitive
+equality and bring back to life again the Divine institution: that
+is the religion I shall proclaim in a little corner of my own, and
+that I aspire to preach to my twelve apostles under the lime-trees
+in my garden.</p></div>
+
+<p>The judgment of the court, first pronounced in February, 1836, and given
+in her favor by default, no opposition having been raised to her claims
+to the proposed partition of property by the defendant, placed her in
+legal possession of her house and her children. Appeal was made,
+however, prolonging and complicating the case, but without affecting its
+termination. In the war of mutual accusations thus stirred up, M.
+Dudevant's <i>rôle</i> as accuser, yet objecting in the same breath to the
+separation, had an appearance of insincerity that could not fail to
+withdraw sympathy from his side, irrespective of any judgment that might
+be held on the conduct of the wife, whose absence and complete
+independence he had authorized or acquiesced in. Before the actual
+conclusion of the law-suit his appeal was withdrawn. As a result, the
+previous judgment in favor of Madame Dudevant was virtually confirmed,
+and the details were settled by private agreement.</p>
+
+<p>It is almost impossible to overrate the importance to George Sand of a
+conclusion that gave her back her old home of Nohant, and secured to her
+the permanent companionship of her children. The present pecuniary
+arrangement left M. Dudevant some hold over Maurice and his education,
+concerning which his parents had long disagreed, and which for another
+year remained a source of contention.</p>
+
+<p>The affair thus concluded, Madame Sand entered formally into possession
+of Nohant; and early in September she started with her two children for
+Switzerland, where they spent the autumn holidays in a long-contemplated
+visit to her friend the Comtesse d'Agoult, then at Geneva. This tour is
+fancifully sketched in a closing number of the <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i>,
+a volume which stands as a sort of literary memorial of two years of
+unsettled, precarious existence, material and spiritual&mdash;a time of trial
+now happily at an end.</p>
+
+<p><i>Simon</i>, a tale dedicated to Madame d'Agoult, and published in the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, 1836&mdash;a graceful story, of no high
+pretentions&mdash;is noticeable as marking the commencement of a decided and
+agreeable change in the tone of George Sand's fiction. Hitherto the
+predominant note struck had been most often one of melancholy, if not
+despair&mdash;the more hopelessly painful the subject, the more fervent,
+apparently, the inspiration to the writer. In <i>Indiana</i> she had
+portrayed the double victim of tyranny and treachery; in <i>Valentine</i>, a
+helpless girl sacrificed to family ambition and social prejudice; in
+<i>Lélia</i> and <i>Jacques</i>, the incurable <i>Weltschmerz</i>, heroism unvalued and
+wasted; in <i>Leone Leoni</i>, the infatuation of a weak-minded woman for a
+phenomenal scoundrel; in <i>André</i>, the wretchedness which a timid,
+selfish character, however amiable, may bring down on itself and on all
+connected with it. Henceforward she prefers themes of a pleasanter
+nature. In <i>Simon</i> she paints the triumph of true and patient love over
+social prejudice and strong opposition. In <i>Mauprat</i>,<a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a> written in
+1837, at Nohant, she exerts all the force of her imagination and
+language to bring before us vividly the gradual redemption of a noble
+but degraded nature, through the influence of an exclusive, passionate
+and indestructible affection. The natural optimism of her temperament,
+not her incidental misfortunes, began and continued to color her
+compositions.</p>
+
+<p>From Switzerland she returned for part of the winter to Paris. She had
+given up her "poet's garret," and occupied for a while a suite of rooms
+in the Hôtel de France, where resided also Madame d'Agoult. The <i>salon</i>
+of the latter was a favorite <i>rendezvous</i> of cosmopolitan artistic
+celebrities, whose general <i>rendezvous</i> just then was Paris. A very
+Pantheon must have been an intimate circle that included, among others,
+George Sand, Daniel Stern, Heine, the Polish poet Mickiewicz, Eugène
+Delacroix, Meyerbeer, Liszt, Hiller, and Frédéric Chopin.</p>
+
+<p>The delicate health of her son forced Madame Sand to leave with him
+shortly for Berry, where he soon became convalescent. Later in the
+season, some of the same party of friends that had met in Paris met
+again at Nohant. It was during this summer that George Sand wrote for
+her child the well-known little tale, <i>Les Maîtres Mosaïstes</i>, in which
+the adventures of the Venetian mosaic-workers are woven into so charming
+a picture. "I do not know why, but it is seldom that I have written
+anything with so much pleasure," she tells us. "It was in the country,
+in summer weather, as hot as the Italian climate I had lately left. I
+have never seen so many birds and flowers in my garden. Liszt was
+playing the piano on the ground floor, and the nightingales, intoxicated
+with music and sunshine, were singing madly in the lilac-trees around."</p>
+
+<p>The party was abruptly dispersed upon the intelligence that reached
+Madame Sand of her mother's sudden, and, as it proved, fatal illness.
+She hurried to Paris, and remained with Madame Maurice Dupin during her
+last days. The old fond affection between them, though fitful in its
+manifestations on the part of the mother, had never been impaired, and
+the breaking of this old link with the past was very deeply felt by
+Madame Sand.</p>
+
+<p>Before returning to Nohant, she spent a few weeks at Fontainebleau with
+her son, from whom she never liked to separate. They passed their days
+in exploring the forest, then larger and wilder than now, botanizing and
+butterfly-hunting. At night she sat up writing, when all was quiet in
+the inn. Just as, whilst at Venice, her fancy flew back to the scenes
+and characters of French provincial life, and <i>André</i> was the result, so
+here, amid the forest landscapes of her own land, her imagination rushed
+off to Venice and the shores of the Brenta, and produced <i>La Dernière
+Aldini</i>.</p>
+
+<p>This constant industry, which had now become her habit of life, was more
+of a practical necessity than ever. Nohant, as already mentioned, barely
+repaid the owner the expenses of keeping it up. Madame Sand, who desired
+to be liberal besides, to travel occasionally, to gratify little
+artistic fancies as they arose, must look to her literary work to
+furnish the means.</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes," she writes from Nohant, in October, 1837, to Madame
+d'Agoult, then in Italy, "I am tempted to realize my capital, and come
+and join you; but out there I should do no work, and the galley-slave is
+chained up. If Buloz lets him go for a walk it is on <i>parole</i>, and
+<i>parole</i> is the cannon-ball the convict drags on his foot."</p>
+
+<p>Nor was it for herself only that she worked in future, but for her
+children, the whole responsibility of providing for both of whose
+education she was now about definitely to take on her own shoulders. The
+power of interference left to M. Dudevant by the recent legal decision
+had been exercised in a manner leading to fresh vexatious contention,
+and continual alarm on Madame Sand's part lest the boy should be taken
+by force from her side. These skirmishes included the actual abduction
+of Solange from Nohant by M. Dudevant during her mother's absence at
+Fontainebleau; a foolish and purposeless trick, by which nothing was to
+be gained, except annoyance and trouble to Madame Sand, whose right to
+the control of her daughter had never been contested. A final settlement
+entered into between the parties, in 1838, placed these matters
+henceforward on a footing of peace, fortunately permanent. By this
+agreement Madame Sand received back from M. Dudevant&mdash;who had lately
+succeeded to his father's estate&mdash;some house property that formed part
+of her patrimony, and paid down to him the sum of £2,000; he ceding to
+her the remnant of his paternal rights; she freeing him from all charges
+for Maurice's education, her authority over which, in future, was
+recognized as complete.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">SOLITUDE, SOCIETY AND SOCIALISM.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> charge of both children now resting entirely in her hands, Madame
+Sand was enabled to fulfill her desire of permanently removing her boy,
+now fourteen years of age, from the college Henri IV. Not only was she
+opposed to the general <i>régime</i> and educational system pursued in French
+public schools of this type, she felt persuaded of its special
+unsuitability to her son, whose tastes and temperament were artistic,
+like her own, and whose classical studies had been repeatedly
+interrupted by illness. His delicate health determined her to spend the
+winter of 1838-9 abroad with her family. Having heard the climate and
+scenery of Majorca highly praised, she selected the island for their
+resort; tempted herself by the prospect of a few months absolute quiet,
+where, with neither letters to answer, nor newspapers to read, she would
+enjoy some rare leisure, which she proposed to spend in studying history
+and teaching French to her children.</p>
+
+<p>Just at this time her friend and ardent admirer, Frédéric Chopin, was
+recovering from a chest attack, the first presage of the illness that
+caused his early death. The eminent pianist and composer had also been
+recommended to winter in the South, and greatly needed repose and change
+of air to recruit him from the fatigues of the Parisian season. It was
+arranged that the convalescent should make one of the expedition to
+Majorca. He joined Madame Sand and her children at Perpignan, and they
+embarked for Barcelona, whence the sea-voyage to the island was safely
+accomplished, the party reaching Palma, the capital, in magnificent
+November weather, and never suspecting how soon they would have cause to
+repent their choice of a retreat.</p>
+
+<p>But their practical information about the island proved lamentably
+insufficient. With the scenery, indeed, they were enraptured. "We
+found," says Madame Sand in her little volume, <i>Un Hiver à Majorque</i>,
+published the following year, "a green Switzerland under a Calabrian
+sky, with all the solemnity and stillness of the East." But though a
+painter's Elysium, Majorca was wanting in the commonest comforts of
+civilized life. Inns were non-existent, foreigners viewed and treated
+with suspicion. The party thought themselves fortunate in securing a
+villa some miles from Palma, furnished, though scantily. "The country,
+nature, trees, sky, sea, and mountains surpass all my dreams," she
+writes in the first days, "it is the promised land; and as we have
+succeeded in housing ourselves pretty well, we are delighted."</p>
+
+<p>The delight was of brief duration. That Madame Sand's manuscripts took a
+month to reach the editor of the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>; that the piano
+ordered from Paris for Chopin took two months to get to Majorca, were
+the least among their troubles. A rainy season of exceptional severity
+set in, and the villa quickly became uninhabitable. It was not
+weatherproof. Chopin fell alarmingly ill. Good food and medical
+attendance were hardly to be procured for him; and finally, the villa
+proprietor, having heard that his tenant was suffering from
+consumption&mdash;an illness believed to be infectious by the Majorcans&mdash;gave
+the whole party notice to quit. The invalid improving somewhat, though
+still too weak to attempt the return journey to France, Madame Sand
+transported her ambulance, as she styled it, to some tolerable quarters
+she had already discovered in the deserted Carthusian monastery of
+Valdemosa&mdash;"a poetical name and a poetical abode," she writes; "an
+admirable landscape, grand and wild, with the sea at both ends of the
+horizon, formidable peaks around us, eagles pursuing their prey even
+down to the orange-trees in our garden, a cypress walk winding from the
+top of our mountain to the bottom of the gorge, torrents over-grown with
+myrtles, palm-trees below our feet, nothing could be more magnificent
+than this spot."</p>
+
+<p>Parts of the old monastic buildings were dilapidated; the rest were in
+good order, being frequented as a summer retreat by the inhabitants of
+Palma. Now, in December, the Chartreuse was entirely abandoned, except
+by a housekeeper, a sacristan and a lone monk, the last offshoot of the
+community&mdash;a kind of apothecary, whose stock-in-trade was limited to
+guimauve and dog-grass.</p>
+
+<p>The rooms into which the travellers moved had just been vacated by a
+Spanish family of political refugees departing for France. These
+lodgings were at least provided with doors, window-panes, and decent
+furniture; but the luxury of chimneys was unknown, and a stove, which
+had to be manufactured at an enormous price on purpose for the party, is
+described as "a sort of iron cauldron, that made our heads ache and
+dried up our throats." Continuous stormy weather having suspended steam
+traffic with the mainland, the visitors had no choice but to remain
+prisoners some two months more, during which the deluge went on with
+little intermission.</p>
+
+<p>Still, to young and romantic imaginations the island and life in the
+ex-monastery offered considerable charm. Madame Sand and her children
+were delighted with the unfamiliar vegetation, the palms, aloes, olives,
+almond and orange trees, the Arab architecture, and picturesque
+costumes. Valdemosa itself was splendidly situated among the mountains,
+in a stone-walled garden surrounded with cypress trees and planted with
+palms and olives. In the morning, Madame Sand gave lessons to the
+children; in the afternoon, they ran wild out of doors whilst she
+wrote&mdash;when the invalid musician was well enough to be left. In the
+evenings she and the young people went wandering by moonlight through
+the cloisters, exploring the monkish cells and chapels. Maurice had
+fortunately recovered his health completely, but poor Chopin's state,
+aggravated by the damp weather and privations&mdash;for the difficulties in
+obtaining a regular supply of provisions were immense&mdash;remained
+throughout their stay a constant and terrible cause of anxiety and
+responsibility to Madame Sand. From the islanders no sort of help or
+even sympathy was forthcoming, and thievish servants and extortionate
+traders were not the least of the annoyances with which the strangers
+had to contend. In a letter to François Rollinat she gives a graphic
+account of their misfortunes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>It has rightly been laid down as a principle that where nature is
+beautiful and generous, men are bad and avaricious. We had all the
+trouble in the world to procure the commonest articles of food,
+such as the island produces in abundance; thanks to the signal
+dishonesty, the plundering spirit of the peasants, who made us pay
+for everything three times what it was worth, so that we were at
+their mercy under the penalty of dying of hunger. We could get no
+one to serve us, because we were not <i>Christians</i> [the travellers
+passed for being "sold to the Devil" because they did not go to
+Mass], and, besides, nobody would attend on a consumptive invalid.
+However, for better for worse, we were established.... The place
+was incomparably poetical; we did not see a living soul, nothing
+disturbed our work; after waiting two months, and paying three
+hundred francs extra, Chopin had at last received his piano, and
+delighted the vaults of his cell with his melodies. Health and
+strength were visibly returning to Maurice; as for me, I worked as
+tutor seven hours a day: I sat up working on my own account half
+the night; Chopin composed masterpieces, and we hoped to put up
+with the remainder of our discomforts by the aid of these
+compensations.</p></div>
+
+<p>It was in the cells of Valdemosa that Madame Sand completed her novel of
+Monastic life, <i>Spiridion</i>, then publishing in the <i>Revue des Deux
+Mondes</i>. "For heaven's sake not so much mysticism!" prayed the editor of
+her, now and then; and assuredly those readers for whom George Sand was
+simply a purveyor of passionate romances, those critics who set her down
+in their minds as exclusively a glorifier of mutinous emotion and the
+apologist of lawless love, must have been taken aback by these pages, in
+which she had devoted her most fervent energies to tracing the spiritual
+history, <i>peu récréatif</i>, as she dryly observes, of a monk who, in the
+days of the decadence of the monastic orders, retained earnestness and
+sincerity; whose mind, revolted by the hypocrisy and worldliness around
+him, passes through the successive stages of heresy and philosophic
+doubt, and to whom is finally revealed an eternal gospel, which lies at
+the core of his old religion, but which later growths have stifled, and
+which outlasts all shocks and changes, and is to generate the religion
+of the future.</p>
+
+<p>The compositions of Chopin above alluded to, include the finest of his
+well-known Preludes, which may easily be conceived of as suggested by
+the strange mingling of contrasting impressions in the Chartreuse.
+"Several of these Preludes," writes Madame Sand, "represent the visions
+that haunted him of deceased monks, the sounds of funeral chants;
+others are soft and melancholy; these came to him in his hours of
+sunshine and health, at the sound of the children's laughter beneath the
+window, the distant thrum of guitars and the songs of the birds under
+the damp foliage; at the sight of the pale little roses in bloom among
+the snow."</p>
+
+<p>The loneliness and melancholy beauty of the spot, however congenial to
+the romance writer or inspiring to the composer, were not the right
+tonics for the nerves of the over-sensitive, imaginative invalid. The
+care and nursing of Madame Sand made amends for much, and by her good
+sense she saved him from being doctored to death by local practitioners.
+But his fortitude, which bore up heroically against his personal danger,
+was not proof against the dreary influences of Valdemosa in bad weather,
+the fogs, the sound of the hurricane sweeping through the valley, and
+bringing down portions of the dilapidated building, the noise of the
+torrents, the cries of the scared sea-birds and the roar of the sea.</p>
+
+<p>The elevation of the Chartreuse made the climate peculiarly disagreeable
+at this season. She writes on:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>We lived in the midst of clouds, and for fifty days were unable to
+get down into the plains; the roads were changed to torrents, and
+we saw nothing more of the sun. I should have thought it all
+beautiful if poor Chopin could only have got on. Maurice was none
+the worse. The wind and the sea sung sublimely as they beat against
+the rocks. The vast and empty cloisters cracked over our heads. If
+I had been there when I wrote the portion of <i>Lélia</i> that takes
+place in the convent, I should have made it finer and truer. But my
+poor friend's chest got worse and worse. The fine weather did not
+return.... A maid I had brought over from France, and who so far
+had resigned herself, on condition of enormous wages, to cook and
+do the housework, began to refuse attendance, as too hard. The
+moment was coming when after having wielded the broom and managed
+the <i>pot au feu</i>, I was ready to drop with fatigue&mdash;for besides my
+work as tutor, besides my literary labor, besides the continual
+attention necessitated by the condition of my invalid, I had
+rheumatism in every limb.</p></div>
+
+<p>The return of spring was hailed as offering a tardy release from their
+island. The steamers were running again, and the party determined to
+leave at all risks; for though Chopin's state was more precarious than
+ever, nothing could be worse for him than to remain. They departed,
+feeling, she admits, as though they were escaping from the tender
+mercies of Polynesian savages, and once safely on board a French vessel
+at Barcelona, they thankfully welcomed the day that restored them to
+comfort and civilization, and saw the end of an expedition that had
+turned out in most respects so disastrous a <i>fiasco</i>.</p>
+
+<p>They remained throughout April at Marseilles, where Chopin, in the hands
+of a good doctor, became convalescent. From Marseilles they made a short
+tour in Italy, visiting Genoa and the neighborhood, and returning to
+France in May, Chopin apparently on the high road to complete recovery.
+It was in the following year that his illness returned in a graver form,
+and unmistakable symptoms of consumption showed themselves. The life of
+a fashionable pianist in Paris, the constant excitement, late hours, and
+heavy strain of nervous exertion, were fatal to his future chances of
+preserving his health; but it was a life to which he had now become
+wedded, and which he never willingly left, except for his long annual
+visits to Nohant.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand repeatedly contemplated settling herself entirely in the
+country. She had no love for Paris. "Parisian life strains our nerves
+and kills us in the long run," she writes from Nohant to one of her
+correspondents. "Ah, how I hate it, that centre of light! I would never
+set foot in it again, if the people I like would make the same
+resolution." And again, speaking of her "Black Valley, so good and so
+stupid," she adds, "Here I am always more myself than at Paris, where I
+am always ill, in body and in spirit."</p>
+
+<p>Paris, however, afforded greater facilities for her children's
+education. She had a strong desire to see her son an artist, and he was
+already studying painting in Delacroix's studio. Also her income at this
+moment did not suffice to enable her to live continuously at Nohant
+where, she frankly confessed, she had not yet found out how to live
+economically, expected as she was to keep open house, regarded as
+grudging and unneighborly if she did not maintain her establishment on a
+scale to which her resources as yet were unequal. Her expenses in the
+country she calculated as double those in Paris, where, as she writes to
+M. Chatiron,&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Everyone's independence is admirable. You invite whom you like, and
+when you don't wish to receive anyone you let the porter know you
+are not at home. Yet I hate Paris in all other respects. There I
+grow stout, and my mind grows thin. You know how quiet and retired
+my life there is, and I do not understand why you tell me, as they
+say in the provinces, that glory keeps me there. I have no glory, I
+have never sought for it, and I don't care a cigarette for it. I
+want to breath fresh air and live in peace. I am succeeding, but
+you see and you know on what conditions.</p></div>
+
+<p>Her Paris residence, a few seasons later, she fixed in the Cour
+d'Orléans Rue St. Lazare, in a block of buildings one-third of which
+was occupied by herself and her family; another belonged to her friend,
+Madame Marliani, wife of the Spanish Consul, the third to Frédéric
+Chopin.</p>
+
+<p>With respect to Chopin's long and deep attachment to Madame Sand, and
+its requital, concerning which so much has been written, there can
+surely be no greater misstatement than to speak of her as having
+blighted his life. This last part of his life was indeed blighted, but
+by ill-health and consequent nervous irritability and suffering; but
+such mitigation as was possible he found for eight years in the womanly
+devotion and genial society of Madame Sand&mdash;real benefits to one whose
+strange and delicate individuality it was not easy to befriend&mdash;and
+which the breach that took place between them shortly before his death
+should not allow us to forget.</p>
+
+<p>"Chopin," observes Eugène Delacroix, "belongs to the small number of
+those whom one can both esteem and love." Madame Sand joined a
+sympathetic appreciation of the refinement of his nature, and an
+enthusiastic admiration of his genius&mdash;feelings she shared with his
+numberless female worshippers&mdash;to a strength of character that lent the
+support no other could perhaps so fully have given, or that he would
+accept from no other, to the fragile, nervous, suffering tone-poet. Her
+sentiments towards him seem to resolve themselves into a great
+tenderness rather than a passionate fervor&mdash;a placid affection for
+himself, and an adoration for his music.</p>
+
+<p>All the time their existences, so far from having been united, flowed in
+different, nay divergent channels. Chopin, the idol of Paris society,
+moved constantly in the aristocratic and fashionable world, from which
+Madame Sand lived aloof. She for her part had heavy domestic cares and
+anxieties that did not touch him, and with the political party which was
+absorbing more and more of her energies he had no sympathy whatever.
+Whether the cause were the false start she had made at the outset by her
+marriage, forbidding her the realization of a woman's ideal, the
+non-separation of the gift of her heart from that of her whole life, or
+whether that her masculine strength of intellect created for her serious
+public interests and occupations, beside which personal pleasures and
+pains are apt to become of secondary moment, certain it appears that
+with George Sand, as with many an eminent artist of the opposite sex,
+such <i>affaires de c&#339;ur</i> were but ripples on the sea of a large and
+active existence.</p>
+
+<p>The year after her return from Majorca was marked by her first
+appearance before the public as a dramatic author. Although it was a
+line in which she afterwards obtained successes, as will be seen in a
+future chapter, the result of this initial effort, <i>Cosima</i>, a five-act
+drama, was not encouraging. It was acted at the Théâtre Français in the
+spring of 1840, and proved a failure. It betrays no insufficient sense
+of dramatic effect, nor lack of the means for producing it, but decided
+clumsiness in the adaptation of these means to that end. The plot and
+personages recall those of <i>Indiana</i>, with the important differences
+that the <i>beau rôle</i> of the piece falls to the husband, and that the
+scene is transported back to Florence in the Middle Ages&mdash;an undoubted
+error, as giving to a play essentially modern and French in its
+complexities of sentiment and motive a strong local coloring of a past
+time and another people, making the whole seem unreal. It has a
+psychological subject which Emile Augier or Dumas <i>fils</i> would know how
+to handle dramatically; but as treated by George Sand, we are
+perpetually being led to anticipate too much in the way of action, to
+have our expectations dissipated the next moment. A wet blanket of
+disappointment on this head dampens any other satisfaction that the
+merits of the play might otherwise afford.</p>
+
+<p>Hitherto she had continued to write regularly for the <i>Revue des Deux
+Mondes</i>. As her revolutionary opinions became more pronounced, they
+began to find utterance in her romances. Her conversion by Michel had
+not only been complete, but the disciple had outstripped the master. The
+study of the communistic theories of Pierre Leroux had familiarized her
+with the speculations in social science of those who at this time were
+devoting their attention to criticising the existing social
+organization, and seeking, and sometimes imagining they had found, the
+secret of creating a better. George Sand's strong admiration for the
+writings of Leroux, always praised by her in the highest terms, strikes
+us now as extravagant, but was shared to some extent by not a few
+leading men of the time, such as Sainte-Beuve and Lamartine. Her
+intellect had eagerly followed this bold and earnest pioneer in
+new-discovered worlds of thought; "I do not say it is the last word of
+humanity, but, so far, it is its most advanced expression," she states
+of his philosophy. The study of it had brought a clearness into her own
+views, due, probably, much more to the action of her own mind upon the
+novel ideas suggested than to the lucidity of a system of social science
+as yet undetermined in some of its main points.</p>
+
+<p>She writes, when looking back on this period from a long distance of
+time,&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>After the despairs of my youth, I was governed by too many
+illusions. Morbid scepticism was succeeded in me by too much
+kindliness and ingenuousness. A thousand times over I was duped by
+dreams of an archangelic fusion of the opposing forces in the great
+strife of ideas.</p></div>
+
+<p>Her novel <i>Horace</i>, written for the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, was
+rejected&mdash;as subversive of law and order&mdash;by the editor, except on
+condition of alterations which she declined to make.</p>
+
+<p>After this temporary rupture with Buloz, Madame Sand's services were
+largely appropriated by the <i>Revue Indépendante</i>, a new journal founded
+in 1840 by her friends Pierre Leroux and Louis Viardot, in conjunction
+with whose names hers appears on the title page as leading contributor.
+For this periodical no theories could be too advanced, no fictitious
+illustrations too audacious, and to its pages accordingly was <i>Horace</i>
+transferred. Among the secondary characters in this novel figure a young
+couple, immaculate otherwise in principle and in conduct, but who as
+converts to St. Simonism have dispensed with the ordinary legal sanction
+to their union. Perhaps a more solid objection to its insertion in the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i> was the picture introduced of the <i>émcute</i> of
+June 1832, painted in heroic colors. Both these features, however, are
+purely incidental. The main interest and the real strength of the book
+lie in a remarkable study of character-development&mdash;that of the chief
+personage, Horace. It is a cleverly painted portrait of a type that
+reappears, with slight modifications, in all ages; a moral charlatan,
+who half imposes on himself, and entirely for a while on other people. A
+would-be hero, genius, and chivalrous lover, he has none of the genuine
+qualities needed for sustaining the parts. Nonchalant and inert of
+temperament, he is capable of nothing beyond a short course of
+successful affectation. The imposition breaking down at last, he sinks
+helplessly into the unheroic mediocrity of position and pretension for
+which alone he is fit.</p>
+
+<p>A veritable attempt at a Socialist novel is the <i>Compagnon du Tour de
+France</i> written in the course of 1840, which must surely be ranked as
+one of the weakest of George Sand's productions. Exactly the converse of
+<i>Horace</i> may be said of this book. In the former, those most repelled by
+the revolutionary doctrines flashing out here and there, will yet be
+struck and interested by the masterly piece of character-painting that
+makes of the novel a success. The utmost fanaticism for the ideas
+ventilated in the <i>Compagnon du Tour de France</i> can reconcile no reader
+to the dullness and unreality of the story which make of it a failure.
+For her socialism itself, as set forth in her writings, dispassionate
+examination of what she actually inculcated, leaves but little warrant,
+in the state of progress now reached, for echoing the mighty outcry
+raised against it at the time. No doubt she thought that a complete
+reorganization of society on a new basis was eminently to be desired.
+But what she definitely advocated was, first, free education for the
+poor, and secondly, some fairer adjustment of the relations to each
+other of capital and labor. As to the first, authority has already
+sanctioned her opinion; the second question, if unsettled, has become a
+first preoccupation with statesmen and philosophers of all denominations
+in the present day.</p>
+
+<p>With regard to the complete solution of the problem, she leaves her
+socialist heroes, as she herself felt, in doubt and perplexity. There
+was something in the schemes and doctrines she conscientiously approved,
+irreconcilable with her artist-nature&mdash;a materialistic tendency which
+clashed with her poetical instincts. When the stern demagogue Michel
+denounced the whole tribe of artists as a corrupting influence,
+enervating to the courage and will of a nation, she rose up
+energetically in defense of the confraternity to which she was born:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Will you tell me, pray, what you mean, with your declamations
+against artists? Cry out against them as much as you please, but
+respect art. Oh, you Vandal! I like that stern sectarian who wants
+to dress Taglioni in a stuff-gown and <i>sabots</i>, and set Liszt's
+hands to turn the machinery of a wine-press, and who yet, as he
+lies on the grass, finds the tears come into his eyes at the least
+linnet's song, and who makes a disturbance in the theatre to stop
+Othello from murdering Malibran! The austere citizen would suppress
+artists as social excrescences that absorb too much of the sap; but
+this gentleman is fond of vocal music, and so will spare the
+singers. Let us hope that painters will find one among your strong
+heads who appreciates painting, and won't wall up all studio
+windows. And as for the poets, they are your cousins; and you don't
+despise their forms of language and their rhythmical mechanism when
+you want to make an impression on the idle crowd. You will go to
+them to take lessons in metaphor, and how to make use of it.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately for the cause of the superiority of antiquity,
+whenever you go to hear Berlioz's <i>Funeral March</i>, the least that
+can happen to you will be to confess that this music is rather
+better than what they used to give us in Sparta, when we served
+under Lycurgus; you will think that Apollo, displeased to see us
+sacrificing to Pallas exclusively, has played us a trick in giving
+lessons to that <i>Babylonian</i>, so that by the exercise of a magnetic
+and disastrous power over us, he may lead our spirits astray.</p></div>
+
+<p>And she would prove to the demagogue, out of his own mouth, that
+everything cannot be reduced to "bread and shoes all round," as the
+grand desideratum. Give these to men, it will not suffice. The eloquent
+orator instinctively seeks besides to impart "hallowed emotions and
+mystic enthusiasm to those who toil and sweat&mdash;he teaches them to hope,
+to dream of God, to take courage and lift themselves above the sickening
+miseries of human conditions by the thought of a future, chimerical it
+may be, but strengthening and sublime."</p>
+
+<p>For a period, however, she was too fascinated by the new ideas to judge
+them, and she straightway sought in her art a means of popularizing
+them. "These ideas," she writes in a later preface to her socialist
+novel, <i>Le Péché de M. Antoine</i>, "at which, as yet but a small number of
+conservative spirits had taken alarm, had, as yet, only really begun to
+sprout in a small number of attentive, laborious minds. The government,
+so long as no actual form of political application was assumed, was not
+to be disquieted by theories, and let every man make his own, put forth
+his dream, and innocently construct his city of the future, by his own
+fire-side, in the garden of his imagination."</p>
+
+<p>She was aware that her readers thought her novels getting more and more
+tedious, in proportion as she communicated to her fictitious heroes and
+heroines the pre-occupations of her brain, and that she was thus
+stepping out of the domain of art. But she affirmed she could never help
+writing of whatever was absorbing her thoughts and feelings at the
+moment, and must take her chance of boring the public. Fortunately for
+<i>Le Péché de M. Antoine</i>, nature and human nature are here allowed to
+claim the larger share of our attention, and philosophy is a secondary
+feature. The scene is laid in the picturesque Marche country on the
+confines of Berry, a day's journey from Nohant, and we are glad to
+linger with her along the rocky banks of the Creuse, or among the ruined
+castles of Crozant and Châteaubrun. The novel contains much that is
+original and admirable in the drawing of characters of the most opposite
+classes.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, in <i>Le Meunier d'Angibault</i>,<a name="FNanchor_C_3" id="FNanchor_C_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_C_3" class="fnanchor">[C]</a> written as was the
+last-mentioned work some four or five years later (1844-45), but which
+may be named here, as making up with <i>Le Compagnon du Tour de France</i>
+the trio of "socialist" novels, the <i>Tendenz</i> does not interfere to the
+detriment of the artistic plan of the book. In it the romantic elements
+of the remote country nook she inhabited are cleverly brought together,
+without departing too widely from probability. The dilapidated castle,
+the picturesque mill, the traditions of brigandage two generations ago,
+all these were realities familiar to her notice. The painting of the
+country and country people is masterly; and there is not a passage in
+the book to offend the taste of the most scrupulous reader. Nor can it
+be justly impugned on the ground of inculcating disturbing political
+principles. The personages, in their preference of poverty and obscurity
+to rank and wealth, may, in the judgment of some, think and conduct
+themselves like chimerical dreamers, but their actions, however
+quixotic, concern themselves alone.</p>
+
+<p>But, previous to either of the two novels last named, she had presented
+the world with a more ambitious work, whose merit was to compel
+universal acknowledgment&mdash;the most important, in fact, she had produced
+for eight years.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">CONSUELO&mdash;HOME LIFE AT NOHANT.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Consuelo</span> first appeared in the <i>Revue Indépendante</i>, 1842-43. This noble
+book might not be inaptly described as,</p>
+
+<p class="poem">
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">&mdash;a whole which, irregular in parts,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Yet left a grand impression on the mind.</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Its reckless proportions naturally "shocked the connoisseurs" among
+literary critics, especially in her own land; but nevertheless it
+became, and deservedly, one of her most popular productions, and did
+more than any other single novel she ever wrote to spread her popularity
+abroad. If <i>Indiana</i>, <i>Valentine</i>, and <i>Lélia</i> had never been written to
+create the fame of George Sand, <i>Consuelo</i> would have done so, and may
+be said to have established it over again, on a better and more lasting
+basis. Upon so well-known a work lengthened comment here would be
+superfluous. Originally intended for a novelette,&mdash;the opening chapters
+appear in the <i>Revue</i> under the modest heading, <i>Consuelo</i>,
+<i>conte</i>,&mdash;the beginning was so successful that the author was urged to
+extend her plan beyond its first proposed limits. The novel is an
+ephemeral form of art, no doubt, but it is difficult to conceive of a
+stage of social and intellectual progress when the first part of
+<i>Consuelo</i> will cease to be read with interest and delight.</p>
+
+<p>The heroine once transported from the lagunes of Venice to the frontier
+of Bohemia and the castle of Rudolstadt, the character of the story
+becomes less naturalistic; the storyteller loses herself somewhat in
+subterranean passages and the mazes of adventure generally. She wrote
+on, she acknowledges, at hap-hazard, tempted and led away by the new
+horizons which the artistic and historical researches her work required
+kept opening to her view. But the powerful contrast between the two
+pictures,&mdash;of bright, sunshiny, free, sensuous, careless Venetian
+folk-life, and of the stern gloom of the mediæval castle, where the more
+spiritual consolations of existence come into prominence&mdash;is singularly
+effective and original. So also is the charming way in which an incident
+in the boyhood of young Joseph Haydn is treated by her fancy, in the
+episode of Consuelo's flight from the castle, when he becomes her
+fellow-traveller, and their adventures across country are told with
+such zest and <i>entrain</i>, in pages where life-sketches of character, such
+as the good-natured, self-indulgent canon, the violent, abandoned
+Corilla, make us forget the wildest improbabilities of the fiction
+itself. The concluding portion of the book, again entirely different in
+frame, with its delineation of art-life in a fashionable capital,
+Vienna, is as true as it is brilliant. It teems with suggestive ideas on
+the subject of musical and dramatic art, and with excellently drawn
+types. The relations of professional and amateur, the contradictions and
+contentions to which, in a woman's nature, the rival forces of love and
+of an artistic vocation may give rise, have never been better portrayed
+in any novel. The heroine, Consuelo, is of course an ideal character:
+her achievements partake of the marvellous; and there are digressions in
+the book which are diffuse in the extreme; but nowhere is the author's
+imagination more attractively displayed and her style more engaging. The
+tone throughout is noble and pure. To look on <i>Consuelo</i> as an agreeable
+story merely is to overlook the elevation of the moral standard of the
+book, in which much of its power resides. It marks more strongly than
+<i>Mauprat</i> the change that had come over the spirit of George Sand's
+compositions.</p>
+
+<p>In the continuation, <i>La Comtesse de Rodolstadt</i>, which followed
+immediately in the <i>Revue Indépendante</i>, 1843, the novelist strays
+further and further from reality&mdash;the <i>terra firma</i> on which her fancy
+improvises such charming dances. Here she only touches the ground now
+and then, and between whiles her imagination asks ours to accompany it
+on the most extraordinary flights. As a novel of adventure, it is
+written with unflagging spirit; and in the rites and doctrines of the
+<i>Illuminati</i>, an idealization of the feature of the secret sects of the
+last century, she found a new medium of expression for her sentiments
+regarding the present abuses of society and the need of thorough
+renovation. Secret societies, at that time, were extremely numerous and
+active among the Republican workers in France. Madame Sand seems
+thoroughly to have appreciated their dangers, and has expressly stated
+that she was no advocate of such sects; that though under a tyranny,
+such as that which oppressed Germany in the times of which she wrote,
+they may be a necessity, elsewhere they are an abuse if not a crime.
+"The custom indeed I have never regarded as applicable for good in our
+time and our country; I have never believed that it can bring forth
+anything in future but a dictatorship, and the dictatorial principle is
+one I have never accepted." (<i>Histoire de ma Vie.</i>)</p>
+
+<p>But the romance of the subject was irresistibly tempting to her
+inventive faculty. "Tell Leroux to send me some more books on
+freemasonry, if he can find any," she writes to a correspondent at Paris
+whilst working at the <i>Comtesse de Rudolstadt</i> at Nohant; "I am plunged
+into it over head and ears. Tell him also that he has there thrown me
+into an abyss of follies and absurdities, but that I am dabbling about
+courageously though prepared to extract nothing but nonsense."</p>
+
+<p>For the musical miracles which it is given to Madame Sand's heroes and
+heroines to perform at a trifling cost, she may well at this time have
+come to regard them as almost in the natural order. She had received her
+second, and her best musical education through the contemplation of
+original musical genius, of the rarest quality, among her most intimate
+friends, her constant guests at Paris and Nohant. The vocal and
+instrumental feats of Consuelo and Count Albert themselves are not more
+astonishing than the actual recorded achievements of Liszt, pronounced a
+perfect <i>virtuoso</i> at twelve years old&mdash;and no wonder! The boy had so
+carried away his accompanyists, the band of the Italian opera at Paris,
+by his performance of the solo in an orchestral piece, that when the
+moment came for them to strike in, one and all forgot to do so, but
+remained silent, petrified with amazement. And Liszt when in the full
+development of his genius, had, as we have seen, been the art-comrade of
+George Sand; he had spent the whole of the summer season of 1837 at
+Nohant, transcribing Beethoven's symphonies for the piano-forte whilst
+she wrote her romances; she was familiar with his marvellous
+improvisations. In her "Trip to Chamounix" (<i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i>, No.
+VI.) she has drawn a vivid picture of their extraordinary effect,
+describing his unrehearsed organ recital in the Cathedral of Freibourg
+to his little party of travelling companions. Nor was the charm of
+Chopin's gift less magical. The well-known anecdotes related on this
+subject are like so many glimpses into a musical paradise. Madame Sand
+has given us an amusing one herself. It is evening in her <i>salon</i> at
+Paris. At the piano is Chopin; and she, her son, Eugène Delacroix, and
+the Polish poet Mickiewicz sit listening whilst the composer, in an
+inspired mood, is extemporizing in the sublimest manner to the little
+circle. All are in silent raptures; when the servant breaks in with the
+alarm&mdash;the house is on fire. They rush to the room where the flames are,
+and succeed after a time in extinguishing them. Then they perceive that
+the poet Mickiewicz is missing. On returning to the <i>salon</i> they find
+him as they left him, rapt, entranced, unconscious of the stir around
+him, of the scare that had driven all the rest from the room. "He did
+not even know we had gone and left him alone. He was listening to
+Chopin, he had continued to hear him." Nor could the bewitched poet be
+brought down from the clouds that evening. He remained deaf to their
+banter, to Madame Sand's laughing admonition, "Next time I am with you
+when the house takes fire, I must begin by putting you into a safe
+place, for I see you would get burnt like a mere faggot, before you knew
+what was going on."</p>
+
+<p>Eugène Delacroix, one of Madame Sand's earliest and most valued friends
+in the artist-world, and one of the many with whom she enjoyed along and
+unclouded friendship, gives in his letters some agreeable pictures of
+life at Nohant, during his visits there in the successive summers of
+1845 and 1846:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>When not assembled together with the rest for dinner, breakfast, a
+game of billiards, or a walk, you are in your room reading, or
+lounging on your sofa. Every moment there come in through the
+window open on the garden, "puffs of music" from Chopin, working
+away on one side, which mingle with the song of nightingales and
+the scent of the roses.</p></div>
+
+<p>He describes a quiet, monastic-like existence, simple and studious: "We
+have not even the distraction of neighbors and friends around. In this
+country everybody stays at home, to look after his oxen and his land.
+One would become a fossil in a very short time."</p>
+
+<p>The greatest event for the visitor was a village-festival&mdash;a wedding or
+a Saint's day&mdash;when the rustic dances went on under the tall elms to the
+roaring of the bagpipes. Peasant youths and peasant maids joined hands
+in the <i>bourrée</i>, the characteristic dance of the country; now, we fear,
+surviving in tradition only, but then still popular. The great artist
+was fired to paint a "Ste. Anne," patron-saint of Nohant, in honor of
+the place, but his work progressed but slowly. He writes in August,
+1846:&mdash;"I am frightfully lazy, I can do nothing, I hardly read; and yet
+the days pass too quickly, for I must soon renounce this <i>vie de
+chanoine</i>, and return into the furnace of stirring ideas, good and bad.
+In Berry they have very few ideas, but they do just as well without."
+Then he adds, "Chopin has been playing Beethoven to me divinely well.
+That is worth all æstheticism."</p>
+
+<p>Little theatrical entertainments of an original kind, presided over by
+Madame Sand, and carried out by herself, her children, and their young
+friends, became in time a prominent feature of life at Nohant. She thus
+describes their nature and commencements:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>During the long evenings I took it into my head to devise for my
+family theatricals on the old Italian pattern&mdash;<i>commedia
+dell'arte</i>&mdash;plays in which the dialogue, itself extemporized, yet
+follows the outlines of a written plan, placarded behind the
+scenes. It is something like the charades acted in society, the
+development of which depends on the talent contributed by the
+actors. It was with these that we began, but little by little the
+word of the charade disappeared. We acted wild <i>saynètes</i>,
+afterwards comedies of plot and intrigue, finally dramas of event
+and emotion.</p>
+
+<p>All began with pantomime; and this was Chopin's invention. He sat
+at the piano and extemporized, whilst the young people acted scenes
+in dumb show and danced comic ballets. These charming
+improvisations turned the children's heads and made their legs
+nimble. He led them just as he chose, making them pass, according
+to his fancy, from the amusing to the severe, from burlesque to
+solemnity&mdash;now graceful, now impassioned. We invented all kinds of
+costumes, so as to play different characters in succession. No
+sooner did the artist see them appear than he adapted his theme and
+rhythm to the parts wonderfully. This would be repeated for two or
+three evenings; after which the <i>maestro</i>, departing for Paris,
+would leave us quite excited, exalted, determined not to let the
+spark be lost with which he had electrified us.</p></div>
+
+<p>Chopin was possessed of much dramatic talent himself, and was an
+admirable mimic. When a boy it had been said of him that he was born to
+be a great actor. His capacity for facial expressions was something
+extraordinary; he often amused his friends by imitations of
+fellow-musicians, reproducing their manner and gestures to the life; so
+well as actually on more than one occasion to take in the spectator.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand thus gives account of the even tenor of her way, in a letter
+of September, 1845:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I have been in Paris till June, and since then am at Nohant until
+the winter, as usual; for henceforward my life is ruled as
+regularly as music paper. I have written two or three novels, one
+of which is just going to appear.</p>
+
+<p>My son is still thin and delicate, but otherwise well. He is the
+best being, the gentlest, most equable, industrious, simple-minded,
+and straightforward ever seen. Our characters, like our hearts,
+agree so well that we can hardly live a day apart. He is entering
+his twenty-third year, Solange her eighteenth. We have our ways of
+merriment, not noisy, but sustained, which bring our ages nearer
+together, and when we have been working hard all the week we allow
+ourselves, by way of a grand holiday, to go and eat our cake out of
+doors some way off, in a wood or an old ruin, with my brother, who
+is like a sturdy peasant, full of fun and good nature, and who
+dines with us every day, seeing that he lives not two miles off.
+Such are our grand pranks.</p></div>
+
+<p>Sometimes these little outings would originate a novel, as with the
+<i>Meunier d'Angibault</i>, which she ascribes to "a walk, a discovery, a day
+of leisure, an hour of idleness." On a ramble with her children she came
+upon what she calls "a nook in a wild paradise;" a mill, whose owner
+had allowed everything to grow around the sluices that chose to spring
+up, briar and alder, oaks and rushes. The stream, left to follow its
+devices, had forced its way through the sand and the grass in a network
+of little waterfalls, covered below in the summer time with thick tufts
+of aquatic plants.</p>
+
+<p>It was enough; the seed was sown and the fruit resulted. "The apple
+falling from the tree led Newton to the discovery of one of the grand
+laws of the universe.... In scientific works of genius, reflection
+derives the causes of things from a single fact. In art's humbler
+fancies, that isolated fact is dressed and completed in a dream."</p>
+
+<p>The picture given by Madame Sand and her guests of these years of her
+life is charming enough, and in certain ways seems an ideal kind of
+existence, amid beloved children, friends, pleasant and calm
+surroundings, and the sweets of successful literary activity. But if it
+had its bright lights, it had also its deep shadows. For every fresh
+pleasure and interest crowded into her existence, there entered a fresh
+source of anxiety and trouble. Age, in bringing her more power of
+endurance, had not blunted her sensibilities. As usual with the
+strongest natures in their hours of depression&mdash;and none so strong as
+to escape these&mdash;she could then look for no help except from herself.
+Those accustomed, like her, to shirk no responsibility, no burden, to
+invite others to lean on them, and to ask no support, if their fortitude
+gives way find the allowance, help and sympathy so easily accorded to
+their weaker fellow-creatures nowhere ready for them. The exclamation
+wrung from one of the characters in a later work of Madame Sand's, may
+be but a faithful echo of the cry of her own nature in some moment of
+mental torment. "Let me be weak; I have been seeming to be strong for so
+long a time!"</p>
+
+<p>Chopin, though the study of his genius had freshly inspired her own, and
+greatly extended her comprehension of musical art, was a being to whom
+the burden of his own life was too painful to allow him to lighten the
+troubles of another; a partial invalid, a prey to nervous irritation, he
+was dependent on her to soothe and cheer him at the best of times, and
+to be nurse and secretary besides when he was prostrated by illness or
+despondency. One is loth to call selfish a nature so attractive in its
+refinement, so unhappy in its over-susceptibility. But it is obvious
+that such a one might easily become a trial to those he loved. With all
+its vigor her nervous system could not escape the exhaustion and
+disturbance that attend on incessant brain-work. "Those who have nothing
+to do," she remarks, "when they see artists produce with facility, are
+ready to wonder at how few hours, how few instants, these can reserve
+for themselves. For such do not know how these gymnastics of the
+imagination, if they do not affect your health, yet leave an excitation
+of your nerves, an obsession of mental pictures, a languor of spirit,
+that forbid you to carry on any other kind of work."</p>
+
+<p>Although her constitution was even stronger than in her youth, she had
+for some years been subject to severe attacks of neuralgia. "Madame Sand
+suffers terribly from violent headaches and pain in her eyes," remarks
+Delacroix, in one of the letters above quoted, "which she takes upon
+herself to surmount as far as possible, with a great effort, so as not
+to distress us by what she goes through." Her habit of writing
+principally at night and contenting herself with the least possible
+allowance of repose, few could have persisted in for so long without
+breaking down. For many years she never took more than four hours sleep.
+The strain began to tell on her eye-sight at last, and already in a
+letter of 1842 she speaks of being temporarily compelled to suspend this
+practice of night-work, to her great regret, as in the daylight hours
+she was never secure from interruption. Only her abnormal power of
+activity and of bearing fatigue could have enabled her to fulfill so
+strenuously the responsibilities she had undertaken to her children, her
+private friends, and the public. The pressure of literary work was
+incessant, and whatever her dislike to accounts and arithmetic she is
+said to have fulfilled her engagements to editors and publishers with
+the regularity and punctuality of a notary. Her large acquaintance,
+relations with various classes, various projects, literary, political,
+and philanthropical, involved an immense amount of serious
+correspondence in addition to that arising from the postal persecution
+from which no celebrity escapes. Ladies wrote to consult her on
+sentimental subjects&mdash;to inquire of her, as of an oracle, whether they
+should bestow their heart, their hand, or both, upon their suitors;
+poets, to solicit her patronage and criticism. In the course of a single
+half-year, 153 manuscripts were sent her for perusal! She replied when
+it seemed fit, conscientiously and ungrudgingly; but experience had made
+her less expansive than formerly to those whose overtures she felt to be
+prompted by curiosity or some such idle motive, in the absence of any
+sympathy for her ways of thinking. "I am not to be caught in my words
+with indifferent persons," she writes to M. Charles Duvernet,
+describing how, when in her friend Madame Marliani's <i>salon</i> in Paris
+she heard herself and her political allies or their opinions attacked,
+she was not to be provoked into argument or indignant denial, but went
+on quietly with her work of hemming pocket-handkerchiefs. "To such
+people one speaks through the medium of the Press. If they will not
+attend, no matter."</p>
+
+<p>Her sex, her anomalous position, her freedom of expression and action,
+exposed her to an extent quite exceptional, even for a public character,
+to the shafts of malice and slander. Accustomed to have to brave the
+worst from such attacks, she might and did arrive at treating them with
+an indifference that was not, however, in her nature, which shrank from
+the observation and personal criticism of the vulgar.</p>
+
+<p>To a young poet of promise in whose welfare she took interest, she
+writes, August, 1842:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Never show my letters except to your mother, your wife, or your
+greatest friend. It is a shy habit, a mania I have to the last
+degree. The idea that I am not writing for those alone to whom I
+write, or for those who love them thoroughly, would freeze my heart
+and my hand directly. Everyone has a fault. Mine is a misanthropy
+in my outward habits&mdash;for all that I have no passion left in me but
+the love of my fellow-creatures; but with the small services that
+my heart and my faith can render in this world, my personality has
+nothing to do. Some people have grieved me very much,
+unconsciously, by talking and writing about me personally and my
+doings, even though favorably, and meaning well. Respect this
+malady of spirit.</p></div>
+
+<p>Madame Sand, being naturally undemonstrative, was commonly more or less
+tongue-tied and chilled in the presence of a stranger, and she had a
+frank dread of introductions and first interviews, even when the
+acquaintance was one she desired to make. Sometimes she asks her friends
+to prepare such new comers for receiving an unfavorable first
+impression, and to beg them not to be unduly prejudiced thereby. Such a
+one would find the persecution of lion-hunters intolerable, and now and
+then this drove her to extremities. Great must, indeed, have been the
+wrath of one of these irrepressibles, who, more obstinate than the rest,
+failing by fair means to get an introduction to George Sand, calmly
+pushed his way into Nohant unauthorized by anyone, whereupon her friends
+conspired to serve him the trick it must be owned he deserved; and which
+we give in the words of Madame Sand, writing to the Comtesse d'Agoult.
+The story is told also by Liszt in his letters:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>M. X. is ushered into my room. A respectable-looking person there
+receives him. She was about forty years of age, but you might give
+her sixty at a pinch. She had had beautiful teeth, but had got
+none left. All passes away! She had been rather good-looking, but
+was so no longer. All changes! Her figure was corpulent, and her
+hands were soiled. Nothing is perfect!</p>
+
+<p>She was clad in a gray woolen gown spotted with black, and lined
+with scarlet. A silk handkerchief was negligently twisted round her
+black hair. Her shoes were faulty, but she was thoroughly
+dignified. Now and then she seemed on the point of putting an <i>s</i>
+or a <i>t</i> in the wrong place, but she corrected herself gracefully,
+talked of her literary works, of her excellent friend M. Rollinat,
+of the talents of her visitor which had not failed to reach her
+ears, though she lived in complete retirement, overwhelmed with
+work. M. G. brought her a foot-stool, the children called her
+mamma, the servants Madame.</p>
+
+<p>She had a gracious smile, and much more distinguished manners than
+that fellow George Sand. In a word X. was happy and proud of his
+visit. Perched in a big chair, with beaming aspect, arm extended,
+speech abundant, there he stayed for a full quarter of an hour in
+ecstasies, and then took leave, bowing down to the ground
+to&mdash;Sophie!</p></div>
+
+<p>It was the maid that had thus been successfully passed off as the
+mistress, who with her whole household enjoyed a long and hearty laugh
+at the expense of the departed unbidden guest. "M. X. has gone off to
+Châteauroux," she concludes, "on purpose to give an account of his
+interview with me, and to describe me personally in all the <i>cafés</i>."</p>
+
+<p>This anecdote however belongs to a much earlier period of her life, the
+year 1837. Of her cordiality and kindliness to those who approached her
+in a right spirit of sincerity and simplicity, many have spoken. For
+English readers we cannot do better than quote Mr. Matthew Arnold's
+interesting account, given in the <i>Fortnightly</i>, 1877, of his visit to
+her in August, 1846. Desirous of seeing the green lanes of Berry, the
+rocky heaths of Bourbonnais, the descriptions of which in <i>Valentine</i>
+and <i>Jeanne</i> had charmed him so strongly, the traveller chose a route
+that brought him to within a few miles of her home:&mdash;"I addressed to
+Madame Sand," he tells us, "the sort of letter of which she must in her
+lifetime have had scores&mdash;a letter conveying to her, in bad French, the
+youthful and enthusiastic homage of a foreigner who had read her works
+with delight." She responded by inviting him to call at Nohant. He came
+and joined a breakfast-party that included Madame Sand and her son and
+daughter, Chopin, and other friends&mdash;Mr. Arnold being placed next to the
+hostess. He says of her:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>As she spoke, her eyes, head, bearing were all of them striking,
+but the main impression she made was one of simplicity, frank,
+cordial simplicity. After breakfast she led the way into the
+garden, asked me a few kind questions about myself and my plans,
+gathered a flower or two and gave them to me, shook hands heartily
+at the gate, and I saw her no more.</p></div>
+
+<p>During the eight years of successful literary activity, lying between
+Madame Sand's return from Majorca and the Revolution of February, 1848,
+the profits of her work had, after the first, enabled her freely to
+spend the greater part of the year at Nohant, and to provide a
+substantial dowry for her daughter. But the amassing of wealth suited
+neither her taste nor her principles. She writes to her poet-protégé M.
+Poncy, in September, 1845:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>We are in easy circumstances, which enables us to do away with
+poverty in our own neighborhood, and if we feel the sorrow of being
+unable to do away with that which desolates the world&mdash;a deep
+sorrow, especially at my age, when life has no intoxicating
+personality left, and one sees plainly the spectacle of society in
+its injustices and frightful disorder&mdash;at least we know nothing of
+<i>ennui</i>, of restless ambition and selfish passions. We have a sort
+of relative happiness, and my children enjoy it with the simplicity
+of their age.</p>
+
+<p>As for me, I only accept it in trembling, for all happiness is like
+a theft in this ill-regulated world of men, where you cannot enjoy
+your ease or your liberty, except to the detriment of your
+fellow-creatures&mdash;by the force of things, the law of inequality,
+that odious law, those odious combinations, the thought of which
+poisons my sweetest domestic joys and revolts me against myself at
+every moment. I can only find consolation in vowing to go on
+writing as long as I have a breath of life left in me, against the
+infamous maxim, "<i>Chacun chez soi, chacun pour soi</i>." Since all I
+can do is to make this protest, make it I shall, in every key.</p></div>
+
+<p>Her republican friends in Berry had founded in 1844 a local journal for
+the spread of liberal ideas&mdash;such as Lamartine at the time was
+supporting at Macon. Madame Sand readily contributed her services to a
+cause where she labored for the enlightenment of the masses on all
+subjects&mdash;truth, justice, religion, liberty, fraternity, duties, and
+rights. The government of Louis Philippe, so long as such utterances
+attacked no definite institution, allowed an almost illimitable freedom
+in expression of opinion. The result was that thought had advanced so
+far ahead of action that social philosophers had grown to argue as
+though practical obstacles had no existence&mdash;to be rudely reminded of
+their consequence, when brought to the front in 1848, and acting
+somewhat too much as if on that supposition.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible not to make concerning Madame Sand, the reflection made
+on other foremost workers in the same cause of organic social
+reform&mdash;namely, that her character and her instincts were in curious
+opposition to her ideas. What was said by Madame d'Agoult of Louis Blanc
+applies with even greater force to George Sand: "The sentiment of
+personality was never stronger than in this opposer of individualism,
+communist theories had for their champion one most unfit to be absorbed
+into the community." For no length of time was the idea of "communism"
+accepted, and never was it advocated by her except in the most
+restricted sense. The land-hunger, or rather land-greed, of the small
+proprietors in her neighborhood had, it is true, given her a certain
+disgust for these contested possessions. But from the preference of a
+small child for a garden of its own however small, to another's however
+large, she characteristically infers the instinct of property as a law
+of nature it were preposterous to disallow, and furthermore she lays
+down as an axiom that, "in treating the communistic idea it is necessary
+first to distinguish what is essential in liberty and work to the
+complete existence of the individual, from what is collective." When
+forced by actual experience to point out what she holds to be the
+rightful application of the idea, she limits it to voluntary
+association; and she hoped great things from the co-operative principle,
+as tending to eliminate the ills of extreme inequalities in the social
+structure, and to preserve everything in it that is worth preserving.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">NOVELIST AND POLITICIAN.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">By</span> her novels classed as "socialistic," Madame Sand had, as we have
+seen, incurred the public hostility of those whom her doctrines alarmed.
+And yet her "communist" heroes and heroines are the most pacific and
+inoffensive of social influences. They merely aspire to isolate
+themselves, and personally to practice principles and virtues of the
+highest order; unworldliness such as, if general, might indeed turn the
+earth into the desired Utopia. Nothing can be said against their
+example, unless that it is too good, and that there is little hope of
+its being widely followed.</p>
+
+<p>Charges of another sort, no less bitter, and though exaggerated,
+somewhat better founded, assailed her after the appearance in 1847 of
+<i>Lucrezia Floriani</i>, a novel of character-analysis entirely, but into
+which she was accused of having introduced an unflattering portrait of
+Frédéric Chopin, whose long and long-requited attachment to her entitled
+him to better treatment at her hands.</p>
+
+<p>With respect to the general question of such alleged fictitious
+reproductions, few novelists escape getting into trouble on this head.
+It has been aptly observed by Mr. Hamerton that the usual procedure of
+the reading public in such cases is to fix on some real personage as
+distinctly unlike the character in the book as possible, for the
+original, and then to complain of the unfaithfulness of the resemblance.
+Madame Sand's taste and higher art-instincts would have revolted against
+the practice&mdash;now unfortunately no longer confined to inferior
+writers&mdash;of forcing attention to a novel by making it the gibbet of
+well-known personalities, with little or no disguise; and Chopin
+himself, morbidly sensitive and fanciful though he was, read her work
+without perceiving in it any intention there to portray their relations
+to each other, which, indeed, had differed essentially from those of the
+personages in the romance.</p>
+
+<p><i>Lucrezia Floriani</i> is a <i>cantatrice</i> of genius, who, whilst still
+young, has retired from the world, indifferent to fame, and effectually
+disenchanted&mdash;so she believes&mdash;with passion. Despite an experience
+strange and stormy, even for a member of her Bohemian profession,
+Lucrezia has miraculously preserved intact her native nobility of soul,
+and appears as a meet object of worship to a fastidious young prince on
+his travels, who becomes passionately enamored of her. He over-persuades
+Lucrezia into trusting that they will find their felicity in each other.
+Their happiness is of the briefest duration, owing to the unreasonable
+character of the prince, who leads the actress a miserable life; his
+love taking the form of petty tyranny and retrospective jealousy. After
+long years of this material and moral captivity, the heroic Lucrezia
+fades and dies.</p>
+
+<p>Not content with identifying the intolerable, though it must be owned
+severely-tested, Prince Karol with Chopin, imaginative writers have gone
+so far as to assert that the book was conceived and written from an
+express design on the novelist's part to bring about the breach of a
+link she was beginning to find irksome!</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand has described how it was written&mdash;as are all such works of
+imagination&mdash;in response to a sort of "call"&mdash;some striking yet
+indefinable quality in one idea among the host always floating through
+the brain of the artist, that makes him instantly seize it and single it
+out as inviting to art-treatment. It would be preposterous to doubt her
+statement. But whether the inspiration ought not to have been sacrificed
+is another question. Her gift was her good angel and her evil angel as
+well, but in any case something of her despot. Here, assuredly, it
+ruled her ill. It is indisputable that, as she had pointed out, the sad
+history of the attachment of Lucrezia the actress and Karol the prince
+deviates too widely from that which was supposed to have originated it
+for just comparisons to be drawn between the two, that Karol is not a
+genius, and therefore has none of the rights of genius&mdash;including, we
+presume, the right to be a torment to those around him&mdash;that to talk of
+a portrait of Chopin without his genius is a contradiction in terms,
+that he never suspected the likeness assumed until it was insinuated to
+him, and so forth. But there remains this, that in the work of
+imagination she here presented to the public there was enough of reality
+interwoven to make the world hasten to identify or confound Prince Karol
+with Chopin. This might have been a foregone conclusion, as also that
+Chopin, the most sensitive of mortals, would be infinitely pained by the
+inferences that would be drawn. Perhaps if only as a genius, he had the
+right to be spared such an infliction; and one must wish it could have
+appeared in this light to Madame Sand. It seems as though it were
+impossible for the author to put himself at the point of view of the
+reader in such matters. The divine spark itself, that quickens certain
+faculties, deadens others. When Goethe, in <i>Werther</i>, dragged the
+private life of his intimate friends, the Kestners, into publicity, and
+by falsifying the character of the one and misrepresenting the conduct
+of the other, in obedience to the requisitions of art, exposed his
+beloved Charlotte and her husband to all manner of annoyances, it never
+seems to have entered into his head beforehand but that they would be
+delighted by what he had done. Nor could he get over his surprise that
+such petty vexations on their part should not be merged in a proud
+satisfaction at the literary memorial thus raised by him to their
+friendly intercourse! This seems incredible, and yet his sincerity
+leaves no room for doubt.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand's transgressions on this head, though few, have obtained
+great notoriety, on account of the extraordinary celebrity of two of the
+personages that suggested characters she has drawn. To the supposed
+originals, however obscure, the mortification is the same. But what
+often passes uncommented on when the individuals said to be traduced are
+unknown to fame, sets the whole world talking when one of the first
+musicians or poets of the century is involved; so that Madame Sand has
+incurred more censure than other novelists, though she has deserved it
+more rarely. But regret remains that for the sake of <i>Lucrezia
+Floriani</i>, one of the least pleasant though by no means the least
+powerful of her novels, she should have exposed herself to the charge of
+unkindness to one who had but a short while to live.</p>
+
+<p>Other causes had latterly been combining to lead to differences of which
+it would certainly be unfair to lay the whole blame on Madame Sand. The
+tie of personal attachment between Chopin and herself was not associated
+by identity of outward interests or even of cares and family affections,
+such as, in the case of husband and wife, make self-sacrifice possible
+under conditions which might otherwise be felt unbearable, and help to
+tide over crises of impatience or wrong. Madame Sand's children were now
+grown up; cross-influences could not but arise, hard to conciliate.
+Without accrediting Chopin with the self-absorption of Prince Karol, it
+is easy to see here, in a situation somewhat anomalous, elements of
+probable discord. It was impossible that he should any longer be a first
+consideration; impossible that he should not resent it.</p>
+
+<p>For some years his state of health had been getting worse and worse, and
+his nervous susceptibilities correspondingly intensified. Madame Sand
+betrayed some impatience at last of what she had long borne
+uncomplainingly, and their good understanding was broken. As was
+natural, the breach was the more severely felt by Chopin, but that it
+was of an irreparable nature, one is at liberty to doubt. He bitterly
+regretted what he had lost, for which not all the attentions showered on
+him by his well-wishers could afford compensation, as his letters
+attest.</p>
+
+<p>But outward circumstances prolonged the estrangement till it was too
+late. They met but once after the quarrel, and that was in company in
+March, 1848. Madame Sand would at once have made some approach, but
+Chopin did not then respond to the appeal; and the reconciliation both
+perhaps desired was never to take place. Political events had intervened
+to widen the gap between their paths. Chopin had neither part nor lot in
+the revolutionary movement that just then was throwing all minds and
+lives into a ferment, and which was completely to engross Madame Sand's
+energies for many months to come. It drove him away to England, and he
+only returned to Paris, in 1849, to die.</p>
+
+<p>In May, 1847, the tranquility of life at Nohant had been varied by a
+family event, the marriage of Madame Sand's daughter Solange with the
+sculptor Clésinger. The remainder of the twelvemonth was spent in the
+country, apparently with very little anticipation on Madame Sand's part
+that the breaking of the political storm, that was to draw her into its
+midst, was so near.</p>
+
+<p>The new year was to be one of serious agitations, different to any that
+had yet entered into her experience. Political enterprise for the time
+cast all purely personal interests and emotions into the background. "I
+have never known how to do anything by halves," she says of herself very
+truly; and whatever may be thought of the tendency of her political
+influence and the manner of its exertion, no one can tax her with
+sparing herself in a contest to which, moreover, she came disinterested;
+vanity and ambition having, in one of her sex, nothing to gain by it.
+But in political matters it seems hard for a poet to do right. If, like
+Goethe, he holds aloof in great crises, he is branded for it as a
+traitor and a bad patriot. The battle of Leipzig is being fought, and he
+sits tranquilly writing the epilogue for a play. If, like George Sand,
+he throws the whole weight of his enthusiastic eloquence into what he
+believes to be the right scale, it is ten to one that his power, which
+knows nothing of caution and patience, may do harm to the cause he has
+at heart.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand rested her hopes for a better state of things, for the
+redemption of France from political corruption, for the amelioration of
+the condition of the working classes, and reform of social institutions
+in general, on the advent to power of those placed at the head of
+affairs by the collapse of the government of Louis Philippe, a crisis
+long threatened, long prepared, and become inevitable.</p>
+
+<p>"The whole system," wrote Heine prophetically of the existing monarchy,
+five years before its fall, "is not worth a charge of powder, if indeed
+some day a charge of powder does not blow it up." February, 1848, saw
+the explosion, the flight of the Royal Family, and the formation of a
+Provisional Government, with Lamartine at its head.</p>
+
+<p>It is hard to realize in the present day, when we contemplate these
+events through the sobering light of the deplorable sequel, how immense
+and wide-spreading was the enthusiasm that at this particular juncture
+seemed to put the fervent soul of a George Sand or an Armand Barbès into
+the most lukewarm and timid. "More than one," writes Madame d'Agoult,
+"who for the last twenty years had been scoffing at every grand thought,
+let himself be won by the general emotion." The prevailing impression
+can have fallen little short of the conviction that a sort of millennium
+was at hand for mankind in general and the French in particular, and
+that all human ills would disappear because a bad government had been
+got rid of, and that without such scenes of blood and strife as had
+disfigured previous revolutions.</p>
+
+<p>The first task was firmly to establish a better one in its place. Madame
+Sand, though with a strong perception of the terrible difficulties
+besetting a ministry which, to quote her own words, would need, in order
+to acquit itself successfully, "the genius of a Napoleon and the heart
+of Christ," never relaxed an instant in the enforcement, both by example
+and exhortation, of her conviction that it was the duty of all true
+patriots and philanthropists to consecrate their energies to the cause
+of the new republic.</p>
+
+<p>"My heart is full and my head on fire," she writes to a fellow-worker in
+the same cause. "All my physical ailments, all my personal sorrows are
+forgotten. I live, I am strong, active, I am not more than twenty years
+old." The exceptional situation of the country was one in which,
+according to her opinion, it behooved men to be ready not only with
+loyalty and devotion, but with fanaticism if needed. She worked hard
+with her son and her local allies at the ungrateful task of
+revolutionizing Le Berry, which, she sighs, "is very drowsy." In March
+she came up to Paris and placed her services as journalist and partizan
+generally at the disposal of Ledru-Rollin, Minister of the Interior
+under the new Government. "Here am I already doing the work of a
+statesman," she writes from Paris to her son at Nohant, March 24. Her
+indefatigable energy, enabling her as it did to disdain repose, was
+perhaps the object of envy to the statesmen themselves. At their disgust
+when kept up all night by the official duties of their posts, she laughs
+without mercy. Night and day her pen was occupied, now drawing up
+circulars for the administration, now lecturing the people in political
+pamphlets addressed to them. To the <i>Bulletin de la République</i>, a
+government journal started with the laudable purpose of preserving a
+clear understanding between the mass of the people in the provinces and
+the central government, she became a leading contributor. For the festal
+invitation performances given to the people at the "Théâtre de la
+République," where Rachel sang the Marseillaise and acted in <i>Les
+Horaces</i>, Madame Sand wrote a little "occasional" prologue, <i>Le Roi
+Attend</i>, a new and democratic version of Molière's <i>Impromptu de
+Versailles</i>. The outline is as follows:&mdash;Molière is discovered impatient
+and uneasy; the King waits, and the comedians are not ready. He sinks
+asleep, and has a vision, in which the muse emerges out of a cloud,
+escorted by Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Shakespeare, and
+Beaumarchais, to each of whom are assigned a few lines&mdash;where possible,
+lines of their own&mdash;in praise of equality and fraternity. They vanish,
+and Molière awakes; his servant announces to him that the King
+waits&mdash;but the King this time is, of course, the people, to whom Molière
+now addresses his flattering speech in turn.</p>
+
+<p>But the fervor of heroism that fired everybody in the first days of
+successful revolution, that made the leaders disinterested, the masses
+well-behaved, reasonable, and manageable, was for the majority a flash
+only; and the dreamed-of social ideal, touched for a moment was to
+recede again into the far distance. It was Madame Sand's error, and no
+ignoble one, to entertain the belief that a nation could safely be
+trusted to the guidance of a force so variable and uncontrollable as
+enthusiasm, and that the principle of self-devotion could be relied upon
+as a motive power. The divisions, intrigues, and fatal complications
+that quickly arose at head-quarters confirmed her first estimation of
+the practical dangers ahead. She clung to her belief in the sublime
+virtues of the masses, and that they would prove themselves grander,
+finer, more generous than all the mighty and the learned ones upon
+earth. But each of the popular leaders in turn was pronounced by her
+tried and found wanting. None of the party chiefs presented the
+desirable combination of perfect heroism and political genius. Michel,
+the apostle who of old had converted her to the cause, she had long
+scorned as a deserter. Leroux, in the moment of action, was a nonentity.
+Barbès "reasons like a saint," she observes, "that is to say, very ill
+as regards the things of this world." Lamartine was a vain trimmer;
+Louis Blanc, a sectarian; Ledru-Rollin, a weathercock. "It is the
+characters that transgress," she complains naïvely as one after the
+other disappointed her. Her own shortcomings on the score of patience
+and prudence were, it must be owned, no less grave. Her
+clear-sightedness was unaccompanied by the slightest dexterity of
+action. Years before, in one of the <i>Lettres d'un Voyageur</i>, she had
+passed a criticism on herself as a political worker, the accuracy of
+which she made proof of when carried into the vortex. "I am by nature
+poetical, but not legislative, warlike, if required, but never
+parliamentary. By first persuading me and then giving me my orders some
+use may be made of me, but I am not fit for discovering or deciding
+anything."</p>
+
+<p>Such an influence, important for raising an agitation, was null for
+controlling and directing the forces thus set in motion. In the
+application of the theories she had accepted she was as weak and obscure
+as she was emphatic and eloquent in the preaching of them. Little help
+could she afford the republican leaders in dealing with the momentous
+question how to fulfill the immense but confused aspirations they had
+raised, how to show that their principles could answer the necessities
+of the moment.</p>
+
+<p>The worst, perhaps, that can be said of Madame Sand's political
+utterances is that they encouraged the people in their false
+belief&mdash;which belief she shared&mdash;that the social reforms so urgently
+needed could be worked rapidly by the Government, providing only it were
+willing. Over-boldness of expression on the part of advanced sections
+only increased the timidity and irresolution of action complained of in
+the administration. As the ranks of the Ministry split up into factions,
+Madame Sand attached herself to the party of Ledru-Rollin&mdash;in whom at
+that time she had confidence,&mdash;a party that desired to see him at the
+head of affairs, and that included Jules Favre, Étienne Arago, and
+Armand Barbès. No more zealous political partizan and agent than Madame
+Sand. The purpose in view was to preserve a cordial <i>entente</i> between
+these trusted chiefs and the masses whose interests they represented and
+on whose support they relied. To this end she got together meetings of
+working-men at her temporary Parisian abode, addressing them in speech
+and in print, and seemingly blind in the heat of the struggle to the
+enormous danger of playing with the unmanageable, unreasoning instincts
+of the crowd. She still cherished the chimera dear to her
+imagination&mdash;the prospective vision of the French people assembling
+itself in large masses, and deliberately and pacifically giving
+expression to its wishes.</p>
+
+<p>Into the <i>Bulletin de la République</i> there crept soon a tone of
+impatience and provocation, improper and dangerous in an official organ.
+The 16th number, which appeared on April 16, at a moment when the
+pending general elections seemed likely to be overruled by
+reactionaries, contained the startling declaration that if the result
+should thus dissatisfy the Paris people, these would manifest their will
+once more, by adjourning the decision of a false national
+representation.</p>
+
+<p>This sentence, which came from the pen of Madame Sand, was interpreted
+into a threat of intimidation from the party that would make
+Ledru-Rollin dictator, and created a considerable stir. There was,
+indeed, no call for a fresh brand of discord in the republican ranks.
+Almost simultaneously came popular demonstrations of a menacing
+character. Ledru-Rollin disavowed the offending <i>Bulletin</i>; but the
+growing uneasiness of the <i>bourgeoisie</i>, the unruly discontent among the
+workmen, the Government, embarrassed and utterly disorganized, was
+powerless to allay. Madame Sand began to perceive that the republic of
+her dreams, the "republican republic," was a forlorn hope, though still
+unconscious that even heavier obstacles to progress existed in the
+governed many than in the incapacity or personal ambition of the
+governing few. She writes to her son from Paris, April 17:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I am sad, my boy. If this goes on, and in some sense there should
+be no more to be done, I shall return to Nohant to console myself
+by being with you. I shall stay and see the National Assembly,
+after which I think I shall find nothing more here that I can do.</p></div>
+
+<p>At the <i>Fête de la Fraternité</i>, April 20th, the spectacle of a million
+of souls putting aside and agreeing to forget all dissensions, all
+wrongs in the past and fears for the future, and uniting in a burst of
+joyous exultation, filled her with enthusiasm and renewed hope. But the
+demonstration of the 15th of May, of which she was next a spectator,
+besides its mischievous effect in alarming the quiet classes and
+exciting the agitators afresh, gave fatal evidence of the national
+disorganization and uncontrollable confusion everywhere prevailing, that
+had doomed the republic from the hour of its birth.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand, though she strenuously denied any participation or sympathy
+with this particular manifestation, was closely associated in the
+public mind with those who had aided and abetted the uprising. During
+the gathering of the populace, which she had witnessed, mingling
+unrecognized among the crowd, a female orator haranguing the mob from
+the lower windows of a <i>café</i> was pointed out to her, and she was
+assured that it was George Sand. During the repressive measures the
+administration was led to take she felt uncertain whether the arrest of
+Barbès might not be followed by her own. Some of her friends advised her
+to seek safety in Italy, where at that time the partisans of liberty
+were more united and sanguine. She turned a deaf ear. But she was
+severed now from all influential connection with those in authority.
+Before the end of May she left for Nohant, with her hopes for the rapid
+regeneration of her country on the wane. "I am afraid for the future,"
+she writes to the imprisoned Barbès, shortly after these events. "I
+suffer for those who do harm and allow harm to be done without
+understanding it.... I see nothing but ignorance and moral weakness
+preponderating on the face of the globe."</p>
+
+<p>Through the medium of the press, notably of the journal <i>La Vraie
+République</i>, she continued to give plain expression to her sentiments,
+regardless of the political enmities she might excite, and of the
+personal mortification to which she was exposed, even at Nohant, which
+with its inmates had recently become the mark for petty hostile
+"demonstrations." Alluding to these, she writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Here in this Berry, so romantic, so gentle, so calm and good, in
+this land I love so tenderly, and where I have given sufficient
+proof to the poor and uneducated that I know my duties towards
+them, I myself in particular am looked upon as the enemy of the
+human race; and if the Republic has not kept its promises, it is I,
+clearly, who am the cause.</p></div>
+
+<p>The term "communist," caught up and passed from mouth to mouth, was
+flung at Madame Sand and her son by the peasants, whose ideas as to its
+significance were not a little wild. "A pack of idiots," she writes to
+Madame Marliani, "who threaten to come and set fire to Nohant. Brave
+they are not, neither morally nor physically; and when they come this
+way and I walk through the midst of them they take off their hats; but
+when they have gone by they summon courage to shout, 'Down with the
+communists.'"</p>
+
+<p>The ingratitude of many who again and again had received succor from her
+and hers, she might excuse on account of their ignorance, but the extent
+of their ignorance was an obstacle to immediate progress whose weight
+she had miscalculated.</p>
+
+<p>"I shall keep my faith," she writes to Joseph Mazzini at this
+crisis&mdash;"the idea, pure and bright, the eternal truth will ever remain
+for me in my heaven, unless I go blind. But hope is a belief in the near
+triumph of one's faith. I should not be sincere if I said that this
+state of mind had not been modified in me during these last months."</p>
+
+<p>The terrible insurrection of June followed, and overwhelmed her for the
+time. It was not only that her nature, womanly and poetical, had the
+greatest horror of bloodshed. The spectacle of the republicans
+slaughtering each other, of the evil passions stirred, the frightful
+anarchy, ended but at a frightful cost, the complete extinction of all
+hopes,&mdash;nothing left rampant but fear, rancor and distrust,&mdash;was
+heart-rendering to her whose heart had been thrown into the national
+troubles. Great was the panic in Berry, an after-clap of the
+disturbances in the capital. Madame Sand's position became more
+unpleasant than ever. She describes herself as "<i>blasée d
+outrages</i>&mdash;threatened perpetually by the coward hatreds and imbecile
+terrors of country places." But to all this she was well-nigh insensible
+in her despair over the public calamities oppressing her nation&mdash;the end
+of all long-struggling aspirations in "frightful confusion, complete
+moral anarchy, a morbid condition, in most which the courageous of us
+lost heart and wished for death.</p>
+
+<p>"You say that the <i>bourgeoisie</i> prevails," she writes to Mazzini, in
+September, 1848, "and that thus it is quite natural that selfishness
+should be the order of the day. But why does the <i>bourgeoisie</i> prevail,
+whilst the people is sovereign, and the principle of its sovereignty,
+universal suffrage, is still standing? We must open our eyes at last,
+and the vision of reality is horrible. The majority of the French people
+is blind, credulous, ignorant, ungrateful, wicked, and stupid; it is
+<i>bourgeoisie</i> itself!"</p>
+
+<p>Under no conceivable circumstances is it likely that Madame Sand would
+not very soon have become disgusted with active politics, for which her
+temperament unfitted her in every respect. Impetuous and
+uncompromisingly sincere, she was predestined to burn her fingers; proud
+and independent, to become something of a scape-goat, charged with all
+the follies and errors which she repudiated, as well as with those for
+which she was more or less directly responsible.</p>
+
+<p>For some time to come she remained in comparative seclusion at Nohant.
+She had not ceased her propaganda, though obliged to conduct it with
+greater circumspection. After the horrors of civil warfare, had come the
+cry for order at any price, and France had declared for the rule of
+Louis Bonaparte. During the course of events that consolidated his
+power, Madame Sand withdrew more and more from the strife of political
+parties. She had been, and we shall find her again, inclined to hope for
+better things for France from its new master than time showed to be in
+store. Other republicans besides herself had been disposed to build high
+their hopes of this future "saviour of society" in his youthful days of
+adversity and mysterious obscurity. When in confinement at the fortress
+of Ham, in 1844, Louis Napoleon sent to George Sand his work on the
+Extinction of Pauperism. She wrote back a flattering letter in which,
+however, with characteristic sincerity, she is careful to remind him
+that the party to which she belonged could never acknowledge any
+sovereign but the people; that this they considered to be incompatible
+with the sovereignty of one man; that no miracle, no personification of
+popular genius in a single individual, could prove to them the right of
+that individual to sovereign power.</p>
+
+<p>Since then she had seen the people supreme, and been forced to own that
+they knew not what they wanted, nor whither they were going, divided in
+mind, ferocious in action. Among the leaders, she had seen some
+infatuated by the allurements of personal popularity, and the rest
+showing, by their inability to cope with the perplexities of
+administrative government, that so far philosophical speculations were
+of no avail in the actual solution of social problems.</p>
+
+<p>The result of her disenchantment was in no degree the overthrow of her
+political faith. A conviction was dawning on her that her social ideal
+was absolutely impracticable in any future that she and her friends
+could hope to live to see. But the belief on which she founded her
+social religion was one in which she never wavered; a certainty that a
+progress, the very idea of which now seemed chimerical, would some day
+appear to all as a natural thing; nay, that the stream of tendency would
+carry men towards this goal in spite of themselves.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">PASTORAL TALES.</p>
+
+
+<p>"So you thought," wrote Madame Sand to a political friend, in 1849,
+"that I was drinking blood out of the skulls of aristocrats. Not I! I am
+reading Virgil and learning Latin." And her best propaganda, as by and
+by she came to own, was not that carried on in journals such as <i>La
+Vraie République</i> and <i>La Cause du Peuple</i>. Through her works of
+imagination she has exercised an influence more powerful and universal,
+if indirect.</p>
+
+<p>Among the more than half a hundred romances of George Sand, there stands
+out a little group of three, belonging to the period we have now
+reached&mdash;the <i>mezzo cammin</i> of her life&mdash;creations in a special style,
+and over which the public voice, whether of fastidious critics or
+general readers, in France or abroad, has been and remains unanimous in
+praise.</p>
+
+<p>In these, her pastoral tales, she hit on a new and happy vein which she
+was peculiarly qualified to work, combining as she did, intimate
+knowledge of French peasant life with sympathetic interest in her
+subject and lively poetic fancy. Here she affronts no prejudices,
+advances no startling theories, handles no subtle, treacherous social
+questions, and to these compositions in a perfectly original <i>genre</i> she
+brought the freshness of genius which "age cannot wither," together with
+the strength and finish of a practiced hand.</p>
+
+<p>Peasants had figured as accessories in her earlier works. The rustic
+hermit and philosopher, Patience, and Marcasse the rat-catcher, in
+<i>Mauprat</i>, are note-worthy examples. In 1844 had appeared <i>Jeanne</i>, with
+its graceful dedication to Françoise Meillant, the unlettered
+peasant-girl who may have suggested the work she could not read&mdash;one of
+a family of rural proprietors, spoken of by Madame Sand in a letter of
+1843 as a fine survival of a type already then fast vanishing&mdash;of
+patriarchally constituted family-life, embodying all that was grand and
+simple in the forms of the olden time.</p>
+
+<p>In <i>Jeanne</i>, Madame Sand had first ventured to make a peasant-girl the
+central figure of her novel, though still so far deferring to the
+received notions of what was essential in order to interest the "gentle"
+reader as to surround her simple heroine with personages of rank and
+education. Jeanne herself, moreover, is an exceptional and a highly
+idealized type&mdash;as it were a sister to Joan of Arc, not the inspired
+warrior-maid, but the visionary shepherdess of the Vosges. Yet the
+creation is sufficiently real. The author had observed how favorable was
+the life of solitude and constant communion with nature led by many of
+these country children in their scattered homesteads, to the development
+of remarkable and tenacious individuality. So with the strange and
+poetical Jeanne, too innately refined to prosper in her rough human
+environment, yet too fixedly simple to fare much better in more
+cultivated circles. She is the victim of a sort of celestial stupidity
+we admire and pity at once. In this study of a peasant heroine resides
+such charm as the book possesses, and the attempt was to lead on the
+author to the productions above alluded to, <i>La Mareau Diable</i>,
+<i>François le Champi</i>, and <i>La Petite Fadette</i>. Of this popular trio the
+first had been published already two years before the Revolution, in
+1846; the second was appearing in the Feuilleton of the <i>Journal des
+Débats</i> at the very moment of the breaking of the storm, which
+interrupted its publication awhile. When those tumultuous months were
+over, and Madame Sand, thrown out of the hurly-burly of active politics,
+was brought back by the course of events to Nohant, she seems to have
+taken up her pen very much where she had laid it down. The break in her
+ordinary round of work made by the excitements of active statesmanship
+was hardly perceptible, and in 1849 <i>Le Champi</i> was followed by <i>La
+Petite Fadette</i>.</p>
+
+<p><i>La Mare au Diable</i>, George Sand's first tale of exclusively
+peasant-life, is usually considered her masterpiece in this <i>genre</i>. It
+was suggested to her, she tells us, by Holbein's dismal engraving of
+death coming to the husbandman, an old, gaunt, ragged, over-worked
+representative of his tribe&mdash;grim ending to a life of cheerless poverty
+and toil!</p>
+
+<p>Here was the dark and painful side of the laborer's existence&mdash;a true
+picture, but not the whole truth. There was another and a bright side,
+which might just as allowably be represented in art as the dreary one,
+and which she had seen and studied. In Berry extreme poverty was the
+exception, and the agriculturist's life appeared as it ought to be,
+healthy, calm, and simple, its laboriousness compensated by the soothing
+influences of nature, and of strong home affections.</p>
+
+<p>This little gem of a work is thoroughly well-known. The ploughing-scene
+in the opening&mdash;ploughing as she had witnessed it sometimes in her own
+neighborhood, fresh, rough ground broken up for tillage, the plough
+drawn by four yoke of young white oxen new to their work and but
+half-tamed, has a simplicity and grandeur of effect not easy to parallel
+in modern art. The <i>motif</i> of the tale is that you often go far to
+search for the good fortune that lies close to your door. Never was so
+homely an adage more freshly and prettily illustrated; yet how slight
+are the materials, how plain is the outline! Germain, the well-to-do,
+widowed laborer, in the course of a few miles' ride, a journey
+undertaken in order to present himself and his addresses to the rich
+widow his father desires him to woo, discovers the real life-companion
+he wants in the poor girl-neighbor, whom he patronizingly escorts on her
+way to the farm where she is hired for service. It all slowly dawns upon
+him, in the most natural manner, as the least incidents of the journey
+call out her good qualities of head and heart&mdash;her helpfulness in
+misadventure, forgetfulness of self, unaffected fondness for children,
+instinctively recognized by Germain's little boy, who, with his
+unconscious childish influence, is one of the prettiest features in the
+book. Germain, by his journey's end, has his heart so well engaged in
+the right quarter that he is proof against the dangerous fascinations of
+the coquettish widow.</p>
+
+<p>There is a breath of poetry over the picture, but no denaturalization
+of the uncultured types. Germain is honest and warm-hearted, but not
+bright of understanding; little Marie is wise and affectionate, but as
+unsentimentally-minded as the veriest realist could desire. The native
+caution and mercenary habit of thought of the French agricultural class
+are indicated by many a humorous touch in the pastorals of George Sand.</p>
+
+<p>Equally pleasing, though not aiming at the almost antique simplicity of
+the <i>Mare au Diable</i>, is the story of <i>François le Champi</i>, the
+foundling, saved from the demoralization to which lack of the softening
+influences of home and parental affection predestine such unhappy
+children, through the tenderness his forlorn condition inspires in a
+single heart&mdash;that of Madeline Blanchet, the childless wife, whose own
+wrongs, patiently borne, have quickened her commiseration for the wrongs
+of others. Her sympathy, little though it lies in her power to manifest
+it, he feels, and its incalculable worth to him, which is such that the
+gratitude of a whole life cannot do more than repay it.</p>
+
+<p>Part of the narrative is here put into the mouth of a peasant, and told
+in peasant language, or something approaching to it. Over the propriety
+of this proceeding, adopted also in <i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i>, French
+critics are disagreed, though for the most part they regret it. It is
+not for a foreigner to decide between them. One would certainly regret
+the absence of some of the extremely original and expressive words and
+turns of speech current among the rural population, forms which such a
+method enabled her to introduce into the narrative as well as into the
+dialogue.</p>
+
+<p><i>La Petite Fadette</i> is not only worthy of its predecessors but by many
+will be preferred to either. There is something particularly attractive
+in the portraits of the twin brothers&mdash;partly estranged by character,
+wholly united by affection,&mdash;and in the figure of Fanchon Fadet, an
+original in humble life, which has made this little work a general
+favorite wherever it is known.</p>
+
+<p>These prose-idylls have been called "The Georgics of France." It is
+curious that in a country so largely agricultural, and where nature
+presents more variety of picturesque aspect than perhaps in any other in
+Europe, the poetic side of rural life should have been so sparingly
+represented in her imaginative literature. French poets of nature have
+mostly sought their inspiration out of their own land, "In France,
+especially," observes Théophile Gautier, "all literary people live in
+town, that is in Paris the centre, know little of what is unconnected
+with it, and most of them cannot tell wheat from barley, potatoes from
+beetroot." It was a happy inspiration that prompted Madame Sand to fill
+in the blank, in a way all her own, and her task as we have seen was
+completed, revolutions notwithstanding. She owns to having then felt the
+attraction experienced in all time by those hard hit by public
+calamities, "to throw themselves back on pastoral dreams, all the more
+naïve and childlike for the brutality and darkness triumphant in the
+world of activity." Tired of "turning round and round in a false circle
+of argument, of accusing the governing minority, but only to be forced
+to acknowledge after all that they were put there by the choice of the
+majority," she wished to forget it all: and her poetic temperament which
+unfitted her for success in politics assisted her in finding consolation
+in nature.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover a district like Le Berry, singularly untouched by corruptions
+of the civilization, and preserving intact many old and interesting
+characteristics, was a field in which she might draw from reality many
+an attractive picture. She was as much rallied by town critics about her
+shepherdesses as though she had invented them. And yet she saw them
+every day, and they may be seen still by any wanderer in those lanes,
+and at every turn, Fanchons, Maries, Nanons, as she described them,
+tending their flock of from five to a dozen sheep, or a few geese, a
+goat and a donkey, all day long between the tall hedgerows, or on the
+common, spinning the while, or possibly dreaming. A certain refinement
+of cast distinguishes the type. Eugène Delacroix, in a letter describing
+a village festival at Nohant, remarks that if positive beauty is rare
+among the natives, ugliness is a thing unknown. A gentle, passive cast
+of countenance prevails among the women: "They are all St. Annes," as
+the artist expresses it. The inevitable changes brought about by
+steam-communication, which have as yet only begun to efface the local
+habits and peculiarities, must shortly complete their work. George
+Sand's pastoral novels will then have additional value, as graphic
+studies of a state of things that has passed away.</p>
+
+<p>It does not appear that the merit of these stories was so quickly
+recognized as that of <i>Indiana</i> and <i>Valentine</i>. The author might
+abstract herself awhile from passing events and write idylls, but the
+public had probably not yet settled down into the proper state of mind
+for fully enjoying them. Moreover Madame Sand's antagonists in politics
+and social science, as though under the impression that she could not
+write except to advance some theory of which they disapproved,
+pre-supposed in these stories a set purpose of exalting the excellence
+of rustic as compared with polite life&mdash;of exaggerating the virtues of
+the poor, to throw into relief the vices of the rich. The romances
+themselves do not bear out such a supposition. In them the author
+chooses exactly the same virtues to exalt, the same vices to condemn, as
+in her novels of refined society. She shows us intolerance, selfishness,
+and tyranny of custom marring or endangering individual happiness among
+the working-classes, as with their superiors. There are Philistines in
+her thatched cottages, as well as in her marble halls. Germain, in <i>La
+Mare au Diable</i>, has some difficulty to discover for himself, as well as
+to convince his family and neighbors, that in espousing the penniless
+Marie he is not marrying beneath him in every sense. François le Champi
+is a pariah, an outcast in the estimation of the rustic world. Fanchon
+Fadet, by her disregard of appearances and village etiquette,
+scandalizes the conservative minds of farmers and millers very much as
+Aurore Dupin scandalized the leaders of society at La Châtre. Most
+prominence is given to the more pleasing characters, but the existence
+of brutality and cupidity among the peasant classes is nowhere kept out
+of sight. Her long practical acquaintance with these classes indeed was
+fatal to illusions on the subject. The average son of the soil was as
+far removed as any other living creature from her ideal of humanity, and
+at the very time when she penned <i>La Petite Fadette</i> she was
+experiencing how far the ignorance, ill-will, and stupidity of her
+poorer neighbors could go.</p>
+
+<p>Thus she writes from Nohant to Barbès at Vincennes, November 1848:
+"Since May, I have shut myself up in prison in my retreat, where, though
+without the hardships of yours, I have more to suffer than you from
+sadness and dejection, ... and am less in safety." Threatened by the
+violence and hatred of the people, she had painfully realized that she
+and her party had their most obstinate enemies among those whom they
+wished and worked to save and defend.</p>
+
+<p>Her profound discouragement finds expression in many of her letters from
+1849 to 1852. The more sanguine hopes of Mazzini and other of her
+correspondents she desires, but no longer expects, to see fulfilled. She
+compares the moral state of France to the Russian retreat; the soldiers
+in the great army of progress seized with vertigo, and seeking death in
+fighting with each other.</p>
+
+<p>To her son, who was in Paris at the time of the disturbances in May,
+1849, she writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Come back, I implore you. I have only you in the world, and your
+death would be mine. I can still be of some small use to the cause
+of truth, but if I were to lose you it would be all over with me. I
+have not got the stoicism of Barbès and Mazzini. It is true they
+are men, and they have no children. Besides, in my opinion it is
+not in fight, not by civil war, that we shall win the cause of
+humanity in France. We have got universal suffrage. The worse for
+us if we do not know how to avail ourselves of it, for that alone
+can lastingly emancipate us, and the only thing that would give us
+the right to take up arms would be an attempt on their part to take
+away our right to vote.</p></div>
+
+<p>During the two years preceding the <i>coup d'état</i> of December, 1851, life
+at Nohant had resumed its wonted cheerfulness of aspect. Madame Sand was
+used to surround herself with young people and artistic people; but now,
+amid their light-heartedness, she had for a period to battle with an
+extreme inward sadness, confirmed by the fresh evidence brought by these
+years of the demoralization in all ranks of opinion. "Your head is not
+very lucid when your heart is so deeply wounded," she had remarked
+already, after the disasters of 1848, "and how can one help suffering
+mortally from the spectacle of civil war and the slaughter among the
+people?"</p>
+
+<p>To that was now added a loss of faith in the virtues of her own party,
+as well as of the masses. It is no wonder if she fell out of love for
+awhile with the ideals of romance, with her own art of fiction, and the
+types of heroism that were her favorite creations. But if the shadow of
+a morbid pessimism crept over her mind, she could view it now as a
+spiritual malady which she had yet the will and the strength to live
+down; as years before she had surmounted a similar phase of feeling
+induced by personal sorrow.</p>
+
+<p>Already, in 1847, she had begun to write her <i>Memoirs</i>, and reverting to
+them now, she found there work that suited her mood, as dealing with the
+past, more agreeable to contemplate just then than the present or the
+future.</p>
+
+<p>However, in September, 1850, we find her writing to Mazzini,&mdash;after
+dwelling on the present shortcomings of the people, and the mixture of
+pity and indignation with which they inspired her: "I turn back to
+fiction and produce, in art, popular types such as I see no longer; but
+as they ought to be and might be." She alludes to a play on which she
+was engaged, and continues: "The dramatic form, being new to me, has
+revived me a little of late; it is the only kind of work into which I
+have been able to throw myself for a year."</p>
+
+<p>The events of December, 1851, surprised her during a brief visit to
+Paris. Her hopes for her country had sunk so low, that she owns herself
+at the moment not to have regarded the <i>coup d'état</i> as likely to prove
+more disastrous to the cause of progress than any other of the violent
+ends which threatened the existing political situation. She left the
+capital in the midst of the cannonade, and with her family around her at
+Nohant awaited the issue of the new dictatorship.</p>
+
+<p>The wholesale arrests that followed immediately, and filled the country
+with stupefaction, made havoc on all sides of her. Among the victims
+were comrades of her childhood, numbers of her friends and acquaintance
+and their relatives&mdash;as well in Berry as in the capital&mdash;many arrested
+solely on suspicion of hostility to the President's views, yet none the
+less exposed to chances of death, or captivity, or exile.</p>
+
+<p>The crisis drove Madame Sand once more to quit the privacy of her
+country life, but this time in the capacity of intercessor with the
+conqueror for his victims. She came up to Paris, and on January 20,
+1852, addressed a letter to the President, imploring his clemency for
+the accused generally in an admirably eloquent appeal to his sentiments
+as well of justice as of generosity. The plea she so forcibly urged,
+that according to his own professions mere opinion was not to be
+prosecuted as a crime, whereas the so-called "preventive measures" had
+involved in one common ruin with his active opponents those who had been
+mere passive spectators of late events, was, of course, unanswerable.
+The future Emperor granted her two audiences within a week at the
+Elysée, in answer to her request, and he succeeded on the first occasion
+in convincing her that the acts of iniquity and intimidation perpetrated
+as by his authority were as completely in defiance of his public
+intentions as of his private principles. As a personal favor to herself,
+he readily offered her the release of any of the political prisoners
+that she choose to name, and promised that a general amnesty should
+speedily follow. She left him, reassured to some extent as to the fate
+in store for her country. The second interview she had solicited in
+order to plead the cause of one of her personal friends, condemned to
+transportation. The mission was a delicate one, for her client would
+engage himself to nothing for the future, and Madame Sand, in
+petitioning for his release, saw no better course open to her than as
+expressed by herself, frankly to denounce him to the President as his
+"incorrigible personal enemy." Upon this the President granted her the
+prisoner's full pardon at once. Madame Sand was naturally touched by
+this ready response of the generous impulse to which she had trusted. To
+those who cast doubts on the sincerity of any good sentiment in such a
+quarter, she very properly replied that it was not for her to be the
+first to discredit the generosity she had so successfully appealed to.</p>
+
+<p>But between her republican friends, loth to owe their deliverance to the
+tender mercies of Louis Napoleon, and her own desire to save their lives
+and liberties, and themselves and their families from ruin and despair,
+she found her office of mediator a most unthankful one. She persisted
+however in unwearying applications for justice and mercy, addressed both
+to the dictator directly, and through his cousin, Prince Napoleon
+(Jerome), between whom and herself there existed a cordial esteem. She
+clung as long as she could to her belief in the public virtue of the
+President, or Emperor as he already began to be called here and there.
+But the promised clemency limited itself to a number of particular cases
+for whom she had specially interceded.</p>
+
+<p>The subsequent conditions of France precluded all free emission of
+socialist or republican opinions, but Madame Sand desired nothing better
+than to send in her political resignation; and it is impossible to share
+the regret of some of her fellow-republicans at finding her again
+devoting her best energies to her art of fiction, and in November, 1853,
+writing to Mazzini such words of wisdom as these:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>You are surprised that I can work at literature. For my part, I
+thank God that he has let me preserve this faculty; for an honest
+and clear conscience like mine still finds, apart from all debate,
+a work of moralization to pursue. What should I do if I relinquish
+my task, humble though it be? Conspire? It is not my vocation; I
+should make nothing of it. Pamphlets? I have neither the wit nor
+the wormwood required for that. Theories? We have made too many,
+and have fallen to disputing, which is the grave of all truth and
+all strength. I am, and always have been, artist before everything
+else. I know that mere politicians look on artists, with great
+contempt, judging them by some of those mountebank-types which are
+a disgrace to art. But you, my friend, you well know that a real
+artist is as useful as the <i>priest</i> and the <i>warrior</i>, and that
+when he respects what is true and what is good, he is in the right
+path where the divine blessing will attend him. Art belongs to all
+countries and to all time, and its special good is to live on when
+all else seems to be dying. That is why Providence delivers it from
+passions too personal or too general, and has given to its
+organization patience and persistence, an enduring sensibility, and
+that contemplative sense upon which rests invincible faith.</p></div>
+
+<p>Her novel, <i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i>, the first-fruits of the year 1853, is
+what most will consider a very good equivalent for party pamphlets and
+political diatribes.</p>
+
+<p>When composing <i>La Mare au Diable</i>, in 1846, Madame Sand looked forward
+to writing a series of such peasant tales, to be collectively entitled
+<i>Les Veillées du Chanvreur</i>, the hemp-beaters being, as will be
+recollected, the Scheherazades of each village. Their number was never
+to be thus augmented, but the idea is recalled by the chapter-headings
+of <i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i>, in which Étienne Despardieu, or Tiennet, the
+rustic narrator, tells, in the successive <i>veillées</i> of a month, the
+romance of his youth. It is a work of a very different type to the rural
+tales that had preceded it, and should be regarded apart from them. It
+is longer, more complex in form and sentiment, more of an ideal
+composition. <i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i>, is a delightful pastoral, woodland
+fantasy, standing by itself among romances much as stands a kindred work
+of imagination, "As You Like It," among plays, yet thoroughly
+characteristic of George Sand, the nature-lover, the seer into the
+mysteries of human character, and the imaginative artist. The agreeable
+preponderates in the story, but it has its tragic features and its
+serious import. A picturesque and uncommon setting adds materially to
+its charm. Every thread tells in this delicate piece of fancy-work, and
+the weaver's art is indescribable. But one may note the ingenuity with
+which four or five interesting yet perfectly natural types are brought
+into a group and contrasted; improbable incidents so handled as not to
+strike a discordant note, the characteristics of the past introduced
+without ever losing hold of the links, the points of identity between
+past and present. The scene is the hamlet of Nohant itself; the time is
+a century ago, when the country, half covered with forest, was wilder,
+the customs rougher, the local coloring stronger than even Madame Sand
+in her childhood had known them. The personages belong to the rural
+proprietor class. The leading characters are all somewhat out of the
+common, but such exist in equal proportions in all classes of society,
+and there is ample evidence besides George Sand's of notable examples
+among the French peasantry. The plot and its interest lie in the
+development of character and the fine tracing of the manner in which the
+different characters are influenced by circumstances and by each other.
+If the beauty of rustic maidens, and of rustic songs and dance-music, as
+here described, seem to transcend probability, it must be remembered it
+is a peasant who speaks of these wonders, and as wonders they might
+appear to his limited experience. As a musical novel, it has the
+ingenious distinction of being told from the point of view of the sturdy
+and honest, but unartistic and non-musical Tiennet; a typical
+Berrichon. Madame Sand was of opinion that during the long occupation of
+Berry by the English the two races had blended extensively, and she
+would thus account for some of the heavier, more inexpansive qualities
+of our nation having become characteristic of this French province.</p>
+
+<p>More than one English reader of <i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i> may have been
+struck by the picture there presented of peasant-folk in a state of
+peace and comfort, such as we do not suppose to have been common in
+France before the Revolution. Madame Sand has elsewhere explained how,
+as a fact, Nohant, and other estates in the region round about, had
+enjoyed some immunity from the worst abuses of the <i>ancien régime</i>.
+Several of these properties, as it happened, had fallen to women or
+minors&mdash;widows, elderly maiden ladies, who, and their agents, spared the
+holders and cultivators of the soil the exactions which, by right or by
+might, its lords were used to levy. "So the peasants," she writes, "were
+accustomed not to put themselves to any inconvenience; and when came the
+Revolution they were already so well relieved virtually from feudal
+bonds that they took revenge on nobody." A new <i>seigneur</i> of Nohant,
+coming to take possession, and thinking to levy his utmost dues, in
+cash and in kind, found his rustic tenants turn a deaf ear to his
+summons. Ere he could insist the storm burst, but it brought no
+convulsion, and merely confirmed an independence already existing.</p>
+
+<p><i>Les Maîtres Sonneurs</i>, whilst illustrating some of the most striking
+merits of George Sand, is free from the defects often laid to her
+charge; and although of all her pastorals it must suffer the most when
+rendered in any language but the original, it is much to be regretted
+that some good translation of this work should not put it within the
+reach of all English readers.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">PLAYS AND LATER NOVELS.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">There</span> are few eminent novelists that have not tried their hands at
+writing for the stage; and Madame Sand had additional inducements to do
+so, beyond those of ambition satiated with literary success, and tempted
+by the charm of making fresh conquest of the public in a more direct and
+personal fashion.</p>
+
+<p>From early childhood she had shown a strong liking for the theatre. The
+rare performances given by travelling acting-companies at La Châtre had
+been her greatest delight when a girl. At the convent-school she had
+arranged Molière from memory for representation by herself and her
+school-fellows, careful so to modify the piece as to avoid all
+possibility of shocking the nuns. Thus the Sisters applauded <i>Le Malade
+Imaginaire</i> without any suspicion that the author was one whose works,
+for them, were placed under a ban, and whose very name they held in
+devout abhorrence. She inherited from her father a taste for acting,
+which she transmitted to her children. We have seen her during her
+literary novitiate in Paris, a studious observer at all theatres, from
+the classic boards of the Français down to the lowest of popular stages,
+the Funambules, where reigned at that time a real artist in pantomime,
+Débureau. His Pierrot, a sort of modified Pulchinello, was renowned; and
+attracted more fastidious critics to his audience than the Paris
+artisans whose idol he was. Since then Madame Sand had numbered among
+her personal friends such leading dramatic celebrities as Madame Dorval,
+Bocage, and Pauline Garcia. "I like actors," she says playfully, "which
+has scandalized some austere people. I have also been found fault with
+for liking the peasantry. Among these I have passed my life, and as I
+found them, so have I described them. As these, in the light of the sun,
+give us our daily bread for our bodies, so those by gaslight give us our
+daily bread of fiction, so needful to the wearied spirit, troubled by
+realities." Peasants and players seem to be the types of humanity
+farthest removed from each other, and it is worthy of remark that George
+Sand was equally successful in her presentation of both.</p>
+
+<p>Her preference for originality and spontaneity before all other
+qualities in a dramatic artist was characteristic of herself, though
+not of her nation. Thus it was that Madame Dorval, the heroine of
+<i>Antony</i> and <i>Marion Delorme</i>, won her unbounded admiration. Even in
+Racine she clearly preferred her to Mlle. Mars, as being a less studied
+actress, and one who abandoned herself more to the inspiration of the
+moment. The effect produced, as described by Madame Sand, will be
+understood by all keenly alive, like herself, to the enjoyment of
+dramatic art. "She" (Madame Dorval) "seemed to me to be myself, more
+expansive, and to express in action and emotion all that I seek to
+express in writing." And compared with such an art, in which conception
+and expression are simultaneous, her own art of words and phrases would
+at such moments appear to her as but a pale reflection.</p>
+
+<p>Bocage, the great character actor of his time, was another who likewise
+appealed particularly to her sympathies, as the personation, on the
+boards, of the protest of the romantic school against the slavery of
+convention and tradition. Her acquaintance with him dated from the first
+representation of Hugo's <i>Lucrèce Borgia</i>, February, 1833, when Bocage
+and the author of <i>Indiana</i>, then strangers to each other, chanced to
+sit side by side. In their joint enthusiasm over the play they made the
+beginning of a thirty years' friendship, terminated only by Bocage's
+death in 1862. "It was difficult not to quarrel with him," she says of
+this popular favorite; "he was susceptible and violent; it was
+impossible not to be reconciled with him quickly. He was faithful and
+magnanimous. He forgave you admirably for wrongs you had never done him,
+and it was as good and real as though the pardon had been actual and
+well-founded, so strong was his imagination, so complete his good
+faith."</p>
+
+<p>The assistance of Madame Dorval, added to the strength of the Comédie
+Française company, did not, however, save from failure Madame Sand's
+first drama, <i>Cosima</i>, produced, as will be remembered, in 1840. She
+allowed nearly a decade to elapse before again seriously competing for
+theatrical honors, by a second effort in a different style, and more
+satisfactory in its results.</p>
+
+<p>This, a dramatic adaptation by herself of her novel, <i>François le
+Champi</i>, was produced at the Odéon in the winter of 1849. Generally
+speaking, to make a good play out of a good novel, the playwright must
+begin by murdering the novel; and here, as in all George Sand's dramatic
+versions of her romances, we seem to miss the best part of the original.
+However, the curious simplicity of the piece, the rustic scenes and
+personages, here faithfully copied from reality, unlike the conventional
+village and villager of opera comique, and the pleasing sentiment that
+runs through the tale, were found refreshing by audiences upon whom the
+sensational incidents and harrowing emotions of their modern drama were
+already beginning to pall. The result was a little stage triumph for
+Madame Sand. It helped to draw to her pastoral tales the attention they
+deserved, but had not instantly won in all quarters. Théophile Gautier
+writes playfully of this piece: "The success of <i>François le Champi</i> has
+given all our vaudeville writers an appetite for rusticity. Only let
+this go on a little, and we shall be inundated by what has humorously
+been called the 'ruro-drama.' Morvan hats and Berrichon head-dresses
+will invade the scenes, and no language be spoken but in dialect."</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand was naturally encouraged to repeat the experiment. This was
+done in <i>Claudie</i> (1851) and <i>Le Pressoir</i> (1853), ruro-dramas both, and
+most favorably received. The first-named has a simple and pathetic
+story, and, as usual with Madame Sand's plays, it was strengthened at
+its first production by the support of some of the best acting talent in
+Paris&mdash;Fechter, then a rising <i>jeune premier</i>, and the veteran Bocage
+ably representing, respectively, youth and age. Old Berrichon airs were
+introduced with effect, as also such picturesque rustic festival customs
+as the ancient harvest-home ceremony, in which the last sheaf is brought
+on a wagon, gaily decked out with poppies, cornflowers and ribbons, and
+receives a libation of wine poured by the hand of the oldest or youngest
+person present.</p>
+
+<p>"But what the theatre can never reproduce," laments Madame Sand, "is the
+majesty of the frame&mdash;the mountain of sheaves solemnly approaching,
+drawn by three pairs of enormous oxen, the whole adorned with flowers,
+with fruit, and with fine little children perched upon the top of the
+last sheaves."</p>
+
+<p>Henceforward a good deal of her time and interest continued to be
+absorbed by these dramatic compositions. But though mostly eliciting
+during her lifetime a gratifying amount of public favor and applause,
+the best of them cannot for an instant be placed in the same high rank
+as her novels. For with all her wide grasp of the value of dramatic art
+and her exact appreciation of the strength and weakness of the acting
+world, her plays remain, to great expectations, uniformly disappointing.
+Her specialty in fiction lies in her favorite art of analyzing and
+putting before us, with extreme clearness, the subtlest ramifications,
+the most delicate intricacies of feeling and thought. A stage audience
+has its eyes and ears too busy to give its full attention to the finer
+complications of sentiment and motive; or, at least, in order to keep
+its interest alive and its understanding clear, an accentuation of
+outline is needed, which she neglects even to seek.</p>
+
+<p>Her assertion, that the niceties of emotion are sufficient to found a
+good play upon, no one now will dream of disputing. But for this an art
+of execution is needed of which she had not the instinct. The action is
+insufficient, or rather, the sense of action is not conveyed. The
+slightness of plot&mdash;a mere thread in most instances&mdash;requires that the
+thread shall at least be never allowed to drop. But she cuts or slackens
+it perpetually, long arguments and digressions intervening, and the
+dialogue, whose monotony is unrelieved by wit, nowhere compensates for
+the limited interest of the action. Awkward treatment is but half felt
+when subject and situations are dramatically strong; but plays with so
+airy and impalpable a basis as these need to be sustained by the utmost
+perfection of construction, concision and polish of dialogue.</p>
+
+<p>Her novel <i>Mauprat</i> has many dramatic points, and she received a score
+of applications for leave to adapt it to the stage. She preferred to
+prepare the version herself, and it was played in the winter of 1853-4,
+with moderate success. But it suffers fatally from comparison with its
+original. An extreme instance is <i>Flaminio</i> (1854), a protracted drama,
+drawn by Madame Sand from her novelette <i>Teverino</i>. This is a
+fantasy-piece whose audacity is redeemed, as are certain other
+blemishes, by the poetic suggestiveness of the figure of Madeline, the
+bird-charmer; whilst the picturesque sketch of Teverino, the idealized
+Italian bohemian, too indolent to turn his high natural gifts to any
+account, has proved invaluable to the race of novelists, who are not yet
+tired of reproducing it in large. The work is one addressed mainly to
+the imagination.</p>
+
+<p>In the play we come down from the clouds; the poetry is gone, taste is
+shocked, fancy uncharmed, the improbabilities become grotesque, and the
+whole is distorted and tedious. Madame Sand's personages are never weary
+of analyzing their sentiments. Her flowing style, so pleasant to read,
+carries us swiftly and easily through her dissertations in print, before
+we have time to tire of them. On the stage such colloquies soon appear
+lengthy and unnatural. The climax of absurdity is reached in <i>Flaminio</i>,
+where we find the adventurer expatiating to the man of the world on
+"the divinity of his essence."</p>
+
+<p>There is scarcely a department of theatrical literature in which Madame
+Sand does not appear as an aspirant. She was a worshipper of
+Shakespeare, acknowledging him as the king of dramatic writers. For her
+attempt to adapt "As You Like It" to suit the tastes of a Parisian
+audience, she disarms criticism by a preface in the form of a letter to
+M. Régnier, of the Comédie Française, prefixed to the printed play. Here
+she says plainly that to resolve to alter Shakespeare is to resolve to
+murder, and that she aims at nothing more than at giving the French
+public some idea of the original. In "As You Like It" the license of
+fancy taken is too wide for the piece to be safely represented to her
+countrymen, since it must jar terribly on "that French reason which,"
+remarks Madame Sand, "we are so vain of, and which deprives us of so
+many originalities quite as precious as itself." The fantastic, which
+had so much attraction for her (possibly a result of her part German
+origin), is a growth that has hard work to flourish on French soil. The
+reader will remember the fate of Weber's <i>Freischütz</i>, outrageously
+hissed when first produced at Paris in its original form. Nine days
+later it was reproduced, having been taken to pieces and put together
+again by M. Castil-Blaze, and thus as <i>Robin des Bois</i> it ran for 357
+nights. The reckless imagination that distinguishes the Shakespearian
+comedy and does not shrink before the introduction of a lion and a
+serpent into the forest of Arden, and the miraculous and instantaneous
+conversion of the wretch Oliver into a worthy suitor for Celia, needed
+to be toned down for acceptance by the Parisians. But Madame Sand was
+less fortunate than M. Castil-Blaze. Her version, produced at the
+Théâtre Français, in 1856, failed to please, although supported by such
+actors as Delaunay, Arnold-Plessy, and Favart. Macready, who had made
+Madame Sand's acquaintance in 1845, when he was giving Shakespearian
+performances in Paris, and whom she greatly admired, dedicating to him
+her little theatrical romance <i>Le Château des Désertes</i>, was present at
+this representation and records it as a failure. But of her works for
+the stage, which number over a score, few like her <i>Comme il vous
+plaira</i> missed making some mark at the time, the prestige of her name
+and the exceptionally favorable circumstances under which they were
+produced securing more than justice for their intrinsic merit. It was
+natural that she should over-estimate their value and continue to add to
+their number. These pieces would be carefully rehearsed on the little
+stage in the house at Nohant, often with the aid of leading professional
+actors; and there, at least, the success was unqualified.</p>
+
+<p>Her ingenious novel <i>Les Beaux Messieurs Bois Doré</i>, dramatized with the
+aid of Paul Meurice and acted in 1862, was a triumph for Madame Sand and
+her friend Bocage. The form and spirit of this novel seem inspired by
+Sir Walter Scott, and though far from perfect, it is a striking instance
+of the versatility of her imaginative powers. The leading character of
+the septuagenarian Marquis, with his many amiable virtues, and his one
+amiable weakness, a longing to preserve intact his youthfulness of
+appearance as he has really preserved his youthfulness of heart, is both
+natural and original, comic and half pathetic withal. The part in the
+play seemed made for Bocage, and his heart was set upon undertaking it.
+But his health was failing at the time, and the manager hesitated about
+giving him the rôle. "Take care, my friend," wrote Bocage to Madame
+Sand; "perhaps I shall die if I play the part; but if I play it not, I
+shall die of that, to a certainty." She insisted, and play it he did, to
+perfection, she tells us. "He did not act the Marquis de Bois Doré; he
+was the personage himself, as the author had dreamt him." It was to be
+his last achievement, and he knew it. "It is my end," he said one
+night, "but I shall die like a soldier on the field of honor." And so he
+did, continuing to play the rôle up till a few days before his death.</p>
+
+<p>More lasting success has attended Madame Sand in two of the lightest of
+society comedies, <i>Le Mariage de Victorine</i> and <i>Le Marquis de
+Villemer</i>, which seem likely to take a permanent place in the
+<i>répertoire</i> of the French stage. The first, a continuation that had
+suggested itself to her of Sedaine's century-old comedy, <i>Le Philosophe
+sans le savoir</i>, escapes the ill fate that seems to attend sequels in
+general. It is of the slightest materials, but holds together, and is
+gracefully conceived and executed. First produced at the Gymnase in
+1851, it was revived during the last year of Madame Sand's life in a
+manner very gratifying to her, being brought out with great applause at
+the Comédie Française, preceded on each occasion by Sedaine's play, and
+the same artists appearing in both.</p>
+
+<p>The excellent dramatic version of her popular novel <i>Le Marquis de
+Villemer</i>, first acted in 1864, is free from the defects that weaken
+most of her stage compositions. It is said that in preparing it she
+accepted some hints from Alexander Dumas the younger. Whatever the
+cause, the result is a play where characters, composition and dialogue
+leave little to be desired.</p>
+
+<p><i>L'autre</i>, her latest notable stage success, brings us down to 1870,
+when it was acted at the Gymnase, Madame Sarah Bernhardt impersonating
+the heroine. This not very agreeable play is derived, with material
+alterations, from Madame Sand's agreeable novel <i>La Confession d'une
+jeune Fille</i>, published in 1864.</p>
+
+<p>If, however, her works for the stage, which fill four volumes, added but
+little, in proportion to their quantity, to her permanent fame, her
+dramatic studies added fresh interest and variety to her experience,
+which brought forth excellent fruit in her novels. Actors, their art and
+way of life have fared notoriously badly in fiction. Such pictures have
+almost invariably fallen into the extreme of unreality or that of
+caricature, whether for want of information or want of sympathy in those
+who have drawn them.</p>
+
+<p>The subject, always attractive for Madame Sand, is one in which she is
+always happy. Already in the first year of her literary career her keen
+appreciation of the art and its higher influences had prompted her
+clever novelette <i>La Marquise</i>. Here she illustrates the power of the
+stage as a means of expression&mdash;of the truly inspired actor, though his
+greatness be but momentary, and his heroism a semblance, to strike a
+like chord in the heart of the spectator&mdash;and, in a corrupt and
+artificial age, to keep alive some latent faith in the ideal. Since
+then the stage and players had figured repeatedly in her works.
+Sometimes she portrays a perfected type, such as Consuelo, or Impéria in
+<i>Pierre qui roule</i>, but always side by side with more earthly and faulty
+representatives such as Corilla and Anzoleto, or Julia and Albany, in
+Narcisse, incarnations of the vanity and instability that are the chief
+dangers of the profession, drawn with unsparing realism. In <i>Le Château
+des Désertes</i> we find further many admirable theories and suggestive
+ideas on the subject of the regeneration of the theatre. But it fared
+with her theatrical as with her political philosophy: she failed in its
+application, not because her theories were false, but for want of
+practical aptitude for the craft whose principles she understood so
+well.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible here to do more than cast a rapid glance over the
+literary work accomplished by George Sand during the first decade of the
+empire. It includes more than a dozen novels, of unequal merit, but of
+merit for the most part very high. The <i>Histoire de ma Vie</i> was
+published in 1855. It is a study of chosen passages out of her life,
+rather than a connected autobiography. One out of the four volumes is
+devoted to the story of her father's life before her birth; two more to
+the story of her childhood and girlhood. The fourth rather indicates
+than fully narrates the facts of her existence from the time of her
+marriage till the Revolution of 1848. It offers to her admirers
+invaluable glimpses into her life and mind, and is a highly interesting
+and characteristic composition, if a most irregular chronicle. It has
+given rise to two most incompatible-sounding criticisms. Some have been
+chiefly struck by its amazing unreserve, and denounced the
+over-frankness of the author in revealing herself to the public. Others
+complain that she keeps on a mask throughout, and never allows us to see
+into the recesses of her mind. Her passion for the analysis of sentiment
+has doubtless led her here, as in her romances, to give very free
+expression to truths usually better left unspoken. But her silence on
+many points about which her readers, whether from mere curiosity or some
+more honorable motive, would gladly have been informed, was then
+inevitable. It could not have been broken without wounding the
+susceptibilities of living persons, which she did right in respecting,
+at the cost of disappointment to an inquisitive public.</p>
+
+<p>In January, 1855, a terrible domestic sorrow befell her in the loss of
+her six-years-old grandchild, Jeanne Clésinger, to whom she was devoted.
+It affected her profoundly. "Is there a more mortal grief," she
+exclaims, "than to outlive, yourself, those who should have bloomed upon
+your grave?" The blow told upon her mentally and physically; she could
+not rally from its effects, till persuaded to seek a restorative in
+change of air and scene, which happily did their work.</p>
+
+<p>"I was ill," she says, when writing of these events to a lady
+correspondent, later in the same year; "my son took me away to Italy....
+I have seen Rome, revisited Florence, Genoa, Frascati, Spezia,
+Marseilles. I have walked a great deal, been out in the sun, the rain,
+the wind, for whole days out of doors. This, for me, is a certain
+remedy, and I have come back cured."</p>
+
+<p>Those who care to follow the mind of George Sand on this Italian journey
+may safely infer from <i>La Daniella</i>, a novel written after this tour,
+and the scene of which is laid in Rome and the Campagna, that the
+author's strongest impression of the Eternal City was one of
+disillusion. Her hero, a Berrichon artist on his travels, confesses to a
+feeling of uneasiness and regret rather than of surprise and admiration.
+The ancient ruins, stupendous in themselves, seemed to her spoilt for
+effect by their situation in the center of a modern town. "Of the Rome
+of the past not enough exists to overwhelm me with its majesty; of the
+Rome of the present not enough to make me forget the first, and much too
+much to allow me to see her."</p>
+
+<p>But the Baths of Caracalla, where the picture is not set in a frame of
+hideous houses, awakened her native enthusiasm. "A grandiose ruin," she
+exclaims, "of colossal proportions; it is shut away, isolated, silent
+and respected. There you feel the terrific power of the Cæsars, and the
+opulence of a nation intoxicated with its royalty over the world."</p>
+
+<p>So in the Appian Way, the road of tombs, the fascination of
+desolation&mdash;a desolation there unbroken and undisfigured by modern
+buildings or otherwise&mdash;she felt to the full. But whatever came under
+her notice she looked on with the eye of the poet and artist, not of the
+archæologist, and approved or disapproved or passed over it accordingly.</p>
+
+<p>The beauties of nature, at Tivoli and Frascati, appealed much more
+surely to her sympathies. But of certain sites in the Campagna much
+vaunted by tourists and hand-books she remarks pertinently: "If you were
+to pass this village" (Marino) "on the railway within a hundred miles of
+Paris, you would not pay it the slightest attention." Such places had
+their individuality, but she upheld that there is not a corner in the
+universe, "however common-place it may appear, but has a character of
+its own, unique in this world, for any one who is disposed to feel or
+comprehend it." In one of her village tales a sagacious peasant
+professes his profound contempt for the man who cannot like the place he
+belongs to.</p>
+
+<p>Neither the grottoes and cascades of Tivoli, the cypress and ilex
+gardens of Frascati and Albano, nor the ruins of Tusculum, were ever so
+pleasant to her eyes as the poplar-fringed banks of the Indre, the
+corn-land sand hedgerows of Berry, and the rocky borders of the Creuse
+at Crozant and Argenton. She had not ceased making fresh picturesque
+discoveries in her own neighborhood. Of these she records an instance in
+her pleasant <i>Promenades autour d'un village</i>, a lively sketch of a few
+days' walking-tour on the banks of the Creuse, undertaken by herself and
+some naturalist friends in June, 1857. In studying the interesting and
+secluded village of Gargilesse, with its tenth-century church and crypt
+with ancient frescoes, its simple and independent-minded population, in
+following the course of a river whose natural wild beauties, equal to
+those of the Wye, are as yet undisfigured here by railroad or the hand
+of man, lingering on its banks full of summer flowers and butterflies,
+exploring the castles of Châteaubrun and La Prugne au Pot, George Sand
+is happier, more herself, more communicative than in Rome, "the museum
+of the universe."</p>
+
+<p>The years 1858 to 1861 show her to us in the fullest conservation of her
+powers and in the heyday of activity. The group of novels belonging to
+this period, the climax of what may be called her second career, is
+sufficiently remarkable for a novelist who was almost a sexagenarian,
+including <i>Elle et Lui</i>, <i>L'Homme de Neige</i>, <i>La Ville Noire</i>,
+<i>Constance Verrier</i>, <i>Le Marquis de Villemer</i> and <i>Valvèdre</i>. <i>Elle et
+Lui</i>, in which George Sand at last broke silence in her own defense on
+the subject of her rupture with Alfred de Musset, first appeared in the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, 1859. Though many of the details are
+fictitious, the author here told the history of her relations with the
+deceased poet much too powerfully for her intention to be mistaken or to
+escape severe blame. That a magnanimous silence would have been the
+nobler course on her part towards the child of genius whose good genius
+she had so signally failed to be, need not be disputed. It must be
+remembered, however, that De Musset on his side had not refrained during
+his lifetime from denouncing in eloquent verse the friend he had
+quarreled with, and satirizing her in pungent prose. Making every
+possible allowance for poetical figures of speech, he had said enough to
+provoke her to retaliate. It is impossible to suppose that there was not
+another side to such a question. But Madame Sand could not defend
+herself without accusing her lost lover. She often proved herself a
+generous adversary&mdash;too generous, indeed, for her own advantage&mdash;and in
+this instance it was clearly not for her own sake that she deferred her
+apology.</p>
+
+<p>It is even conceivable that the poet, when in a just frame of mind, and
+not seeking inspiration for his <i>Nuit de Mai</i> or <i>Histoire d'un Merle
+blanc</i>, would not have seen in <i>Elle et Lui</i> a falsification of the
+spirit of their history. The theorizing of the outside world in such
+matters is of little worth; but the novel bears, conspicuously among
+Madame Sand's productions, the stamp of a study from real life, true in
+its leading features. And the conduct of the heroine, Therèse, though
+accounted for and eloquently defended, is by no means, as related,
+ideally blameless. After an attachment so strong as to induce a
+seriously-minded person, such as she is represented, to throw aside for
+it all other considerations, the hastiness with which, on discovering
+her mistake, she entertains the idea of bestowing her hand, if not her
+heart, on another, is an exhibition of feminine inconsequence which no
+amount of previous misconduct on the part of her lover, Laurent, can
+justify. Further, Therèse is self-deceived in supposing her passion to
+have died out with her esteem. She breaks with the culprit and engages
+her word to a worthier man. But enough remains over of the past to
+prevent her from keeping the promise she ought never to have made. When
+she sacrifices her unselfish friend to return to the lover who has made
+her miserable, she is sincere, but not heroic. She is too weak to shake
+off the influence of the fatal infatuation and shut out Laurent from her
+life, nor yet can she accept her heart's choice for better or worse,
+even when experience has left her little to learn with regard to
+Laurent. Clearly both friend and lover, out of a novel, would feel
+wronged. Therèse's excuse lies in the extremely trying character of her
+companion, whose vagaries may be supposed to have driven her beside
+herself at times, just as her airs of superiority and mute reproach may
+have driven him not a little mad. Those who wish to know in what spirit
+Madame Sand met the attacks upon her provoked by this book, will find
+her reply in a very few words at the conclusion of her preface to <i>Jean
+de la Roche</i>, published the same year.</p>
+
+<p>Most readers of <i>Elle et Lui</i> have been so preoccupied with the
+question of the rights and wrongs of the originals in their behavior to
+each other, so inclined to judge of the book according to its supposed
+accuracy or inaccuracy as a matter of history, that its force, as a
+study of the attraction that so often leads two exceptional but
+hopeless, irreconcilable spirits to seek in each other a refuge from the
+isolation in which their superiority places them, has been somewhat
+overlooked. Laurent, whether a true portrait or not, is only too true to
+nature; excessive in his admirable powers and in his despicable
+weakness. Therèse is an equally faithful picture of a woman not quite up
+to the level of her own principles, which are so high that any lapse
+from them on her part brings down more disasters on herself and on
+others than the misdemeanors of avowedly unscrupulous persons.</p>
+
+<p>Within a few months of <i>Elle et Lui</i> had appeared <i>L'Homme de Neige</i>,<a name="FNanchor_D_4" id="FNanchor_D_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_D_4" class="fnanchor">[D]</a>
+a work of totally different but equally characteristic cast. The
+author's imagination had still all its old zest and activity, and
+readers for whom fancy has any charm will find this Scandinavian romance
+thoroughly enjoyable. The subject of the marionette theater, here
+introduced with such brilliant and ingenious effect, she had studied
+both historically and practically. She and her son found it so
+fascinating that, years before this time, a miniature stage had been
+constructed by the latter at Nohant, over which he presided, and which
+they and their friends found an endless source of amusement. Madame Sand
+wrote little dramas expressly for such representations, and would sit up
+all night, making dresses for the puppets. In an agreeable little
+article she has devoted to the subject, she describes how from the
+crudest beginnings they succeeded in elaborating their art to a high
+pitch; the <i>répertoire</i> of their lilliputian theater including more than
+twenty plays, their "company" over a hundred marionettes.</p>
+
+<p>To the next year, 1860, belong the pleasant tale of artisan life, <i>La
+Ville Noire</i>, and the well-known and popular <i>Marquis de Villemer</i>,
+notable as a decided success in a <i>genre</i> seldom adopted by her, that of
+the purely society novel.</p>
+
+<p>Already Madame Sand had outlived the period of which she was so
+brilliant a representative. After the Romantic movement had spent its
+force, a reaction had set in that was influencing the younger school of
+writers, and that has continued to give the direction to successful
+talent until the present day. Of the so-called "realism," Madame Sand
+said that it was nothing new. She saw there merely another form of the
+same revolt of nature against affectation and convention which had
+prompted the Romantic movement, whose disciples had now become guilty of
+affectation in their turn. <i>Madame Bovary</i> she pronounced with truth to
+be but concentrated Balzac. She was ready to perceive and do justice to
+the great ability of the author, as to original genius in any school;
+thus of Tourguénief she speaks with enthusiasm: "Realist to see all,
+poet to beautify all, great heart to pity and understand all." But she
+deplored the increasing tendency among artists to give the preference
+among realities to the ugliest and the most painful. Her personal
+leanings avowedly were towards the other extreme; but she was too
+large-minded not to recognize that truth in one form or another must
+always be the prime object of the artist's search. The manner of its
+presentation will vary with the age.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Let the realists, if they like, go on proclaiming that all is
+prose, and the idealists that all is poesy. The last will have
+their rainy days, the first their days of sunshine. In all arts the
+victory remains with a privileged few, who go their own ways; and
+the discussions of the "schools" will pass away like old fashions.</p></div>
+
+<p>On the generation of writers that George Sand saw growing up, any
+opinion pronounced must be premature. But with regard to herself, it
+should now be possible to regard her work in a true perspective. As with
+Byron, Dickens, and other popular celebrities, a phase of infinite
+enthusiasm for her writings was duly succeeded by a phase of determined
+depreciation. The public opinion that survives when blind friendship and
+blind enmity have done their worst is likely to be the judgment of
+posterity.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">ARTIST AND MORALIST.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">On</span> what, in the future, will the fame of George Sand mainly rest?
+According to some critics, on her gifts of fertile invention and fluent
+narration alone, which make her novels attractive in spite of the
+chimerical theories, social, political and religious, everywhere
+interwoven. According to other judges again, her fictions transcend and
+are likely to outlive other fictions by virtue of certain eternal
+philosophic verities which they persistently set forth, and which give
+them a serious interest the changes in novel-fashions cannot effect.</p>
+
+<p>The conclusion seems inevitable that whilst the artistic strength of
+George Sand's writings is sufficient to command readers among those most
+out of harmony with her views, to minds in sympathy with her own these
+romances, because they express and enforce with earnestness, sincerity
+and fire, the sentiments of a poetic soul, a generous heart, and an
+immense intelligence, on subjects of consequence to humanity, have a
+higher value than can attach to skillful development of plot and
+intrigue, mere display of literary cleverness, or of the storings of
+minute observation.</p>
+
+<p>Her opinions themselves have been widely misapprehended, perhaps because
+her personality&mdash;or rather that imaginary personage, the George Sand of
+the myths&mdash;has caused a confusion in people's minds between her ideal
+standard and her individual success in keeping up to it. We would not
+ignore the importance of personal example in one so famous as herself.
+We may pass by eccentricities not inviting to imitation; for if any of
+her sex ever thought to raise themselves any nearer to the level of
+George Sand by smoking or wearing men's clothes, such puerility does not
+call for notice. Still, the influence she strenuously exerted for good
+as a writer for the public would have worked more clearly had she never
+seemed to swerve from the high principles she expressed, or been led
+away by the disturbing forces of a nature calm only on the surface.
+Nothing is more baffling than the incomplete revelations of a very
+complex order of mind, with its many-sided sympathies and its apparent
+contradictions. The self-justification she puts forward for her errors
+is sometimes sophistical, but not for that insincere. She is not trying
+to make us her dupes; she is the dupe herself of her dangerous
+eloquence. But her moral worth so infinitely outweighed the alloy as to
+leave but little call, or even warrant, for dwelling on the latter. "If
+I come back to you," said her old literary patron Delatouche, into whose
+disfavor she had fallen awhile, when he came years after to ask for the
+restitution of the friendship he had slighted, "it is that I cannot help
+myself, and your qualities surpass your defects."</p>
+
+<p>To pass from herself to her books, no one has made more frank, clear and
+unchanging confession of their heart's faith or their head's principles.
+Her creed was that which has been, and ever will be in some guise, the
+creed of minds of a certain order. She did not invent it. Poets,
+moralists, theologians, have proclaimed it before her and after her. She
+found for it a fresh mode of expression, one answering to the needs of
+the age to which she belonged.</p>
+
+<p>It is in the union of rare artistic genius with an almost as rare and
+remarkable power of enthusiasm for moral and spiritual truth that lies
+her distinguishing strength. Most of her novels&mdash;all her best
+novels&mdash;share this characteristic of seeming to be prompted by the
+double and equal inspiration of an artistic and a moral purpose.
+Wherever one of these preponderates greatly, or is wanting altogether,
+the novel falls below her usual standard.</p>
+
+<p>For in several qualities reckoned important her work is open to
+criticism. "Plan, or the want of it," she acknowledges, with a sort of
+complacency, "has always been my weak point." Thus whilst in many of her
+compositions, especially the shorter novels, the construction leaves
+little to be desired, <i>Consuelo</i> is only one among many instances in
+which all ordinary rules of symmetry and proportion are set at naught.
+Sometimes the leading idea assumed naturally and easily a perfect form;
+if simple, as in <i>André</i> and her pastorals, it usually did so; but if
+complex, she troubled herself little over the task of symmetrical
+arrangement. M. Maxime Du Camp reports that she said to him: "When I
+begin a novel I have no plan; it arranges itself whilst I write, and
+becomes what it may." This fault shocks less in England, where genius is
+apt to rebel against the restrictions of form, and such irregularity has
+been consecrated, so to speak, by the masterpieces of the greatest among
+our imaginative writers. And even the more precise criticism of her
+countrymen has owned that this carelessness works by no means entirely
+to her disadvantage. In fictions more faultless as literary compositions
+the reader, whilst struck with admiration for the art with which the
+whole is put together, is apt to lose something of the illusion&mdash;the
+impression of nature and conviction. The faults of no writer can be more
+truly defined as the <i>défauts de ses qualités</i> than those of George
+Sand. Shorn of her spontaneity, she would indeed be shorn of her
+strength. We are carried along by the pleasant, easy stream of her
+musical eloquence, as by an orator who knows so well how to draw our
+attention that we forget to find him too long. Her stories may be read
+rapidly, but to be enjoyed should be read through. Dipped into and their
+parts taken without reference to the whole, they can afford
+comparatively but little pleasure.</p>
+
+<p>In translation no novelist loses more than George Sand,&mdash;who has so much
+to lose! The qualities sacrificed, though almost intangible, are
+essential to the force of her charm. The cement is taken away and the
+fabric coheres imperfectly; and whilst the beauties of her manner are
+blurred, its blemishes appear increased; the lengthiness, over-emphasis
+of expression, questionable taste of certain passages, become more
+marked. Although nevertheless many of her tales remain pleasant reading,
+they suffer as much as translated poetry, and only a very inadequate
+impression of her art as a novelist can be arrived at from any rendering
+of it in a foreign tongue.</p>
+
+<p>Her dialogue has neither brilliancy nor variety. Her characters
+characterize themselves by the sentiments they express; their manner of
+expression is somewhat uniform&mdash;it is the manner of George Sand; and
+although pleasant humor and good-natured fun abound in her pages, these
+owe none of their attractions to witty sayings, being curiously bare of
+a <i>bon mot</i> or an epigram.</p>
+
+<p>But we find there the rarer merits of a poetic imagination, a vast
+comprehension of nature, admirable insight into human character and
+power of clear analysis; a whole science of sentiment and art of
+narrative, and a charm of narrative style that soothes the nerves like
+music.</p>
+
+<p>She has given us a long gallery of portraits of extraordinary variety.
+It is true that her creations for the most part affect us rather as
+masterly portraits than as living, walking men and women. This is
+probably owing to the above-noted sameness of style of dialogue, and the
+absence generally of the dramatic quality in her novels. On the other
+hand they are extremely picturesque, in the highest sense, abounding in
+scenes and figures which, without inviting to the direct illustration
+they are too vivid to need, are full of suggestions to the artist. The
+description in <i>Teverino</i> of Madeleine, the bird-charmer, kneeling at
+prayer in the rude mountain chapel, or outside on the rocks, exercising
+her natural magic over her feathered friends; in <i>Jeanne</i>, of the
+shepherd-girl discovered asleep on the Druidical stones; the noon-day
+rest of the rustic fishing-party in <i>Valentine</i>&mdash;Benedict seated on the
+felled ash-tree that bridges the stream, Athenaïs gathering
+field-flowers on the banks, Louise flinging leaves into the current,
+Valentine reclining dreamily among the tall river-reeds,&mdash;are a few
+examples taken at random, which it would be easy to multiply <i>ad
+infinitum</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Any classification of her works in order of time that professes to show
+a progressive change of style, a period of super-excellence or of
+distinct decadence, seems to us somewhat fanciful. From <i>Indiana</i> and
+its immediate successors, denounced by so many as fraught with peril to
+the morals of her nation, down to <i>Nanon</i> (1872), which might certainly
+carry off the prize of virtue in a competition in any country, George
+Sand can never be said to have entirely abandoned one "manner" for
+another, or for any length of time to have risen above or sunk below a
+certain level of excellence. <i>André</i>, extolled by her latest critics as
+"a delicious eclogue of the fields," was contemporary with the
+bombastic, false Byronism of <i>Jacques</i>; the feeble narrative of <i>La Mare
+au Diable</i> with the passion-introspection of <i>Lucrezia Floriani</i>. The
+ever-popular <i>Consuelo</i> immediately succeeded the feeble <i>Compagnon du
+Tour de France</i>. <i>La Marquise</i>, written in the first year of her
+literary life, shows a power of projection out of herself, and of
+delicate analysis, hardly to be surpassed; but <i>Francia</i>, of forty
+years' later date, is an equally perfect study. From the time of
+<i>Indiana</i> onwards she continued to produce at the rate of about two
+novels a year; and at intervals, rare intervals, the product was a
+failure. But we shall find her when approaching seventy still writing
+on, without a trace of the weakness of old age.</p>
+
+<p>The charge of "unreality" so commonly brought against her novels it may
+be well briefly to examine. Such little fantasy-pieces in Hoffmann's
+manner as <i>Le Château des Désertes</i>, <i>Teverino</i>, and others, making no
+pretense to be exact studies of nature, cannot fairly be censured on
+this head. Like fairy tales they have a place of their own in art. One
+of the prettiest of these is <i>Les Dames Vertes</i>, in which the fable
+seems to lead us over the borders of the supernatural; but the secret of
+the mystification, well kept till the last, is itself so pleasing and
+original that the reader has no disappointing sense as of having had a
+hoax played upon his imagination.</p>
+
+<p>In character drawing no one can, on occasion, be a more uncompromising
+realist than George Sand. André, Horace, Laurent in <i>Elle et Lui</i>,
+Pauline, Corilla, Alida in <i>Valvèdre</i>, might be cited as examples. But
+her theory was unquestionably not the theory which guides the modern
+school of novel writers. She wrote, she states explicitly, for those
+"who desire to find in a novel a sort of ideal life." She made this her
+aim, but without depreciation of the widely different aims of other
+authors. "You paint mankind as they are," she said to Balzac; "I, as
+they ought to be, or might become. You write the comedy of humanity. I
+should like to write the eclogue, the poem, the romance of humanity."
+She has been taxed with flattering nature and human nature because her
+love of beauty&mdash;defined by her as the highest expression of
+truth&mdash;dictated her choice of subjects. An artist who paints roses
+paints from reality as entirely as he who paints mud. Her principle was
+to choose among realities those which seemed best worth painting.</p>
+
+<p>The amount of idealization in her peasant sketches was naturally
+over-estimated by those who, never having studied the class, could not
+conceive of a peasant except conventionally, as a drunken boor. The very
+just portrait of Cecilia Boccaferri, the conscientious but obscure
+artist in <i>Le Château des Désertes</i>, might seem over-flattered to such
+as imagine that all opera-singers must be persons of riotous living. The
+types she prefers to present, if exceptional, are not impossible or
+non-existent. An absolutely faultless heroine, such as Consuelo, she
+seldom attempts to bring before us; an ideal hero; never.</p>
+
+<p>Further, even when the idealism is greatest the essence is true. Her
+most fanciful conceptions, most improbable combinations, seem more
+natural than do every-day scenes and characters treated by inferior
+artists. This is only partly due to the inimitable little touches of
+nature that renew the impression of reality at every page. Her
+imagination modified her material, but only in order the more vividly to
+illustrate truths positive and everlasting. So did Shakespeare when he
+drew Prospero and Miranda, Caliban and Ariel. Art, as regarded by George
+Sand, is a search for ideal truth rather than a study of positive
+reality. This principle determined the spirit of her romances. She was
+the highest in her <i>genre</i>; let the world decide which <i>genre</i> is the
+highest.</p>
+
+<p>When, after the publication of <i>Indiana</i>, <i>Valentine</i>, <i>Lélia</i> and
+<i>Jacques</i>, the moral tendency of her works was so sharply attacked, it
+was contended on her behalf by some friendly critics that art and
+social morality have no necessary connection&mdash;a line of defense she
+would have been the last to take up for herself. In the present day her
+judges complain rather of her incessant moralizing, and on the whole
+with more reason. She indignantly denied that her novels had the evil
+tendencies imputed to them. Certainly the supposition of the
+antagonistic spirit of her writings to Christianity and marriage
+vanishes in proportion to the reader's acquaintance with her works. But
+against certain doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church
+which she believed to be pernicious in their influence, she from the
+first declared war, and by her frank audacity made bitter enemies. M.
+Renan relates that when he was a boy of fifteen his ecclesiastical
+superiors showed him George Sand, emblematically portrayed for the
+admonition of the youth under their care, as a woman in black trampling
+on a cross! Now, it is not merely that her own faith was eminently
+Christian in character, and that the Christian ideal seemed to her the
+most perfect that has yet presented itself to the mind of man; but if
+unable to accept for herself the doctrine of revelation as commonly
+interpreted, she is utterly without the aggressiveness of spirit, the
+petty flippancy, that often betray the intellectual bigot under the
+banner of free thought. She was too large-minded to incline to ridicule
+the serious convictions of earnest seekers for truth, and she respected
+all sincerity of belief&mdash;all faith that produced beneficence in action.</p>
+
+<p>The alleged hostility of her romances to marriage resumes itself into a
+declared hostility to the conventional French system of match-making.
+Much that she was condemned for venturing to put forward we should
+simply take for granted in England, where&mdash;whichever system work the
+best in practice&mdash;to the strictest Philistine's ideas of propriety there
+is nothing unbecoming in a love-match. The aim and end of true love in
+her stories is always marriage, whether it be the simple attachment of
+Germain, the field-laborer, for the rustic maiden of his choice, the
+romantic predilection of the rich young widow in <i>Pierre qui roule</i> for
+the handsome actor Laurence, or the worship of Count Albert for the
+<i>cantatrice</i> Consuelo. Her ideal of marriage was, no doubt, a high one,
+"the indissoluble attachment of two hearts fired with a like love;" a
+love "great, noble, beautiful, voluntary, eternal." Among French
+novelists she should rather be noted for the extremely small proportion
+of her numerous romances that have domestic infelicity for a theme.</p>
+
+<p>Her remark that their real offense was that they were a great deal too
+moral for some of their critics, hit home, inasmuch as in her attack on
+the ordinary marriage system of France she struck directly at the
+fashionable immorality which is its direct result, and which she saw,
+both in life and in literature, pass free of censure. It is the selfish
+intriguer who meets with least mercy in her pages, and who is there held
+up, not only to dislike, but to ridicule.</p>
+
+<p>Persons perplexed by the fact that particular novels of hers which,
+judged by certain theories, ought to be morally hurtful, do yet produce
+a very different effect, have accounted for it in different ways. One
+explains it by saying that if there is poison on one page there is
+always the antidote on the next. Another observes that a certain
+morality of misfortune is never absent from her fictions. In other
+words, she nowhere presents us with the spectacle of real happiness
+reaped at the expense of a violation of conscience. And in the rare
+cases where the purpose of the novel seems questionable, she defeats her
+own end. For truth always preponderates over error in her conceptions,
+and the result is a moral effect.</p>
+
+<p>The want of delicacy that not unfrequently disfigures her pages and
+offends us, offends also as an artistic fault. As a fact it is taste
+rather than conscience that she is thus apt to shock. For the almost
+passing coarseness of expression or thought is nothing more than the
+overflow, the negligent frankness of a rich and active but healthy
+nature, not the deliberate obliquity of a corrupt fancy or perverted
+mind. Such unreserve, unfortunately, has too commonly been the
+transgression of writers of superabundant energy. But her sins are
+against outward decorum rather than against the principles upon which
+the rules of decorum are based. No one was better capable of
+appreciating and indicating with fine touches, delicacy and niceties of
+taste and feeling in others. Her sympathy with such sensitiveness is a
+corrective that should render harmless what might vitiate taste if that
+qualification were absent. And her stories, though including a very few
+instances where the subject chosen seems to most English minds too
+repulsive to admit of possible redemption, and the frequent incidental
+introduction of situations and frank discussion of topics inadmissible
+in English fiction of that period&mdash;an honorable distinction it seems in
+some danger of losing in the present&mdash;can hardly be censured from the
+French standpoint, as fair critics now admit. It is inconceivable that a
+public could be demoralized by <i>Indiana</i> and <i>Valentine</i>, at a time when
+no subject seemed wicked and morbid enough to satisfy popular taste.
+The art of George Sand in the main was sound and healthy, and in flat
+opposition to the excesses both of the ultra-romantic and ultra-realist
+schools.</p>
+
+<p>Clear-sighted critics, perceiving that the impression produced by her
+works is not one to induce men and women to defy the laws of their
+country, nor likely to undermine their religious faith, have gone more
+to the heart of the matter. The dangerous tendency is more insidious,
+they say, and more general. Virtue, and not vice, is made attractive in
+her books; but it is an easy virtue, attained without self-conquest. All
+her characters, good and bad, act alike from impulse. Those who seek
+virtue seek pleasure in so doing, and her philosophy of life seems to be
+that people should do as they like. The morality she commends to our
+sympathy and admiration is a morality of instinct and emotion, not of
+reason and principle. Self-renunciation, immolation of desire in
+obedience to accepted precept, is ignored. Sentiment is supreme. Duty,
+as a motive power, is set aside.</p>
+
+<p>George Sand, who as a writer from first to last appeared as a crusader
+against the evil, injustice and vice that darken the world, did
+undoubtedly choose rather to speak out of her heart to our hearts, than
+out of her head to our heads, and considered moreover that such was the
+more effectual way. Her idea of virtue lay not in the curbing of evil
+instincts, but in their conversion or modification by the evoking of
+good impulses, that "guiding and intensifying of our emotions by a new
+ideal" which has been called the great work of Christianity.</p>
+
+<p>It is not&mdash;or not in the first place&mdash;that people should do as they
+like, but that they should like to do right; and further, that human
+nature in that ideal life the sentiment of which pervades her works, and
+in which she saw "no other than the normal life as we are called to know
+it," does not desire what is hurtful to it.</p>
+
+<p>The goodness that consists in doing right or refraining from doing wrong
+reluctantly, or in obedience to prescribed rules, or from mechanical
+habit, had for her no life or charm. The object to be striven for should
+be nothing less than the "perfect harmony of inward desire and outward
+obligation."</p>
+
+<p>Virtue should be chosen, though we seem to sacrifice happiness; but that
+the two are in the beginning identical, that, as expressed by Mr.
+Herbert Spencer, "whether perfection of nature, virtuousness of action,
+or rectitude of motive, be assigned as the proper aim, the definition of
+perfection, virtue, rectitude, brings us down to happiness experienced
+in some form, at some time, by some person as the fundamental idea," is
+a philosophic truth of which a large <i>aperçu</i> is observable in the works
+of George Sand. Self-sacrifice should spring from direct desire,
+altruism be spontaneous&mdash;a need&mdash;becoming a second and better nature;
+not won by painful effort, but through the larger development of the
+principle of sympathy. Strong in her own immense power of sympathy, she
+applied herself to the task of awakening and extending such sympathies
+in others. This she does by the creation of agreeable, interesting and
+noble types, such as may put us out of conceit with what is mean and
+base. Goodness, as understood and portrayed by her, must recommend
+itself not only to the judgment but to the heart. She worked to
+popularize high sentiments, and to give shape and reality to vague ideas
+of human excellence. Her idea of virtue as a motive, not a restraint,
+not the controlling of low and evil desires, but the precluding of all
+temptations to yield to these, by the calling out of stronger, higher
+desires, so far from being a low one, is indeed the very noblest; yet
+not on that account a chimera to those who hold, like her, to the
+conviction that "what now characterizes the exceptionally high may be
+expected eventually to characterize all. For that which the highest
+human nature is capable of is within the reach of human nature at
+large." "We gravitate towards the ideal," she writes, "and this
+gravitation is infinite, as is the ideal itself." And her place remains
+among those few great intelligences who can be said to have given
+humanity an appreciable impulse in the direction of progress.</p>
+
+
+
+<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h3>
+
+<p class="chap">LATER YEARS.</p>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">When</span>, in 1869, Madame Sand was applied to by M. Louis Ulbach&mdash;a literary
+friend who proposed to write her biography&mdash;for some account of her life
+from that time onwards where her memoirs break off, she replied, in a
+letter now appended to those memoirs, as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>For the last five-and-twenty years there is nothing more that is of
+interest. It is old age, very quiet and very happy, <i>en famille</i>,
+crossed by sorrows entirely personal in their nature&mdash;deaths,
+defections, and then the general state of affairs in which we have
+suffered, you and I, from the same causes. My time is spent in
+amusing the children, doing a little botany, long walks in
+summer&mdash;I am still a first-rate pedestrian&mdash;and writing novels,
+when I can secure two hours in the daytime and two in the evening.
+I write easily and with pleasure. This is my recreation, for my
+correspondence is numerous, and there lies work indeed! If one had
+none but one's friends to write to! But how many requests, some
+touching, some impertinent! Whenever there is anything I can do, I
+reply. Those for whom I can do nothing I do not answer. Some
+deserve that one should try, even with small hope of succeeding.
+Then one must answer that one will try. All this, with private
+affairs to which one must really give attention now and then, makes
+some ten letters a day.</p></div>
+
+<p>The old age of George Sand, brighter, fuller and more active than the
+youth of most men and women, was in itself a most signal proof of the
+stability and worth of her mental organization. Life, which deteriorates
+a frail character, told with a perfecting and elevating power upon hers.</p>
+
+<p>Of her earlier personal beauty few traces remained after middle age
+except a depth of expression in her eyes, the features having become
+thickened by age. Some among those who, like Dickens, first saw her in
+her later years and still looked for the semblance of a heroine of
+romance, failed to find the muse Lélia of their imaginations under the
+guise of a middle-aged <i>bourgeoise</i>. But such impressions were
+superficial. Her portrait in black and white by Couture, engraved by
+Manceau, seems to reconcile these apparent discrepancies. Beauty is not
+here, but the face is so powerful and comprehensive that we perceive
+there at once the mirror of a mind capable of embracing both the prose
+and the poetry of life; and by many this portrait is preferred to the
+earlier likenesses.</p>
+
+<p>Nor is there anything more remarkable in her correspondence than the
+extremely interesting series of letters, extending from February, 1863,
+to within three months of her death in 1876, and addressed to Gustave
+Flaubert, at this period her familiar friend. The intercourse of two
+minds of so different an intellectual and moral order as those of the
+authors of <i>Consuelo</i> and of <i>Madame Bovary</i> offers to all a curious
+study. To the admirers of George Sand these letters are invaluable, both
+from a literary point of view and as a record of her inner life from
+that time onwards, when, as expressed by herself, she resolutely buried
+youth, and owned herself the gainer by an increasing calm within. The
+secret of her future happiness she found in living for her children and
+her friends. That she retained her zest for intellectual pleasures she
+ascribed to the very fact that she never allowed herself to be absorbed
+for long in these and in herself.</p>
+
+<p>"Artists are spoilt children," she writes to Flaubert, "and the best of
+them are great egoists. You tell me I love them too well; I love them as
+I love woods and fields, all things, all beings that I know a little and
+make my constant study. In the midst of it all I pursue my calling; and
+how I love that calling of mine, and all that nourishes and renovates
+it!"</p>
+
+<p>We must now take up the thread of outward events again, which we have
+slightly anticipated.</p>
+
+<p>In the autumn of 1860 Madame Sand had a severe attack of typhoid fever.
+She was then on the point of beginning her little tale, <i>La Famille de
+Germandre</i>; "<i>le roman de ma fièvre</i>," she playfully terms it
+afterwards, when retracing the circumstances in a letter to her old
+friend François Rollinat:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The day before that upon which I was suddenly taken very seriously
+ill, I had felt quite well. I had scribbled the beginning of a
+novel; I had placed all my personages; I knew them thoroughly; I
+knew their situations in the world, their characters, tendencies,
+ideas, relations to each other. I saw their faces. All that
+remained to be known was what they were going to do, and I did not
+trouble my head about that, having time to think it over to-morrow.</p></div>
+
+<p>Struck down on the morrow, she was for many days in a precarious
+condition; and in the confused fancies of fever found herself wandering
+with <i>La Famille de Germandre</i> about the country, alighting in ruined
+castles, and encountering the most whimsical adventures in flood and
+field.</p>
+
+<p>It would have been an easy death, she remarked afterwards, had she died
+then, as she might, in her dream; but she came to herself to find her
+son and friends in such anxiety on her account, so overjoyed at her
+convalescence, that she could not but be glad of the life that was given
+back to her. Early in 1861 we find her recruiting her forces by a stay
+at Tamaris, near Toulon, completing the novel interrupted by illness;
+resuming her long walks and botanic studies, and thoroughly enjoying the
+sense of returning vital powers.</p>
+
+<p>She stood always in great dread of the idea of possibly losing her
+activity as she advanced in years. The infirmities of old age, however,
+she was happily to be spared, preserving her energy and mental
+faculties, as will be seen, till just before her death. But though she
+was restored to health and strength, this illness seems to have left its
+traces on her constitution.</p>
+
+<p>Her son's marriage to Mdlle. Calamatta, spoken of by Madame Sand as a
+heart's desire of hers at length fulfilled, took place in 1862, not many
+months after his return from half a year of travel in Africa and
+America, in the company of Prince Napoleon. The event proved a fresh
+source of the purest happiness to her, and was not to separate her from
+her son. The young people settled at Nohant, which remained her
+head-quarters. There a few years later we find her residing almost
+exclusively, except when called by matters of business to her
+<i>pied-à-terre</i> in Paris, where she never lingered long. To the two
+little grand-daughters, Aurore and Gabrielle, whom she saw spring up in
+her home, she became passionately devoted. Most of her compositions
+henceforward are dated from Nohant, where, indeed, more than fifty years
+of her life were spent.</p>
+
+<p>As regards decorum of expression and temperance of sentiments, the later
+novels of George Sand have earned more praise than censure; but some
+readers may feel that in fundamental questions of taste the comparison
+between them and their forerunners is not always entirely to their
+advantage. The fervor of youth has a certain purifying power to redeem
+from offense matter, even though over-frankly treated, which becomes
+disagreeable in cold analysis, however sober the wording, and clear and
+admirable the moral pointed.</p>
+
+<p><i>Mademoiselle La Quintinie</i>, which appeared in 1863, was suggested by M.
+Octave Feuillet's <i>Sibille</i>. The point of M. Feuillet's novel is, that
+Sibille, an ardent Catholic, stifles her love, and renounces her lover
+on account of his heterodox opinions. Madame Sand gives us the
+reverse&mdash;a heroine who is reflectively rather than mystically inclined,
+and whose lover by degrees succeeds in effecting her conversion to his
+more liberal views. Here, as elsewhere, the author's mind shows a
+sympathetic comprehension of the standpoint of enlightened Protestantism
+curiously rare among those who, like herself, have renounced Romanism
+for the pursuit of free thought and speculation. But even those who
+prefer the <i>dénoûment</i> of George Sand's novel to that of M. Feuillet's
+will not rank <i>Mademoiselle La Quintinie</i> very high among the author's
+productions. It is colorless, and artistically weak, however
+controversially strong.</p>
+
+<p>Madame Sand, according to her own reckoning in 1869, had made at least
+£40,000 by her writings. Out of this she had saved no fortune. She had
+always preferred to live from day to day on the proceeds of her work,
+regulating her expenses accordingly, trusting her brain to answer to any
+emergency and bring her out of the periodical financial crises in which
+the uncertainty of literary gains and the liberality of her expenditure
+involved her. She continued fond of travelling, especially of exploring
+the nooks and corners of France, felt by her to be less well known than
+they deserve, and fully as picturesque as the spots tourists go far to
+visit. Here she sought fresh frames for her novels. "If I have only
+three words to say about a place," she tells us, "I like to be able to
+refer to it in my memory so as to make as few mistakes as possible."</p>
+
+<p>In January, 1869, we find her writing of herself in a playful strain to
+her friend Flaubert:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The individual called George Sand is quite well, enjoying the
+marvelous winter now reigning in Berry, gathering flowers, taking
+note of interesting botanic anomalies, stitching at dresses and
+mantles for her daughter-in-law, costumes for the marionettes,
+dressing dolls, reading music, but, above all, spending hours with
+little Aurore, who is a wonderful child. There is not a being on
+earth more tranquil and happier in his home than this old
+troubadour retired from business, now and then singing his little
+song to the moon, singing well or ill he does not particularly
+care, so long as he gives the <i>motif</i> that is running in his
+head.... He is happy, for he is at peace, and can find amusement in
+everything.</p></div>
+
+<p>M. Plauchut, another literary friend and a visitor at Nohant during this
+last decade of her lifetime, gives a picture of the order of her day; it
+is simplicity itself.</p>
+
+<p>Nine o'clock, in summer and in winter alike, was her hour of waking.
+Letters and newspapers would then occupy her until noon, when she came
+down to join the family <i>déjeûner</i>. Afterwards she would stroll for an
+hour in the garden and the wood, visiting and tending her favorite
+plants and flowers. At two o'clock she would come indoors to give a
+lesson to her grandchildren in the library, or work there on her own
+account, undistracted by the romps around her. Dinner at six was
+followed by a short evening walk, after which she played with the
+children, or set them dancing indoors. She liked to sit at the piano,
+playing over to herself bits of music by her favorite Mozart, or old
+Spanish and Berrichon airs. After a game of dominoes or cards she would
+still sit up so late, occupying herself with water-color painting or
+otherwise, that sometimes her son was obliged to take away the lights.
+These long evenings, the same writer bears witness, sometimes afforded
+rare opportunities of hearing Madam Sand talk of the events and the men
+of her time. In the absolute quiet of the country, among a small circle
+of responsive minds, she, so silent otherwise, became expansive. "Those
+who have never heard George Sand at such hours," he concludes, "have
+never known her. She spoke well, with great elevation of ideas, charming
+eloquence, and a spirit of infinite indulgence." When at length she
+retired, it was to write on until the morning hours according to her old
+habit, only relinquished when her health made this imperative.</p>
+
+<p>She had allowed her son and her daughter-in-law to take the cares of
+household management off her hands. This left her free, as she
+expressed it, to be a child again, to hold aloof from things immediate
+and transitory, reserving her thoughts and contemplations for what is
+general and eternal. She found a poet's pleasure in abstracting herself
+from human life, saying: "There are hours when I escape from myself,
+when I live in a plant, when I feel myself grass, a bird, a tree-top, a
+cloud, a running stream." Shaking off, as it were, the sense of
+personality, she felt more freely and fully the sense of kinship with
+the life and soul of the universe.</p>
+
+<p>It was her habit every evening to sum up in a few lines the impressions
+of the day, and this journal, for the conspicuous absence of incident in
+its pages, she compares to the log-book of a ship lying at anchor. But
+one terrible and little anticipated break in its tranquil monotony was
+yet to come.</p>
+
+<p>George Sand lived to see her country pass through every imaginable
+political experience. Born before the First Republic had expired, she
+had witnessed the First Empire, the restored Monarchy, the Revolution of
+1830, the reign of Louis Philippe, the convulsions of 1848, the
+presidency of Louis Bonaparte, and the Second Empire. She was still to
+see and outlive its fall, the Franco-German War, the Commune, and to
+die, as she was born, under a republic.</p>
+
+<p>To some of her friends who had reproached her with showing too much
+indulgence for the state of things under Imperial rule, she replied that
+the only change in her was that she had acquired more patience in
+proportion as more was required. The <i>régime</i> she condemned&mdash;and amid
+apparent prosperity had foretold the corrupting influence on the nation
+of the established ideal of frivolity, and that a crash of some kind
+must ensue. Her judgment on the Emperor, after his fall, is worth
+noting, if only because it is dispassionate. Since his elevation to the
+Imperial dignity she had lost all old illusions as to his public
+intentions. With regard to these, on the occasion of her interviews with
+him at the Elysée, he had completely deceived her, and designedly, she
+had at first thought. Nor had she concealed her disgust.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I left Paris, and did not come to an appointment he had offered me.
+They did not tell me "The King might have had to wait!" but they
+wrote "The Emperor waited." However, I continued to write to him,
+whenever I saw hopes of saving some victim, to ponder his answers
+and watch his actions; and I became convinced that he did not
+intentionally impose upon any one. He imposed on himself and on
+everybody else.... In private life he had genuine qualities. I
+happened to see in him a side that was really generous and sincere.
+His dream of grandeur for France was not that of a sound mind, but
+neither of an ordinary mind. Really France would have sunk too low
+if she had submitted for twenty years to the supremacy of a
+<i>crétin</i>, working only for himself. One would then have to give her
+up in despair for ever and ever. The truth is that she mistook a
+meteor for a star, a silent dreamer for a man of depth. Then seeing
+him sink under disasters he ought to have foreseen, she took him
+for a coward.</p></div>
+
+<p>George Sand's <i>Journal d'un Voyageur pendant la guerre</i> has a peculiar
+and painful interest. It is merely a note-book of passing impressions
+from September, 1870, to January, 1871; but its pages give a most
+striking picture of those effects of war which have no place in military
+annals.</p>
+
+<p>The army disasters of the autumn were preceded by natural calamities of
+great severity. The heat of the summer in Berry had been tremendous, and
+Madame Sand describes the havoc as unprecedented in her experience&mdash;the
+flowers and grass killed, the leaves scorched and yellowed, the baked
+earth under foot literally cracking in many places; no water, no hay, no
+harvest, but destructive cattle-plague, forest-fires driving scared
+wolves to seek refuge in the courtyard of Nohant itself&mdash;the remnant of
+corn spared by the sun, ruined by hail-storms. She and all her family
+had suffered from the unhealthiness of the season. Thus the political
+catastrophe found her already weakened by anxiety and fatigue, and
+feeling greatly the effort to set to work again. Finally, an outbreak of
+malignant small-pox in the village forced her to take her little
+grandchildren and their mother from Nohant out of reach of the
+infection. September and October were passed at or in the neighborhood
+of Boussac, a small town some thirty miles off. Sedan was over, and the
+worst had begun; the protracted suspense, the long agony of hope.</p>
+
+<p>Those suffered most perhaps who, like herself, had to wait in enforced
+inaction, amid the awful dead calm that reigned in the provinces, yet
+forbidden to forget their affliction for a moment. The peasant was gone
+from the land&mdash;only the old and infirm were left to look after the
+flocks, to till and sow the field. Madame Sand notes, and with a kind of
+envy, the stolid patience and industry, the inextinguishable confidence,
+of poor old Jacques Bonhomme when things are at the worst. "He knows
+that in one way or another it is he who will have to pay the expenses of
+the war; he knows next winter will be a season of misery and want, but
+he believes in the spring"&mdash;in the bounty of nature to repair war's
+ravages.</p>
+
+<p>During this time of unimaginable trouble some of the strongest minds
+were unhinged. It is no small honor to George Sand that hers should
+have preserved its balance. The pages of this journal are distinguished
+throughout by a wonderful calm of judgment and an equitable tone&mdash;not
+the calm of indifference, but of a broad and penetrating intelligence,
+no longer to be blinded by the wild excitement and passions of the
+moment, or exalted by childish hopes one hour to be thrust into the
+madness of despair the next.</p>
+
+<p>Although tempted now and then to regret that she had recovered from her
+illness ten years ago, surviving but to witness the abasement of France,
+she was not, like others, panic-struck at the prospect of invasion, as
+though this meant the end of their country. "It will pass like a squall
+over a lake," she said.</p>
+
+<p>But it was a time when they could be sure of nothing except of their
+distress. The telegraph wires were cut; rumors of good news they feared
+to believe would be succeeded by tales of horror they feared to
+discredit. Tidings would come that three hundred thousand of the enemy
+had been disposed of in a single engagement and King William taken
+prisoner; then of fatal catastrophes befallen to private
+friends&mdash;stories which often proved equally unfounded.</p>
+
+<p>She had friends shut up in Paris of whom she knew not whether they were
+alive or dead. The strain of anxiety and painful excitement made sleep
+impossible to her except in the last extremity of fatigue. Yet she had
+her little grandchildren to care for; and when they came around her,
+clamoring for the fairy tales she was used to supply, she contented them
+as well as she could and gave them their lessons as usual, anxious to
+keep them from realizing the sadness the causes of which they were too
+young to understand.</p>
+
+<p>It was the first time that she had known a distress that forbade her to
+find a solace in nature. She describes how one day, walking out with
+some friends and following the course of the river Tarde, she had half
+abandoned herself to the enjoyment of the scene&mdash;the cascade, the
+dragon-flies skimming the surface, the purple scabious flowers, the
+goats clambering on the boulders of rock that strewed the borders and
+bed of the stream&mdash;when one of the party remarks: "Here's a retreat
+pretty well fortified against the Prussians."</p>
+
+<p>And the present, forgotten for an instant in reverie, came back upon her
+with a shock.</p>
+
+<p>Letters in that district took three or four days to travel thirty miles.
+Newspapers were rarely to be procured; and when procured, made up of
+contradictions, wild suggestions, and the pretentious speeches of
+national leaders, meant to be reassuring, but marked by a vagueness and
+violence from which Madame Sand rightly augured ill.</p>
+
+<p>The red-letter days were those that brought communications from their
+friends in Paris by the aerial post. On October 11, two balloons,
+respectively called "George Sand" and the "Armand Barbès," left the
+capital. "My name," she remarks, "did not bring good luck to the
+first&mdash;which suffered injuries and descended with difficulty, yet
+rescued the Americans who had gone up in it." The "Barbès" had a
+smoother but a more famous flight; alighting and depositing M. Gambetta
+safely at Tours.</p>
+
+<p>As the autumn advanced Madame Sand and her family were enabled to return
+to Nohant. But what a return was that! The enemy were quartered within
+forty miles, at Issoudun; the fugitives thence were continually seen
+passing, carrying off their children, their furniture and their
+merchandise to places of security. Already the enemy's guns were said to
+have been heard at La Châtre. Madame Sand walked in her garden daily
+among her marigolds, snapdragon and ranunculus, making curious
+speculations as to what might be in store for herself and her
+possessions. She remarks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>You get accustomed to it, even though you have not the consolation
+of being able to offer the slightest resistance.... I look at my
+garden, I dine, I play with the children, whilst waiting in
+expectation of seeing the trees felled roots upwards; of getting no
+more bread to eat, and of having to carry my grandchildren off on
+my shoulders; for the horses have all been requisitioned. I work,
+expecting my scrawls to light the pipes of the Prussians.</p></div>
+
+<p>But the enemy, though so near, never passed the boundaries of the "Black
+Valley." The department of the Indre remained uninvaded, though
+compassed on all sides by the foreign army; and George Sand was able to
+say afterwards that she at least had never seen a Prussian soldier.</p>
+
+<p>A sad Christmas was passed. On the last night of 1870 a meeting of
+friends at Nohant broke up with the parting words, "All is lost!"</p>
+
+<p>"The execrable year is out," writes Madame Sand, "but to all appearances
+we are entering upon a worse."</p>
+
+<p>On the 15th of January, 1871, her little drama <i>François le Champi</i>,
+first represented in the troublous months of 1849, was acted in Paris
+for the benefit of an ambulance. She notes the singular fate of this
+piece to be reproduced in time of bombardment. A pastoral!</p>
+
+<p>The worst strain of suspense ended January 29, with the capitulation of
+Paris. Here the <i>Journal d'un Voyageur</i> breaks off. It would be sad
+indeed had her life, like that of more than one of her compeers, closed
+then over France in mourning. Although it was impossible but that such
+an ordeal must have impaired her strength, she outlived the war's
+ending, and the horrible social crisis which she had foreseen must
+succeed the political one. Happier than Prosper Mérimée, than Alexandre
+Dumas, and others, she saw the dawn of a new era of prosperity for her
+country, whose vital forces, as she had also foretold, were to prevail
+in the end over successive ills&mdash;the enervation of corruption, of
+military disaster, and the "orgie of pretended renovators" at home, that
+signalized the first months of peace abroad.</p>
+
+<p>In January, 1872, we again find her writing cheerily to Flaubert:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Mustn't be ill, mustn't be cross, my old troubadour. Say that
+France is mad, humanity stupid, and that we are unfinished animals
+every one of us, you must love on all the same, yourself, your
+race, above all, your friends. I have my sad hours. I look at my
+blossoms, those two little girls smiling as ever, their charming
+mother, and my good, hard-working son, whom the end of the world
+will find hunting, cataloguing, doing his daily task, and yet as
+merry as Punch in his rare leisure moments.</p></div>
+
+<p>In a later letter she writes in a more serious strain:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>I do not say that humanity is on the road to the heights; I believe
+it in spite of all, but I do not argue about it, which is useless,
+for every one judges according to his own eyesight, and the general
+outlook at the present moment is ugly and poor. Besides, I do not
+need to be assured of the salvation of our planet and its
+inhabitants in order to believe in the necessity of the good and
+the beautiful; if our planet departs from this law it will perish;
+if its inhabitants discard it they will be destroyed. As for me, I
+wish to hold firm till my last breath, not with the certainty or
+the demand to find a "good place" elsewhere, but because my sole
+pleasure is to maintain myself and mine in the upward way.</p></div>
+
+<p>The last five years of her life saw her pen in full activity. In the
+<i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, <i>Malgrétout</i>, the novel of 1870, was succeeded
+by <i>Flamarande</i> and <i>Les Deux Frères</i>&mdash;compositions executed with
+unflagging energy and animation of style; <i>La Tour de Percemont</i>, and a
+series of graceful fairy-stories entitled <i>Contes d'une grand'mère</i>.
+<i>Nanon</i> (1872), a rustic romance of the First Revolution, is a highly
+remarkable little work, possibly suggested by her recent experiences of
+the effect of public disturbances on remote country places.</p>
+
+<p>She was also a constant contributor to the newspaper <i>Le Temps</i>. A
+critical notice by her hand of M. Renan's <i>Dialogues et Fragments
+Philosophiques</i>, reprinted from those columns, bears date May, 1876,
+immediately before she succumbed to the illness which in a few days was
+to cut short her life.</p>
+
+<p>At the beginning of this year she had written on this subject to
+Flaubert, in the brave spirit she would fain impart to her weaker
+brethren:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Life is perhaps eternal, and work in consequence eternal. If so,
+let us finish our march bravely. If otherwise, if the individual
+perish utterly, let us have the honor of having done our task. That
+is duty, for our only obvious duties are to ourselves and our
+fellow-creatures. What we destroy in ourselves we destroy in them.
+Our abasement abases them; our falls drag them down; we owe to them
+to stand fast, to save them from falling. The desire to die early
+is a weakness, as is the desire to live long.</p></div>
+
+<p>George Sand, like most persons of an exceptional constitution, had
+little faith in the efficacy for herself of medical science. She was
+persuaded that the prescribed remedies did her more harm than good, and
+on more than one occasion, when her health had caused her children
+uneasiness, they had had to resort to an affectionate <i>ruse</i> to induce
+her to take advice. Her habit of disregarding physical ailments,
+fighting against them as a weakness, and working on in their despite,
+led her to neglect for too long failing health that should have been
+attended to. During the whole of May, 1876, Madame Sand, though
+suffering from real illness, continued to join in the household routine
+and to proceed with her literary work as usual. Not till the last days
+of the month did she, unable any longer to make light of her danger, at
+length consent to send for professional advice. It was then too late.
+She was suffering from internal paralysis. The medical attention which,
+sought earlier, might, in the opinion of the doctors, have prolonged her
+life for years, could now do nothing to avert the imminent fatal
+consequences of her illness. "It is death," she said; "I did not ask for
+it, but neither do I regret it." For beyond the sorrow of parting it had
+no particular terrors for her; she had viewed and could meet it in
+another spirit. "Death is no more," she had written; "it is life renewed
+and purified."</p>
+
+<p>She lingered for a week, in great suffering, but bearing all with
+fortitude and an unflinching determination not to distress those around
+her by painful complaining. Up to her last hour she preserved
+consciousness and lucidity. The words, "<i>Ne touchez pas à la verdure</i>,"
+among the last that fell from her lips, were understood by her children,
+who knew her wish that the trees should be undisturbed under which, in
+the village cemetery, she was soon to find a resting-place&mdash;a wish that
+had been sacredly respected.</p>
+
+<p>Her suffering ceased a short while before death, which came to her so
+quietly that the transition was almost imperceptible to the watchers by
+her side. It was on the morning of the 8th of June. She was within a
+month of completing her seventy-second year. Although her life's work
+had long since been mainly accomplished, yet the extinction of that
+great intelligence was felt by many&mdash;as fitly expressed by M.
+Renan&mdash;"like a diminution of humanity."</p>
+
+<p>Two days later she was buried in the little cemetery of Nohant, that
+adjoins her own garden wall. The funeral was conducted with extreme
+simplicity, in accordance with her taste and spirit. The scene was none
+the less a memorable one. The rain fell in torrents, but no one seemed
+to regard it; the country-people flocking in from miles around, old men
+standing bare-headed for hours, heedless of the deluge. The peasant and
+the prince, Parisian leaders of the world of thought and letters, and
+the humblest and most unlearned of her poorer neighbors, stood together
+over her grave.</p>
+
+<p>Six peasants carried the bier from the house to the church, a few paces
+distant. The village priest came, preceded by three chorister-boys and
+the venerable singing-clerk of the parish, to perform the ceremony. A
+portion of the little churchyard, railed off from the rest and planted
+with evergreen-trees, contains the graves of her grandmother, her
+father, and the two little grandchildren she had lost. A plain granite
+tomb in their midst now marks the spot where George Sand was laid,
+literally buried in flowers.</p>
+
+<p>A great spirit was gone from the world; and a good spirit, it will be
+generally acknowledged: an artist in whose work the genuine desire to
+leave those she worked for better than she found them, is one inspiring
+motive. Such endeavor may seem to fail, and she affirmed: "A hundred
+times it does fail in its immediate results. But it helps,
+notwithstanding, to preserve that tradition of good desires and of good
+deeds, without which all would perish."</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="c">Famous Women.</p>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<p class="c">GEORGE SAND.</p>
+
+<p class="c"><i>The next volumes in the Famous Women Series will be</i>:</p>
+
+<table summary="next"
+cellspacing="2"
+cellpadding="0">
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Margaret Fuller.</span> By Julia Ward Howe.</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Maria Edgeworth.</span> By Miss Zimmern.</td></tr>
+
+
+<tr><td colspan="2" align="center"
+style="line-height:50px;"><i>Already published</i>:</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">George Eliot.</span> By Miss Blind.</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Emily Brontë.</span> By Miss Robinson.</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">George Sand.</span> By Miss Thomas.</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Mary Lamb.</span> By Mrs. Gilchrist.</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr />
+
+<h1>GEORGE SAND'S NOVELS.</h1>
+<table summary="novels"
+cellspacing="4"
+cellpadding="4">
+
+<tr><td align="right">I.</td><td>MAUPRAT. Translated by <span class="smcap">Virginia Vaughan</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">II.</td><td>ANTONIA. Translated by <span class="smcap">Virginia Vaughan</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">III.</td><td>MONSIEUR SYLVESTRE. Translated by <span class="smcap">Francis George Shaw</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">IV.</td><td>THE SNOW MAN. Translated by <span class="smcap">Virginia Vaughan</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">V.</td><td>THE MILLER OF ANGIBAULT. Translated by <span class="smcap">Mary E. Dewey</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">VI.</td><td>MY SISTER JEANNIE. Translated by <span class="smcap">S. R. Crocker</span>.</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan="2" align="center"><i>A standard Library Edition, uniformly bound, in neat 16mo volumes. Each
+volume sold separately. Price $1.50.</i></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+
+<p class="c">SOME NOTICES OF "MAUPRAT."</p>
+
+<div class="novels">
+<p>"An admirable translation. As to 'Mauprat,' with which novel Roberts
+Brothers introduce the first of French novelists to the American public,
+if there were any doubts as to George Sand's power, it would for ever
+set them at rest.... The object of the story is to show how, by her
+(Edmée's) noble nature, he (Mauprat) is subsequently transformed from a
+brute to a man; his sensual passion to a pure and holy love."&mdash;<i>Harper's
+Monthly.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The excellence of George Sand, as we understand it, lies in her
+comprehension of the primitive elements of mankind. She has conquered
+her way into the human heart, and whether it is at peace or at war, is
+the same to her; for she is mistress of all its moods. No woman before
+ever painted the passions and the emotions with such force and fidelity,
+and with such consummate art. Whatever else she may be, she is always an
+artist.... Love is the key-note of 'Mauprat,'&mdash;love, and what it can
+accomplish in taming an otherwise untamable spirit. The hero, Bernard
+Mauprat, grows up with his uncles, who are practically bandits, as was
+not uncommon with men of their class, in the provinces, before the
+breaking out of the French Revolution. He is a young savage, of whom the
+best that can be said is, that he is only less wicked than his
+relatives, because he has somewhere within him a sense of generosity and
+honor, to which they are entire strangers. To sting this sense into
+activity, to detect the makings of a man in this brute, to make this
+brute into a man, is the difficult problem, which is worked out by
+love,&mdash;the love of Bernard for his cousin Edmée, and hers for him,&mdash;the
+love of two strong, passionate, noble natures, locked in a
+life-and-death struggle, in which the man is finally overcome by the
+unconquerable strength of womanhood. Only a great writer could have
+described such a struggle, and only a great artist could have kept it
+within allowable limits. This George Sand has done, we think; for her
+portrait of Bernard is vigorous without being coarse, and her situations
+are strong without being dangerous. Such, at least, is the impression we
+have received from reading 'Mauprat,' which, besides being an admirable
+study of character, is also a fine picture of French provincial life and
+manners."&mdash;<i>Putnam's Monthly.</i></p>
+
+<p>"Roberts Brothers propose to publish a series of translations of George
+Sand's better novels. We can hardly say that all are worth appearing in
+English; but it is certain that the 'better' list will comprise a good
+many which are worth translating, and among these is 'Mauprat,'&mdash;though
+by no means the best of them. Written to show the possibility of
+constancy in man, a love inspired before and continuing through
+marriage, it is itself a contradiction to a good many of the popular
+notions respecting the author,&mdash;who is generally supposed to be as
+indifferent to the sanctities of the marriage relation as was her
+celebrated ancestor, Augustus of Saxony.... The translation is
+admirable. It is seldom that one reads such good English in a work
+translated from any language. The new series is inaugurated in the best
+possible way, under the hands of Miss Vaughan, and we trust that she may
+have a great deal to do with its continuance. It is not every one who
+can read French who can write English so well."&mdash;<i>Old and New.</i></p>
+
+<p><i>Sold everywhere. Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price,
+by the Publishers</i>,</p>
+
+</div>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="c top5"><i>Messrs. Roberts Brothers' Publications.</i></p>
+
+
+<p class="c">FAMOUS WOMEN SERIES.</p>
+
+<p class="c ltr">EMILY BRONTË.</p>
+
+<p class="c"><span class="smcap">By A. MARY F. ROBINSON</span>.</p>
+
+<p class="c">One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.</p>
+<div class="novels">
+<p>"Miss Robinson has written a fascinating biography.... Emily Brontë is
+interesting, not because she wrote 'Wuthering Heights,' but because of
+her brave, baffled, human life, so lonely, so full of pain, but with a
+great hope shining beyond all the darkness, and a passionate defiance in
+bearing more than the burdens that were laid upon her. The story of the
+three sisters is infinitely sad, but it is the ennobling sadness that
+belongs to large natures cramped and striving for freedom to heroic,
+almost desperate, work, with little or no result. The author of this
+intensely interesting, sympathetic, and eloquent biography, is a young
+lady and a poet, to whom a place is given in a recent anthology of
+living English poets, which is supposed to contain only the best poems
+of the best writers."&mdash;<i>Boston Daily Advertiser.</i></p>
+
+<p>"Miss Robinson had many excellent qualifications for the task she has
+performed in this little volume, among which may be named, an
+enthusiastic interest in her subject and a real sympathy with Emily
+Brontë's sad and heroic life. 'To represent her as she was,' says Miss
+Robinson, 'would be her noblest and most fitting monument.' ... Emily
+Brontë here becomes well known to us and, in one sense, this should be
+praise enough for any biography."&mdash;<i>New York Times.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The biographer who finds such material before him as the lives and
+characters of the Brontë family need have no anxiety as to the interest
+of his work. Characters not only strong but so uniquely strong, genius
+so supreme, misfortunes so overwhelming, set in its scenery so forlornly
+picturesque, could not fail to attract all readers, if told even in the
+most prosaic language. When we add to this, that Miss Robinson has told
+their story <i>not</i> in prosaic language, but with a literary style
+exhibiting all the qualities essential to good biography, our readers
+will understand that this life of Emily Brontë is not only as
+interesting as a novel, but a great deal more interesting than most
+novels. As it presents most vividly a general picture of the family,
+there seems hardly a reason for giving it Emily's name alone, except
+perhaps for the masterly chapters on 'Wuthering Heights,' which the
+reader will find a grateful condensation of the best in that powerful
+but somewhat forbidding story. We know of no point in the Brontë
+history&mdash;their genius, their surroundings, their faults, their
+happiness, their misery, their love and friendships, their
+peculiarities, their power, their gentleness, their patience, their
+pride,&mdash;which Miss Robinson has not touched upon with conscientiousness
+and sympathy."&mdash;<i>The Critic.</i></p>
+
+<p>"'Emily Brontë' is the second of the 'Famous Women Series,' which
+Roberts Brothers, Boston, propose to publish, and of which 'George
+Eliot' was the initial volume. Not the least remarkable of a very
+remarkable family, the personage whose life is here written, possesses a
+peculiar interest to all who are at all familiar with the sad and
+singular history of herself and her sister Charlotte. That the author,
+Miss A. Mary F. Robinson, has done her work with minute fidelity to
+facts as well as affectionate devotion to the subject of her sketch, is
+plainly to be seen all through the book."&mdash;<i>Washington Post.</i></p>
+</div>
+<p>Sold by all Booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the Publishers,</p>
+
+
+<p class="c top5">MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS'</p>
+
+<p class="c">Classic Series.</p>
+
+
+<p>A collection of world-renowned works selected from the literatures of
+all nations, printed from new type in the best manner, and neatly and
+durably bound. Handy books, convenient to hold, and an ornament to the
+library shelves.</p>
+
+<p class="c">READY AND IN PREPARATION.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><span class="smcap">Sir Walter Scott's</span> "<span class="smcap">Lay of the Last Minstrel</span>," "<span class="smcap">Marmion</span>," and "<span class="smcap">The
+Lady of the Lake</span>." The three poems in one volume.</p></div>
+
+<p>"There are no books for boys like these poems by Sir Walter Scott. Every
+boy likes them, if they are not put into his hands too late. <i>They
+surpass everything for boy reading.</i>"&mdash;<i>Ralph Waldo Emerson.</i></p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><span class="smcap">Oliver Goldsmith's</span> "<span class="smcap">The Vicar of Wakefield</span>." With Illustrations by
+Mulready.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Defoe's</span> "<span class="smcap">Robinson Crusoe</span>." With Illustrations by Stothard.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Bernardin de Saint-Pierre's</span> "<span class="smcap">Paul and Virginia</span>." With Illustrations
+by Lalauze.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Southey's</span> "<span class="smcap">Life of Nelson</span>." With Illustrations by Birket Foster.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Voltaire's</span> "<span class="smcap">Life of Charles the Twelfth</span>." With Maps and Portraits.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Maria Edgeworth's</span> "<span class="smcap">Classic Tales</span>." With a biographical Sketch by
+Grace A. Oliver.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Lord Macaulay's</span> "<span class="smcap">Lays of Ancient Rome</span>." With a Biographical Sketch
+and Illustrations.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Bunyan's</span> "<span class="smcap">Pilgrim's Progress</span>." With all of the original
+Illustrations in fac-simile.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Classic Heroic Ballads.</span> Edited by the Editor of "Quiet Hours."</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Classic Tales.</span> By Anna Letitia Barbauld. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.</p>
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Classic Tales.</span> By Ann and Jane Taylor. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.</p></div>
+
+<p class="c">AND OTHERS.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p class="c un">MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS' PUBLICATIONS.</p>
+
+<p class="c">Famous Women Series.</p>
+
+<p class="c ltr">GEORGE ELIOT.</p>
+
+<p class="c"><span class="smcap">By MATHILDE BLIND</span>.</p>
+
+<p class="c">One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"Messrs. Roberts Brothers begin a series of Biographies of Famous
+Women with a life of George Eliot, by Mathilde Blind. The idea of
+the series is an excellent one, and the reputation of its
+publishers is a guarantee for its adequate execution. This book
+contains about three hundred pages in open type, and not only
+collects and condenses the main facts that are known in regard to
+the history of George Eliot, but supplies other material from
+personal research. It is agreeably written, and with a good idea of
+proportion in a memoir of its size. The critical study of its
+subject's works, which is made in the order of their appearance, is
+particularly well done. In fact, good taste and good judgment
+pervade the memoir throughout."&mdash;<i>Saturday Evening Gazette.</i></p>
+
+<p>"Miss Blind's little book is written with admirable good taste and
+judgment, and with notable self-restraint. It does not weary the
+reader with critical discursiveness, nor with attempts to search
+out high-flown meanings and recondite oracles in the plain 'yea'
+and 'nay' of life. It is a graceful and unpretentious little
+biography, and tells all that need be told concerning one of the
+greatest writers of the time. It is a deeply interesting if not
+fascinating woman whom Miss Blind presents," says the New York
+<i>Tribune</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Blind's little biographical study of George Eliot is written
+with sympathy and good taste, and is very welcome. It gives us a
+graphic if not elaborate sketch of the personality and development
+of the great novelist, is particularly full and authentic
+concerning her earlier years, tells enough of the leading motives
+in her work to give the general reader a lucid idea of the true
+drift and purpose of her art, and analyzes carefully her various
+writings, with no attempt at profound criticism or fine writing,
+but with appreciation, insight, and a clear grasp of those
+underlying psychological principles which are so closely interwoven
+in every production that came from her pen."&mdash;<i>Traveller.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The lives of few great writers have attracted more curiosity and
+speculation than that of George Eliot. Had she only lived earlier
+in the century she might easily have become the centre of a mythos.
+As it is, many of the anecdotes commonly repeated about her are
+made up largely of fable. It is, therefore, well, before it is too
+late, to reduce the true story of her career to the lowest terms,
+and this service has been well done by the author of the present
+volume."&mdash;<i>Philadelphia Press.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the publishers,</p>
+
+<hr />
+<p class="c"><b>A SELECTION FROM</b></p>
+
+<p class="c ltr">Messrs. ROBERTS BROTHERS'</p>
+
+<p class="c ltr"><b>Latest New Publications.</b></p>
+
+
+<p>FIGURES OF THE PAST. From the Leaves of Old Journals. By Josiah Quincy
+(Class of 1821, Harvard College). 16mo. Price, $1.50</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"There are chapters on life in the Academy at Andover, on Harvard
+Sixty Years Ago, on Commencement Day in 1821, the year of the
+author's graduation, and on visits to and talks with John Adams,
+with reminiscences of Lafayette, Judge Story, John Randolph,
+Jackson and other eminent persons, and sketches of old Washington
+and old Boston society. The kindly pen of the author is never
+dipped in gall&mdash;he remembers the pleasing aspects of character, and
+his stories and anecdotes are told in the best of humor and leave
+no sting. The book is of a kind which we are not likely to have
+again, for the men of Mr. Quincy's generation, those at least who
+had his social opportunities, are nearly all gone. These pictures
+of old social and political conditions are especially suggestive as
+reminding us that a single life, only lately closed, linked us with
+days, events and men that were a part of our early history and
+appear remote because of the multitude of changes that have
+transformed society in the interval."&mdash;<i>Boston Journal.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>WHIST, OR BUMBLEPUPPY? By Pembridge.</p>
+
+<p>From the Second London Edition. 16mo. Cloth. Price, .50</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p><span class="smcap">Definition of Bumblepuppy</span>&mdash;Bumblepuppy is persisting to play whist,
+either in utter ignorance of all its known principles, or in
+defiance of them, or both.</p>
+
+<p>"'Whist, or Bumblepuppy?' is one of the most entertaining, and at
+the same time one of the soundest books on whist ever written. Its
+drollery may blind some readers to the value of its advice; no man
+who knows anything about whist, however, will fail to read it with
+interest, and few will fail to read it with advantage. Upon the
+ordinary rules of whist, Pembridge supplies much sensible and
+thoroughly amusing comment. The best player in the world may gain
+from his observations, and a mediocre player can scarcely find a
+better counsellor. There is scarcely an opinion expressed with
+which we do not coincide."&mdash;<i>London Sunday Times.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>RECOLLECTIONS OF DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. By T. Hall Caine. With
+Portrait. One vol. 8vo. Cloth, gilt. Price, $3.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"Mr. Caine's 'Recollections of Rossetti' throws light upon many
+events in Rossetti's life over which there hung a veil of
+mystery.... A book that must survive."&mdash;<i>London Athenæum.</i></p></div>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<p>PHYLLIS BROWNE. A Story. By Flora L. Shaw. Author of "Castle Blair" and
+"Hector." 16mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price, $1.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"'Castle Blair' and 'Hector' are such good stories that a third, by
+the same author, Flora L. Shaw, will be equally welcomed. 'Hector'
+was one of the most charming books ever written about a boy.
+'Phyllis Browne' is the new story. She is evidently the author's
+ideal girl, as Hector was her ideal boy, and a noble, splendid girl
+she is. Yet the book is not a child's book; it is <i>about</i> children,
+but not for them. The story is far more interesting than most
+novels are, and far more exciting. The rash generosity of the
+children is beautiful; their free, trustful lives are noble and
+sweet; but when they undertake to right social wrongs, and
+gallantly set their brave hearts and childish inexperience against
+the established wrongs of society, they come to grief, but in no
+common-place way. Their dangers are as unusual and on as large a
+scale as their characters and courage are. The book is full of
+tender and loving things; it makes the heart larger, and brings
+back the splendid dreams of one's own youth," says the Boston
+correspondent of the <i>Worcester Spy</i>.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>THE MARQUIS OF CARABAS. A Romance. By Harriet Prescott Spofford, author
+of "The Amber Gods," "The Thief in the Night," etc. 16mo. Cloth. Price,
+$1.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"This is the latest offering of the author of 'The Amber Gods,' and
+it is as odd as striking, and as impressive in its shadowy
+implication as anything she has ever written. Handled differently,
+the incidents would seem theatrical; as told by Mrs. Spofford, the
+story is like the vivid passages of a drama from which, once seen,
+you cannot escape. Pleasant or unpleasant they force themselves
+upon the consideration and lay hold of the imagination. So it is
+with 'The Marquis of Carabas.'"&mdash;<i>Chicago Inter-Ocean.</i></p>
+
+<p>"'The Marquis of Carabas,' by Harriet Prescott Spofford, is a work
+of unique quality, being really a poem in the guise of a prose
+novel. The thought is tense and sublimated, and the style glowing,
+musical and polished. There is abundant invention in the story, and
+nothing of common-place and indolent imitation which in the case of
+ordinary raconteurs contributes so largely to swell the bulk of
+results. The narrative fascinates one, but the fascination is not
+of a stream flowing largely and naturally through the landscape; it
+is rather that of silver bells, whose clear, finely modulated
+chimes touch the finer issues of feeling, but not without some
+obtrusive sense of study and premeditation."&mdash;<i>Home Journal.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>LANDOR'S IMAGINARY CONVERSATIONS. With a portrait. A new edition. 5
+volumes. 16mo.</p>
+
+<table summary="price">
+<tr><td>Cloth. Oxford style. Price, &nbsp; &nbsp;</td><td align="right">$5.00</td></tr>
+<tr><td>Imitation half calf,</td><td align="right">6.25</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+
+<p>PEARLS OF THE FAITH; or, Islam's Rosary; being the "Ninety-nine
+Beautiful Names of Allah." By Edwin Arnold. 16mo. Cloth. Uniform with
+"The Light of Asia." Price, $1.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"Mr. Edwin Arnold has finished his Oriental trilogy. The first part
+is 'The Light of Asia.' The second part is 'The Indian Song of
+Songs,' The trilogy is completed by 'Pearls of the Faith,' in which
+the poet tells the beads of a pious Moslem. The Mohammedan has a
+chaplet of three strings, each string containing 33 beads, each
+bead representing one of the 'Ninety-nine beautiful names of Allah.
+These short poems have no connection; they vary in measure, but are
+all simple and without a touch of obscurity. All the legends and
+instructions inculcate the gentle virtues that make life
+lovely&mdash;courtesy, humility, hospitality, care for the poor and the
+ill, kindness to dumb animals, perfect manners in social
+intercourse. Many of the poems are suitable for Christian
+Sunday-schools.... The view of Mohammedanism given by these poems
+is very pleasant; the precepts for life here are sweet and noble;
+the promises for heaven are definite; they appeal directly to the
+love of what is known as pleasure in this life, and that must be
+renounced in this life, but in the next it may be enjoyed to the
+uttermost without evil consequences."&mdash;<i>Boston Daily Advertiser.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>ART AND NATURE IN ITALY. By Eugene Benson. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"Mr. Benson's long residence in that country has operated to imbue
+his mind with the spirit of the region. He treats <i>con amore</i> of
+its art in its historical and in its modern aspects, and he
+presents its scenes of nature in their most fascinating form. Mr.
+Benson is not only one of the most appreciative of students and
+observers, but he has a rare grace of manner as well. He writes
+little of late, but his productions are always acceptable to
+cultivated people."&mdash;<i>Saturday Evening Gazette.</i></p>
+
+<p>"This book is a record of impressions and reflections on art and
+nature in Italy. The great beauty and the historic associations of
+the country are set forth in very pleasing language by one who
+fully appreciates them. He particularly describes those portions of
+that beautiful land in which its most distinguished artists have
+lived, showing how its natural features, its enchanting scenery,
+must have had a molding influence upon their tastes and their
+works. His estimates of art and artists and his criticisms are, in
+the main, just and satisfactory."&mdash;<i>Western Christian Advocate.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>NORSE STORIES, RETOLD FROM THE EDDAS. By Hamilton W. Mabie. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.00</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"Is one of the most charming little books for children I have ever
+seen. The myths are splendidly told, and every household in America
+ought to have a copy of the book."&mdash;<i>Prof. R. B. Anderson.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The old Norse stories bear being told again and again. Mr. Mabie
+keeps their freshness, fascination and simplicity in his new
+version of them, and one reads with unabated pleasure of Odin's
+search for wisdom, of the wooing of Gerd, and of all the strange
+adventures of Thor, of the beautiful Balder, of the wicked Loke,
+and, best of all, of the new earth that was created after long
+years of darkness, in which there was no sun, no moon, no stars, no
+Asgard, no Hel, no Jotunheim; in which gods, giants, monsters and
+men were all dead&mdash;the earth upon which the gods look lovingly,
+upon which men are industrious and obedient, and know that the
+All-Father helps them."&mdash;<i>Boston Daily Advertiser.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+
+<p>THE WISDOM OF THE BRAHMIN. A Didactic Poem. Translated from the German
+of Friedrich Rückert. By Chas. T. Brooks. Six cantos. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"The Brahmin," says the translator, "is a poem of vast range,
+expressing the world-wisdom which the author had been for years
+storing up in his large heart, and evolving out of his creative
+soul." Says Dr. Beyer, in his Life of Rückert: "'The Wisdom of the
+Brahmin' is a poetic house-treasure of which our nation may justly
+be proud. So much has been said and sung of late years of 'The
+Light of Asia,' the 'Sympathy of Religions,' and the like, that the
+present seemed to be an auspicious moment to venture a volume of
+Rückert's greatest work."</p>
+
+<p>"'These twenty books are a sea of thoughts and contemplations full
+of Brahminic tranquility and German depth and fullness, in simple
+gnomes, sentences, epigrams, parables, fables and tales.'
+Gottsschall declares the work to be 'a poetic treasure of which the
+German nation may justly be proud.' The translator, speaking of his
+own experiences, says the poem has affected him as 'a sparkling
+flood of heart-searching and soul-lifting thought and sentiment,
+such as no other work within our knowledge has ever
+presented.'"&mdash;<i>Home Journal.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>SOCRATES. The Apology and Crito of Plato, and the Phædo of Plato.
+Uniform with "Marcus Aurelius," "Imitation of Christ," etc. 18mo.
+Flexible cloth, red edges. Price, 50 cents each. Two series in one
+volume. Cloth, red edges. Price, 75 cents.</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"If, as is strongly asserted, there may be found in the writings of
+Plato all the wisdom and learning of the ancients, as well as the
+treasure-house from which all succeeding writers have borrowed
+their best ideas, then are these little books worth their weight in
+gold, for they contain some of the choicest gems to be found in the
+collected works of the famous Greek philosopher. They are companion
+volumes, the text being taken unabridged from Professor Jewett's
+revised translation of Plato. They tell the whole story of the
+trial, imprisonment and death of Socrates. The Apology gives the
+defense, the Crito relates the offer of escape, the Phædo describes
+the last hours. The more studiously and the more frequently these
+books are read the more keen will be the appreciation of their
+intellectual and moral excellence."&mdash;<i>Providence Journal.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>JEAN INGELOW'S NOVELS. Off the Skelligs; Fated to be Free; Sarah de
+Berenger; Don John. A new edition. 4 vols. 16mo. Imitation half calf.
+Price, $5.00</p>
+
+<hr style="width:10%;" />
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+<p>THE JEAN INGELOW BIRTHDAY BOOK. With red-line border and divisions, 12
+illustrations and portrait.</p>
+
+<table summary="book"
+cellpadding="2"
+cellspacing="2">
+<tr><td>16mo. Cloth, gilt and illuminated. Price,</td><td align="right">$1.00</td></tr>
+<tr><td>Full calf or morocco,</td><td align="right">$3.50</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"This is a dainty little volume having a selection from Jean
+Ingelow for each day of the year. The extracts are of both prose
+and verse. There are graceful illustrations for each month suited
+in subject to the season. The book will be welcomed by admirers of
+this writer and must prove a popular gift-book for the birthday
+season."&mdash;<i>Chicago Advance.</i></p>
+
+<p>"We have seen no more tasteful book this year than 'The Jean
+Ingelow Birthday Book,' which Messrs. Roberts Brothers publish. It
+is somewhat larger in form than are the birthday books with which
+the public is familiar, is printed on very fine paper, and has a
+page with the usual quotations and the usual blanks, the whole
+encircled with a carmine line border, the date of the days of the
+months being printed in the same color. The work is illustrated
+with handsome engravings, and has a steel-engraved portrait of Jean
+Ingelow. The binding is a real gem. Nothing could well be more
+attractive in the way of cloth ornament than is its combination of
+design and color."&mdash;<i>Saturday Evening Gazette.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>UNDER THE SUN. By Phil. Robinson, the new English Humorist. With a
+Preface by Edwin Arnold, author of "The Light of Asia." 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.50</p>
+
+<div class="novels">
+<p>This is a volume of essays, humorous and pathetic, of incidents, scenes,
+and objects grouped under the heads: Indian Sketches, The Indian
+Seasons, Unnatural History, Idle Hours under the Punkah.</p>
+
+<p>"Under the Sun," by Phil. Robinson, is one of the most delightful
+of recent books. The style is fascinating in its strength and
+picturesqueness, and there is now and then a delicious quaintness
+that recalls Charles Lamb. A volume such as this is rare in our
+day, when the art of essay writing is almost lost and forgotten.
+Freshness, vigor, humor, pathos, graphic power, a keen love for
+nature, a gentle love for animals, and a pleasing originality are
+among the more charming characteristics of this work, which may be
+read again and again with renewed satisfaction. Its scenes are laid
+in India, and whether the author discourses of the elephant, the
+rhinoceros, some bird that has attracted his attention, a tree, or
+a flower; whether he describes an exciting hunt, or tells a
+marvellous story; whether he moralizes or gives free rein to his
+fancy, he is always brilliant, fascinating, vivacious and masterly.
+It is difficult to write of this remarkable book without
+superlatives; but it is not too much to insist that it is
+impossible to exaggerate its peculiar merits, or to bestow too
+large a share of praise upon it. It is not a book for the few, but
+for the many, and all will find delight in its perusal."&mdash;<i>Saturday
+Evening Gazette.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+
+<p>A LITTLE PILGRIM. Reprinted from Macmillan's Magazine. 16mo. Cloth. Red
+edges. Price, $ .75</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"An exquisitely written little sketch is found in that remarkable
+production, 'The Little Pilgrim,' which is just now attracting much
+attention both in Europe and America. It is highly imaginative in
+its scope, representing one of the world-worn and weary pilgrims of
+our earthly sphere as entering upon the delights of heaven after
+death. The picture of heaven is drawn with the rarest delicacy and
+refinement, and is in agreeable contrast in this respect to the
+material sketch of this future home furnished in Miss Stuart
+Phelps's well-remembered 'Gates Ajar.' The book will be a balm to
+the heart of many readers who are in accord with the faith of its
+author; and to others its reading will afford rare pleasure from
+the exceeding beauty and affecting simplicity of its almost perfect
+literary style."&mdash;<i>Saturday Evening Gazette.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The life beyond the grave, when the short life in this world is
+ended, is to many a source of dread&mdash;to all a mystery. 'A Little
+Pilgrim' has apparently solved it, and, indeed, it seems on reading
+this little book as if there were a great probability about it. A
+soft, gentle tone pervades its every sentence, and one cannot read
+it without feeling refreshed and strengthened."&mdash;<i>The Alta
+California.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>THE GREAT EPICS OF MEDIÆVAL GERMANY. An Outline of their Contents and
+History. By George Theodore Dippold, Professor at Boston University and
+Wellesley College. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.50</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>Professor Francis J. Child, of Harvard College, says: "It is an
+excellent account of the chief German heroic poems of the Middle
+Ages, accompanied with spirited translations. It is a book which
+gives both a brief and popular, and also an accurate, account of
+this important section of literature, and will be very welcome here
+and at other colleges."</p>
+
+<p>"No student of modern literature, and above all no student who aims
+to understand the literary development of Europe in its fullest
+range, can leave this rich and ample world of early song
+unexplored. To all such Professor Dippold's book will have the
+value of a trustworthy guide.... It has all the interest of a
+chapter in the growth of the human mind into comprehension of the
+universe and of itself, and it has the pervading charm of the vast
+realm of poetry through which it moves."&mdash;<i>Christian Union.</i></p></div>
+
+
+<p>MY HOUSEHOLD OF PETS. By Théophile Gautier. Translated from the French
+by Susan Coolidge. With illustrations by Frank Rogers. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25</p>
+
+<div class="novels"><p>"This little book will interest lovers of animals, and the quaint
+style in which M. Gautier tells of the wisdom of his household pets
+will please every one. The translator, too, is happy in her work,
+for she has succeeded in rendering the text into English without
+loss of the French tone, which makes it fascinating. These
+household pets consisted of white and black cats, dogs, chameleons,
+lizards, magpies, and horses, each of which has a character and
+story of its own. Illustrations and a pretty binding add to the
+attractions of the volume."&mdash;<i>Worcester Spy.</i></p>
+
+<p>"The ease and elegance of Théophile Gautier's diction is wonderful,
+and the translator has preserved the charm of the French author
+with far more than the average fidelity. 'My Household of Pets' is
+a book which can be read with pleasure by young and old. It is a
+charming volume.&mdash;<i>St. Louis Spectator.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>*<sup>*</sup>*Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.</p>
+
+<hr />
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> The biography of Alfred De Musset, by Paul De Musset,
+translated from the French by Harriet W. Preston. Boston, Roberts
+Brothers.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> Mauprat, translated by Miss Vaughan. Boston, Roberts
+Brothers.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_C_3" id="Footnote_C_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_C_3"><span class="label">[C]</span></a> The Miller of Angibault. Translated by M. E. Dewey. Boston,
+Roberts Brothers.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_D_4" id="Footnote_D_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_D_4"><span class="label">[D]</span></a> The "Snow Man," translated by Virginia Vaughan. Boston:
+Roberts Brothers.</p></div>
+
+</div>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
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+</body>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Famous Women: George Sand
+
+Author: Bertha Thomas
+
+Release Date: February 27, 2009 [EBook #28209]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS WOMEN: GEORGE SAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Delphine Lettau, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _FAMOUS WOMEN_]
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+BY
+
+BERTHA THOMAS.
+
+BOSTON:
+ROBERTS BROTHERS.
+1883.
+
+_Copyright, 1883_,
+BY ROBERTS BROTHERS.
+
+UNIVERSITY PRESS:
+JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE.
+
+
+
+
+PREFATORY NOTE.
+
+
+The authentic materials available for an account of the life of George
+Sand, although lately increased by the publication of a large part of
+her correspondence, are still incomplete. Her memoirs by her own hand,
+dealing fully with her early life alone, remain unsupplemented by any
+entire and detailed biography, for which, indeed, the time seems hardly
+yet come. Hence one among many obvious difficulties in the way of this
+attempt to prepare for English readers a brief sketch that shall at
+least indicate all the more salient features of a life of singularly
+varied aspect.
+
+Much, though of interest in itself, must here be omitted, as beyond the
+scope of the present study. There are points again into which, as
+touching persons still living or quite recently deceased, it would be
+premature to enter. But none seem of such importance as to forbid the
+endeavor, by a careful review of those facts in the life of George Sand
+which most justly represent her character as a whole, and were the
+determining influences on her career and on her work, to arrive at truth
+and completeness of general outline, the utmost it is possible to hope
+to accomplish in this little volume.
+
+BERTHA THOMAS.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY YEARS
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+GIRLHOOD AND MARRIED LIFE
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+DEBUT IN LITERATURE
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+LELIA--ITALIAN JOURNEY
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+MENTAL DEVELOPMENT
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+SOLITUDE, SOCIETY AND SOCIALISM
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+CONSUELO--HOME LIFE AT NOHANT  149
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+NOVELIST AND POLITICIAN  170
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+PASTORAL TALES
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+PLAYS AND LATER NOVELS
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+ARTIST AND MORALIST
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+LATER YEARS
+
+
+
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+EARLY YEARS.
+
+
+In naming George Sand we name something more exceptional than even a
+great genius. Her rise to eminence in the literature of her century, is,
+if not without a parallel, yet absolutely without a precedent, in the
+annals of women of modern times.
+
+The origin of much that is distinctive in the story of her life may be
+traced in the curious story of her lineage.
+
+George Sand was of mixed national descent, and in her veins ran the
+blood of heroes and of kings. The noble and the artist, the
+_bourgeoisie_ and the people, all had their representatives among their
+immediate ancestors. Her grandmother, the guardian of her girlhood, was
+the child of Maurice, Marshal Saxe, that favorite figure in history and
+romance, himself son of the famous Augustus II., Elector of Saxony, and
+King of Poland, and the Swedish Countess Aurora von Koenigsmark. The
+Marshal's daughter Aurore, though like her father of illegitimate
+birth--her mother, who was connected with the stage, passed by her
+professional name of Mlle. Verrieres--obtained after the Marshal's death
+the acknowledgment and protection of his relatives in high places,
+notably of his niece, the Dauphin of France, grand-daughter of Augustus
+of Poland, and mother of the three kings--Louis XVI., Louis XVIII., and
+Charles X.
+
+Carefully educated at St. Cyr, Mlle. de Saxe was married, when little
+more than a child, to the Count de Horn, who was also of partly royal
+but irregular origin. He very shortly afterward fell in a duel. His
+widow, at thirty, became the wife of M. Dupin de Franceuil, an old
+gentleman of good provincial family and some fortune. Maurice, their
+only child, was the father of George Sand.
+
+Madame Dupin (the suffix de Franceuil was afterwards dropped by her
+husband) appears to have inherited none of the adventurous and erratic
+tendencies of her progenitors. Aristocratic in her sympathies,
+philosophic in her intellect, and strictly decorous in her conduct,
+throughout the whole of her long and checkered life she was regarded
+with respect. Left a widow again, ten years after her second marriage,
+she concentrated her hopes and affections on her handsome and amiable
+son Maurice. Though fondly attached to her, he was yet to be the cause
+of her heaviest sorrows, by his more than hazardous marriage, and by his
+premature and tragical fate.
+
+His strongest natural leanings seem to have been towards art in general,
+music and the drama in particular, and of his facile, buoyant, artist
+temperament there is ample evidence; but the political conditions of
+France under the Directory in 1798 left him no choice but to enter the
+army, where he served under Dupont, winning his commission on the field
+of Marengo in 1800. It was during this Italian campaign that the young
+officer met with the woman who, four years later, became his wife, and
+the mother of his illustrious child.
+
+Mademoiselle Sophie Victorie Delaborde, was, emphatically speaking, a
+daughter of the people. Her father had been a poor bird-seller at Paris,
+where she herself had worked as a milliner. Left unprotected at a very
+early age, thoroughly uneducated and undisciplined, gifted with
+considerable beauty, and thrown on the world at a time when the very
+foundations of society seemed to be collapsing, she had been exposed to
+extreme dangers, and without any of the ordinary safeguards against
+them. That she proved herself not undeserving of the serious attachment
+with which she inspired Maurice Dupin, her least favorable judges were
+afterwards forced to admit; though, at the time this infatuation of the
+lieutenant of six-and-twenty for one four years his senior, and of the
+humblest extraction, and whose life hitherto had not been blameless, was
+naturally regarded as utterly disastrous by his elders.
+
+The devoted pair were married secretly at Paris in 1804; and on the 5th
+of July in the same year--the last of the French Republic and the first
+of the Empire--their daughter entered the world, receiving the name of
+Amantine-Lucile-Aurore.
+
+The discovery of the _mesalliance_ she had been dreading for some time,
+and which her son had not dared to confess to her, was a heavy blow to
+old Madame Dupin. However, she schooled herself to forgive what was
+irrevocable, and to acknowledge this most unwelcome daughter-in-law, the
+infant Aurore helping unconsciously to effect the reconciliation. But
+for more than three years M. Dupin's mother and his wife scarcely ever
+met. Madame Dupin _mere_ was living in a retired part of the country, in
+the very centre of France, on the little property of Nohant, which she
+had bought with what the Revolution had left her out of her late
+husband's fortune. Maurice, now Captain Dupin and _aide-de-camp_ to
+Murat, resided, when not on service, in Paris, where he had settled with
+his wife and child. The union, strange though it may seem, continued to
+be a happy one. Besides a strong attachment there existed a real
+conformity of disposition between the two. The mother of George Sand was
+also, in her way, a remarkable woman. She has been described by her
+daughter as "a great artist lost for want of development"; showing a
+wonderful dexterity in whatever she put her hand to, no matter if
+practiced in it or not. "She tried everything, and always
+succeeded"--sewing, drawing, tuning the piano--"she would have made
+shoes, locks, furniture, had it been necessary." But her tastes were
+simple and domestic. Though married out of her rank, she was entirely
+without any vain ambition to push herself into fashionable society, the
+constraint of which, moreover, she could not bear. "She was a woman for
+the fire-side, or for quick, merry walks and drives. But in the house or
+out of doors, what she wanted was intimacy and confidence, complete
+sincerity in her relations with those around her, absolute liberty in
+her habits and the disposal of her time. She always led a retired life,
+more anxious to keep aloof from tiresome acquaintance than to seek such
+as might be advantageous. That was just the foundation of my father's
+character; and in this respect never was there a better-assorted couple.
+They could never be happy except in their own little _menage_.
+Everywhere out of it they had to stifle their melancholy yawns, and they
+have transmitted to me that secret shyness which has always made the gay
+world intolerable, and home a necessity to me."
+
+In a modest _bourgeois_ habitation in the Rue Meslay, afterwards
+transferred to the Rue Grange-Bateliere, Aurore Dupin's infancy passed
+tranquilly away, under the wing of her warmly affectionate mother who,
+though utterly illiterate, showed intuitive tact and skill in fostering
+the child's intelligence. "Mine," says her daughter, "made no
+resistance; but was never beforehand with anything, and might have been
+very much behindhand if left to itself."
+
+Aurore was not four years old when adventures began for her in earnest.
+In the spring of 1808, her father was at Madrid, in attendance upon
+Murat; and Madame Maurice Dupin, becoming impatient of prolonged
+separation from her husband, started off with her little girl to join
+him. The hazards and hardships of the expedition, long mountain drives
+and wild scenery, strange fare and strange sights, could not fail
+vividly to impress the child, whose imagination from her cradle was
+extraordinarily active. Her mother ere this had discovered that Aurore,
+then little more than a baby, and pent up within four chairs to keep her
+out of harm's way, would make herself perfectly happy, plucking at the
+basket-work and babbling endless fairy tales to herself, confused and
+diluted versions of the first fictions narrated to her. A picturesque
+line in a nursery song was enough to bring before her a world of
+charming wonders; the figures, birds, and flowers on a Sevres china
+candelabrum would call up enchanting landscapes; and the sound of a
+flageolet played from some distant attic start a train of melodious
+fancies and throw her into musical raptures. Her daily experiences,
+after reaching Madrid with her mother, continued to be novel and
+exciting in the extreme. The palace of the Prince de la Paix, where
+Murat and his suite had their quarters, was to her the realization of
+the wonder-land of Perrault and d'Aulnoy; Murat, the veritable Prince
+Fanfarinet. She was presented to him in a fancy court-dress, devised for
+the occasion by her mother, an exact imitation of her father's uniform
+in miniature, with spurs, sword, and boots, all complete. The Prince
+was amused by the jest, and took a fancy to the child, calling her his
+little _aide-de-camp_. After a residence of several weeks in this abode,
+whose splendor was alloyed by not a little discomfort and squalor, the
+return-journey had to be accomplished in the height of summer, amid
+every sort of risk; past reeking battle-fields, camps, sacked and
+half-burnt villages and beleaguered cities. Captain Dupin succeeded,
+however, in escorting his family safely back into France again, the
+party halting to recruit awhile under his mother's roof.
+
+Nohant, a spot that has become as famous through its associations as
+Abbotsford, lies about three miles from the little town of La Chatre, in
+the department of the Indre, part of the old province of Berry. The
+manor is a plain gray house with steep mansard roofs, of the time of
+Louis XVI. It stands just apart from the road, shaded by trees, beside a
+pleasure ground of no vast extent, but with its large flower-garden and
+little wood allowed to spread at nature's bidding, quite in the English
+style. Behind the house cluster a score of cottages of the scattered
+hamlet of Nohant; in the centre rises the smallest of churches, with a
+tiny cemetery hedged around and adjoining the wall of the manor garden.
+
+At this country home the tired travellers gladly alighted; but they had
+barely a few weeks in which to recover from the fatigues of their
+Spanish campaign, when a terrible calamity overwhelmed the household.
+Maurice Dupin, riding home one night from La Chatre, was thrown from his
+horse and killed on the spot.
+
+The story of Aurore Dupin's individual life opens at once with the death
+of her father--a loss she was still too young to comprehend, but for
+which she was soon to suffer through the strange, the anomalous
+position, in which it was to place her. Maurice Dupin's patrician mother
+and her plebeian daughter-in-law, bereft thus violently of him who had
+been the only possible link between them, found themselves hopelessly,
+actively, and increasingly at variance. Their tempers clashed, their
+natures were antipathetic, their views contradictory, their positions
+irreconcilable. Aurore was not only thrust into an atmosphere of strife,
+but condemned to the apple of discord. She was to grow up between two
+hostile camps, each claiming her obedience and affection.
+
+The beginning was smooth, and the sadness which alone kept the peace was
+not allowed to weigh on the child. She ran wild in the garden, the
+country air and country life strengthening a naturally strong
+constitution; and her intelligence, though also allowed much freedom in
+its development, was not neglected. A preceptor was on the spot in the
+person of the fourth inmate of Nohant, an old pedagogue, Deschartres by
+name, formerly her father's tutor, who had remained in Madame Dupin's
+service as "intendant." The serio-comic figure of this personage, so
+graphically drawn by George Sand herself in the memoirs of her early
+life, will never be forgotten by any reader of those reminiscences.
+Pedant, she says, was written in every line of his countenance and every
+movement that he made. He was possessed of some varied learning, much
+narrow prejudice, and a violent, crotchety temper, but had proved during
+the troubles of the Revolution his sincere and disinterested devotion to
+the family he served, and Aurore and "the great man," as she afterwards
+nicknamed her old tutor, were always good friends.
+
+Before she was four years old she could read quite well; but she remarks
+that it was only after learning to write that what she read began to
+take a definite meaning for her. The fairy-tales perused but half
+intelligently before were re-read with a new delight. She learnt grammar
+with Deschartres, and from her grandmother took her first lessons in
+music, an art of which she became passionately fond; and it always
+remained for her a favourite source of enjoyment, though she never
+acquired much proficiency as a musical performer. The educational
+doctrines of Rousseau had then brought into fashion a _regime_ of
+open-air exercise and freedom for the young, such as we commonly
+associate with English, rather than French, child-life; and Aurore's
+early years--when domestic hostilities and nursery tyrannies, from
+which, like most sensitive children, she suffered inordinately, were
+suspended--were passed in the careless, healthy fashion approved in this
+country. A girl of her own age, but of lower degree, was taken into the
+house to share her studies and pastimes. Little Ursule was to become, in
+later years, the faithful servant of her present companion, who had then
+become lady of the manor, and who never lost sight of this humble
+friend. Aurore had also a boy playmate in a _protege_ of her
+grandmother's, five years her senior, who patronised and persecuted her
+by turns, in his true fraternal fashion. This boy, Hippolyte, the son of
+a woman of low station, was in fact Aurore's half-brother, adopted from
+his birth and brought up by Madame Dupin the elder, whose indulgence,
+where her son was concerned, was infinite. With these, and the children
+of the farm-tenants and rural proprietors around, Aurore did not want
+for companions. But the moment soon arrived when the painful family
+dispute of which she was the object, was to become the cause of more
+distress to the child than to her elders. There were reasons which stood
+in the way of Madame Maurice Dupin's fixing her residence permanently
+under her mother-in-law's roof. But the mind of the latter was set on
+obtaining the guardianship of her grand-daughter, the natural heir to
+her property, and on thus assuring to her social and educational
+privileges of a superior order. The child's heart declared unreservedly
+for her mother, whose passionate fondness she returned with the added
+tenderness of a deeper nature, and all attempts to estrange the two had
+only drawn them closer together. But the pecuniary resources of Maurice
+Dupin's widow were of the smallest, and the advantages offered to her
+little girl by the proposed arrangement so material, that the older lady
+gained her point in the end. Madame Maurice settled in Paris. Aurore
+grew up her grandmother's ward, with Nohant for her home; a home she was
+to keep, knowing no other, till the end of her life.
+
+The separation was brought about very gradually to the child. The first
+few winters were spent in Paris, where her grandmother had an
+establishment. Then she could pass whole days with her mother, who, in
+turn, spent summers at Nohant, and Aurore for years was buoyed up by the
+hope that a permanent reunion would still be brought about. But meantime
+domestic jealousy and strife, inflamed by the unprincipled meddling of
+servants, raged more fiercely than ever, and could not but be a source
+of more than ordinary childish misery to their innocent object. It was
+but slowly that she became attached to her grandmother, whose
+undemonstrative temper, formal habits and condescending airs were little
+calculated to win over her young affections, or fire her with gratitude
+for the anxiety displayed by this guardian to form her manners and
+cultivate her intellect. Nay, the result was rather to implant in her a
+premature dislike and distrust for conventional ideals. From the
+standard of culture and propriety, from the temptations of social rank
+and wealth held up for her preference, she instinctively turned to the
+simple, unrestrained affection of the despised mother, and the greater
+freedom and expansion enjoyed in such company. In vain did disdainful
+lady's-maids try to taunt her into precocious worldly wisdom, asking if
+she could really want to go and eat beans in a little garret. Such a
+condition, naturally, she began to regard as the equivalent of a noble
+and glorious existence!
+
+Meantime, throughout all these alternations of content and distress,
+Nohant and its surroundings were perforce becoming dear to her, as only
+the home of our childhood can ever become. The scenery and
+characteristics of that region are familiar to all readers of the works
+of George Sand; a quiet region of narrow, winding, shady lanes, where
+you may wander long between the tall hedges without meeting a living
+creature but the wild birds that start from the honey-suckle and
+hawthorn, and the frogs croaking among the sedges; a region of
+soft-flowing rivers with curlew-haunted reed beds, and fields where
+quails cluck in the furrows; the fertile plain studded with clumps of
+ash and alder, and a rare farm-habitation standing amid orchards and
+hemp-fields, or a rarer hamlet of a dozen cottages grouped together. The
+country is flat, and, viewed from the rail or high road, unimpressive.
+But those fruitful fields have a placid beauty, and it needs but to
+penetrate the sequestered lanes and explore the thicket-bound courses of
+the streams, to meet with plenty of those pleasant solitudes after a
+poet's own heart, whose gift is to seize and perpetuate transient
+effects, and to open the eyes of duller minds to charms that might pass
+unnoticed. In this sense only can George Sand be said to have idealized
+for us the landscapes she loved.
+
+The thoughtful, poetic side of her temperament showed itself early,
+leading her to seek long intervals of solitude, when she would bury
+herself in books or dreams, to satisfy the cravings of her intellect and
+imagination. On the other hand, her vigorous physical organization kept
+alive her taste for active amusements and merry companionship. So the
+child-squire romped on equal terms with the little rustics of Nohant,
+sharing their village sports and the occupations of the seasons as they
+came round: hay-making and gleaning in summer; in winter weaving
+bird-nets to spread in the snowy fields for the wholesale capture of
+larks; anon listening with mixed terror and delight to the picturesque
+legends told by the hemp-beaters, as they sat at their work out of doors
+on September moonlight evenings--to all the traditional ghost-stories of
+the "Black Valley," as she fancifully christened the country round
+about. Tales were these of fantastic animals and goblins, the
+_grand'-bete_ and the _levrette blanche_, Georgeon, that imp of
+mischief, night apparitions of witches and charmers of wolves, singing
+Druidical stones and mysterious portents--a whole fairy mythology, then
+firmly believed in by the superstitious peasantry.
+
+As a signal contrast to this way of life came for a time the annual
+visits to Paris--suspended after she was ten years old. There liberty
+ended, and the girl was transported into a novel and most uncongenial
+sphere. Her grandmother's friends and relatives were mostly old people,
+who clung to antiquated modes and customs; and distinguished though such
+circles might be, the youngest member only found out that they were
+intolerably dull. The wrinkled countesses with their elaborate toilettes
+and ceremonious manners, the _abbes_ with their fashionable
+tittle-tattle and their innumerable snuff-boxes, the long dinners, the
+accomplishment-lessons, notably those in dancing and deportment, were
+repugnant to the soul of the little hoyden. She made amends to herself
+by observing these new scenes and characters narrowly, with the acute
+natural perception that was one of her leading gifts. From this
+artificial atmosphere of constraint, it was inevitable that she should
+welcome hours of escape into her mother's unpretending domestic circle;
+and already at ten years old she had pronounced the lot of a
+scullery-maid enviable, compared to that of an old _marquise_.
+
+Nevertheless the fact of her having, at an age when impressions are
+strongest, and most lasting, mixed freely and on equal terms with the
+upper classes of society, was a point in her education not without its
+favorable action on her afterwards as a novelist. Despite her firm
+republican sympathies, emphatic disdain for mere rank and wealth, and
+her small mercy for the foibles of the fashionable world, she can enter
+into its spirit, paint its allurements without exaggeration, and
+indicate its shortcomings with none of that asperity of the outsider
+which always suggests some unconscious envy lurking behind the scorn.
+
+The despised accomplishment-lessons, in themselves tending only to so
+much agreeable dabbling, proved useful to her indirectly by creating new
+interests, and as an intellectual stimulus. There seems to have been
+little or no method about her early education. The study of her own
+language was neglected, and the time spent less profitably, she
+considered in acquiring a smattering of Latin with Deschartres. She took
+to some studies with avidity, while others remained wholly distasteful
+to her. For mere head-work she cared little. Arithmetic she detested;
+versification, no less. Her imagination rebelled against the
+restrictions of form. Nowhere, perhaps, except in the free-fantasia
+style of the novel, could this great prose-poet have found the right
+field in which to do justice to her powers. The dry _technique_ in music
+was a stumbling-block of which she was impatient. History and literature
+she enjoyed in whatever they offered that was romantic, heroic, or
+poetically suggestive. In her Nohant surroundings there was nothing to
+check, and much to stimulate, this dominant, imaginative faculty. Her
+youthful attempts at original composition she quickly discarded in
+disgust; but it seemed almost a law of her mind that whatever was
+possessing it she must instinctively weave into a romance. Thus in
+writing her history-epitome she must improve on the original, when too
+dry, by exercising her fancy in the description of places and
+personages. The actual political events of that period were of the most
+exciting character; Napoleon's Russian campaign, abdication, retreat to
+Elba, the Hundred Days, Waterloo, the Restoration, following each other
+in swift succession. Old Madame Dupin was an anti-Bonapartist, but
+Aurore had caught from her mother something of the popular infatuation
+for the emperor, and her fancy would create him over again, as he might
+have been had his energies been properly directed. Her day-dreams were
+often so vivid as to effect her senses with all the force of realities.
+
+Such a visionary life might have been most dangerous and mentally
+enervating had her organization been less robust, and the tendency to
+reverie not been matched by lively external perception and plentiful
+physical activity. As it was, if at one moment she was in a cloud-land
+of her own, or poring over the stories of the Iliad, the classic
+mythologies, or Tasso's _Gerusalemme_, the next would see her scouring
+the fields with Ursule and Hippolyte, playing practical jokes on the
+tutor, and extemporizing wild out-of-door games and dances with her
+village companions.
+
+Of serious religious education she received none at all. Here, again,
+the authorities were divided. Her mother was pious in a primitive way,
+though holding aloof from priestly influences. The grandmother, a
+disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of Voltaire, had renounced the
+Catholic creed, and was what was then called a Deist. But beyond
+discouraging a belief in miraculous agencies she preserved a neutrality
+with her ward on the subject, and Aurore was left free to drift as her
+nature should decide. Instinctively she felt more drawn toward her
+mother's unreasoning, emotional faith than toward a system of
+philosophic, critical inquiry. But on both sides what was offered her to
+worship was too indefinite to satisfy her strong religious instincts.
+Once more she filled in the blank with her imagination, which was
+forthwith called upon to picture a being who should represent all
+perfections, human and divine; something that her heart could love, as
+well as her intelligence approve.
+
+This ideal figure, for whom she devised the name _Corambe_, was to
+combine all the spiritual qualities of the Christian ideal with the
+earthly grace and beauty of the mythological deities of Greece. For very
+many years she cherished this fantasy, finding there the scope she
+sought for her aspirations after superhuman excellence. It is hardly too
+much to say that the Christianity which had been expressly left out in
+her teaching she invented for herself. She erected a woodland altar in
+the recesses of a thicket to this imaginary object of her adoration, and
+it is a characteristic trait that the sacrifices she chose to offer
+there were the release of birds and butterflies that had been taken
+prisoners--as a symbolical oblation most welcome to a divinity whose
+essential attributes were infinite mercy and love. It will be remembered
+that a somewhat similar anecdote is related of the youthful Goethe.
+
+Aurore, as the years went on, had grown sincerely fond of Madame Dupin;
+but her mother still held the foremost place in her heart, and she had
+never ceased to cherish the belief that if they two could live together
+she would be perfectly happy. The discovery of this deeply irritated her
+grandmother, who at length was provoked to intimate to the girl
+something of the real motive for insisting on this separation--namely,
+that her mother's antecedents were such as, in the eyes of Aurore's
+well-wishers, rendered it desirable to establish the daughter's
+existence apart from that of her parent. Sooner or later such a
+revelation must have been made; but made as it was, thus precipitately,
+in a moment of jealous anger, the chief result was of necessity to cause
+a painful and dangerous shock to the sensitive young mind. It brought
+about an unnatural discord in her moral nature, forbidden all at once to
+respect what she had loved most, and must continue to love, in spite of
+all. On the injurious effects of the over-agitation to which she was
+subjected in her childhood she has laid much stress in her remarkable
+work, "The Story of My Life." Much of this book, written when she was
+between forty and fifty, reads like a romance; and had a certain amount
+of retrospective imagination entered into the treatment of these
+reminiscences it would not be surprising. The tendency to impart
+poetical color and significance to whatever was capable of taking it was
+her mastering impulse, and may sometimes have led her to lose the
+distinction between fancy and reality, especially as by her own
+confession her memory was never her strong point. But she had an
+excellent memory for impressions, and no reader whose own recollections
+of childhood have not grown faint, but will feel the profound truth of
+the spirit of the narrative, which is of a kind that occasional
+exaggerations in the letter cannot depreciate in value as a
+psychological history. For an account of her early life it must always
+remain the most important source.
+
+Aurore was now thirteen, and though she had read a good deal of
+miscellaneous literature her instruction had been mostly of a desultory
+sort; she was behindhand in the accomplishments deemed desirable for
+young ladies; and her country manners, on the score of etiquette, left
+something to be desired. To school, therefore, it was decided that she
+must go; and her grandmother selected that held by the nuns of the
+"English convent" at Paris, as the most fashionable institution of the
+kind.
+
+This _Convent des Anglaises_ was a British community, first established
+in the French capital in Cromwell's time. It has now been removed, and
+its site, the Rue St. Victor, has undergone complete transformation. In
+1817, however, it was in high repute among conventual educational
+establishments. To this retreat Aurore was consigned and there spent
+more than two years, an untroubled time she has spoken of as in many
+respects the happiest of her life. There is certainly nothing more
+delightful in her memoirs than the vivid picture there drawn of the
+convent-school interior, drawn without flattery or malice, and with
+sympathy and animation.
+
+The nunnery was an extensive building of rambling construction--with
+parts disused and dilapidated--quite a little settlement, counting some
+150 inmates, nuns, pupils and teachers; with cells and dormitories, long
+corridors, chapels, kitchens, distillery, spiral staircases and
+mysterious nooks and corners; a large garden planted with chestnut
+trees, a kitchen garden, and a little cemetery without gravestones,
+over-grown with evergreens and flowers. The sisters were all English,
+Irish, or Scotch, but the majority of the pupils and the secular
+mistresses were French. Of the nuns the ex-scholar speaks with respect
+and affection, but their religious exercises left them but the smaller
+share of their time and attention to devote to the pupils. The girls
+almost without exception were of high social rank, the _bourgeois_
+element as yet having scarcely penetrated this exclusive seminary.
+Aurore formed warm friendships with many of her school-fellows, and
+seems to have been decidedly popular with the authorities as well, in
+spite of the high spirits which amid congenial company found vent in
+harmless mischief and a sort of organized playful insubordination. The
+school had two parties: the _sages_ or good girls, and the _diables_,
+their opposites. Among the latter Aurore conscientiously enrolled
+herself and became a leader in their escapades, acquiring the sobriquet
+of "Madcap." These outbreaks led to nothing more heinous than playing
+off tricks on a tyrannical mistress, or making raids on the forbidden
+ground of the kitchen garden. But the charm that held together the
+confraternity of _diables_ was a grand, long-cherished design, to which
+their best energy and ingenuity were devoted--a secret, heroic-sounding
+enterprise, set forth as "the deliverance of the victim." A tradition
+existed among them that a captive was kept languishing miserably in some
+remote cell, and they had set themselves the task of discovering and
+liberating this hapless wretch.
+
+It is needless to say that prisoner and dungeon existed in their
+girlishly romantic brains alone, but easy to see how such a legend might
+possess itself of their imaginations, and to what bewitching exploits it
+might invite firm believers. The supervision was not so very strict but
+that a _diable_ of spirit might sometimes play truant from the
+class-room unnoticed. The truants would then start on an exciting
+journey of discovery through the tortuous passages, exploring the
+darkest recesses of the more deserted portions of the convent; now
+penetrating into the vaults, now adventuring on the roofs, regardless
+of peril to life or limb. This sublimely ridiculous undertaking,
+half-sport, half-earnest, so fascinated Aurore as to become the most
+important occupation of her mind!
+
+The teaching provided for the young ladies appears to have been of the
+customary superficial order--of everything a little; a little music, a
+little drawing, a little Italian. With English she had the opportunity
+of becoming really conversant, as it was the language commonly spoken in
+the convent, where also she could not fail to acquire some insight into
+the English character. This she has treated more fairly than England for
+long was to treat her. Few of her gifted literary countrymen have done
+such justice to the sterling good qualities of our nation. Even when, in
+delineating the Briton, she caricatures those peculiarities with which
+he is accredited abroad, her blunders seem due to incomplete knowledge
+rather than to any inability to comprehend the spirit of a people with
+whom, indeed, she had many points of sympathy. She could penetrate that
+coldness and constraint of manner so repelling to French natures, and
+has said of us, with unconventional truth, that our character is in
+reality more vehement than theirs; but with less mastery over our
+emotions themselves, we have more mastery over the expression of our
+emotions. Among her chosen school-comrades were several English girls,
+but on leaving the convent their paths separated, and in her after life
+she had but rare opportunities for renewing these early friendships.
+
+Some eighteen months had elapsed in this fashion when Aurore began to
+tire of _diablerie_. The victim remained undiscoverable. The store of
+practical jokes was exhausted. Her restless spirit, pent up within those
+convent walls, was thirsting for a new experience,--something to fill
+her heart and life.
+
+It came in the dawn of a religious enthusiasm--different from her
+mystical dream of _Corambe_, which however poetical was out of harmony
+with the spirit and ritual of a Catholic convent. But monastic life had
+its poetical aspects also; and through these it was that its
+significance first successfully appealed to her. An evening in the
+chapel, a Titian picture representing Christ on the Mount of Olives, a
+passage chanced upon in the "Lives of the Saints," brought impressions
+that awoke in her a new fervor, and inaugurated a period of ardent
+Catholicism. All vagueness was gone from her devotional aspirations,
+which now acquired a direct personal import. The change brought a
+revolution in her general behavior. She was understood to have been
+"converted." "Madcap" was now nicknamed "Sainte Aurore" by her profane
+school-fellows, and she formed the serious desire and intention of
+becoming a nun.
+
+The sisters, a practical-minded community, behaved with great good sense
+and discretion. Without distressing the youthful proselyte by casting
+doubts on her "vocation," they reminded her that the consideration was a
+distant one, as for years to come her first duty would be to her
+relatives, who would never sanction her present determination. Her
+confessor, the Abbe Premord, a Jesuit and man of the world, was likewise
+kindly discouraging; and perceiving that her zeal was leading her to
+morbid self-accusation and asceticism of mood, he shrewdly enjoined upon
+her as a penance to take part in the sports and pastimes with the rest
+as heretofore, much to her dismay. But she soon found her liking for
+these return, and with it her health of mind. Unshaken still in her
+private belief that she would take the veil in due time, she was content
+to wait, and in the interval to be a useful and agreeable member of
+society. No more insubordination, no more mischievous freaks, yet
+"Sainte Aurore" remained the life and soul of all recreations recognized
+by authority, which even included little theatrical performances now and
+then.
+
+She had become more regular in her studies since her mind had taken a
+serious turn, but her heart was less in them than ever. Considering
+this, and the deficiencies in the system of instruction itself, it is
+hardly surprising that when, in the spring of 1820, her grandmother
+fearing that the monastic idea was taking hold of Aurore in good earnest
+decided to remove her from the _Couvent des Anglaises_, she knew little
+more than when first she had entered it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+GIRLHOOD AND MARRIED LIFE.
+
+
+Aurore Dupin was now fifteen, and so far, though somewhat peculiarly
+situated, she and her life had presented no very extraordinary features,
+nor promise of the same. Her energies had flowed into a variety of
+channels, and manifestly clever and accustomed to take the lead though
+she might be, no one, least of all herself, seems to have thought of
+regarding her as a wonder. The Lady Superior of the _Couvent des
+Anglaises_, who called her "Still Waters," had perhaps an inkling of
+something more than met the eye, existent in this pupil. But a dozen
+years were yet to elapse before the moment came when she was to start
+life afresh for herself, on a footing of independence and literary
+enterprise, and by her first published attempts raise her name at once
+above the names of the mass of her fellow-creatures.
+
+Old Madame Dupin, warned by failing health that her end was not far off,
+would gladly have first assured a husband's protection for her ward,
+whom she had now succeeded in really dissociating from her natural
+guardian. The girl's bringing-up, and an almost complete separation for
+the last five years, had made a gap--in habits of mind and feeling--such
+as could hardly be quite bridged over, between her mother and herself.
+But though beginning to be sadly aware of this and of the increasing
+violence and asperities of poor Madame Maurice Dupin's temper, which
+made peace under one roof with her a matter of difficulty, Aurore hung
+back from the notion of marriage, and clearly was much too young to be
+urged into taking so serious a step. So to Nohant she returned from the
+convent in the spring of 1820. There she continued to strike that
+judicious compromise between temporal and spiritual duties and pleasures
+enjoined on her by her clerical adviser. Still bent on choosing a
+monastic life, when free to choose for herself, she was reconciled in
+the meantime to take things as they came, and to make herself happy and
+add to the happiness of her grandmother in the ordinary way. So we find
+her enjoying the visit of one of her school friends, getting up little
+plays to amuse the elders, practicing the harp, receiving from her
+brother Hippolyte--now a noisy hussar--during his brief visit home, her
+first initiation into the arts of riding--for the future her favorite
+exercise--and of pistol-shooting; and last, but not least, beginning to
+suspect that she had learned nothing whatever while at school, and
+setting to work to educate herself, as best she could, by miscellaneous
+reading.
+
+In the spring of the following year Madame Dupin's health and mental
+faculties utterly broke down. But she lived on for another ten months.
+Aurore for the time was placed in a most exceptional position for a
+French girl of sixteen. She was thrown absolutely on herself and her own
+resources, uncontrolled and unprotected, between a helpless, half
+imbecile invalid, and the eccentric, dogmatic pedagogue, Deschartres.
+Highly susceptible to influences from without, her mind, during their
+sudden and complete suspension, seemed as it were invited to discover
+and take its own bent.
+
+Piqued by the charge of dense ignorance flung at her by her ex-tutor,
+and aware that there was truth in it, she would now sit up all night
+reading, finding her appetite for the secular knowledge she used to
+despise grow by what it fed upon. The phase of religious exaltation she
+had recently passed through still gave the tone to her mind, and it was
+with the works of famous philosophers, metaphysicians, and Christian
+mystics that she began her studies. Comparing the "Imitation of Christ"
+with Chateaubriand's "Spirit of Christianity," and struck here and
+elsewhere with the wide discrepancies and contradictions of opinion
+manifest between great minds ranging themselves under one theological
+banner, she was led on to speculations that alarmed her conscience, and
+she appealed to her spiritual director, the Abbe Premord, for advice,
+fearing lest her faith might be endangered if she read more. He
+encouraged her to persevere, telling her in no wise to deny herself
+these intellectual enjoyments. But her rigid Catholicism was doomed from
+that hour. Hers was that order of mind which can never give ostensible
+adhesion to a creed whilst morally unconvinced; never accept that refuge
+of the weak from the torment of doubt, in abdicating the functions of
+reason and conscience, shifting the onus of responsibility on to others,
+and agreeing to believe, as it were, by proxy. She had plunged
+fearlessly and headlong into Aristotle, Bacon, Locke, Condillac, Mably,
+Leibnitz, Bossuet, Pascal, Montaigne, Montesquieu; beginning to call
+many things in question, and, through the darkness and confusion into
+which she was sometimes thrown, trying honestly and sincerely to feel
+her way to some more glorious faith and light.
+
+In the convent she had been familiarized with Romanism under its most
+attractive aspects. The moral refinement, the mystery, the seclusion,
+and picturesque beauties of that abode had a poetic charm that had
+carried her irresistibly away. But, confronted with the system in its
+practical working, she was staggered by many of its features. In the
+country churches around her she saw the peasantry encouraged in their
+grossest superstitions, and the ritual, carelessly hurried through,
+degenerate often into mere mockery. The practice of confession,
+moreover--her ultimate condemnation of which, as an institution whose
+results for good are scanty, its dangers excessive, will be endorsed by
+most persons in this country--and the Church's denial of the right of
+salvation to all outside its pale, revolted her; and she caught at the
+teaching of those who claimed liberty of conscience. "Reading Leibnitz,"
+she observes, "I became a Protestant without knowing it." That purer and
+more liberal Christianity she dreamed of had, she discovered, been the
+ideal of many great men. The step brought her face to face with fresh
+and grave problems of which, she truly observes, the solutions were
+beyond her years, and beyond that era. There came to her rare moments of
+celestial calm and concord, but she owed them to other and indirect
+sources of inspiration. The study of philosophy, indeed, was not much
+more congenial to her at sixteen than arithmetic had been at six. In
+what merely exercised memory and attention she took comparatively but
+languid interest. Instruction, to bring her its full profit, must be
+conveyed through the medium of moral emotion, but the mysterious power
+of feeling to stimulate intellect was with her immense. She turned now
+to the poets--Shakespeare, Byron, Dante, Milton, Virgil, Pope. A poet
+herself, she discovered that these had more power than controversialists
+to strengthen her religious convictions, as well as to enlarge her mind.
+Above all, the writings of the poet-moralist, Jean-Jacques Rousseau,
+helped her towards resolving the question that occupied her, of her true
+vocation in life, now that her determination to take the veil was not a
+little shaken.
+
+The midnight student was by turns Amazon and sick-nurse as well. From
+the fatigue of long watches over her books or by the invalid's bedside,
+she found a better and more invigorating refreshment than sleep in
+solitary morning rides across country. Her fearlessness on horseback was
+madness in the eyes of the neighbors. Riding, then and there, was almost
+unheard of for ladies, a girl in a riding-habit regarded as simply a
+Cossack in petticoats, and Mademoiselle Dupin's delight in
+horse-exercise sufficed to stamp her as eccentric and strong-minded in
+the opinion of the country gentry and the towns-folk of La Chatre. They
+had heard of her studies, too, and disapproved of them as unlady-like in
+character. Philosophy was bad enough, but anatomy, which she had been
+encouraged to take up by Deschartres, himself a proficient in medical
+science, was worse--sacrilegious, for a person understood to be
+professedly of a devotional turn of mind. She went game-shooting with
+the old tutor; he had a mania for the sport, which she humored though
+she did not share. But when quails were the object, she owns to have
+enjoyed her part in the chase, which was to crouch in the furrows among
+the green corn, imitating the cry of the birds to entice them within
+gunshot of the sportsman. Lastly, finding in the feminine
+costume-fashions of that period a dire impediment to out-door enterprise
+of the sort, in a region of no roads, or bad roads, of rivers
+perpetually in flood, turning the lanes into water-courses for
+three-fourths of the year, of miry fields and marshy heaths, she
+procured for herself a suit of boy's clothes, donning blouse and gaiters
+now and then without compunction for these rough country walks and
+rambles.
+
+Here, indeed, was more than enough to raise a hue-and-cry at La Chatre,
+a small provincial town, probably neither better nor worse than the rest
+of its class, a class never yet noted for charity or liberality of
+judgment. The strangest stories began to be circulated concerning her,
+stories for the most part so false and absurd as to inspire her with a
+sweeping contempt for public opinion. By a very common phenomenon, she
+was to incur throughout her life far more censure through freaks,
+audacious as breaches of custom, but intrinsically harmless, nor likely
+to set the fashion to others, than is often reserved for errors of a
+graver nature. The conditions of ordinary middle-class society are
+designed, like ready-made clothes, to fit the vast majority of human
+beings, who live under them without serious inconvenience. For the
+future George Sand to confine her activities within the very narrow
+restrictions laid down by the social code of La Chatre was, it must be
+owned, hardly to be expected. It was perhaps premature to throw down the
+gauntlet at sixteen, but her inexperience and isolation were complete.
+The grandmother in her dotage was no counsellor at all. Deschartres, an
+oddity himself, cared for none of these things. Those best acquainted
+with her at La Chatre, families the heads of which had known her father
+well and whose younger members had fraternized with her from childhood
+upwards, liked her none the less for her unusual proceedings, and
+defended her stoutly against her detractors.
+
+"You are losing your best friend," said her dying grandmother to her
+when the end came, in December, 1821. Aurore was, indeed, placed in a
+difficult and painful situation. She had inherited all the property of
+the deceased, who, in her will, expressed her desire that her own
+nearest relations by her marriage with M. Dupin, a family of the name of
+de Villeneuve, well-off and highly connected, should succeed her as
+guardians to her ward. But it was impossible to dispute the claims of
+Madame Maurice Dupin to the care of her own daughter if she chose to
+assert them, which she quickly did, bearing off the girl with her to
+Paris--Nohant being left under the stewardship of Deschartres--and by
+her unconciliatory behavior further alienating the other side of the
+family from whom Aurore, through no fault of her own, was virtually
+estranged at the moment when she stood most in need of a friend. Twenty
+years later they came forward to claim kinship and friendship again: it
+was then with George Sand, the illustrious writer, become one of the
+immortals.
+
+Thus her lot was cast for her in her mother's home and plebeian circle
+of acquaintance. So much the worse, it was supposed, for her prospects,
+social and matrimonial. This did not distress her, but none the less was
+the time that followed an unhappy one. The mother whom she had idolized,
+and of whom she always remained excessively fond, appears to have been
+something of a termagant in her later years. The heavy troubles of her
+life had aggravated one of those irascible and uncontrollable tempers
+that can only be soothed by superior violence. Aurore, saddened, gentle,
+and submissive, only exasperated her. Her fitful affection and fitful
+rages combined to make her daughter's life miserable, and to incline the
+girl unconsciously to look over-favorably on any recognized mode of
+escape that should present itself.
+
+A long visit to the country-house of some friends near Melun, was hailed
+as a real relief by both. Here there were young people, and plenty of
+cheerful society. Aurore became like one of the family, and her mother
+was persuaded to allow her to prolong her stay indefinitely. Among the
+new acquaintance she formed whilst on this visit was one that decided
+her future.
+
+M. Casimir Dudevant was a young man on terms of intimacy with her hosts,
+the Duplessis family. From the first he was struck by Mlle. Dupin, who
+on his further acquaintance was not otherwise than pleased with him.
+The sequel, before long, came in an offer of marriage on his part, which
+she accepted with the approval of her friends.
+
+He was seven-and-twenty, had served in the army, and studied for the
+law; but had expectations which promised an independence. His father,
+Colonel Dudevant, a landed proprietor in Gascony, whose marriage had
+proved childless, had acknowledged Casimir, though illegitimate, and
+made him his heir. It was reckoned not a brilliant _parti_ for the
+_chatelaine_ of Nohant, but a perfectly eligible one. It was not a
+_mariage de convenance_; the young people had chosen freely. Still less
+was it a love match. Romantic sentiment--counted out of place in such
+arrangements by the society they belonged to--seems not to have been
+dreamed of on either side. But they had arranged it for themselves,
+which to Aurore would naturally seem, as indeed it was, an improvement
+on the usual mode of procedure, according to which the burden of choice
+would have rested with her guardians. It was a _mariage de raison_
+founded, as she and he believed, on mutual friendliness; in reality on a
+total and fatal ignorance of each other's characters, and probably, on
+Aurore's side, of her own as well. She was only just eighteen, and had a
+wretched home.
+
+The match was sanctioned by their parents, respectively. In September,
+1822, Aurore Dupin became Madame Dudevant, and shortly afterwards she
+and her husband established themselves at Nohant, there to settle down
+to quiet country life.
+
+If tranquillity did not bring all the happiness that was expected, it
+was at least unbroken by such positive trials as those to come, and
+whatever was lacking to Madame Dudevant's felicity she forgot for a
+while in her joy over the birth of her son Maurice, in the summer of
+1823--a son for whom more than ordinary treasures of maternal affection
+were in store, and who, when his childhood was past, was to become and
+remain until the time of her death a sure consolation and compensation
+to her for the troubles of her life.
+
+The first two years after her marriage were spent almost without
+interruption in the still monotony of Nohant. "We live here as quietly
+as possible," she writes to her mother in June, 1825, "seeing very few
+people, and occupying ourselves with rural cares." That absolute
+dependence on each other's society that might have had its charm for a
+really well-assorted couple was, however, not calculated to prolong any
+illusions that might exist as to the perfect harmony of their
+dispositions. Already in the summer of 1824 the Dudevants had sought a
+change from seclusion in a long visit to their friends the Duplessis,
+after which they rented a villa in the environs of Paris for a short
+while. The spring found them back at Nohant, and the summer of 1825 was
+marked by a tour to the Pyrenees, undertaken in concert with some old
+school-fellows of Aurore's, two sisters, who with their father were
+starting for Cauterets. The pleasure of girlish friendships renewed gave
+double charm to the trip, and her delight in the mountain scenery knew
+no bounds.
+
+"I am in such a state of enthusiasm about the Pyrenees," she writes to
+her mother, "that I shall dream and talk of nothing but mountains and
+torrents, caves and precipices, all the rest of my life." She joined
+eagerly in every excursion on foot and horseback, but even moderate
+feats of mountaineering, such as are now expected of the quietest
+English lady-tourists by their husbands and brothers, were then deemed
+startlingly eccentric, and got her into fresh trouble on this head.
+
+Her letters and the fragments of her journal kept during this time, and
+in which she tried to commit to paper her impressions, whilst fresh and
+vivid, of the Pyrenees, show the same peculiar descriptive power that
+distinguished her novels--that art of seizing grand general effects
+together with picturesque detail, and depicting them in a simple and
+straightforward manner, in which she was an adept. It must be added that
+the diffuseness which characterizes her fiction, also pervades her
+correspondence. Neither can be adequately represented by extracts. Her
+composition is like a gossamer web, that must be shown in its entirety,
+as to split it up is to destroy it.
+
+The ensuing winter and spring were passed agreeably in visits with her
+husband to his family at Nerac, Gascony, and to friends in the
+neighborhood. In the summer of 1826 their wanderings ended. Once more
+they settled down at Nohant, where Madame Dudevant, except for a few
+brief absences on visits to friends, or to health resorts in the
+vicinity, remained stationary for the next four years, during which her
+after-destiny was unalterably shaping itself.
+
+It is perfectly idle to speculate on what might have happened had her
+lot in marriage turned out a fortunate one, or had she married for love,
+or had the moral character of the partner of her life preserved any
+solid claim on her respect, since the contrary was unhappily the case.
+Their situation, no doubt, was anomalous. In the young girl of barely
+eighteen, country-bred and intellectually immature, whom M. Dudevant had
+chosen to marry, who could have discerned one of the greatest poetical
+geniuses and most powerful minds of the century? Some commiseration
+might _a priori_ be felt for the petty squire's son who had taken the
+hand of the pretty country-heiress, promising himself, no doubt, a
+comfortable jog-trot existence in the ordinary groove, to discover in
+after years that he was mated with the most remarkable woman that had
+made herself heard of in the literary world since Sappho! But he
+remained fatally blind to the nature of the development that was taking
+place under his eyes, preserving to the last the serenest contempt for
+his wife's intelligence. Her large mind and enthusiastic temperament
+sought in vain for moral sympathy from a narrow common spirit, and in
+proportion as her faculties unfolded, increasing disparity between them
+brought increasing estrangement. Such a strong artist-nature may require
+for its expansion an amount of freedom not easily compatible with
+domestic happiness. But of real domestic happiness she never had a fair
+chance, and for a time the will to make the best of her lot as it was
+cast appears not to have been wanting.
+
+The Dudevants, after their return home in 1826, began to mix more freely
+in such society as La Chatre and the environs afforded, and at certain
+seasons there was no lack of provincial gayeties. Aurore Dudevant all
+her life long was quite indifferent to what she has summarily dismissed
+as "the silly vanities of finery"--"_Souffrir pour etre belle_" was what
+from her girlhood she declined to do. Regard for the brightness of her
+eyes, her complexion, the whiteness of her hands, the shape of her foot,
+never made her sacrifice her midnight study, her walks in the sunshine,
+or her good country sabots for the rough lanes of Berry. "To live under
+glass, in order not to get tanned, or chapped, or faded before the time,
+is what I have always found impossible," she for her part has
+acknowledged. And she cared very moderately for general society. She
+writes to her mother in spring, 1826: "It is not the thing of all others
+that reposes, or even that amuses me best; still there are obligations
+in this life, which one must take as they come." She was not yet
+two-and-twenty, and carnival-tide with its social "obligations" in the
+form of balls and receptions was not unwelcome. They snatched her away
+from her increasing depression. She writes of these diversions to her
+mother in a lively strain, describing how one ball was kept up till nine
+o'clock the next day, how every Sunday morning the _cure_ preaches
+against dancing, but in the evening the dance goes on in despite of
+him--how this cross _cure_ is not their own parish _cure_ of St.
+Chartier,--a very old friend and a "character" who, when Madame Dudevant
+was five-and-thirty, used to say of her, "Aurore is a child I have
+always been fond of." "As for him, if only he were sixty years younger,"
+she adds, "I would undertake to make him dance himself if I set about
+it." Then follows an amusing sketch of a rustic bridal, the double
+marriage of two members of the Nohant establishment:
+
+     The wedding-feast came off in our coach-houses--there was dinner in
+     one, dancing in the other. The splendor was such as you may
+     imagine; three tallow candle-ends by way of illumination, lots of
+     home-made wine for refreshment; the orchestra consisting of a
+     bagpipe and a hurdy-gurdy, the noisiest and, therefore, the best
+     appreciated in the country side. We invited some friends over from
+     La Chatre, and made fools of ourselves in a hundred thousand ways;
+     as, for instance, dressing up as peasants in the evening and
+     disguising ourselves so well as not to recognize each other. Madame
+     Duplessis was charming in a red petticoat; Ursule, in a blue blouse
+     and a big hat was a most comical fellow; Casimir, got up as a
+     beggar, had some halfpence given him in all good faith; Stephane,
+     whom I think you know, as a spruce peasant, made believe to have
+     been drinking, stumbled against our _sous-prefet_ and accosted
+     him--he is a nice fellow, and was just going to depart when all of
+     a sudden he recognized us. Well, it was a most farcical evening,
+     and would have amused you I will engage. Perhaps you, too, would
+     have been tempted to put on the country-cap, and I will answer for
+     it that there would not have been a pair of black eyes to compete
+     with yours.
+
+In other letters written in a vein of charming good humor, her facility
+and spirit are shown in her treatment of trivial incidents, or sketches
+of local characters, as this, for example, of an ancient female servant
+in her employ:
+
+     The strangest old woman in the world--active, industrious, clean
+     and faithful, but an unimaginable grumbler. She grumbles by day,
+     and I think by night, when asleep. She grumbles whilst making the
+     butter, she grumbles when feeding the poultry, she grumbles even at
+     her meals. She grumbles at other people, and when she is alone she
+     grumbles at herself. I never meet her without asking her how her
+     grumbling is getting on, and she grumbles away more than ever.
+
+And elsewhere she has her fling at the little squabbles and absurdities
+of provincial society, the "sets" and petty distinctions, giving a
+humorous relation of the collapse of her well-meaning efforts, in
+conjunction with friends at the _sous-prefecture_, to do away with some
+of these caste prejudices, of the horror and indignation created in the
+oligarchy of La Chatre by the apparition of an inoffensive music-master
+and his wife at the _sous-prefet's_ reception, horror so great that on
+the next occasion, the _salon_ of the official was unfurnished with
+guests, except for the said music-master and the Dudevants themselves.
+She wrote a poetical skit to commemorate the incident, which created
+great amusement among her friends.
+
+In the autumn, 1828, her daughter Solange was born. The care of her two
+children, to whom she was devoted, occupied her seriously. Maurice's
+education was beginning, a fresh inducement to her to study that she
+might be better able to superintend his instruction. His least
+indisposition put her into a fever of anxiety. Her own health during all
+these years had repeatedly given cause for alarm. Symptoms of
+chest-disease showed themselves, but afterwards disappeared, her
+constitutional vigor triumphing in the end over complaints which seem to
+a great extent to have been of a nervous order. Meantime her domestic
+horizon was becoming overcast at many points.
+
+Her brother, Hippolyte Chatiron, now married, came with his family to
+settle in the neighborhood, and spent some time at Nohant. He had fallen
+into the fatal habit of drinking, in which he was joined by M. Dudevant
+to the degradation of his habits and, it would be charitable to suppose,
+to the confusion of his intelligence. This grave ill came to make an
+open break in the household calm, hitherto undisturbed on the surface.
+Low company and its brutalizing influences were tending to bring about a
+state of things to which the most patient of wives might find it hard to
+submit. A role of complete self-effacement was not one it was in her
+power long to sustain, and the utter moral solitude into which she was
+thrown consolidated those forces inclining her to the extreme of
+self-assertion. For together with trials without came the growing sense
+of superiority, the _ennui_ and unrest springing from mental faculties
+with insufficient outlet, and moreover, denied the very shadow of
+appreciation at home, where she saw the claim to her deference and
+allegiance co-exist with a repudiation she resented of all idea of the
+reciprocity of such engagements.
+
+She had voluntarily handed over the management of her property--the
+revenue of which was hardly proportionate to the necessary expenses and
+required careful economy--to her husband, an arrangement which left her,
+even for pocket money, dependent on him. She now set herself to devise
+some means of adding to her resources by private industry. The more
+ambitious project of securing by her own exertions a separate
+maintenance for herself and her children would at this time have seemed
+chimerical, but it haunted her as a dream long before it took definite
+shape.
+
+It was not in literature that she first fancied she saw her way to
+earning an independent income. She had begun to make amateur essays in
+novel-writing, but was as dissatisfied with them as with the
+compositions of her childhood, and with a religious novelette she had
+produced whilst in the convent, and speedily committed to the flames.
+Again, alluding to her attempts, in 1825, at descriptions of the
+Pyrenees, she says: "I was not capable then of satisfying myself by what
+I wrote, for I finished nothing, and did not even acquire a taste for
+writing."
+
+But she had dabbled in painting, and remained fond of it. "The finest of
+the arts," she calls it, writing to her mother in 1830, "and the most
+pleasant, as a life-occupation, whether taken up for a profession, or
+for amusement merely. If I had real talent, I should consider such a lot
+the finest in the world." But neither did the decoration of fans and
+snuff-boxes nor the production of little water-color likenesses of her
+children and friends, beyond which her art did not go, promise anything
+brilliant in the way of remuneration.
+
+In her circle of friends at La Chatre--old family friends who had known
+her all her life--were those who had recognized and admired her superior
+ability. Here, too, she met more than one young spirit with literary
+aspirations, and one, at least, M. Jules Sandeau, who was afterwards to
+achieve distinguished literary success. The desire to go and do
+likewise came and took hold of her, together with the conviction of her
+capability to make her mark. However discontented with her essays in
+novel-writing hitherto, she began to be conscious she was on the right
+track. The Revolution of July, 1830, had just been successfully
+accomplished, and new hopes and ambitions for the world in general, and
+their own country in particular, lent a stimulus to the intellectual
+activity of the youth of France--a movement too strong not to make
+itself felt, even in Berry.
+
+The state of things at Nohant for the last two years had, as we have
+seen, been tending rather to stifle than to keep alive any hesitation or
+compunction Madame Dudevant might have felt at breaking openly from her
+present condition. In a letter, dated October, 1830, to her son's
+private tutor, M. Boucoiran, who had then been a year under their roof
+in that capacity, she remarks, significantly:
+
+     You often wonder at my mobility of temper, my flexible character.
+     What would become of me without this power of self-distraction? You
+     know all in my life, and you ought to understand that but for that
+     happy turn of mind which makes me quickly forget a sorrow, I should
+     be disagreeable and perpetually withdrawn into myself, useless to
+     others, insensible to their affection.
+
+The distance between herself and her husband had, indeed, been widening
+until now the sole real link between them was their joint love for the
+children. No pretence of mutual affection existed any longer. Madame
+Dudevant's feeling seems to have been of indifference merely; M.
+Dudevant's of dislike, mingled, probably, with a little fear. It appears
+that he committed to paper his sentiments on the subject, and that this
+document, ostensibly intended by him not to be opened till after his
+death, was found and perused by his wife. It was the provocation thus
+occasioned her, and the certainty thus acquired of her husband's
+aversion to her society, that brought matters to a climax; so, at least,
+she asserted in the heat of the moment. But nothing, we imagine, could
+long have deferred her next step, strange and venturesome though it was.
+Violent in acting on a determination when taken, after the manner, as
+she observes, of those whose determinations are slow in forming, she
+declared her intentions to her husband, and obtained his consent to her
+plan.
+
+According to this singular arrangement she was to be permitted to spend
+every alternate three months in Paris, where she proposed to try her
+fortune with her pen. She looked forward to having her little girl to be
+there with her as soon as she was comfortably settled, supposing the
+experiment to succeed. For half the year she would continue to reside,
+as hitherto, at Nohant, so as not to be long separated from her son, who
+was old enough to miss her, and to part from whom, on any terms, cost
+her dear. But he was to be sent to school in two years, and for the
+meantime she had secured for him the care and services of M. Boucoiran,
+whom she thoroughly trusted.
+
+Her husband was to allow her L120 a year out of her fortune, and on
+condition that the allowance should not be exceeded, he left her at
+liberty to get on as she chose, abstaining from further interference.
+
+It seems obvious that this compromise, whilst postponing, could only
+render more inevitable a future separation on less amicable terms,
+though neither appear to have realized it at the time. Madame Dudevant
+can have had no motive to blind her in the matter beyond her desire, in
+detaching herself from her present position, not to disconnect her life
+from that of her children. The freedom she demanded it was probably too
+late to deny. Those about her, her husband and M. Chatiron, who, with
+his family, was temporarily domesticated at Nohant, and who so far
+supported her as to offer her the loan of rooms held by him in Paris,
+for the first part of her stay, thought her resolution but a caprice.
+And viewed by the light of her subsequent success it is hard now to
+realize the boldness of an undertaking whose consequences, had it
+failed, must have been humiliating and disastrous. She had no practical
+knowledge of the world, had received no artistic training, and enjoyed
+none of the advantages of intellectual society. But she had
+extraordinary courage, spirit, and energy, springing no doubt from a
+latent sense of extraordinary powers, almost matured, though as yet but
+half-manifest. So much she knew of herself, and states modestly: "I had
+discovered that I could write quickly, easily, and for long at a time
+without fatigue; that my ideas, torpid in my brain, woke up and linked
+themselves together deductively in the flow of the pen; that in my life
+of seclusion, I had observed a good deal, and understood pretty well the
+characters I had chanced to come across, and that, consequently, I knew
+human nature well enough to describe it." A most moderate estimate, in
+which, however, she had yet to convince people that she was not
+self-deceived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+DEBUT IN LITERATURE.
+
+
+In the first days of January 1831, the Rubicon was passed. The step,
+though momentous in any case to Madame Dudevant, was one whose ultimate
+consequences were by none less anticipated than by herself, when to town
+she came, still undecided whether her future destiny were to decorate
+screens and tea-caddies, or to write books, but resolved to give the
+literary career a trial.
+
+For actual subsistence she had her small fixed allowance from home; for
+credentials she was furnished with an introduction or two to literary
+men from her friends in the country who had some appreciation, more or
+less vague, of her intellectual powers. Though courageous and
+determined, she was far from self-confident; she asked herself if she
+might not be mistaking a mere fancy for a faculty, and her first step
+was to seek the opinion of some experienced authority as to her talent
+and chances.
+
+M. de Keratry, a popular novelist, to whom she was recommended, spoke
+his mind to her without restraint. It was to the crushing effect that a
+woman ought not to write at all. Her sex, Madame Dudevant was informed,
+can have no proper place in literature whatsoever. M. Delatouche,
+proprietor of the _Figaro_, poet and novelist besides, and cousin of her
+old and intimate friends the Duvernets, of La Chatre, was a shade more
+encouraging, even so far committing himself as to own that, if she would
+not let herself be disgusted by the struggles of a beginner, there might
+be a distant possibility for her of making some sixty pounds a year by
+her pen. Such specimens of her fiction as she submitted to him he
+condemned without appeal, but he encouraged her to persevere in trying
+to improve upon them, and advised her well in advising her to avoid
+imitation of any school or master, and fearlessly to follow her own
+bent.
+
+Meantime he took her on to the staff of his paper, then in its infancy
+and comparative obscurity. Journalism however was the department of
+literature least suited to her capabilities, and her
+fellow-contributors, though so much less highly gifted than Madame
+Dudevant, excelled her easily in the manufacture of leaders and
+paragraphs to order. To produce an article of a given length, on a given
+subject, within a given time, was for her the severest of ordeals; here
+her exuberant facility itself was against her. She would exhaust the
+space allotted to her, and find herself obliged to break off just at the
+point when she felt herself "beginning to begin." But she justly valued
+this apprenticeship as a professional experience, bringing her into
+direct relations with the literary world she was entering as a perfect
+stranger. Once able to devote herself entirely to composition and to
+live for her work, she found her calling begin to assert itself
+despotically. In a letter to a friend, M. Duteil, at La Chatre, dated
+about six weeks after her arrival in Paris, she writes:--
+
+     If I had foreseen half the difficulties that I find, I should not
+     have undertaken this enterprise. Well, the more I encounter the
+     more I am resolved to proceed. Still, I shall soon be returning
+     home again, perhaps without having succeeded in launching my boat,
+     but with hopes of doing better another time, and with plans of
+     working harder than ever.
+
+Three weeks later we find her writing to her son's tutor, M. Boucoiran,
+in the same strain:--
+
+     I am more than ever determined to follow the literary career. In
+     spite of the disagreeables I often meet with, in spite of days of
+     sloth and fatigue that come and interrupt my work, in spite of the
+     more than humble life I lead here, I feel that henceforth my
+     existence is filled. I have an object, a task, better say it at
+     once, a passion. The profession of a writer is a violent one, and
+     so to speak, indestructible. Once let it take possession of your
+     wretched head, you cannot stop. I have not been successful; my work
+     was thought too unreal by those whom I asked for advice.
+
+But still she persisted, providing, as best she could, "copy" for the
+_Figaro_, at seven francs a column, and trying the experiment of
+literary collaboration, working at fictions and magazine articles, the
+joint productions of herself and her friend and fellow-student, Jules
+Sandeau, who wrote for the _Revue de Paris_. It was under his name that
+these compositions appeared, Madam Dudevant, in these first
+trial-attempts, being undesirous to bring hers before the public.
+
+"I have no time to write home," she pleads, petitioning M. Boucoiran for
+news from the country, "but I like getting letters from Nohant, it rests
+my heart and my head."
+
+And alluding to her approaching temporary return thither, in accordance
+with the terms of her agreement with M. Dudevant, she writes to M.
+Charles Duvernet:--
+
+     I long to get back to Berry, for I love my children more than all
+     besides, and, but for the hopes of becoming one day more useful to
+     them with the scribe's pen than with the housekeeper's needle, I
+     should not leave them for so long. But in spite of innumerable
+     obstacles I mean to take the first steps in this thorny career.
+
+In her case it was really the first step only that cost dear; whilst
+against the annoyances with which, as a new comer, she had to contend,
+there was ample compensation to set in the novel interests of the
+intellectual, political, and artistic world stirring around her. Country
+life and peasant life she had had the opportunity of studying from her
+youth up; of middle-class society she had sufficient experience; she
+counted relatives and friends among the _noblesse_, and had moved in
+those charmed circles; but the republic of art and letters, to which by
+nature and inclination she emphatically belonged, was a land of promise
+first opened up to her now. She was eager and impatient to
+deprovincialize herself.
+
+In the art galleries of the Louvre, at the theatre and the opera, in the
+daily interchange of ideas on all kinds of topics with her little circle
+of intelligent acquaintance, her mind grew richer by a thousand new
+impressions and enjoyments, and rapidly took fresh strength together
+with fresh knowledge. The heavy practical obstacles that interfere with
+such self-education on the part of one of her sex were seriously
+aggravated in her case by her narrow income. How she surmounted them is
+well known; assuming on occasion a disguise which, imposing on all but
+the initiated, enabled her everywhere to pass for a collegian of
+sixteen, and thus to go out on foot in all weathers, at all hours, alone
+if necessary, unmolested and unobserved, in theatre or restaurant,
+boulevard or reading-room. In defense of her adoption of this strange
+measure, she pleads energetically the perishable nature of feminine
+attire in her day,--a day before double-soles or ulsters formed part of
+a lady's wardrobe,--its incompatibility with the incessant going to and
+fro which her busy life required, the exclusion of her sex from the best
+part of a Paris theatre, and so forth; the ineffable superiority of a
+costume which, economy and comfort apart, secured her equal independence
+with her men competitors in the race, and identical advantages as to the
+rapid extension of her field of observation. The practice, though never
+carried on by her to such an extent as very commonly asserted, was one
+to which she did not hesitate to resort now and then in later years, as
+a mere measure of convenience--a measure the world will only tolerate in
+the Rosalinds and Violas of the stage. The career of George Sand was,
+like her nature, entirely exceptional, and any attempt to judge it in
+any other light lands us in hopeless moral contradictions. She had
+extraordinary incentives to prompt her to extraordinary actions, which
+may be condemned or excused, but which there could be no greater
+mistake than to impute to ordinary vulgar motives. It must also be
+remembered that fifty years ago, the female art student had no
+recognized existence. She was shut out from that modicum of freedom and
+of practical advantages it were arbitrary to deny, and which may now be
+enjoyed by any earnest art aspirant in almost any great city. However
+unjustifiable the proceeding resorted to for a time by George Sand and
+Rosa Bonheur may be held to be, it cannot possibly be said they had no
+motive for it but a fantastic one.
+
+Writing to her mother from Nohant, whither she had returned in April for
+a length of time as agreed, Madam Dudevant speaks out characteristically
+in defense of her love of independence:--
+
+     I am far from having that love of pleasure, that need of amusement
+     with which you credit me. Society, sights, finery, are not what I
+     want,--you only are under this mistake about me,--it is liberty. To
+     be all alone in the street and able to say to myself, I shall dine
+     at four or at seven, according to my good pleasure; I shall go to
+     the Tuileries by way of the Luxembourg instead of going by the
+     Champs Elysees; this is what amuses me far more than silly
+     compliments and stiff drawing-room assemblies.
+
+Such audacious self-emancipation, she was well aware, must estrange her
+from her friends of her own sex in the upper circles of Parisian
+society, and she anticipated this by making no attempt to renew such
+connections. For the moment she thought only of taking the shortest,
+and, as she judged, the only way for a "torpid country wife," like
+herself, to acquire the freedom of action and the enlightenment she
+needed. Those most nearly related to her offered no opposition. It was
+otherwise with her mother-in-law, the _baronne_ Dudevant, with whom she
+had a passage-of-arms at the outset on the subject of her literary
+campaign, here disapproved _in toto_.
+
+"Is it true," enquired this lady, "that it is your intention to _print
+books_?"
+
+"Yes, madame."
+
+"Well, I call that an odd notion!"
+
+"Yes, madame."
+
+"That is all very good and very fine, but I hope you are not going to
+put the name that I bear on the _covers of printed books_?"
+
+"Oh, certaintly not, madame, there is no danger."
+
+The liberty to which other considerations were required to give way was
+certainly complete enough. The beginning of July found her back at work
+in the capital. On the Quai St. Michel--a portion of the Seine
+embankment facing the towers of Notre Dame, the Sainte Chapelle, and
+other picturesque monuments of ancient Paris--she had now definitely
+installed herself in modest lodgings on the fifth story. Accepted and
+treated as a comrade by a little knot of fellow _literati_ and
+colleagues on the _Figaro_, two of whom--Jules Sandeau and Felix
+Pyat--were from Berry, like herself; and with Delatouche, also a
+Berrichon, for their head-master, she served thus singularly her brief
+apprenticeship to literature and experience;--sharing with the rest both
+their studies and their relaxations, dining with them at cheap
+restaurants, frequenting clubs, studios, and theatres of every degree;
+the youthful effervescence of her student-friends venting itself in such
+collegians' pranks as parading deserted quarters of the town by
+moonlight, in the small hours, chanting lugubrious strains to astonish
+the shopkeepers. The only great celebrity whose acquaintance she had
+made was Balzac, himself the prince of eccentrics. Although he did not
+encourage Madame Dudevant's literary ambition, he showed himself kindly
+disposed towards her and her young friends, and she gives some amusing
+instances that came under her notice of his oddities. Thus, once after a
+little Bohemian dinner at his lodgings in the Rue Cassini, he insisted
+on putting on a new and magnificent dressing-gown, of which he was
+exceedingly vain, to display to his guests, of whom Madame Dudevant was
+one; and not satisfied therewith, must needs go forth, thus accoutred,
+to light them on their walk home. All the way he continued to hold forth
+to them about four Arab horses, which he had not got yet, but meant to
+get soon, and of which, though he never got them at all, he firmly
+believed himself to have been possessed for some time. "He would have
+escorted us thus," says Madame Dudevant, "from one extremity of Paris to
+another, if we had let him."
+
+Twice again before the end of the year, faithful to her original
+intentions, we find her returning to her place as mistress of the house
+at Nohant, occupying herself with her children, and working at the novel
+_Indiana_, which was to create her reputation the following year.
+
+Meanwhile, a novelette, _La Prima Donna_, the outcome of the literary
+collaboration with Jules Sandeau, had found its way into a magazine, the
+_Revue de Paris_; and was followed by a longer work of fiction, of the
+same double authorship, entitled _Rose et Blanche_, published under
+Sandeau's _nom de plume_ of Jules Sand.
+
+This literary partnership was not to last long, and to-day the novel
+will be found omitted in the list of the respective works of its
+authors. Its perusal will hardly repay the curious. The powerful genius
+of Madame Dudevant, the elegant talent of the author of _Mlle. de la
+Seigliere_, are mostly conspicuous by their absence in _Rose et
+Blanche_, or _La Comedienne et la Religieuse_, an imitative attempt, and
+not a happy one, in the style of fiction then in vogue.
+
+Madame Dudevant had stepped into the literary world at the moment of the
+most ardent activity of the Romantic movement. The new school was on the
+point of achieving its earliest signal triumphs. Victor Hugo's first
+poems had just been followed by the dramas _Hernani_ and _Marion
+Delorme_. Dumas' _Antony_ was drawing crowded and enthusiastic houses. A
+few months before the publication of _Rose et Blanche_ appeared _Notre
+Dame de Paris_. The passion for innovation which had seized on all the
+younger school of writers was leading many astray. The strange freaks of
+Hugo's genius had, to quote Madame Dudevant's own expression, excited a
+"ferocious appetite" for whatever was most outrageous, and set taste,
+precedent, and probability most flatly at defiance. From those
+aberrations into which the great master's imitators had been betrayed
+Madame Dudevant's fine art-instincts were calculated to preserve her;
+but she had not yet learned to trust to them implicitly.
+
+_Rose et Blanche_, though containing many clever passages--waifs and
+strays of shrewd observation, description and character analysis,--is in
+the main ill-conceived, ill-constructed, and unreal. The two authors
+have sacrificed their individualities in a mistaken effort to follow the
+fashion's lead, resulting in a most ineffective compound of tameness and
+sensationalism. Amazing adventures are undergone by each heroine before
+she is one-and-twenty. Angels of innocence, they are doomed to have
+their existences crushed out by the heartless conduct of man, Blanche
+expiring of dismay almost as soon as she is led from the altar, Rose
+burying herself and her despair in a convent. The then favorite heroes
+of romance were of the French Byronic type--young men of fortune who
+have exhausted life before they are five-and-twenty, whose minds are
+darkened by haunting memories of some terrific crime, but who are none
+the less capable of all the virtues and great elevation of sentiment on
+occasion. None of these requisitions are left unfulfilled by the
+unamiable hero of _Rose et Blanche_, a work which did little to advance
+the fortunes of its authors, and whose intrinsic merits offer little
+warrant for dragging it out of the oblivion into which it has been
+suffered to drop.
+
+To escape the influences of the literary revolution everywhere then
+triumphant was of course impossible. To make them serve her individual
+genius instead of enslaving her individuality was all Madame Dudevant
+needed to learn. Her friend Balzac had done this for himself, suiting
+his genius to the period without any sacrifice of originality. Although
+not yet at the height of his fame he had produced many most successful
+works, and Madame Dudevant, according to her own account, derived great
+profit from the study of his method, although with no inclination to
+follow in his direction. Yet he afterwards observed to her, "Our two
+roads lead to the same goal."
+
+_Rose et Blanche_, though little noticed by the public, brought a
+publisher to the door, one Ernest Dupuy, with an order for another novel
+by the same authors. _Indiana_ was ready-written, and came in response
+to the demand. But as Sandeau had had no hand whatever in this
+composition, the signature had of course to be varied. The publisher
+wishing to connect the new novel with its predecessor it was decided to
+alter the prefix only. She fixed on George, as representative of Berry,
+the land of husbandmen; and George Sand thus became pseudonym of the
+author of _Indiana_, a pseudonym whose origin imaginative critics have
+sought far afield and some have discovered in her alleged sympathy with
+Kotzebue's murderer, Karl Sand, and political assassination in general!
+Its assumption was to inaugurate a new era in her life.
+
+In the last days of April, 1832, appeared _Indiana_, by George Sand. "I
+took," says Madame Dudevant, in her account of the transaction, "the
+1,200 francs paid me by the publisher, which to me were a little
+fortune, hoping he would see his money back again." She had recently
+returned from one of her periodical visits to Nohant, accompanied this
+time by her little girl, whom the progress already achieved enabled her
+now to take into her charge, and was living very quietly and studiously
+in her humble establishment on the Quai St. Michel, when she awoke to
+find herself famous.
+
+Her success, for which indeed there had been nothing to prepare
+her--neither flattery of friends, nor vain-glorious ambition within
+herself--was immediate and conclusive. Whatever differences of opinion
+might exist about the book, critics agreed in recognizing there the
+revelation of a new writer of extraordinary power. "One of those masters
+who have been gifted with the enchanter's wand and mirror," wrote
+Sainte-Beuve, a few months later, when he did not hesitate to compare
+the young author to Madame de Stael. The novel of sentimental analysis,
+a style in which George Sand is unsurpassed, was then a fresh and
+promising field. _Indiana_, without the aid of marvellous incidents,
+startling crimes, or iniquitous mysteries, riveted the attention of its
+readers as firmly as the most thrilling tales of adventure and horror.
+It is a "soul's tragedy," and that is all--the love-tragedy vulgarized
+since by repeated treatment by inferior novelists, of a romantic,
+sensitive, passionate, high-natured girl, hopelessly ill-mated with a
+somewhat tyrannical and stupid, yet not entirely ill-disposed old
+colonel, and exposed to the seductions of a Lovelace--the truth about
+whose unloveable character, in its profound and heartless egoism, first
+bursts upon her at the moment when, maddened by brutal insult, she is
+driven to claim the generous devotion he has proffered a thousand times.
+Side by side with the ideal of selfishness, Raymon stands in contrast
+with the ideally chivalrous Ralph, Indiana's despised cousin, who,
+loving her disinterestedly and in silence, has watched over her as a
+guardian-friend to the last, and does save her ultimately. The florid
+descriptions, the high-flown strains of emotion, which now strike as
+blemishes in the book, were counted beauties fifty years since; and even
+to-day, when reaction has brought about an extreme distaste for
+emotional writing, they cannot conceal the superior ability of the
+novelist. The sentiment, however extravagantly worded, is genuine and
+spontaneous, and has the true ring of passionate conviction. The
+characters are vividly, if somewhat closely drawn and contrasted, the
+scenes graphic; every page is colored by fervid imagination, and despite
+some violations of probability in the latter portion, out of keeping
+artistically with the natural character of the rest of the book, the
+whole has the strength of that unity and completeness of conception
+which is the distinguishing stamp of a genius of the first order. The
+_entrain_ of the style is irresistible. It was written, she tells us,
+_tout d'un jet_, under the force of a stimulus from within. Ceasing to
+counterfeit the manner of anyone, or to consult the exigencies of the
+book-market, she for the first time ventures to be herself responsible
+for the inspiration and the mode of expression adopted.
+
+The papers spoke of the new novel in high tones of praise, the public
+read it with avidity. The authorship, for a time, continued to perplex
+people. In spite of the masculine pseudonym, certain feminine qualities,
+niceties of perception and tenderness, were plainly recognized in the
+work, but the possibility that so vigorous and well-executed a
+composition could come from a feminine hand was one then reckoned
+scarcely admissible. Even among those already in the secret were
+sceptics who questioned the author's power to sustain her success,
+since nearly everybody, it is said, can produce one good novel.
+
+"The success of _Indiana_ has thrown me into dismay," writes Madame
+Dudevant, in July, 1832, to M. Charles Duvernet, at La Chatre. "Till
+now, I thought my writing was without consequence, and would not merit
+the slightest attention. Fate has decreed otherwise. The unmerited
+admiration of which I have become the object must be justified." And
+_Valentine_ was already in progress; and its publication, not many
+months after _Indiana_, to be a conclusive answer to the challenge.
+
+The season of 1832, in which George Sand made her _debut_ in literature,
+was marked, in Paris, by public events of the most tragic character. In
+the spring, the cholera made its appearance, and struck panic into the
+city. Six people died in the house where Madame Dudevant resided, but
+neither she nor any of her friends were attacked. She was next to be a
+witness of political disturbances equally terrible. The disappointment
+felt by the Liberals at the results of the Revolution of 1830, and of
+the establishment of Louis Philippe's Government, upon which such high
+hopes had been founded, was already beginning to assert itself in secret
+agitation, and in the sanguinary street insurrections, such as that of
+June, 1832, sanguinarily repressed. Madame Dudevant at this time had no
+formulated political creed, and political subjects were those least
+attractive to her. But though born in the opposite camp she felt all her
+natural sympathies incline to the Republican side. They were further
+intensified by the scenes of which she was an eye-witness, and which
+roused a similar feeling even among anti-revolutionists. Thus Heine, in
+giving an account of the struggle mentioned above, and speaking of the
+enthusiasts who sacrificed their lives in this desperate demonstration,
+exclaims: "I am, by God! no Republican. I know that if the Republicans
+conquer they will cut my throat, and all because I don't admire all they
+admire; but yet the tears came into my eyes as I trod those places still
+stained with their blood. I had rather I, and all my fellow-moderates,
+had died than those Republicans."
+
+Amid such disturbing influences it is not surprising that we find her
+complaining in the letter last quoted that her work makes no progress;
+but the lost time was made up for by redoubled industry during her
+summer visit to Nohant.
+
+In the autumn appeared _Valentine_. This second novel not only confirmed
+the triumph won by the first, but was a surer proof of the writer's
+calibre, as showing what she could do with simpler materials. Here,
+encouraged by success, she had ventured to take her stand entirely on
+her own ground--dispensing even with an incidental trip to the tropics,
+which, in _Indiana_, strikes as a misplaced concession to the prevalent
+craze for Oriental coloring--and to lay the scene in her own obscure
+province of Berry, her first descriptions of which show her rare
+comprehension of the poetry of landscape. Like _Indiana_, _Valentine_ is
+a story of the affections; like _Indiana_, it is a domestic tragedy, of
+which the girl-heroine is the victim of a pernicious system that makes
+of marriage, in the first instance, a mere commercial speculation.
+Indeed, the extreme painfulness of the story would render the whole too
+repulsive but for the charm of the setting, which relieves it not a
+little, and a good deal of humor in the treatment of the minor
+characters, notably the eighteenth century _marquise_, and the Lhery
+family of peasant-_parvenus_. The personages are drawn with more finish
+than those in _Indiana_; the tone is more natural in its pitch. It is
+the work of one who finds in every-day observation, as well as in such
+personal emotions as come but once in a lifetime, the inspiration that
+smaller talents can derive from the latter alone.
+
+In both her consummate art, or rather natural gift of the art of
+narrative, is the mainstay of the fabric her imagination has reared.
+That incomparable style of hers is like some magic fairy-ring, that
+bears the wearer, safe and victorious, through manifold perils--perils
+these of prolixity, exaggeration, and disdain of careful construction.
+Both _Indiana_ and _Valentine_, moreover, contain scenes and passages
+offensive to English taste, but it is impossible fairly to criticise the
+fiction of a land where freer expression in speech and in print than
+with us is habitually recognized and practiced, from our own standpoint
+of literary decorum. It was not for this feature that French criticism
+had already begun to charge her books with dangerous tendencies (thus
+contributing largely to noise her fame abroad), as breathing rebellion
+against the laws of present society; charges which, so far as _Indiana_
+and _Valentine_ are concerned, had, as is now generally admitted, but
+little foundation. Each is the story of an unhappy marriage, but there
+is no attempt whatever to throw contempt on existing institutions, or to
+propound any theory, unless it be the idea--no heresy or novelty in
+England at least--that marriage, concluded without love on either side,
+is fraught with special dangers to the wife, whose happiness is bound up
+with her affections. It was the bold and uncompromising manner in which
+this plain fact was brought forward, the energy of the protest against
+a real social abuse, which moved some critics to sound a war-cry for
+which, as yet, no just warrant had been given.
+
+Besides these two novels, containing full proof of her genius, if not of
+its highest employment, there appeared, late in 1832, that remarkable
+novelette, _La Marquise_, revealing fresh qualities of subtle
+penetration and clear analysis. The flexibility of her imagination, the
+variety in her modes of its application, form an essential
+characteristic of her work. Not by any single novel, nor, indeed by
+half-a-dozen taken at random, can she be adequately represented.
+
+When in the winter of 1832 Madame Sand returned with her little girl to
+Paris after spending the autumn, as usual, at Nohant, it was to rather
+more comfortable quarters, on the Quai Malplaquet. The rapid sale of her
+books was placing her in comparatively easy circumstances, and giving
+fresh spur to her activity. But her situation was transforming itself
+fast; the freedom of obscurity was lost to her for ever from the day
+when the unknown personage, George Sand, became the object of general
+curiosity--of curiosity redoubled in Paris by the rumors current there
+of her exceptional position, eccentric habits, and interesting
+personality.
+
+The celebrated portrait of her by Eugene Delacroix was painted in the
+year 1833. It is a three-quarter view, and represents her wearing her
+_quasi_ masculine _redingote_, with broad _revers_ and loosely knotted
+silk neck-tie. Of somewhat later date is a highly interesting drawing by
+Calamatta, well-known by engravings; but of George Sand in her first
+youth no likeness unfortunately has been left to the world. She has been
+most diversely described by her different contemporaries. But that at
+this time she possessed real beauty is perfectly evident; for all that
+she denies it herself, and that, unlike most women, and nearly all
+French women, she scorned to enhance it by an elaborated toilette.
+Heine, though he never professed himself one of her personal adorers,
+compares the beauty of her head to that of the Venus of Milo, saying,
+"It bears the stamp of ideality, and recalls the noblest remaining
+examples of Greek art." Her figure was somewhat too short, but her hands
+and feet were very small and beautifully shaped. His acquaintance with
+her dates from the early years of her literary triumphs, and his
+description is in harmony with Calamatta's presentation. She had dark
+curling hair, a beauty in itself, falling in profusion to her shoulders,
+well-formed features, pale olive-tinted complexion, the countenance
+expressive, the eyes dark and very fine, not sparkling, but mild and
+full of feeling. The face reminds us of the character of "Still Waters,"
+attributed to the Aurore Dupin of fifteen by the Lady Superior of the
+English convent. Her voice was soft and muffled, and the simplicity of
+her manner has been remarked on by those who sought her acquaintance, as
+a particular charm. Yet, like all reserved natures, she often failed to
+attract strangers at a first meeting. In general conversation she
+disappointed people, by not shining. Men and women, immeasurably her
+inferiors, surpassed her in ready wit and brilliant repartee. Her
+taciturnity in society has been somewhat ungenerously laid to a _parti
+pris_. She was one, it is said, who took all and gave nothing. That she
+was intentionally chary of her passing thoughts and impressions to those
+around her, is, however, sufficiently disproved by her letters. Here she
+shows herself lavish of her mind to her correspondents. Conversation and
+composition necessitate a very different brain action, and her
+marvellous facility in writing seems really to have been accompanied
+with no corresponding readiness of speech and reply. Probably it was
+only, as she herself states, when she had a pen in her hand that her
+lethargic ideas would arise and flow in order as they should. And the
+need of self-expression felt by all those who have not the gift of
+communicating themselves fully and easily in speech or manner, a strong
+need in her case, from her having so much to express, was the spur that
+drove her to seek and find the mode of so doing in art.
+
+Her silence in company certainly did not detract from her fascination
+upon a closer acquaintance. Of those who fell under the spell, the more
+fortunate came at once to terms of friendship with her, which remained
+undisturbed through life. Thus, of one among this numerous brotherhood,
+Francois Rollinat, with whom she would congratulate herself on having
+realized the perfection of such an alliance of minds, she could write
+when recording their friendship, then already a quarter of a century
+old, that it was still young as compared with some that she counted, and
+that dated from her childhood.
+
+Others fell in love with her, and found her unresponsive. With some of
+these, jealousies and misunderstandings arose, and led to estrangements,
+for the most part but temporary. Yet the winner of her heart was
+scarcely to be envied. She was apt--she has herself thus expressed
+it--to see people through a prism of enthusiasm, and afterwards to
+recover her lucidity of judgment. Great, no doubt, was her power of
+self-illusion; it betrayed her into errors that have been unsparingly
+judged. For her power of calm and complete disillusion she was perhaps
+unique among women, and it is no wonder if mankind have found it hard to
+forgive.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+LELIA.--ITALIAN JOURNEY.
+
+
+It was less than two years since she had come up to the capital, to seek
+her fortunes there in literature. Aurore Dudevant, hereafter to be
+spoken of as George Sand (for she made her adopted name more her own
+than that she had borne hitherto, and became George Sand for her private
+friends as well as for the public,) found herself raised to eminence
+among the eminent. And it was at an exceptionally brilliant epoch in
+French imaginative literature that the distinction had been won. Such a
+burst of talent as that which signalized the opening years of Louis
+Philippe's reign is unexampled in French literary history. With Hugo,
+Dumas, De Musset, Balzac, not to mention lesser stars, the author of
+_Indiana_ and _Valentine_, although a woman, was acknowledged as worthy
+to rank. The artist in her, a disturbing element in her inner life which
+had driven her out of the spiritual bondage and destitution of a petty
+provincial environment to secure for herself freedom and expansion, had
+justified the audacity of the move by a triumphant artistic success.
+From this time onward her artistic faculty dominated her life, often,
+probably, unknown to herself an invincible force of instinct she obeyed,
+whilst assigning, in all good faith, other motives for her course of
+action, and for real or apparent inconsequences, that have been
+constantly misrepresented and misunderstood.
+
+So sudden and abrupt a change would have turned all heads but the
+strongest. Publishers competed with one another to secure her next work.
+Buloz, proprietor of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, engaged her to write
+regularly for his periodical, to which, for the next ten years, she
+never ceased to be a regular and extensive contributor. Although the
+scale of remuneration was not then very high she was clearly secure, so
+long as she allowed nothing to interfere with her literary work, of
+earning a sufficient income for her own needs. She had learnt the
+importance of pecuniary independence, and never pretended to despise the
+reward of her industry. To luxury she was indifferent, but the necessity
+of strict economy was a burden she was impatient of; she liked to have
+plenty to give away, and was always excessively liberal to the poor. Her
+little dwelling on the Quai Malplaquet was no longer the hermitage of
+an anonymous writer of no account. The great in art and letters,
+leading critics, such as Sainte-Beuve and Gustave Planche, came eager to
+seek her acquaintance, and delighting to honor the obscure student of a
+year ago.
+
+Writing to M. Boucoiran after her return to Paris in December, 1832, she
+describes her altered position:--
+
+     All day long I am beset with visitors, who are not all
+     entertaining. It is a calamity of my profession, which I am partly
+     obliged to bear. But in the evening I shut myself up with my pens
+     and ink, Solange, my piano, and a fire. With all these I pass some
+     right pleasant hours. No noise but the sounds of a harp, coming I
+     know not whence, and of the playing of a fountain under my window.
+     This is highly poetical--pray don't make game of me!
+
+There was another side to her success. Fame brought trials and
+annoyances that fell with double severity on her as a woman. Her door
+was besieged by a troop of professional beggars, impostors, impertinent
+idlers, and inquisitive newsmongers. Jealousy and ill-will, inevitably
+attendant on sudden good fortune such as hers, busied themselves with
+direct calumny and insidious misrepresentation. No statement so
+unfounded, so wildly improbable about her, but it obtained circulation
+and credit. Till the end of her life she remained the centre of a cloud
+of myths, many, to the present day, accepted as gospel. People insisted
+on identifying her with the heroines of her novels. Incidents, personal
+descriptions, nay, whole letters extracted from these novels will be
+found literally transcribed into alleged biographies of herself and her
+friends, as her own statement of matters of fact. Now, though the spirit
+of her life is strongly and faithfully represented by her fiction taken
+as a whole, those who would read in any special novel the literal record
+of any of the special events of her existence cannot be too much on
+their guard. Whatever the material under treatment, George Sand must
+retouch, embellish, transform, artist-fashion, as her genius shall
+dictate, till often little resemblance is left between the original and
+the production it has done no more than suggest. Romance and reality are
+so fused together in these apparent outpourings of spirit that her
+nearest friends were at a loss how to separate them. As an actress into
+many a favorite part, so could she throw herself into her favorite
+characters; but seldom if ever will much warrant be found in actual fact
+for identifying these creations with their creatress.
+
+How, indeed, could so many-sided a nature as hers be truly represented
+in a single novel? Her rare physical and mental energies enabled her to
+combine a life of masculine intellectual activity with the more highly
+emotional life of a woman, and with vigilance in her maternal cares.
+Maurice was placed in the spring of 1833 at the College Henri IV., at
+Paris; thus she had now both son and daughter near her, and watched
+indefatigably over them, their childish illnesses and childish
+amusements, their moral and intellectual training absorbing a large
+share of her time and attention. Heine, a friendly visitor at her house,
+says:--
+
+     I have often been present for hours whilst she gave her children a
+     lesson in French, and it is a pity that the whole of the French
+     Academy could not have been present too, as it is quite certain
+     that they might have derived great profit from it.
+
+Not all the distractions of fame and work, of passionate pleasure or
+passionate sorrow, ever relaxed her active solicitude for the present
+and future welfare of her two young children. "They give me the only
+real joys of my life," she repeats again and again.
+
+_Lelia_, begun immediately after _Valentine_ was published in the spring
+of 1833, and created an immense sensation. Hailed by her admirers as a
+sign of an accession of power, of power exerted in quite a new
+direction, it brought down on the writer's head a storm of hostile
+criticism, as a declared enemy of religion and domestic
+morality--enhancing her celebrity not a little.
+
+_Lelia_, a lyrical novel--an outburst of poetical philosophy in prose,
+stands alone among the numerous productions of George Sand. Here she
+takes every sort of poetical license, in a work without the restrictions
+of poetic form, which are the true conditions of so much latitude.
+"Manfred" and "Alastor" are fables not further removed from real life
+than is _Lelia_. The personages are like allegorical figures, emblematic
+of spiritual qualities on a grand scale, the scenes like the
+paradisiacal gardens that visited the fancy of Aurore Dupin when a
+child. There is no action. The interest is not in the characters and
+what they do, but in what they say. The declamatory style, then so
+popular, is one the taste for which has so completely waned that _Lelia_
+will find comparatively few readers in the present day, fewer who will
+not find its perusal wearisome, none perhaps whose morality, however
+weak, will be seriously shaken by utterances ever and anon hovering on
+the perilous confines of the sublime and the ludicrous.
+
+_Lelia_, a female Faust or Manfred, a mysterious muse-like heroine, who
+one night sleeps on the heathery mountain-side, the next displays the
+splendor of a queen in palaces and fairy-like villas; her sorely tried
+and hapless lover, Stenio, the poet, who pours forth odes to his own
+accompaniment on the harp, and lingers the night long among Alpine
+precipices brooding over the abyss; Trenmor, the returned gentleman
+convict and Apostle of the Carbonari, whose soul has been refreshed,
+made young and regenerated at the galleys; and the mad Irish priest,
+Magnus, are impossible personages, inviting to easy ridicule, and
+neither wisdom nor folly from their lips is likely to beguile the ears
+of the present generation.
+
+It is no novel, but a poetical essay, fantastically conceived and
+executed with the _sans gene_ of an improvisatore. For those who admire
+the genius of George Sand its interest as a psychological revelation
+remains unabated. Into _Lelia_, she owns, she put more of her real self
+than into any other of her books--of herself, that is, and her state of
+mind at the dawn of a period of moral disturbance and revolt. All must
+continue to recognize there an extraordinary exhibition of poetical
+power and musical style. As a work of art George Sand has herself
+pronounced it absurd, yet she always cherished for it a special
+predilection, and, as will be seen, took the trouble to rewrite it some
+years later, when in a happier and healthier frame of mind than that
+which inspired this unique and most characteristic composition.
+
+The note of despair struck in _Lelia_, the depth of bitter feeling, the
+capacity for mental and moral speculation and suffering it seemed to
+disclose, astounded many of her familiar acquaintance. "_Lelia_ is a
+fancy-type," so writes to the author her friend and neighbor in Berry,
+Jules Neraud, an ardent naturalist, whose botanical and entomological
+pursuits she had often shared: "it is not like you--you who are merry,
+dance the _bourree_, appreciate lepidoptera, do not despise puns, who
+are not a bad needlewoman, and make very good preserves. Is it possible
+you should have thought so much, felt so much, without anyone having any
+idea of it?"
+
+_Lelia_ was certainly the expression of a new phase in her mind's
+history, a moral crisis she could not escape, which was all the more
+severe for her having, as she remarks, reached her thirtieth year
+without having opened her eyes to the realities of life. Till the time
+of her coming to Paris, for very dearth of outward impressions, she had
+lived chiefly in dreams, the life of all others most favorable to the
+prolongation of ignorance and credulity. The liberty and activity she
+had enjoyed for the last two years were fatal to Utopian theories.
+
+It was not only the bitterness that springs from disenchantment in
+individuals, the sense of the miserable insufficiency of human love to
+satisfy her spiritual aspirations producing "that widely concluding
+unbelief which," as her sister in greatness has said, "we call knowledge
+of the world, but which is really disappointment in you and in me."
+George Sand was one to whom scepticism was intolerable. Pessimistic
+doctrines were fatal to her mind's equilibrium, and private experience
+and outward intellectual influences were driving her to distrust all
+objects of her previous worship, human and divine. The moment was one
+when the most fundamental social and religious principles were being
+called in question.
+
+"Nothing in my old beliefs," she writes, "was sufficiently formulated in
+me, from a social point of view, to help me to struggle against this
+cataclysm; and in the religious and socialistic theories of the moment I
+did not find light enough to contend with the darkness." The poet's
+creed, with which her mind had hitherto rested satisfied, was shaken,
+and appeared to prove a false one. She was staggered by the infinity of
+evil, misery, and injustice, which dwellers in great cities are not
+allowed to forget, the problem of humanity, the eternal mystery of
+suffering and wrong predominant in a world on the beneficence of whose
+Supreme Power all her faiths were founded.
+
+Her mental revolt and suffering found vent in _Lelia_, which it was an
+immense relief to her to write. Characteristic as an exhibition of
+feeling and of mastery of language, it is not in the least typical of
+her fiction. Yet, but for _Lelia_, and its successor _Jacques_, it is
+impossible to point to a work of hers that would ever have lastingly
+stamped her, in the public mind, as an expounder of dangerous theories.
+In _Lelia_, however, which is strongly imbued with Byronic coloring, she
+had chosen to pose somewhat as the proud angel in rebellion; and the
+immediate effect of hostile criticism was to confirm her in the position
+taken up. Neither _Lelia_ nor _Jacques_ combined the elements of lasting
+popularity with those of instant success; but they roused a stir and
+strife which created an impression of her as a writer systematically
+inimical to religion and marriage--an impression almost ludicrously at
+variance with facts, taking her fiction as a whole, but which has only
+recently begun to give way, in this country, to a juster estimate of its
+tendencies.
+
+The morality of _Lelia_, which it is rather difficult to discuss
+seriously in the present day, both the personages and their environment
+being too preternatural for any direct application to be drawn from
+them, as reflecting modern society, found indiscreet champions as
+determined as its aggressors. Violently denounced by M. Capo de
+Feuillide, of the _Europe litteraire_, it was warmly defended by M.
+Gustave Planche, in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. The war of words grew
+so hot between them that a challenge and encounter were the
+result--surely unique in the annals of duelling. The swords of the
+critics fortunately proved more harmless than their words.
+
+From the morbid depression that had tormented her mind and imagination,
+and has its literary memorial in _Lelia_, she was to find a timely,
+though but a temporary rescue, in the charm of a new acquaintance--the
+delighting society of a poetic mind of an order not inferior to her own.
+
+It was in August, 1833, at a dinner given by Buloz to the staff of the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, that George Sand first made the personal
+acquaintance of Alfred de Musset, then in his twenty-third year, and
+already famous through his just published poem, _Rolla_, and his earlier
+dramas, _Andrea del Sarto_ and _Les Caprices de Marianne_. He rapidly
+became enamored of the author of _Lelia_, who for her part felt
+powerfully the attraction of his many admirable qualities, mutual
+enchantment leading them so far as to believe they could be the hero and
+heroine of a happy love tale. In a letter of September 21, addressed to
+her friend and correspondent Sainte-Beuve, whom she had made the
+confidant of her previous depression and strange moods of gloom, she
+writes of herself as lifted out of such dangers by a happiness beyond
+any she had imagined, restoring youth to her heart--the happiness
+accorded her by the poet's society and his preference for her own. De
+Musset, at this time, would have given the world to have been able to
+make her his wife.
+
+The story of their short-lived infatuation and of the swift-following
+mutual disenchantment,--a story which, says Sainte-Beuve, has become
+part of the romance of the nineteenth century,--is perhaps of less
+consequence here than in the life of De Musset,[A] in whom the
+over-sensitiveness of genius was not allied with the extraordinary
+healthy vitality which enabled George Sand to come out of the most
+terrible mental experiences unembittered, with the balance of her mind
+unshaken, and her powers unimpaired. Yet that he acquired an empire over
+her no other ever acquired there is much to indicate. It took her from
+France for a while, from her children, her friends--and the breaking of
+the spell set her at war, not only with him, but for a while with
+herself, with life, and her fellow creatures.
+
+In the last days of 1833, she and the author of _Rolla_ started on a
+journey to Italy, where George Sand spent six months, and where she has
+laid the scene of a number of her novels: the first and best part of
+_Consuelo_, _La Derniere Aldini_, _Leone_, _Leoni_, _La Daniella_, and
+others. The spirit of that land she has caught and reproduced perhaps
+more successfully than any other of the many novelists who have chosen
+it for a frame--of Italy as the artist's native country, that is--not
+the Italy of political history, nor of the Medici, but the Italy that is
+the second home of painters, poets, and musicians. Can anything be more
+enjoyable, and at the same time more vividly true, than George Sand's
+delineations of Venice; and, in the first of the _Lettres d'un
+Voyageur_, the pictures given of her wanderings on the shores of the
+Brenta, of Bassano, the Brenta valley, Oliero, Possagno, Asolo, a
+delicious land, till quite recently as little tourist-trodden as in
+1834? What a contrast to the purely imaginary descriptions in _Lelia_,
+written before those beauties had appeared to her except in dreams!
+
+From Genoa the travellers journeyed to Pisa, Florence, and thence to
+Venice, where first George Sand felt herself really at home in Italy.
+The architecture, the simplicity of Venetian life and manners, the
+theatres--from the opera-houses, where Pasta and Donzelli were singing,
+down to the national drama of Pulchinello--the pictures, the sea, the
+climate, combined to make of it a place of residence so perfectly to her
+mind, that again and again in her letters she expresses her wish that
+she could bring over her children and there fix her abode.
+
+"It is the only town I can love for its own sake," she says of it.
+"Other cities are like prisons, which you put up with for the sake of
+your fellow-prisoners." This Italian journey marks a fresh stage in her
+artistic development, quite apart from the attendant romantic
+circumstances, the alleged disastrous consequences to a child of genius
+less wise and fortunate than herself, which has given an otherwise
+disproportionate notoriety to this brief episode.
+
+George Sand was no doubt fatally in error when she persuaded herself,
+and even succeeded in persuading the poet's anxious mother, that she had
+it in her to be his guardian angel, and reform him miraculously in a
+short space of time; and that because he had fallen in love with her she
+would know how to make him alter a way of life he had no abiding desire
+to abandon. Such a task demands a readiness not merely for
+self-sacrifice, but for self-suppression; and her individuality was far
+too pronounced to merge itself for long in ministering to another's. She
+never seems to have possessed the slightest moral ascendancy over him,
+beyond the power of wounding him very deeply by the change in her
+sentiments, however much he might feel himself to blame for it.
+
+The history of the separation of the lovers--of De Musset's illness,
+jealousy, and departure from Venice alone--is a thrice-told tale. Like
+the subject of "The Ring and the Book," it has been set forth, by
+various persons, variously interested, with correspondingly various
+coloring. The story, as told by George Sand in her later novel, _Elle et
+Lui_, is substantially the same as one related by De Musset in his
+_Confession d'un Enfant du Siecle_, published two years after these
+events, and in which, if it is to be regarded as reflecting personal
+idiosyncrasies in the slightest degree, the poet certainly makes himself
+out as the most insupportable of human companions. None the less did the
+publication of _Elle et Lui_, a quarter of a century later, provoke a
+savage retort from the deceased poet's brother, in _Lui et Elle_.
+Finally, in _Lui_, a third novelist, Madame Colet, presented the world
+with a separate version of the affair from one who imagined she could
+have made up to the poet for what he had lost.
+
+But it needs no deep study of human nature, or yet of these novels, to
+understand the impracticability of two such minds long remaining
+together in unity. Genius, in private life, is apt to be a torment--its
+foibles demanding infinite patience, forbearance, nay, affectionate
+blindness, in those who would minister to its happiness, and mitigate
+the worst results of those foibles themselves. Certainly George Sand,
+for a genius, was a wonderfully equable character; her "satanic" moods
+showed themselves chiefly in pen and ink; her nerves were very strong,
+the balance of her physical and mental organization was splendidly even,
+as one imagines Shakespeare's to have been. But the very vigor of her
+character, its force of self-assertion, unfitted her to be the
+complement to any but a very yielding nature. The direct influence a
+passive, merely receptive spirit would have accepted, and gratefully,
+was soon felt as an intolerable burden by a mind in many ways different
+from her own, but with the same imperious instinct of freedom, and as
+little capable of playing anvil to another mind for long. He rebelled
+against her ascendancy, but suffered from the spell. She was no Countess
+Guiccioli, content to adore and be adored, and exercise an indirect
+power for good on a capricious lover. Her logical mind, energetic and
+independent, grew impatient of the seeming inconsistencies of her gifted
+companion; and when at last she began to perceive in them the fatal
+conditions of those gifts themselves, only compassion survived in her,
+as she thought, and compassion was cold.
+
+How could De Musset, with such an excellent example of prudence, regular
+hours, good sense, calm self-possession, and ceaseless literary industry
+as hers before his eyes, not be stirred up to emulate such admirable
+qualities? But her reason made him unreasonable; the indefatigability of
+her pen irritated his nerves, and made him idle out of contradiction;
+her homilies provoked only fresh imprudences--as though he wanted to
+make proof of his independence whilst secretly feeling her dominion--a
+phenomenon with which highly nervous people will sympathize not a
+little, but which was perfectly inexplicable to George Sand.
+
+His genius was of a more delicate essence than hers; he has struck, at
+times, a deeper note. But his nature was frailer, his muse not so easily
+within call, his character as intolerant of restraint as her own, but
+less self-sufficing; and the morbid taint of thought then prevalent, and
+which her natural optimism and better balanced faculties enabled her to
+throw off very shortly, had entered into him ineffaceably. Whether or
+not she brought a fresh blight on his mind, she certaintly failed to
+cure it.
+
+The spring had hardly begun when De Musset was struck down by fever.
+George Sand, who had previously been very ill herself, nursed him
+through his attack with great devotion; and in six weeks' time he was
+restored to health, if not to happiness. Theirs was at an end, as they
+recognized, and agreed to part--"for a time, perhaps, or perhaps for
+ever," she wrote,--with their attachment broken but not destroyed.
+
+It was early in April that De Musset started on his homeward journey.
+George Sand saw him on his way as far as Vicenza, and ere returning to
+Venice, made a little excursion in the Alps, along the course of the
+Brenta. "I have walked as much as four-and-twenty miles a day," she
+writes to M. Boucoiran, "and found out that this sort of exercise is
+very good for me, both morally and physically. Tell Buloz I will write
+some letters for the _Revue_, upon my pedestrian tours. I came back into
+Venice with only seven centimes in my pocket, otherwise I should have
+gone as far as the Tyrol; but the want of baggage and money obliged me
+to return. In a few days I shall start again, and cross over the Alps by
+the gorges of the Piave."
+
+And the spring's delights on the Alpine borders of Lombardy are
+described by her _con amore_, in the promised letters:--
+
+     The country was not yet in its full splendor; the fields were of a
+     faint green, verging on yellow, and the leaves only coming into bud
+     on the trees. But here and there the almonds and peaches in flower
+     mixed their garlands of pink and white with the dark clumps of
+     cypress. Through the midst of this far-spreading garden the Brenta
+     flowed swiftly and silently over her sandy bed, between two large
+     banks of pebbles, and the rocky _debris_ which she tears out of the
+     heart of the Alps, and with which she furrows the plains in her
+     days of anger. A semi-circle of fertile hills, overspread with
+     those long festoons of twisting vine that suspend themselves from
+     all the trees in Venetia, made a near frame to the picture; and the
+     snowy mountain-heights, sparkling in the first rays of sunshine,
+     formed an immense second border, standing, as if cut out in silver,
+     against the solid blue of the sky.
+
+None of these excursions, however, were ever carried very far. For the
+next three months she remained almost entirely stationary at Venice, her
+head-quarters. She had taken apartments for herself in the interior of
+the city, in a little low-built house, along the narrow, green, and yet
+limpid canal, close to the Ponte dei Barcaroli. "There," she tells us,
+"alone all the afternoon, never going out except in the evening for a
+breath of air, working at night as well, to the song of the tame
+nightingales that people all Venetian balconies, I wrote _Andre_,
+_Jacques_, _Mattea_, and the first _Lettres d'un Voyageur_."
+
+None can read the latter and suppose that the suffering of the recent
+parting was all on one side. The poet continued to correspond with her,
+and the consciousness of the pain she had inflicted she was clearly not
+sufficiently indifferent herself to support. But neither De Musset nor
+any other in whom, through the "prism of enthusiasm," she may have seen
+awhile a hero of romance, was ever a primary influence on her life.
+These were two. Firstly, her children, who although at a distance were
+seldom absent from her thoughts. Of their well-being at school and at
+home respectively, she was careful to keep herself informed, down to the
+minutest particulars, by correspondents in Paris and at Nohant, whence
+no opposition whatever was raised by its occupier to her prolonged
+absence abroad. Secondly, her art-vocation. She wrote incessantly; and
+independently of the pecuniary obligations to do so which she put
+forward, it is obvious that she had become wedded to this habit of work.
+"The habit has become a faculty--the faculty a need. I have thus come to
+working for thirteen hours at a time without making myself ill; seven
+or eight a day on an average, be the task done better or worse," she
+writes to M. Chatiron, from Venice, in March. Sometimes, as with _Leone
+Leoni_, she would complete a novel in a week; a few weeks later it was
+in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_. Such haste she afterward deprecated,
+and, like all other workers, she aspired to a year's holiday in which to
+devote herself to the study of the masterpieces of modern literature;
+but the convenient season for such suspension of her own productive
+activity never came. And whilst at Venice she found herself literally in
+want of money to leave it. Buloz had arranged with her that she should
+contribute thirty-two pages every six weeks to his periodical for a
+yearly stipend of L160. She had anticipated her salary for the expenses
+of her Italian journey, and must acquit herself of the arrears due
+before she could take wing.
+
+_Jacques_, the longest of the novels written at Venice, afforded fresh
+grounds to those who taxed her works with hostility to social
+institutions. Without entering into the vexed question of the right of
+the artist in search of variety to exercise his power on any theme that
+may invite to its display, and of the precise bearing of ethical rules
+on works of imagination, it is permissible to doubt that _Jacques_,
+however bitter the sentiments of the author at that time regarding the
+marriage tie, ever seriously disturbed the felicity of any domestic
+household in the past or present day. It is too lengthy and too
+melancholy to attract modern readers, who care little to revel in the
+luxuries of woe, so relished by those of a former age. We cannot do
+better than quote the judgment pronounced by Madame Sand herself, thirty
+years later, on this work of pure sentimentalism--generated by an epoch
+thrown into commotion by the passionate views of romanticism--the epoch
+of Rene, Lara, Childe Harold, Werther, types of desperate men; life
+weary, but by no means weary of talking. "_Jacques_," she observes,
+"belonged to this large family of disillusioned thinkers; they had their
+_raison d'etre_, historical and social. He comes on the scene in the
+novel, already worn by deceptions; he thought to revive through his
+love, and he does not revive. Marriage was for him only the drop of
+bitterness that made the cup overflow. He killed himself to bequeath to
+others the happiness for which he cared not, and in which he believed
+not."
+
+_Jacques_, taken as a _plaidoyer_ against domestic institutions,
+singularly misses its aim. As critics have remarked, some of the most
+eloquent pages are those that treat of married bliss. Our sympathies
+are entirely with the wronged husband against his silly little wife. It
+is a kindred work to _Lelia_, and its faults are the same; but whilst
+dealing ostensibly with real life and possible human beings it cannot,
+like _Lelia_, be placed apart, and retain interest as a literary
+curiosity.
+
+_Andre_ is a very different piece of work and a little masterpiece of
+its kind. The author, in her preface, tells us how, whilst mechanically
+listening to the incessant chatter of the Venetian sempstresses in the
+next room to her own, she was struck by the resemblance between the mode
+of life and thought their talk betrayed, and that of the same class of
+girls at La Chatre; and how in the midst of Venice, to the sound of the
+rippling waters stirred by the gondolier's oar, of guitar and serenade,
+and within sight of the marble palaces, her thoughts flew back to the
+dark and dirty streets, the dilapidated houses, the wretched moss-grown
+roofs, the shrill concerts of the cocks, cats, and children of the
+little French provincial town. She dreamt also of the lovely meadows,
+the scented hay, the little running streams, and the floral researches
+she had been fond of. This tenacity of her instincts was a safeguard she
+may have sometimes rebelled against as a chain; it was with her an
+essential feature, and, despite all vagaries, gave a great unity to her
+life.
+
+"Venice," she writes to M. Chatiron in June, "with her marble staircases
+and her wonderful climate, does not make me forget anything that has
+been dear to me. Be sure that nothing in me dies. My life has its
+agitations; destiny pushes me different ways, but my heart does not
+repudiate the past. Old memories have a power none can ignore, and
+myself less than another. I love on the contrary to recall them, and we
+shall soon find ourselves together again in the old nest at Nohant."
+_Andre_ she considered the outcome of this feeling of nostalgia. In it
+she has put together the vulgar elements of inferior society in a
+common-place country town, and produced a poem, though one of the
+saddest. If the florist heroine, Genevieve, is a slightly idealized
+figure, the story and general character-treatment are realistic to a
+painful degree. There is more power of simple pathos shown here than is
+common in the works of George Sand. _Andre_ is a refreshing contrast, in
+its simplicity and brevity, to the inflation of _Lelia_ and _Jacques_.
+It was an initial essay, and a model one, in a style with better claims
+to enduring popularity.
+
+As the summer advanced, George Sand found herself free to depart, and
+started on her way back to France, famishing, as she tells us, for the
+sight of her children. Her grand anxiety was to reach her destination
+in time for the breaking-up day and distribution of prizes at the
+College Henri IV. "I shall be at Paris before then," she writes from
+Milan, to her son, "if I die on the way, and really the heat is such
+that one might die of it." From Milan she journeyed over the Simplon to
+the Rhone valley, Martigny, Chamounix, and Geneva, performing great part
+of the way on foot. She reached Paris in the middle of August, and a few
+days later started with her boy for Nohant, where Solange had spent the
+time during her mother's absence, and where they remained together for
+the holidays. Here too she was in the midst of a numerous circle of
+friends of both sexes, in whose staunch friendliness she found a solace
+of which she stood in real need.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+MENTAL DEVELOPMENT.
+
+
+The period immediately following George Sand's return from Italy in
+August 1834, was a time of transition, both in her outer and inner life.
+If undistinguished by the production of any novel calculated to create a
+fresh sensation, it shows no abatement of literary activity. This, as we
+have seen, had become to her a necessity of nature. Neither vicissitudes
+without nor commotions within, though they might direct or stimulate,
+seem to have acted as a check on the flow of her pen.
+
+During the first twelvemonth she continued to reside alternately at
+Nohant, whither she came with her son and daughter for their
+holidays--Solange being now placed in a children's school kept by some
+English ladies at Paris,--and her "poet's garret," as she styled her
+third floor _appartement_ on the Quai Malplaquet.
+
+This winter saw the ending for herself and De Musset of their hapless
+romance. An approach to complete reconciliation--for the existing
+partial estrangement had been discovered to be more unbearable than all
+besides--led to stormy scenes and violent discord, and resulted before
+very long in mutual avoidance, which was to be final. It is said that
+forgiveness is the property of the injured, and it should be remembered
+that whenever De Musset's name is mentioned by George Sand it is with
+the admiring respect of one to whom his genius made that name sacred,
+and who refused to the end of his life to use the easy weapon offered
+her by his notorious frailties for vindicating herself at his expense.
+And, however pernicious the much talked of effect on De Musset's mind,
+it is but fair to the poet to recollect that it is no less true of him
+than of George Sand that his best work, that with which his fame has
+come chiefly to associate itself, was accomplished after this painful
+experience.
+
+Into her own mental state--possibly at this time the least enviable of
+the two--we get some glimpses in the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_ of the
+autumn 1834, and winter 1834-35. Here, again, we should be content with
+gathering a general impression, and not ingenuously read literal facts
+in all the self-accusations and recorded experiences of the
+"_voyageur_"--a semi-fictitious personage whose improvisations were,
+after all, only a fresh exercise which George Sand had invented for her
+imagination taking herself and reality for a starting-point merely, a
+suggestive theme.
+
+But the despair and disgust of life, to which both these and her private
+letters give such uncompromising and eloquent expression, indubitably
+reflect her feelings at this moral crisis--the feelings of one who
+having openly braved the laws of society, to become henceforward a law
+unto herself, recognizes that she has only found her way to fresh
+sources of misery. Never yet had she had such grave and deep causes of
+individual mental torment to blacken her views of existence, and incline
+her to abhor it as a curse. "Your instinct will save you, bring you back
+to your children," wrote a friend who knew her well. But her maternal
+love and solicitude themselves were becoming a source of added distress
+and apprehension.
+
+The extraordinary arrangement she and M. Dudevant had entered into four
+years before with regard to each other, was clearly one impossible to
+last. It will be recollected that she at that time had relinquished her
+patrimony to those who had thought it no dishonor to continue to enjoy
+it; and the terms of that agreement had since been nominally
+undisturbed. But besides that, the control of the children remained a
+constant subject of dissension. M. Dudevant was beginning to get into
+pecuniary difficulties in the management of his wife's estate. Sometimes
+he contemplated resigning it to her, and retiring to Gascony, to live
+with his widowed stepmother on the property which at her death would
+revert to him. But unfortunately he could not make up his mind to this
+course. No sooner had he drawn up an agreement consenting to a division
+of property, than he seemed to regret the sacrifice; upon which she
+ceased to press it.
+
+Meantime Madame Dudevant, whose position at Nohant was that of a visitor
+merely, and becoming untenable, felt her hold on her cherished home and
+her children becoming more precarious day by day.
+
+Some of her friends had strongly advised her to travel for a length of
+time, both as offering a mortal remedy, and as a temporary escape from
+the practical perplexities of the moment. Her rescue, however, was to be
+otherwise effected, and a number of new intellectual interests that
+sprang up for her at this time all tended to retain her in her own
+country.
+
+It was in the course of this spring that she made the acquaintance of M.
+de Lamennais, introduced to her by their common friend, the composer,
+Franz Liszt. The famous author of the _Paroles d'un Croyant_ had
+virtually severed himself from the Church of Rome by his recent
+publication of this little volume, pronounced by the Pope, "small in
+size, immense in perversity!" The eloquence of the poet-priest, and the
+doctrines of the anti-Catholic and humanitarian Christianity of which he
+came forward as the expounder, could not fail powerfully to impress her
+intelligence. Here seemed the harbor of refuge her half-wrecked faiths
+were seeking, and what the abbe's antagonists denounced as the
+"diabolical gospel of social science," came to her as the teachings of
+an angel of light. Christianity as preached by him was a sort of
+realization of the ideal religion of Aurore Dupin--faith divorced from
+superstition and the doctrine of Romish infallibility. Complete identity
+of sentiments between herself and the abbe was out of the question. But
+his was the right mind coming to her mind at the right moment, and
+exercised a healing influence over her troubled spirits. For _Le Monde_,
+a journal founded by him shortly after this time, she wrote the _Lettres
+a Marcie_, an unfinished series, treating of moral and spiritual
+problems and trials. Finally, the position M. de Lamennais had taken up
+as the apostle of the people further enlisted her sympathies in his
+cause, which made religious one with social reform, and amalgamated the
+protest against moral enslavement with the liberation-schemes then
+fermenting in young and generous minds all over Europe.
+
+The belief in the possibility of their speedy realization was then
+wide-spread--a conviction that, as Heine puts it, some grand recipe for
+freedom and equality, invented, well drawn up, and inserted in the
+_Moniteur_, was all that was needed to secure those benefits for the
+world at large. If George Sand, led afterwards into searching for this
+empirical remedy for the wrongs and sufferings of the masses, believed
+the elixir to have been found in the establishment of popular
+sovereignty by universal suffrage, it was through the persuasive
+arguments of the leaders of the movement, with whom at this period she
+was first brought into personal relations. Her own unbiassed judgment,
+to which she reverted long years after, when she had seen these
+illusions perish sadly, was less sanguine in its prognostications for
+the immediate future, as appears in her own reflections in a letter of
+this time:--
+
+     What I see in the midst of the divergencies of all these reforming
+     sects is a waste of generous sentiments and of noble thoughts, a
+     tendency towards social amelioration, but an impossibility for the
+     time to bring forth through the want of a head to that great body
+     with a hundred hands, that tears itself to pieces, for not knowing
+     what to attack. So far the struggles make only dust and noise. We
+     have not yet come to the era that will construct new societies, and
+     people them with perfected men.
+
+She had recently been introduced to a political and legal celebrity of
+his day, the famous advocate Michel, of Bourges. He was then at the
+height of his reputation, which, won by his eloquent and successful
+defense of political prisoners on various occasions, was considerable.
+Madame Sand had been advised to consult him professionally about her
+business affairs, and for this purpose went over one day with some of
+her Berrichon friends to see him at Bourges. But the man of law had, it
+appears, been reading _Lelia_, and instead of talking of business with
+his distinguished client, dashed at once into politics, philosophy, and
+social science, overpowering his listeners with the strength of his
+oratory. His sentiments were those of extreme radicalism, and he carried
+on a little private propaganda in the country around. The force of his
+character seems to have spent itself in oratorical effort. He could
+preach revolution, but not suggest reform; denounce existing abuses, but
+do nothing towards the remodelling of social institutions; and in after
+years he failed, as so many leading men in his profession have failed,
+to make any impression as a speaker in Parliament. The author of
+_Lelia_ was overwhelmed, if not all at once converted, by the tremendous
+rhetorical power of this singular man. She was a proselyte worth the
+trouble of making, and Michel was bent on drawing her more closely into
+active politics, with which hitherto she had occupied herself very
+little. He began a correspondence, writing her long epistles, the sum of
+which, she says, may thus be resumed:--"Your scepticism springs from
+personal unhappiness. Love is selfish. Extend this solicitude for a
+single individual to the whole human race." He certainly succeeded in
+inspiring her with a strong desire to share his passion for politics,
+his faith, his revivifying hopes of a speedy social renovation, his
+ambition to be one of its apostles. To Michel, under the sobriquet of
+"Everard," are addressed several of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_ of the
+spring and summer of 1835, letters which she defines as "a rapid
+analysis of a rapid conversion."
+
+But Michel's work was a work of demolition only; and when his earnest
+disciple wanted new theories in place of the old forms so ruthlessly
+destroyed, he had none to offer. There were others, however, who could.
+She was soon to be put into communication with a number of the active
+workers for the republican cause throughout the country. They counted
+many of the best hearts and not the worst heads in France, and were
+naturally eager to enlist her energies on their side.
+
+Foremost, by right of the influence exercised over her awhile by his
+writings, was the philosopher Pierre Leroux, with whom her acquaintance
+dates from this same year. In spite of the wide divergence between her
+pre-eminently artistic spirit and a mind of the rougher stamp of this
+born iconoclast, he was to indoctrinate her with many new opinions. His
+disinterested character won her admiration; he was a practical
+philanthropist as well as a critical thinker, one whose life and
+fighting power were devoted to promoting the good of the working classes
+to whom he belonged, having been brought up as a printer. He was
+regarded as the apostle of communism, as then understood, or rather not
+understood--for the form under which it suggested itself to the social
+reformers of the period in question was entirely indefinite.
+
+Meantime the novelist's pen was far from idle. One or two pleasant
+glimpses she has given us into her manner of working belong to this
+year. In the summer the heat in her "poet's garret" becoming
+intolerable, she took refuge in a congenial solitude offered by the
+ground-floor apartments of the house, then in course of reconstruction,
+dismantled and untenanted. The works had been temporarily suspended,
+and Madame Sand took possession of the field abandoned by the builders
+and carpenters. The windows and doors opening into the garden had been
+taken away, and the place thus turned into an airy, cool retreat. Out of
+the apparatus of the workmen, left behind, she constructed her
+writing-establishment, and here, secure from interruption, denying
+herself to all visitors, never going out except to visit her children at
+their respective schools, she completed her novel with no companions but
+the spiders crawling over the planks, the mice running in and out of the
+corners, and the blackbirds hopping in from the garden; the deep sense
+of solitude enhanced by the roar of the city in the very heart of which
+she had thus voluntarily isolated herself.
+
+As an artistic experience she found it refreshing, and repeated it more
+than once. Soon after, a friend offered her the loan of an empty house
+at Bourges, a town that had been suggested to her as a desirable place
+of residence, should the circumstances at Nohant ever force her to
+abandon it entirely. As a home she saw and disapproved of Bourges, but
+she thoroughly enjoyed a brief retreat spent there in an absolutely
+deserted, vine-covered dwelling, standing in a garden enclosed by stone
+walls. Her meals were handed in through a wicket. A few friends came to
+see her in the evenings. The days, and often the nights, she passed in
+study and meditation, shut up in the library reading Lavater,
+expatiating on her impressions of his theories in a letter addressed to
+Franz Liszt (inserted among the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_), or strolling
+in the flower garden--"forgotten," she tells us, "by the whole world,
+and plunged into oblivion of the actualities of my own existence."
+
+Of her numerous letters of advice to her boy at school, we quote one
+written during this summer of 1835, when their future relations to each
+other were in painful uncertainty:--
+
+     Work, be strong and proud; despise the little troubles supposed to
+     belong to your age. Reserve your strength of resistance for deeds
+     and facts that are worth the effort. If I am here no longer, think
+     of me who worked and suffered cheerfully. We are like each other in
+     mind and in countenance. I know already from this day what your
+     intellectual life will be. I fear for you many and deep sorrows. I
+     hope for you the purest of joys. Guard within yourself that
+     treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to
+     lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness. Know how to
+     replace in your heart, by the happiness of those you love, the
+     happiness that may be wanting to yourself. Keep the hope of another
+     life. It is there that mothers meet their sons again. Love all
+     God's creatures. Forgive those who are ill-conditioned, resist
+     those who are unjust, and devote yourself to those who are great
+     through their virtue. Love me. I will teach you many, many things
+     if we live together. If that blessing (the greatest that can befall
+     me, the only one that makes me wish for a long life) is not to be,
+     you must pray for me, and from the grave itself, if anything
+     remains of me in the universe, the spirit of your mother will watch
+     over you.
+
+In the autumn, 1835, Madame Dudevant, under legal advice, and supported
+by the approval of friends of both parties, determined to apply to the
+courts for a judicial separation from her husband, on the plea of
+ill-treatment. She had sufficient grounds to allege for her claim, and
+had then every reason to hope that her demand would not even be
+contested by M. Dudevant, who, on former occasions, had voluntarily
+signed but afterwards revoked the agreement she hereby only desired to
+make valid and permanent, and which, ensuring to him a certain
+proportion of her income, gave her Nohant for a place of habitation, and
+established the children under her care.
+
+Pending the issue of this suit, which, unexpectedly protracted, dragged
+on until the summer of the next year, she availed herself of the
+hospitality of a family at La Chatre, friends of old standing, and from
+under whose roof she awaited, as from a neutral ground, the decision of
+her judges. During this year she saw little of Paris, and less of
+Nohant, except for a brief visit which, profiting by a moment when its
+walls were absolutely deserted by every other human being, she paid to
+her house--not knowing then whether she would ever, so to speak, inhabit
+it again in her own right.
+
+On the result of the legal proceedings depended her future home and the
+best part of her happiness. Sooner than be parted from her children, she
+contemplated the idea, in case of the decision going against her, of
+escaping with them to America! Yet, in the midst of all this suspense,
+we find her industrious as ever, joining in the daytime in the family
+life of the household with which she was domesticated, helping to amuse
+the children among them, retiring to her room at ten at night, to work
+on at her desk till seven in the morning, according to her wont. A more
+cheerful tone begins to pervade her effusions. The clouds were slowly
+breaking on all sides at once, and a variety of circumstances combining
+to restore to her mind its natural tone--faith, hope, and charity to her
+heart, and harmony to her existence. She began to perceive what she was
+enabled afterwards more fully to acknowledge as follows:--
+
+     As to my religion, the ground of it has never varied. The forms of
+     the past have vanished, for me as for my century, before the light
+     of study and reflection. But the eternal doctrine of believers, of
+     God and His goodness, the immortal soul and the hopes of another
+     life, this is what, in myself, has been proof against all
+     examination, all discussion, and even intervals of despairing
+     doubt.
+
+It is significant that during these months, spent for the most part at
+La Chatre, we find her rewriting _Lelia_, trying, as she expressed her
+intention, "to transform this work of anger into a work of gentleness."
+_Engelwald_, a novel of some length on which she was engaged, was
+destined never to see the light.
+
+To the Comtesse d'Agoult, better known by her _nom de plume_ of Daniel
+Stern, whose acquaintance she had recently made in Paris, she writes in
+May, 1836:--
+
+     I am still at La Chatre, staying with my friends, who spoil me like
+     a child of five years old. I inhabit a suburb, built in terraces
+     against the rock. At my feet lies a wonderfully pretty valley. A
+     garden thirty feet square and full of roses, and a terrace
+     extensive enough for you to walk along it in ten steps, are my
+     drawing-room, my study, and gallery. My bed-room is rather
+     large--it is decorated with a red cotton curtained bed--a real
+     peasant's bed, hard and flat, two straw chairs, and a white wooden
+     table. My window is situated six feet above the terrace. By the
+     trellised trees on the wall I can get out and in, and stroll at
+     night among my thirty feet of flowers without having to open a door
+     or wake anyone.
+
+     Sometimes I go out riding alone, at dusk. I come in towards
+     midnight. My cloak, my rough hat, and the melancholy trot of my
+     nag, make me pass in the darkness for a commercial traveller, or a
+     farm-boy.
+
+     One of my grand amusements is to watch the transition from night to
+     day; it effects itself in a thousand different manners. This
+     revolution, apparently so uniform, has every day a character of its
+     own.
+
+The summer that had set in was unusually hot and sultry. Writing to
+Madame d'Agoult, July 10, 1836, she thus describes her enjoyment of a
+season that allowed of some of the pleasures of primitive existence:--
+
+     I start on foot at three in the morning, fully intending to be back
+     by eight o'clock; but I lose myself in the lanes; I forget myself
+     on the banks of the river; I run after butterflies; and I get home
+     at midday in a state of torrefaction impossible to describe.
+
+Another time the sight of the cooling stream is more than she can
+resist, and she walks into the Indre fully dressed; but a few minutes
+more and the sun has dried her garments, and she proceeds on her walk of
+ten or twelve miles--"Never a cockchafer passes but I run after it."
+
+     You have no idea of all the dreams I dream during my walks in the
+     sun. I fancy myself in the golden days of Greece. In this happy
+     country where I live you may often go for six miles without meeting
+     a human creature. The flocks are left by themselves in pastures
+     well enclosed by fine hedges; so the illusion can last for some
+     time. One of my chief amusements when I have got out to some
+     distance, where I don't know the paths, is to fancy I am wandering
+     over some other country with which I discover some resemblance. I
+     recollect having strolled in the Alps, and fancied myself for hours
+     in America. Now I picture to myself an Arcadia in Berry. Not a
+     meadow, not a cluster of trees which, under so fine a sun, does not
+     appear to me quite Arcadian.
+
+We give these passages because they seem to us very forcibly to portray
+one side, and that the strongest and most permanent, of the character of
+George Sand: the admixture of a child's simplicity of tastes, a poet's
+fondness for reverie, and that instinctive independence of habits--an
+instinct stronger than the restraints of custom--which her individuality
+seemed to demand.
+
+In the letter last quoted to Madame d'Agoult, the new ideal which was
+arising out of these contemplations is thus resumed:--
+
+     To throw yourself into the lap of mother nature: to take her really
+     for mother and sister; stoically and religiously to cut off from
+     your life what is mere gratified vanity; obstinately to resist the
+     proud and the wicked; to make yourself humble with the unfortunate,
+     to weep with the misery of the poor; nor desire another consolation
+     than the putting down of the rich; to acknowledge no other God than
+     Him who ordains justice and equality upon men; to venerate what is
+     good, to judge severely what is only strong, to live on very
+     little, to give away nearly all, in order to re-establish primitive
+     equality and bring back to life again the Divine institution: that
+     is the religion I shall proclaim in a little corner of my own, and
+     that I aspire to preach to my twelve apostles under the lime-trees
+     in my garden.
+
+The judgment of the court, first pronounced in February, 1836, and given
+in her favor by default, no opposition having been raised to her claims
+to the proposed partition of property by the defendant, placed her in
+legal possession of her house and her children. Appeal was made,
+however, prolonging and complicating the case, but without affecting its
+termination. In the war of mutual accusations thus stirred up, M.
+Dudevant's _role_ as accuser, yet objecting in the same breath to the
+separation, had an appearance of insincerity that could not fail to
+withdraw sympathy from his side, irrespective of any judgment that might
+be held on the conduct of the wife, whose absence and complete
+independence he had authorized or acquiesced in. Before the actual
+conclusion of the law-suit his appeal was withdrawn. As a result, the
+previous judgment in favor of Madame Dudevant was virtually confirmed,
+and the details were settled by private agreement.
+
+It is almost impossible to overrate the importance to George Sand of a
+conclusion that gave her back her old home of Nohant, and secured to her
+the permanent companionship of her children. The present pecuniary
+arrangement left M. Dudevant some hold over Maurice and his education,
+concerning which his parents had long disagreed, and which for another
+year remained a source of contention.
+
+The affair thus concluded, Madame Sand entered formally into possession
+of Nohant; and early in September she started with her two children for
+Switzerland, where they spent the autumn holidays in a long-contemplated
+visit to her friend the Comtesse d'Agoult, then at Geneva. This tour is
+fancifully sketched in a closing number of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_,
+a volume which stands as a sort of literary memorial of two years of
+unsettled, precarious existence, material and spiritual--a time of trial
+now happily at an end.
+
+_Simon_, a tale dedicated to Madame d'Agoult, and published in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1836--a graceful story, of no high
+pretentions--is noticeable as marking the commencement of a decided and
+agreeable change in the tone of George Sand's fiction. Hitherto the
+predominant note struck had been most often one of melancholy, if not
+despair--the more hopelessly painful the subject, the more fervent,
+apparently, the inspiration to the writer. In _Indiana_ she had
+portrayed the double victim of tyranny and treachery; in _Valentine_, a
+helpless girl sacrificed to family ambition and social prejudice; in
+_Lelia_ and _Jacques_, the incurable _Weltschmerz_, heroism unvalued and
+wasted; in _Leone Leoni_, the infatuation of a weak-minded woman for a
+phenomenal scoundrel; in _Andre_, the wretchedness which a timid,
+selfish character, however amiable, may bring down on itself and on all
+connected with it. Henceforward she prefers themes of a pleasanter
+nature. In _Simon_ she paints the triumph of true and patient love over
+social prejudice and strong opposition. In _Mauprat_,[B] written in
+1837, at Nohant, she exerts all the force of her imagination and
+language to bring before us vividly the gradual redemption of a noble
+but degraded nature, through the influence of an exclusive, passionate
+and indestructible affection. The natural optimism of her temperament,
+not her incidental misfortunes, began and continued to color her
+compositions.
+
+From Switzerland she returned for part of the winter to Paris. She had
+given up her "poet's garret," and occupied for a while a suite of rooms
+in the Hotel de France, where resided also Madame d'Agoult. The _salon_
+of the latter was a favorite _rendezvous_ of cosmopolitan artistic
+celebrities, whose general _rendezvous_ just then was Paris. A very
+Pantheon must have been an intimate circle that included, among others,
+George Sand, Daniel Stern, Heine, the Polish poet Mickiewicz, Eugene
+Delacroix, Meyerbeer, Liszt, Hiller, and Frederic Chopin.
+
+The delicate health of her son forced Madame Sand to leave with him
+shortly for Berry, where he soon became convalescent. Later in the
+season, some of the same party of friends that had met in Paris met
+again at Nohant. It was during this summer that George Sand wrote for
+her child the well-known little tale, _Les Maitres Mosaistes_, in which
+the adventures of the Venetian mosaic-workers are woven into so charming
+a picture. "I do not know why, but it is seldom that I have written
+anything with so much pleasure," she tells us. "It was in the country,
+in summer weather, as hot as the Italian climate I had lately left. I
+have never seen so many birds and flowers in my garden. Liszt was
+playing the piano on the ground floor, and the nightingales, intoxicated
+with music and sunshine, were singing madly in the lilac-trees around."
+
+The party was abruptly dispersed upon the intelligence that reached
+Madame Sand of her mother's sudden, and, as it proved, fatal illness.
+She hurried to Paris, and remained with Madame Maurice Dupin during her
+last days. The old fond affection between them, though fitful in its
+manifestations on the part of the mother, had never been impaired, and
+the breaking of this old link with the past was very deeply felt by
+Madame Sand.
+
+Before returning to Nohant, she spent a few weeks at Fontainebleau with
+her son, from whom she never liked to separate. They passed their days
+in exploring the forest, then larger and wilder than now, botanizing and
+butterfly-hunting. At night she sat up writing, when all was quiet in
+the inn. Just as, whilst at Venice, her fancy flew back to the scenes
+and characters of French provincial life, and _Andre_ was the result, so
+here, amid the forest landscapes of her own land, her imagination rushed
+off to Venice and the shores of the Brenta, and produced _La Derniere
+Aldini_.
+
+This constant industry, which had now become her habit of life, was more
+of a practical necessity than ever. Nohant, as already mentioned, barely
+repaid the owner the expenses of keeping it up. Madame Sand, who desired
+to be liberal besides, to travel occasionally, to gratify little
+artistic fancies as they arose, must look to her literary work to
+furnish the means.
+
+"Sometimes," she writes from Nohant, in October, 1837, to Madame
+d'Agoult, then in Italy, "I am tempted to realize my capital, and come
+and join you; but out there I should do no work, and the galley-slave is
+chained up. If Buloz lets him go for a walk it is on _parole_, and
+_parole_ is the cannon-ball the convict drags on his foot."
+
+Nor was it for herself only that she worked in future, but for her
+children, the whole responsibility of providing for both of whose
+education she was now about definitely to take on her own shoulders. The
+power of interference left to M. Dudevant by the recent legal decision
+had been exercised in a manner leading to fresh vexatious contention,
+and continual alarm on Madame Sand's part lest the boy should be taken
+by force from her side. These skirmishes included the actual abduction
+of Solange from Nohant by M. Dudevant during her mother's absence at
+Fontainebleau; a foolish and purposeless trick, by which nothing was to
+be gained, except annoyance and trouble to Madame Sand, whose right to
+the control of her daughter had never been contested. A final settlement
+entered into between the parties, in 1838, placed these matters
+henceforward on a footing of peace, fortunately permanent. By this
+agreement Madame Sand received back from M. Dudevant--who had lately
+succeeded to his father's estate--some house property that formed part
+of her patrimony, and paid down to him the sum of L2,000; he ceding to
+her the remnant of his paternal rights; she freeing him from all charges
+for Maurice's education, her authority over which, in future, was
+recognized as complete.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+SOLITUDE, SOCIETY AND SOCIALISM.
+
+
+The charge of both children now resting entirely in her hands, Madame
+Sand was enabled to fulfill her desire of permanently removing her boy,
+now fourteen years of age, from the college Henri IV. Not only was she
+opposed to the general _regime_ and educational system pursued in French
+public schools of this type, she felt persuaded of its special
+unsuitability to her son, whose tastes and temperament were artistic,
+like her own, and whose classical studies had been repeatedly
+interrupted by illness. His delicate health determined her to spend the
+winter of 1838-9 abroad with her family. Having heard the climate and
+scenery of Majorca highly praised, she selected the island for their
+resort; tempted herself by the prospect of a few months absolute quiet,
+where, with neither letters to answer, nor newspapers to read, she would
+enjoy some rare leisure, which she proposed to spend in studying history
+and teaching French to her children.
+
+Just at this time her friend and ardent admirer, Frederic Chopin, was
+recovering from a chest attack, the first presage of the illness that
+caused his early death. The eminent pianist and composer had also been
+recommended to winter in the South, and greatly needed repose and change
+of air to recruit him from the fatigues of the Parisian season. It was
+arranged that the convalescent should make one of the expedition to
+Majorca. He joined Madame Sand and her children at Perpignan, and they
+embarked for Barcelona, whence the sea-voyage to the island was safely
+accomplished, the party reaching Palma, the capital, in magnificent
+November weather, and never suspecting how soon they would have cause to
+repent their choice of a retreat.
+
+But their practical information about the island proved lamentably
+insufficient. With the scenery, indeed, they were enraptured. "We
+found," says Madame Sand in her little volume, _Un Hiver a Majorque_,
+published the following year, "a green Switzerland under a Calabrian
+sky, with all the solemnity and stillness of the East." But though a
+painter's Elysium, Majorca was wanting in the commonest comforts of
+civilized life. Inns were non-existent, foreigners viewed and treated
+with suspicion. The party thought themselves fortunate in securing a
+villa some miles from Palma, furnished, though scantily. "The country,
+nature, trees, sky, sea, and mountains surpass all my dreams," she
+writes in the first days, "it is the promised land; and as we have
+succeeded in housing ourselves pretty well, we are delighted."
+
+The delight was of brief duration. That Madame Sand's manuscripts took a
+month to reach the editor of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_; that the piano
+ordered from Paris for Chopin took two months to get to Majorca, were
+the least among their troubles. A rainy season of exceptional severity
+set in, and the villa quickly became uninhabitable. It was not
+weatherproof. Chopin fell alarmingly ill. Good food and medical
+attendance were hardly to be procured for him; and finally, the villa
+proprietor, having heard that his tenant was suffering from
+consumption--an illness believed to be infectious by the Majorcans--gave
+the whole party notice to quit. The invalid improving somewhat, though
+still too weak to attempt the return journey to France, Madame Sand
+transported her ambulance, as she styled it, to some tolerable quarters
+she had already discovered in the deserted Carthusian monastery of
+Valdemosa--"a poetical name and a poetical abode," she writes; "an
+admirable landscape, grand and wild, with the sea at both ends of the
+horizon, formidable peaks around us, eagles pursuing their prey even
+down to the orange-trees in our garden, a cypress walk winding from the
+top of our mountain to the bottom of the gorge, torrents over-grown with
+myrtles, palm-trees below our feet, nothing could be more magnificent
+than this spot."
+
+Parts of the old monastic buildings were dilapidated; the rest were in
+good order, being frequented as a summer retreat by the inhabitants of
+Palma. Now, in December, the Chartreuse was entirely abandoned, except
+by a housekeeper, a sacristan and a lone monk, the last offshoot of the
+community--a kind of apothecary, whose stock-in-trade was limited to
+guimauve and dog-grass.
+
+The rooms into which the travellers moved had just been vacated by a
+Spanish family of political refugees departing for France. These
+lodgings were at least provided with doors, window-panes, and decent
+furniture; but the luxury of chimneys was unknown, and a stove, which
+had to be manufactured at an enormous price on purpose for the party, is
+described as "a sort of iron cauldron, that made our heads ache and
+dried up our throats." Continuous stormy weather having suspended steam
+traffic with the mainland, the visitors had no choice but to remain
+prisoners some two months more, during which the deluge went on with
+little intermission.
+
+Still, to young and romantic imaginations the island and life in the
+ex-monastery offered considerable charm. Madame Sand and her children
+were delighted with the unfamiliar vegetation, the palms, aloes, olives,
+almond and orange trees, the Arab architecture, and picturesque
+costumes. Valdemosa itself was splendidly situated among the mountains,
+in a stone-walled garden surrounded with cypress trees and planted with
+palms and olives. In the morning, Madame Sand gave lessons to the
+children; in the afternoon, they ran wild out of doors whilst she
+wrote--when the invalid musician was well enough to be left. In the
+evenings she and the young people went wandering by moonlight through
+the cloisters, exploring the monkish cells and chapels. Maurice had
+fortunately recovered his health completely, but poor Chopin's state,
+aggravated by the damp weather and privations--for the difficulties in
+obtaining a regular supply of provisions were immense--remained
+throughout their stay a constant and terrible cause of anxiety and
+responsibility to Madame Sand. From the islanders no sort of help or
+even sympathy was forthcoming, and thievish servants and extortionate
+traders were not the least of the annoyances with which the strangers
+had to contend. In a letter to Francois Rollinat she gives a graphic
+account of their misfortunes:--
+
+     It has rightly been laid down as a principle that where nature is
+     beautiful and generous, men are bad and avaricious. We had all the
+     trouble in the world to procure the commonest articles of food,
+     such as the island produces in abundance; thanks to the signal
+     dishonesty, the plundering spirit of the peasants, who made us pay
+     for everything three times what it was worth, so that we were at
+     their mercy under the penalty of dying of hunger. We could get no
+     one to serve us, because we were not _Christians_ [the travellers
+     passed for being "sold to the Devil" because they did not go to
+     Mass], and, besides, nobody would attend on a consumptive invalid.
+     However, for better for worse, we were established.... The place
+     was incomparably poetical; we did not see a living soul, nothing
+     disturbed our work; after waiting two months, and paying three
+     hundred francs extra, Chopin had at last received his piano, and
+     delighted the vaults of his cell with his melodies. Health and
+     strength were visibly returning to Maurice; as for me, I worked as
+     tutor seven hours a day: I sat up working on my own account half
+     the night; Chopin composed masterpieces, and we hoped to put up
+     with the remainder of our discomforts by the aid of these
+     compensations.
+
+It was in the cells of Valdemosa that Madame Sand completed her novel of
+Monastic life, _Spiridion_, then publishing in the _Revue des Deux
+Mondes_. "For heaven's sake not so much mysticism!" prayed the editor of
+her, now and then; and assuredly those readers for whom George Sand was
+simply a purveyor of passionate romances, those critics who set her down
+in their minds as exclusively a glorifier of mutinous emotion and the
+apologist of lawless love, must have been taken aback by these pages, in
+which she had devoted her most fervent energies to tracing the spiritual
+history, _peu recreatif_, as she dryly observes, of a monk who, in the
+days of the decadence of the monastic orders, retained earnestness and
+sincerity; whose mind, revolted by the hypocrisy and worldliness around
+him, passes through the successive stages of heresy and philosophic
+doubt, and to whom is finally revealed an eternal gospel, which lies at
+the core of his old religion, but which later growths have stifled, and
+which outlasts all shocks and changes, and is to generate the religion
+of the future.
+
+The compositions of Chopin above alluded to, include the finest of his
+well-known Preludes, which may easily be conceived of as suggested by
+the strange mingling of contrasting impressions in the Chartreuse.
+"Several of these Preludes," writes Madame Sand, "represent the visions
+that haunted him of deceased monks, the sounds of funeral chants;
+others are soft and melancholy; these came to him in his hours of
+sunshine and health, at the sound of the children's laughter beneath the
+window, the distant thrum of guitars and the songs of the birds under
+the damp foliage; at the sight of the pale little roses in bloom among
+the snow."
+
+The loneliness and melancholy beauty of the spot, however congenial to
+the romance writer or inspiring to the composer, were not the right
+tonics for the nerves of the over-sensitive, imaginative invalid. The
+care and nursing of Madame Sand made amends for much, and by her good
+sense she saved him from being doctored to death by local practitioners.
+But his fortitude, which bore up heroically against his personal danger,
+was not proof against the dreary influences of Valdemosa in bad weather,
+the fogs, the sound of the hurricane sweeping through the valley, and
+bringing down portions of the dilapidated building, the noise of the
+torrents, the cries of the scared sea-birds and the roar of the sea.
+
+The elevation of the Chartreuse made the climate peculiarly disagreeable
+at this season. She writes on:--
+
+     We lived in the midst of clouds, and for fifty days were unable to
+     get down into the plains; the roads were changed to torrents, and
+     we saw nothing more of the sun. I should have thought it all
+     beautiful if poor Chopin could only have got on. Maurice was none
+     the worse. The wind and the sea sung sublimely as they beat against
+     the rocks. The vast and empty cloisters cracked over our heads. If
+     I had been there when I wrote the portion of _Lelia_ that takes
+     place in the convent, I should have made it finer and truer. But my
+     poor friend's chest got worse and worse. The fine weather did not
+     return.... A maid I had brought over from France, and who so far
+     had resigned herself, on condition of enormous wages, to cook and
+     do the housework, began to refuse attendance, as too hard. The
+     moment was coming when after having wielded the broom and managed
+     the _pot au feu_, I was ready to drop with fatigue--for besides my
+     work as tutor, besides my literary labor, besides the continual
+     attention necessitated by the condition of my invalid, I had
+     rheumatism in every limb.
+
+The return of spring was hailed as offering a tardy release from their
+island. The steamers were running again, and the party determined to
+leave at all risks; for though Chopin's state was more precarious than
+ever, nothing could be worse for him than to remain. They departed,
+feeling, she admits, as though they were escaping from the tender
+mercies of Polynesian savages, and once safely on board a French vessel
+at Barcelona, they thankfully welcomed the day that restored them to
+comfort and civilization, and saw the end of an expedition that had
+turned out in most respects so disastrous a _fiasco_.
+
+They remained throughout April at Marseilles, where Chopin, in the hands
+of a good doctor, became convalescent. From Marseilles they made a short
+tour in Italy, visiting Genoa and the neighborhood, and returning to
+France in May, Chopin apparently on the high road to complete recovery.
+It was in the following year that his illness returned in a graver form,
+and unmistakable symptoms of consumption showed themselves. The life of
+a fashionable pianist in Paris, the constant excitement, late hours, and
+heavy strain of nervous exertion, were fatal to his future chances of
+preserving his health; but it was a life to which he had now become
+wedded, and which he never willingly left, except for his long annual
+visits to Nohant.
+
+Madame Sand repeatedly contemplated settling herself entirely in the
+country. She had no love for Paris. "Parisian life strains our nerves
+and kills us in the long run," she writes from Nohant to one of her
+correspondents. "Ah, how I hate it, that centre of light! I would never
+set foot in it again, if the people I like would make the same
+resolution." And again, speaking of her "Black Valley, so good and so
+stupid," she adds, "Here I am always more myself than at Paris, where I
+am always ill, in body and in spirit."
+
+Paris, however, afforded greater facilities for her children's
+education. She had a strong desire to see her son an artist, and he was
+already studying painting in Delacroix's studio. Also her income at this
+moment did not suffice to enable her to live continuously at Nohant
+where, she frankly confessed, she had not yet found out how to live
+economically, expected as she was to keep open house, regarded as
+grudging and unneighborly if she did not maintain her establishment on a
+scale to which her resources as yet were unequal. Her expenses in the
+country she calculated as double those in Paris, where, as she writes to
+M. Chatiron,--
+
+     Everyone's independence is admirable. You invite whom you like, and
+     when you don't wish to receive anyone you let the porter know you
+     are not at home. Yet I hate Paris in all other respects. There I
+     grow stout, and my mind grows thin. You know how quiet and retired
+     my life there is, and I do not understand why you tell me, as they
+     say in the provinces, that glory keeps me there. I have no glory, I
+     have never sought for it, and I don't care a cigarette for it. I
+     want to breath fresh air and live in peace. I am succeeding, but
+     you see and you know on what conditions.
+
+Her Paris residence, a few seasons later, she fixed in the Cour
+d'Orleans Rue St. Lazare, in a block of buildings one-third of which
+was occupied by herself and her family; another belonged to her friend,
+Madame Marliani, wife of the Spanish Consul, the third to Frederic
+Chopin.
+
+With respect to Chopin's long and deep attachment to Madame Sand, and
+its requital, concerning which so much has been written, there can
+surely be no greater misstatement than to speak of her as having
+blighted his life. This last part of his life was indeed blighted, but
+by ill-health and consequent nervous irritability and suffering; but
+such mitigation as was possible he found for eight years in the womanly
+devotion and genial society of Madame Sand--real benefits to one whose
+strange and delicate individuality it was not easy to befriend--and
+which the breach that took place between them shortly before his death
+should not allow us to forget.
+
+"Chopin," observes Eugene Delacroix, "belongs to the small number of
+those whom one can both esteem and love." Madame Sand joined a
+sympathetic appreciation of the refinement of his nature, and an
+enthusiastic admiration of his genius--feelings she shared with his
+numberless female worshippers--to a strength of character that lent the
+support no other could perhaps so fully have given, or that he would
+accept from no other, to the fragile, nervous, suffering tone-poet. Her
+sentiments towards him seem to resolve themselves into a great
+tenderness rather than a passionate fervor--a placid affection for
+himself, and an adoration for his music.
+
+All the time their existences, so far from having been united, flowed in
+different, nay divergent channels. Chopin, the idol of Paris society,
+moved constantly in the aristocratic and fashionable world, from which
+Madame Sand lived aloof. She for her part had heavy domestic cares and
+anxieties that did not touch him, and with the political party which was
+absorbing more and more of her energies he had no sympathy whatever.
+Whether the cause were the false start she had made at the outset by her
+marriage, forbidding her the realization of a woman's ideal, the
+non-separation of the gift of her heart from that of her whole life, or
+whether that her masculine strength of intellect created for her serious
+public interests and occupations, beside which personal pleasures and
+pains are apt to become of secondary moment, certain it appears that
+with George Sand, as with many an eminent artist of the opposite sex,
+such _affaires de coeur_ were but ripples on the sea of a large and
+active existence.
+
+The year after her return from Majorca was marked by her first
+appearance before the public as a dramatic author. Although it was a
+line in which she afterwards obtained successes, as will be seen in a
+future chapter, the result of this initial effort, _Cosima_, a five-act
+drama, was not encouraging. It was acted at the Theatre Francais in the
+spring of 1840, and proved a failure. It betrays no insufficient sense
+of dramatic effect, nor lack of the means for producing it, but decided
+clumsiness in the adaptation of these means to that end. The plot and
+personages recall those of _Indiana_, with the important differences
+that the _beau role_ of the piece falls to the husband, and that the
+scene is transported back to Florence in the Middle Ages--an undoubted
+error, as giving to a play essentially modern and French in its
+complexities of sentiment and motive a strong local coloring of a past
+time and another people, making the whole seem unreal. It has a
+psychological subject which Emile Augier or Dumas _fils_ would know how
+to handle dramatically; but as treated by George Sand, we are
+perpetually being led to anticipate too much in the way of action, to
+have our expectations dissipated the next moment. A wet blanket of
+disappointment on this head dampens any other satisfaction that the
+merits of the play might otherwise afford.
+
+Hitherto she had continued to write regularly for the _Revue des Deux
+Mondes_. As her revolutionary opinions became more pronounced, they
+began to find utterance in her romances. Her conversion by Michel had
+not only been complete, but the disciple had outstripped the master. The
+study of the communistic theories of Pierre Leroux had familiarized her
+with the speculations in social science of those who at this time were
+devoting their attention to criticising the existing social
+organization, and seeking, and sometimes imagining they had found, the
+secret of creating a better. George Sand's strong admiration for the
+writings of Leroux, always praised by her in the highest terms, strikes
+us now as extravagant, but was shared to some extent by not a few
+leading men of the time, such as Sainte-Beuve and Lamartine. Her
+intellect had eagerly followed this bold and earnest pioneer in
+new-discovered worlds of thought; "I do not say it is the last word of
+humanity, but, so far, it is its most advanced expression," she states
+of his philosophy. The study of it had brought a clearness into her own
+views, due, probably, much more to the action of her own mind upon the
+novel ideas suggested than to the lucidity of a system of social science
+as yet undetermined in some of its main points.
+
+She writes, when looking back on this period from a long distance of
+time,--
+
+     After the despairs of my youth, I was governed by too many
+     illusions. Morbid scepticism was succeeded in me by too much
+     kindliness and ingenuousness. A thousand times over I was duped by
+     dreams of an archangelic fusion of the opposing forces in the great
+     strife of ideas.
+
+Her novel _Horace_, written for the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, was
+rejected--as subversive of law and order--by the editor, except on
+condition of alterations which she declined to make.
+
+After this temporary rupture with Buloz, Madame Sand's services were
+largely appropriated by the _Revue Independante_, a new journal founded
+in 1840 by her friends Pierre Leroux and Louis Viardot, in conjunction
+with whose names hers appears on the title page as leading contributor.
+For this periodical no theories could be too advanced, no fictitious
+illustrations too audacious, and to its pages accordingly was _Horace_
+transferred. Among the secondary characters in this novel figure a young
+couple, immaculate otherwise in principle and in conduct, but who as
+converts to St. Simonism have dispensed with the ordinary legal sanction
+to their union. Perhaps a more solid objection to its insertion in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_ was the picture introduced of the _emcute_ of
+June 1832, painted in heroic colors. Both these features, however, are
+purely incidental. The main interest and the real strength of the book
+lie in a remarkable study of character-development--that of the chief
+personage, Horace. It is a cleverly painted portrait of a type that
+reappears, with slight modifications, in all ages; a moral charlatan,
+who half imposes on himself, and entirely for a while on other people. A
+would-be hero, genius, and chivalrous lover, he has none of the genuine
+qualities needed for sustaining the parts. Nonchalant and inert of
+temperament, he is capable of nothing beyond a short course of
+successful affectation. The imposition breaking down at last, he sinks
+helplessly into the unheroic mediocrity of position and pretension for
+which alone he is fit.
+
+A veritable attempt at a Socialist novel is the _Compagnon du Tour de
+France_ written in the course of 1840, which must surely be ranked as
+one of the weakest of George Sand's productions. Exactly the converse of
+_Horace_ may be said of this book. In the former, those most repelled by
+the revolutionary doctrines flashing out here and there, will yet be
+struck and interested by the masterly piece of character-painting that
+makes of the novel a success. The utmost fanaticism for the ideas
+ventilated in the _Compagnon du Tour de France_ can reconcile no reader
+to the dullness and unreality of the story which make of it a failure.
+For her socialism itself, as set forth in her writings, dispassionate
+examination of what she actually inculcated, leaves but little warrant,
+in the state of progress now reached, for echoing the mighty outcry
+raised against it at the time. No doubt she thought that a complete
+reorganization of society on a new basis was eminently to be desired.
+But what she definitely advocated was, first, free education for the
+poor, and secondly, some fairer adjustment of the relations to each
+other of capital and labor. As to the first, authority has already
+sanctioned her opinion; the second question, if unsettled, has become a
+first preoccupation with statesmen and philosophers of all denominations
+in the present day.
+
+With regard to the complete solution of the problem, she leaves her
+socialist heroes, as she herself felt, in doubt and perplexity. There
+was something in the schemes and doctrines she conscientiously approved,
+irreconcilable with her artist-nature--a materialistic tendency which
+clashed with her poetical instincts. When the stern demagogue Michel
+denounced the whole tribe of artists as a corrupting influence,
+enervating to the courage and will of a nation, she rose up
+energetically in defense of the confraternity to which she was born:--
+
+     Will you tell me, pray, what you mean, with your declamations
+     against artists? Cry out against them as much as you please, but
+     respect art. Oh, you Vandal! I like that stern sectarian who wants
+     to dress Taglioni in a stuff-gown and _sabots_, and set Liszt's
+     hands to turn the machinery of a wine-press, and who yet, as he
+     lies on the grass, finds the tears come into his eyes at the least
+     linnet's song, and who makes a disturbance in the theatre to stop
+     Othello from murdering Malibran! The austere citizen would suppress
+     artists as social excrescences that absorb too much of the sap; but
+     this gentleman is fond of vocal music, and so will spare the
+     singers. Let us hope that painters will find one among your strong
+     heads who appreciates painting, and won't wall up all studio
+     windows. And as for the poets, they are your cousins; and you don't
+     despise their forms of language and their rhythmical mechanism when
+     you want to make an impression on the idle crowd. You will go to
+     them to take lessons in metaphor, and how to make use of it.
+
+     Unfortunately for the cause of the superiority of antiquity,
+     whenever you go to hear Berlioz's _Funeral March_, the least that
+     can happen to you will be to confess that this music is rather
+     better than what they used to give us in Sparta, when we served
+     under Lycurgus; you will think that Apollo, displeased to see us
+     sacrificing to Pallas exclusively, has played us a trick in giving
+     lessons to that _Babylonian_, so that by the exercise of a magnetic
+     and disastrous power over us, he may lead our spirits astray.
+
+And she would prove to the demagogue, out of his own mouth, that
+everything cannot be reduced to "bread and shoes all round," as the
+grand desideratum. Give these to men, it will not suffice. The eloquent
+orator instinctively seeks besides to impart "hallowed emotions and
+mystic enthusiasm to those who toil and sweat--he teaches them to hope,
+to dream of God, to take courage and lift themselves above the sickening
+miseries of human conditions by the thought of a future, chimerical it
+may be, but strengthening and sublime."
+
+For a period, however, she was too fascinated by the new ideas to judge
+them, and she straightway sought in her art a means of popularizing
+them. "These ideas," she writes in a later preface to her socialist
+novel, _Le Peche de M. Antoine_, "at which, as yet but a small number of
+conservative spirits had taken alarm, had, as yet, only really begun to
+sprout in a small number of attentive, laborious minds. The government,
+so long as no actual form of political application was assumed, was not
+to be disquieted by theories, and let every man make his own, put forth
+his dream, and innocently construct his city of the future, by his own
+fire-side, in the garden of his imagination."
+
+She was aware that her readers thought her novels getting more and more
+tedious, in proportion as she communicated to her fictitious heroes and
+heroines the pre-occupations of her brain, and that she was thus
+stepping out of the domain of art. But she affirmed she could never help
+writing of whatever was absorbing her thoughts and feelings at the
+moment, and must take her chance of boring the public. Fortunately for
+_Le Peche de M. Antoine_, nature and human nature are here allowed to
+claim the larger share of our attention, and philosophy is a secondary
+feature. The scene is laid in the picturesque Marche country on the
+confines of Berry, a day's journey from Nohant, and we are glad to
+linger with her along the rocky banks of the Creuse, or among the ruined
+castles of Crozant and Chateaubrun. The novel contains much that is
+original and admirable in the drawing of characters of the most opposite
+classes.
+
+Finally, in _Le Meunier d'Angibault_,[C] written as was the
+last-mentioned work some four or five years later (1844-45), but which
+may be named here, as making up with _Le Compagnon du Tour de France_
+the trio of "socialist" novels, the _Tendenz_ does not interfere to the
+detriment of the artistic plan of the book. In it the romantic elements
+of the remote country nook she inhabited are cleverly brought together,
+without departing too widely from probability. The dilapidated castle,
+the picturesque mill, the traditions of brigandage two generations ago,
+all these were realities familiar to her notice. The painting of the
+country and country people is masterly; and there is not a passage in
+the book to offend the taste of the most scrupulous reader. Nor can it
+be justly impugned on the ground of inculcating disturbing political
+principles. The personages, in their preference of poverty and obscurity
+to rank and wealth, may, in the judgment of some, think and conduct
+themselves like chimerical dreamers, but their actions, however
+quixotic, concern themselves alone.
+
+But, previous to either of the two novels last named, she had presented
+the world with a more ambitious work, whose merit was to compel
+universal acknowledgment--the most important, in fact, she had produced
+for eight years.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+CONSUELO--HOME LIFE AT NOHANT.
+
+
+CONSUELO first appeared in the _Revue Independante_, 1842-43. This noble
+book might not be inaptly described as,
+
+    --a whole which, irregular in parts,
+    Yet left a grand impression on the mind.
+
+Its reckless proportions naturally "shocked the connoisseurs" among
+literary critics, especially in her own land; but nevertheless it
+became, and deservedly, one of her most popular productions, and did
+more than any other single novel she ever wrote to spread her popularity
+abroad. If _Indiana_, _Valentine_, and _Lelia_ had never been written to
+create the fame of George Sand, _Consuelo_ would have done so, and may
+be said to have established it over again, on a better and more lasting
+basis. Upon so well-known a work lengthened comment here would be
+superfluous. Originally intended for a novelette,--the opening chapters
+appear in the _Revue_ under the modest heading, _Consuelo_,
+_conte_,--the beginning was so successful that the author was urged to
+extend her plan beyond its first proposed limits. The novel is an
+ephemeral form of art, no doubt, but it is difficult to conceive of a
+stage of social and intellectual progress when the first part of
+_Consuelo_ will cease to be read with interest and delight.
+
+The heroine once transported from the lagunes of Venice to the frontier
+of Bohemia and the castle of Rudolstadt, the character of the story
+becomes less naturalistic; the storyteller loses herself somewhat in
+subterranean passages and the mazes of adventure generally. She wrote
+on, she acknowledges, at hap-hazard, tempted and led away by the new
+horizons which the artistic and historical researches her work required
+kept opening to her view. But the powerful contrast between the two
+pictures,--of bright, sunshiny, free, sensuous, careless Venetian
+folk-life, and of the stern gloom of the mediaeval castle, where the more
+spiritual consolations of existence come into prominence--is singularly
+effective and original. So also is the charming way in which an incident
+in the boyhood of young Joseph Haydn is treated by her fancy, in the
+episode of Consuelo's flight from the castle, when he becomes her
+fellow-traveller, and their adventures across country are told with
+such zest and _entrain_, in pages where life-sketches of character, such
+as the good-natured, self-indulgent canon, the violent, abandoned
+Corilla, make us forget the wildest improbabilities of the fiction
+itself. The concluding portion of the book, again entirely different in
+frame, with its delineation of art-life in a fashionable capital,
+Vienna, is as true as it is brilliant. It teems with suggestive ideas on
+the subject of musical and dramatic art, and with excellently drawn
+types. The relations of professional and amateur, the contradictions and
+contentions to which, in a woman's nature, the rival forces of love and
+of an artistic vocation may give rise, have never been better portrayed
+in any novel. The heroine, Consuelo, is of course an ideal character:
+her achievements partake of the marvellous; and there are digressions in
+the book which are diffuse in the extreme; but nowhere is the author's
+imagination more attractively displayed and her style more engaging. The
+tone throughout is noble and pure. To look on _Consuelo_ as an agreeable
+story merely is to overlook the elevation of the moral standard of the
+book, in which much of its power resides. It marks more strongly than
+_Mauprat_ the change that had come over the spirit of George Sand's
+compositions.
+
+In the continuation, _La Comtesse de Rodolstadt_, which followed
+immediately in the _Revue Independante_, 1843, the novelist strays
+further and further from reality--the _terra firma_ on which her fancy
+improvises such charming dances. Here she only touches the ground now
+and then, and between whiles her imagination asks ours to accompany it
+on the most extraordinary flights. As a novel of adventure, it is
+written with unflagging spirit; and in the rites and doctrines of the
+_Illuminati_, an idealization of the feature of the secret sects of the
+last century, she found a new medium of expression for her sentiments
+regarding the present abuses of society and the need of thorough
+renovation. Secret societies, at that time, were extremely numerous and
+active among the Republican workers in France. Madame Sand seems
+thoroughly to have appreciated their dangers, and has expressly stated
+that she was no advocate of such sects; that though under a tyranny,
+such as that which oppressed Germany in the times of which she wrote,
+they may be a necessity, elsewhere they are an abuse if not a crime.
+"The custom indeed I have never regarded as applicable for good in our
+time and our country; I have never believed that it can bring forth
+anything in future but a dictatorship, and the dictatorial principle is
+one I have never accepted." (_Histoire de ma Vie._)
+
+But the romance of the subject was irresistibly tempting to her
+inventive faculty. "Tell Leroux to send me some more books on
+freemasonry, if he can find any," she writes to a correspondent at Paris
+whilst working at the _Comtesse de Rudolstadt_ at Nohant; "I am plunged
+into it over head and ears. Tell him also that he has there thrown me
+into an abyss of follies and absurdities, but that I am dabbling about
+courageously though prepared to extract nothing but nonsense."
+
+For the musical miracles which it is given to Madame Sand's heroes and
+heroines to perform at a trifling cost, she may well at this time have
+come to regard them as almost in the natural order. She had received her
+second, and her best musical education through the contemplation of
+original musical genius, of the rarest quality, among her most intimate
+friends, her constant guests at Paris and Nohant. The vocal and
+instrumental feats of Consuelo and Count Albert themselves are not more
+astonishing than the actual recorded achievements of Liszt, pronounced a
+perfect _virtuoso_ at twelve years old--and no wonder! The boy had so
+carried away his accompanyists, the band of the Italian opera at Paris,
+by his performance of the solo in an orchestral piece, that when the
+moment came for them to strike in, one and all forgot to do so, but
+remained silent, petrified with amazement. And Liszt when in the full
+development of his genius, had, as we have seen, been the art-comrade of
+George Sand; he had spent the whole of the summer season of 1837 at
+Nohant, transcribing Beethoven's symphonies for the piano-forte whilst
+she wrote her romances; she was familiar with his marvellous
+improvisations. In her "Trip to Chamounix" (_Lettres d'un Voyageur_, No.
+VI.) she has drawn a vivid picture of their extraordinary effect,
+describing his unrehearsed organ recital in the Cathedral of Freibourg
+to his little party of travelling companions. Nor was the charm of
+Chopin's gift less magical. The well-known anecdotes related on this
+subject are like so many glimpses into a musical paradise. Madame Sand
+has given us an amusing one herself. It is evening in her _salon_ at
+Paris. At the piano is Chopin; and she, her son, Eugene Delacroix, and
+the Polish poet Mickiewicz sit listening whilst the composer, in an
+inspired mood, is extemporizing in the sublimest manner to the little
+circle. All are in silent raptures; when the servant breaks in with the
+alarm--the house is on fire. They rush to the room where the flames are,
+and succeed after a time in extinguishing them. Then they perceive that
+the poet Mickiewicz is missing. On returning to the _salon_ they find
+him as they left him, rapt, entranced, unconscious of the stir around
+him, of the scare that had driven all the rest from the room. "He did
+not even know we had gone and left him alone. He was listening to
+Chopin, he had continued to hear him." Nor could the bewitched poet be
+brought down from the clouds that evening. He remained deaf to their
+banter, to Madame Sand's laughing admonition, "Next time I am with you
+when the house takes fire, I must begin by putting you into a safe
+place, for I see you would get burnt like a mere faggot, before you knew
+what was going on."
+
+Eugene Delacroix, one of Madame Sand's earliest and most valued friends
+in the artist-world, and one of the many with whom she enjoyed along and
+unclouded friendship, gives in his letters some agreeable pictures of
+life at Nohant, during his visits there in the successive summers of
+1845 and 1846:--
+
+     When not assembled together with the rest for dinner, breakfast, a
+     game of billiards, or a walk, you are in your room reading, or
+     lounging on your sofa. Every moment there come in through the
+     window open on the garden, "puffs of music" from Chopin, working
+     away on one side, which mingle with the song of nightingales and
+     the scent of the roses.
+
+He describes a quiet, monastic-like existence, simple and studious: "We
+have not even the distraction of neighbors and friends around. In this
+country everybody stays at home, to look after his oxen and his land.
+One would become a fossil in a very short time."
+
+The greatest event for the visitor was a village-festival--a wedding or
+a Saint's day--when the rustic dances went on under the tall elms to the
+roaring of the bagpipes. Peasant youths and peasant maids joined hands
+in the _bourree_, the characteristic dance of the country; now, we fear,
+surviving in tradition only, but then still popular. The great artist
+was fired to paint a "Ste. Anne," patron-saint of Nohant, in honor of
+the place, but his work progressed but slowly. He writes in August,
+1846:--"I am frightfully lazy, I can do nothing, I hardly read; and yet
+the days pass too quickly, for I must soon renounce this _vie de
+chanoine_, and return into the furnace of stirring ideas, good and bad.
+In Berry they have very few ideas, but they do just as well without."
+Then he adds, "Chopin has been playing Beethoven to me divinely well.
+That is worth all aestheticism."
+
+Little theatrical entertainments of an original kind, presided over by
+Madame Sand, and carried out by herself, her children, and their young
+friends, became in time a prominent feature of life at Nohant. She thus
+describes their nature and commencements:--
+
+     During the long evenings I took it into my head to devise for my
+     family theatricals on the old Italian pattern--_commedia
+     dell'arte_--plays in which the dialogue, itself extemporized, yet
+     follows the outlines of a written plan, placarded behind the
+     scenes. It is something like the charades acted in society, the
+     development of which depends on the talent contributed by the
+     actors. It was with these that we began, but little by little the
+     word of the charade disappeared. We acted wild _saynetes_,
+     afterwards comedies of plot and intrigue, finally dramas of event
+     and emotion.
+
+     All began with pantomime; and this was Chopin's invention. He sat
+     at the piano and extemporized, whilst the young people acted scenes
+     in dumb show and danced comic ballets. These charming
+     improvisations turned the children's heads and made their legs
+     nimble. He led them just as he chose, making them pass, according
+     to his fancy, from the amusing to the severe, from burlesque to
+     solemnity--now graceful, now impassioned. We invented all kinds of
+     costumes, so as to play different characters in succession. No
+     sooner did the artist see them appear than he adapted his theme and
+     rhythm to the parts wonderfully. This would be repeated for two or
+     three evenings; after which the _maestro_, departing for Paris,
+     would leave us quite excited, exalted, determined not to let the
+     spark be lost with which he had electrified us.
+
+Chopin was possessed of much dramatic talent himself, and was an
+admirable mimic. When a boy it had been said of him that he was born to
+be a great actor. His capacity for facial expressions was something
+extraordinary; he often amused his friends by imitations of
+fellow-musicians, reproducing their manner and gestures to the life; so
+well as actually on more than one occasion to take in the spectator.
+
+Madame Sand thus gives account of the even tenor of her way, in a letter
+of September, 1845:--
+
+     I have been in Paris till June, and since then am at Nohant until
+     the winter, as usual; for henceforward my life is ruled as
+     regularly as music paper. I have written two or three novels, one
+     of which is just going to appear.
+
+     My son is still thin and delicate, but otherwise well. He is the
+     best being, the gentlest, most equable, industrious, simple-minded,
+     and straightforward ever seen. Our characters, like our hearts,
+     agree so well that we can hardly live a day apart. He is entering
+     his twenty-third year, Solange her eighteenth. We have our ways of
+     merriment, not noisy, but sustained, which bring our ages nearer
+     together, and when we have been working hard all the week we allow
+     ourselves, by way of a grand holiday, to go and eat our cake out of
+     doors some way off, in a wood or an old ruin, with my brother, who
+     is like a sturdy peasant, full of fun and good nature, and who
+     dines with us every day, seeing that he lives not two miles off.
+     Such are our grand pranks.
+
+Sometimes these little outings would originate a novel, as with the
+_Meunier d'Angibault_, which she ascribes to "a walk, a discovery, a day
+of leisure, an hour of idleness." On a ramble with her children she came
+upon what she calls "a nook in a wild paradise;" a mill, whose owner
+had allowed everything to grow around the sluices that chose to spring
+up, briar and alder, oaks and rushes. The stream, left to follow its
+devices, had forced its way through the sand and the grass in a network
+of little waterfalls, covered below in the summer time with thick tufts
+of aquatic plants.
+
+It was enough; the seed was sown and the fruit resulted. "The apple
+falling from the tree led Newton to the discovery of one of the grand
+laws of the universe.... In scientific works of genius, reflection
+derives the causes of things from a single fact. In art's humbler
+fancies, that isolated fact is dressed and completed in a dream."
+
+The picture given by Madame Sand and her guests of these years of her
+life is charming enough, and in certain ways seems an ideal kind of
+existence, amid beloved children, friends, pleasant and calm
+surroundings, and the sweets of successful literary activity. But if it
+had its bright lights, it had also its deep shadows. For every fresh
+pleasure and interest crowded into her existence, there entered a fresh
+source of anxiety and trouble. Age, in bringing her more power of
+endurance, had not blunted her sensibilities. As usual with the
+strongest natures in their hours of depression--and none so strong as
+to escape these--she could then look for no help except from herself.
+Those accustomed, like her, to shirk no responsibility, no burden, to
+invite others to lean on them, and to ask no support, if their fortitude
+gives way find the allowance, help and sympathy so easily accorded to
+their weaker fellow-creatures nowhere ready for them. The exclamation
+wrung from one of the characters in a later work of Madame Sand's, may
+be but a faithful echo of the cry of her own nature in some moment of
+mental torment. "Let me be weak; I have been seeming to be strong for so
+long a time!"
+
+Chopin, though the study of his genius had freshly inspired her own, and
+greatly extended her comprehension of musical art, was a being to whom
+the burden of his own life was too painful to allow him to lighten the
+troubles of another; a partial invalid, a prey to nervous irritation, he
+was dependent on her to soothe and cheer him at the best of times, and
+to be nurse and secretary besides when he was prostrated by illness or
+despondency. One is loth to call selfish a nature so attractive in its
+refinement, so unhappy in its over-susceptibility. But it is obvious
+that such a one might easily become a trial to those he loved. With all
+its vigor her nervous system could not escape the exhaustion and
+disturbance that attend on incessant brain-work. "Those who have nothing
+to do," she remarks, "when they see artists produce with facility, are
+ready to wonder at how few hours, how few instants, these can reserve
+for themselves. For such do not know how these gymnastics of the
+imagination, if they do not affect your health, yet leave an excitation
+of your nerves, an obsession of mental pictures, a languor of spirit,
+that forbid you to carry on any other kind of work."
+
+Although her constitution was even stronger than in her youth, she had
+for some years been subject to severe attacks of neuralgia. "Madame Sand
+suffers terribly from violent headaches and pain in her eyes," remarks
+Delacroix, in one of the letters above quoted, "which she takes upon
+herself to surmount as far as possible, with a great effort, so as not
+to distress us by what she goes through." Her habit of writing
+principally at night and contenting herself with the least possible
+allowance of repose, few could have persisted in for so long without
+breaking down. For many years she never took more than four hours sleep.
+The strain began to tell on her eye-sight at last, and already in a
+letter of 1842 she speaks of being temporarily compelled to suspend this
+practice of night-work, to her great regret, as in the daylight hours
+she was never secure from interruption. Only her abnormal power of
+activity and of bearing fatigue could have enabled her to fulfill so
+strenuously the responsibilities she had undertaken to her children, her
+private friends, and the public. The pressure of literary work was
+incessant, and whatever her dislike to accounts and arithmetic she is
+said to have fulfilled her engagements to editors and publishers with
+the regularity and punctuality of a notary. Her large acquaintance,
+relations with various classes, various projects, literary, political,
+and philanthropical, involved an immense amount of serious
+correspondence in addition to that arising from the postal persecution
+from which no celebrity escapes. Ladies wrote to consult her on
+sentimental subjects--to inquire of her, as of an oracle, whether they
+should bestow their heart, their hand, or both, upon their suitors;
+poets, to solicit her patronage and criticism. In the course of a single
+half-year, 153 manuscripts were sent her for perusal! She replied when
+it seemed fit, conscientiously and ungrudgingly; but experience had made
+her less expansive than formerly to those whose overtures she felt to be
+prompted by curiosity or some such idle motive, in the absence of any
+sympathy for her ways of thinking. "I am not to be caught in my words
+with indifferent persons," she writes to M. Charles Duvernet,
+describing how, when in her friend Madame Marliani's _salon_ in Paris
+she heard herself and her political allies or their opinions attacked,
+she was not to be provoked into argument or indignant denial, but went
+on quietly with her work of hemming pocket-handkerchiefs. "To such
+people one speaks through the medium of the Press. If they will not
+attend, no matter."
+
+Her sex, her anomalous position, her freedom of expression and action,
+exposed her to an extent quite exceptional, even for a public character,
+to the shafts of malice and slander. Accustomed to have to brave the
+worst from such attacks, she might and did arrive at treating them with
+an indifference that was not, however, in her nature, which shrank from
+the observation and personal criticism of the vulgar.
+
+To a young poet of promise in whose welfare she took interest, she
+writes, August, 1842:--
+
+     Never show my letters except to your mother, your wife, or your
+     greatest friend. It is a shy habit, a mania I have to the last
+     degree. The idea that I am not writing for those alone to whom I
+     write, or for those who love them thoroughly, would freeze my heart
+     and my hand directly. Everyone has a fault. Mine is a misanthropy
+     in my outward habits--for all that I have no passion left in me but
+     the love of my fellow-creatures; but with the small services that
+     my heart and my faith can render in this world, my personality has
+     nothing to do. Some people have grieved me very much,
+     unconsciously, by talking and writing about me personally and my
+     doings, even though favorably, and meaning well. Respect this
+     malady of spirit.
+
+Madame Sand, being naturally undemonstrative, was commonly more or less
+tongue-tied and chilled in the presence of a stranger, and she had a
+frank dread of introductions and first interviews, even when the
+acquaintance was one she desired to make. Sometimes she asks her friends
+to prepare such new comers for receiving an unfavorable first
+impression, and to beg them not to be unduly prejudiced thereby. Such a
+one would find the persecution of lion-hunters intolerable, and now and
+then this drove her to extremities. Great must, indeed, have been the
+wrath of one of these irrepressibles, who, more obstinate than the rest,
+failing by fair means to get an introduction to George Sand, calmly
+pushed his way into Nohant unauthorized by anyone, whereupon her friends
+conspired to serve him the trick it must be owned he deserved; and which
+we give in the words of Madame Sand, writing to the Comtesse d'Agoult.
+The story is told also by Liszt in his letters:--
+
+     M. X. is ushered into my room. A respectable-looking person there
+     receives him. She was about forty years of age, but you might give
+     her sixty at a pinch. She had had beautiful teeth, but had got
+     none left. All passes away! She had been rather good-looking, but
+     was so no longer. All changes! Her figure was corpulent, and her
+     hands were soiled. Nothing is perfect!
+
+     She was clad in a gray woolen gown spotted with black, and lined
+     with scarlet. A silk handkerchief was negligently twisted round her
+     black hair. Her shoes were faulty, but she was thoroughly
+     dignified. Now and then she seemed on the point of putting an _s_
+     or a _t_ in the wrong place, but she corrected herself gracefully,
+     talked of her literary works, of her excellent friend M. Rollinat,
+     of the talents of her visitor which had not failed to reach her
+     ears, though she lived in complete retirement, overwhelmed with
+     work. M. G. brought her a foot-stool, the children called her
+     mamma, the servants Madame.
+
+     She had a gracious smile, and much more distinguished manners than
+     that fellow George Sand. In a word X. was happy and proud of his
+     visit. Perched in a big chair, with beaming aspect, arm extended,
+     speech abundant, there he stayed for a full quarter of an hour in
+     ecstasies, and then took leave, bowing down to the ground
+     to--Sophie!
+
+It was the maid that had thus been successfully passed off as the
+mistress, who with her whole household enjoyed a long and hearty laugh
+at the expense of the departed unbidden guest. "M. X. has gone off to
+Chateauroux," she concludes, "on purpose to give an account of his
+interview with me, and to describe me personally in all the _cafes_."
+
+This anecdote however belongs to a much earlier period of her life, the
+year 1837. Of her cordiality and kindliness to those who approached her
+in a right spirit of sincerity and simplicity, many have spoken. For
+English readers we cannot do better than quote Mr. Matthew Arnold's
+interesting account, given in the _Fortnightly_, 1877, of his visit to
+her in August, 1846. Desirous of seeing the green lanes of Berry, the
+rocky heaths of Bourbonnais, the descriptions of which in _Valentine_
+and _Jeanne_ had charmed him so strongly, the traveller chose a route
+that brought him to within a few miles of her home:--"I addressed to
+Madame Sand," he tells us, "the sort of letter of which she must in her
+lifetime have had scores--a letter conveying to her, in bad French, the
+youthful and enthusiastic homage of a foreigner who had read her works
+with delight." She responded by inviting him to call at Nohant. He came
+and joined a breakfast-party that included Madame Sand and her son and
+daughter, Chopin, and other friends--Mr. Arnold being placed next to the
+hostess. He says of her:--
+
+     As she spoke, her eyes, head, bearing were all of them striking,
+     but the main impression she made was one of simplicity, frank,
+     cordial simplicity. After breakfast she led the way into the
+     garden, asked me a few kind questions about myself and my plans,
+     gathered a flower or two and gave them to me, shook hands heartily
+     at the gate, and I saw her no more.
+
+During the eight years of successful literary activity, lying between
+Madame Sand's return from Majorca and the Revolution of February, 1848,
+the profits of her work had, after the first, enabled her freely to
+spend the greater part of the year at Nohant, and to provide a
+substantial dowry for her daughter. But the amassing of wealth suited
+neither her taste nor her principles. She writes to her poet-protege M.
+Poncy, in September, 1845:--
+
+     We are in easy circumstances, which enables us to do away with
+     poverty in our own neighborhood, and if we feel the sorrow of being
+     unable to do away with that which desolates the world--a deep
+     sorrow, especially at my age, when life has no intoxicating
+     personality left, and one sees plainly the spectacle of society in
+     its injustices and frightful disorder--at least we know nothing of
+     _ennui_, of restless ambition and selfish passions. We have a sort
+     of relative happiness, and my children enjoy it with the simplicity
+     of their age.
+
+     As for me, I only accept it in trembling, for all happiness is like
+     a theft in this ill-regulated world of men, where you cannot enjoy
+     your ease or your liberty, except to the detriment of your
+     fellow-creatures--by the force of things, the law of inequality,
+     that odious law, those odious combinations, the thought of which
+     poisons my sweetest domestic joys and revolts me against myself at
+     every moment. I can only find consolation in vowing to go on
+     writing as long as I have a breath of life left in me, against the
+     infamous maxim, "_Chacun chez soi, chacun pour soi_." Since all I
+     can do is to make this protest, make it I shall, in every key.
+
+Her republican friends in Berry had founded in 1844 a local journal for
+the spread of liberal ideas--such as Lamartine at the time was
+supporting at Macon. Madame Sand readily contributed her services to a
+cause where she labored for the enlightenment of the masses on all
+subjects--truth, justice, religion, liberty, fraternity, duties, and
+rights. The government of Louis Philippe, so long as such utterances
+attacked no definite institution, allowed an almost illimitable freedom
+in expression of opinion. The result was that thought had advanced so
+far ahead of action that social philosophers had grown to argue as
+though practical obstacles had no existence--to be rudely reminded of
+their consequence, when brought to the front in 1848, and acting
+somewhat too much as if on that supposition.
+
+It is impossible not to make concerning Madame Sand, the reflection made
+on other foremost workers in the same cause of organic social
+reform--namely, that her character and her instincts were in curious
+opposition to her ideas. What was said by Madame d'Agoult of Louis Blanc
+applies with even greater force to George Sand: "The sentiment of
+personality was never stronger than in this opposer of individualism,
+communist theories had for their champion one most unfit to be absorbed
+into the community." For no length of time was the idea of "communism"
+accepted, and never was it advocated by her except in the most
+restricted sense. The land-hunger, or rather land-greed, of the small
+proprietors in her neighborhood had, it is true, given her a certain
+disgust for these contested possessions. But from the preference of a
+small child for a garden of its own however small, to another's however
+large, she characteristically infers the instinct of property as a law
+of nature it were preposterous to disallow, and furthermore she lays
+down as an axiom that, "in treating the communistic idea it is necessary
+first to distinguish what is essential in liberty and work to the
+complete existence of the individual, from what is collective." When
+forced by actual experience to point out what she holds to be the
+rightful application of the idea, she limits it to voluntary
+association; and she hoped great things from the co-operative principle,
+as tending to eliminate the ills of extreme inequalities in the social
+structure, and to preserve everything in it that is worth preserving.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+NOVELIST AND POLITICIAN.
+
+
+By her novels classed as "socialistic," Madame Sand had, as we have
+seen, incurred the public hostility of those whom her doctrines alarmed.
+And yet her "communist" heroes and heroines are the most pacific and
+inoffensive of social influences. They merely aspire to isolate
+themselves, and personally to practice principles and virtues of the
+highest order; unworldliness such as, if general, might indeed turn the
+earth into the desired Utopia. Nothing can be said against their
+example, unless that it is too good, and that there is little hope of
+its being widely followed.
+
+Charges of another sort, no less bitter, and though exaggerated,
+somewhat better founded, assailed her after the appearance in 1847 of
+_Lucrezia Floriani_, a novel of character-analysis entirely, but into
+which she was accused of having introduced an unflattering portrait of
+Frederic Chopin, whose long and long-requited attachment to her entitled
+him to better treatment at her hands.
+
+With respect to the general question of such alleged fictitious
+reproductions, few novelists escape getting into trouble on this head.
+It has been aptly observed by Mr. Hamerton that the usual procedure of
+the reading public in such cases is to fix on some real personage as
+distinctly unlike the character in the book as possible, for the
+original, and then to complain of the unfaithfulness of the resemblance.
+Madame Sand's taste and higher art-instincts would have revolted against
+the practice--now unfortunately no longer confined to inferior
+writers--of forcing attention to a novel by making it the gibbet of
+well-known personalities, with little or no disguise; and Chopin
+himself, morbidly sensitive and fanciful though he was, read her work
+without perceiving in it any intention there to portray their relations
+to each other, which, indeed, had differed essentially from those of the
+personages in the romance.
+
+_Lucrezia Floriani_ is a _cantatrice_ of genius, who, whilst still
+young, has retired from the world, indifferent to fame, and effectually
+disenchanted--so she believes--with passion. Despite an experience
+strange and stormy, even for a member of her Bohemian profession,
+Lucrezia has miraculously preserved intact her native nobility of soul,
+and appears as a meet object of worship to a fastidious young prince on
+his travels, who becomes passionately enamored of her. He over-persuades
+Lucrezia into trusting that they will find their felicity in each other.
+Their happiness is of the briefest duration, owing to the unreasonable
+character of the prince, who leads the actress a miserable life; his
+love taking the form of petty tyranny and retrospective jealousy. After
+long years of this material and moral captivity, the heroic Lucrezia
+fades and dies.
+
+Not content with identifying the intolerable, though it must be owned
+severely-tested, Prince Karol with Chopin, imaginative writers have gone
+so far as to assert that the book was conceived and written from an
+express design on the novelist's part to bring about the breach of a
+link she was beginning to find irksome!
+
+Madame Sand has described how it was written--as are all such works of
+imagination--in response to a sort of "call"--some striking yet
+indefinable quality in one idea among the host always floating through
+the brain of the artist, that makes him instantly seize it and single it
+out as inviting to art-treatment. It would be preposterous to doubt her
+statement. But whether the inspiration ought not to have been sacrificed
+is another question. Her gift was her good angel and her evil angel as
+well, but in any case something of her despot. Here, assuredly, it
+ruled her ill. It is indisputable that, as she had pointed out, the sad
+history of the attachment of Lucrezia the actress and Karol the prince
+deviates too widely from that which was supposed to have originated it
+for just comparisons to be drawn between the two, that Karol is not a
+genius, and therefore has none of the rights of genius--including, we
+presume, the right to be a torment to those around him--that to talk of
+a portrait of Chopin without his genius is a contradiction in terms,
+that he never suspected the likeness assumed until it was insinuated to
+him, and so forth. But there remains this, that in the work of
+imagination she here presented to the public there was enough of reality
+interwoven to make the world hasten to identify or confound Prince Karol
+with Chopin. This might have been a foregone conclusion, as also that
+Chopin, the most sensitive of mortals, would be infinitely pained by the
+inferences that would be drawn. Perhaps if only as a genius, he had the
+right to be spared such an infliction; and one must wish it could have
+appeared in this light to Madame Sand. It seems as though it were
+impossible for the author to put himself at the point of view of the
+reader in such matters. The divine spark itself, that quickens certain
+faculties, deadens others. When Goethe, in _Werther_, dragged the
+private life of his intimate friends, the Kestners, into publicity, and
+by falsifying the character of the one and misrepresenting the conduct
+of the other, in obedience to the requisitions of art, exposed his
+beloved Charlotte and her husband to all manner of annoyances, it never
+seems to have entered into his head beforehand but that they would be
+delighted by what he had done. Nor could he get over his surprise that
+such petty vexations on their part should not be merged in a proud
+satisfaction at the literary memorial thus raised by him to their
+friendly intercourse! This seems incredible, and yet his sincerity
+leaves no room for doubt.
+
+Madame Sand's transgressions on this head, though few, have obtained
+great notoriety, on account of the extraordinary celebrity of two of the
+personages that suggested characters she has drawn. To the supposed
+originals, however obscure, the mortification is the same. But what
+often passes uncommented on when the individuals said to be traduced are
+unknown to fame, sets the whole world talking when one of the first
+musicians or poets of the century is involved; so that Madame Sand has
+incurred more censure than other novelists, though she has deserved it
+more rarely. But regret remains that for the sake of _Lucrezia
+Floriani_, one of the least pleasant though by no means the least
+powerful of her novels, she should have exposed herself to the charge of
+unkindness to one who had but a short while to live.
+
+Other causes had latterly been combining to lead to differences of which
+it would certainly be unfair to lay the whole blame on Madame Sand. The
+tie of personal attachment between Chopin and herself was not associated
+by identity of outward interests or even of cares and family affections,
+such as, in the case of husband and wife, make self-sacrifice possible
+under conditions which might otherwise be felt unbearable, and help to
+tide over crises of impatience or wrong. Madame Sand's children were now
+grown up; cross-influences could not but arise, hard to conciliate.
+Without accrediting Chopin with the self-absorption of Prince Karol, it
+is easy to see here, in a situation somewhat anomalous, elements of
+probable discord. It was impossible that he should any longer be a first
+consideration; impossible that he should not resent it.
+
+For some years his state of health had been getting worse and worse, and
+his nervous susceptibilities correspondingly intensified. Madame Sand
+betrayed some impatience at last of what she had long borne
+uncomplainingly, and their good understanding was broken. As was
+natural, the breach was the more severely felt by Chopin, but that it
+was of an irreparable nature, one is at liberty to doubt. He bitterly
+regretted what he had lost, for which not all the attentions showered on
+him by his well-wishers could afford compensation, as his letters
+attest.
+
+But outward circumstances prolonged the estrangement till it was too
+late. They met but once after the quarrel, and that was in company in
+March, 1848. Madame Sand would at once have made some approach, but
+Chopin did not then respond to the appeal; and the reconciliation both
+perhaps desired was never to take place. Political events had intervened
+to widen the gap between their paths. Chopin had neither part nor lot in
+the revolutionary movement that just then was throwing all minds and
+lives into a ferment, and which was completely to engross Madame Sand's
+energies for many months to come. It drove him away to England, and he
+only returned to Paris, in 1849, to die.
+
+In May, 1847, the tranquility of life at Nohant had been varied by a
+family event, the marriage of Madame Sand's daughter Solange with the
+sculptor Clesinger. The remainder of the twelvemonth was spent in the
+country, apparently with very little anticipation on Madame Sand's part
+that the breaking of the political storm, that was to draw her into its
+midst, was so near.
+
+The new year was to be one of serious agitations, different to any that
+had yet entered into her experience. Political enterprise for the time
+cast all purely personal interests and emotions into the background. "I
+have never known how to do anything by halves," she says of herself very
+truly; and whatever may be thought of the tendency of her political
+influence and the manner of its exertion, no one can tax her with
+sparing herself in a contest to which, moreover, she came disinterested;
+vanity and ambition having, in one of her sex, nothing to gain by it.
+But in political matters it seems hard for a poet to do right. If, like
+Goethe, he holds aloof in great crises, he is branded for it as a
+traitor and a bad patriot. The battle of Leipzig is being fought, and he
+sits tranquilly writing the epilogue for a play. If, like George Sand,
+he throws the whole weight of his enthusiastic eloquence into what he
+believes to be the right scale, it is ten to one that his power, which
+knows nothing of caution and patience, may do harm to the cause he has
+at heart.
+
+Madame Sand rested her hopes for a better state of things, for the
+redemption of France from political corruption, for the amelioration of
+the condition of the working classes, and reform of social institutions
+in general, on the advent to power of those placed at the head of
+affairs by the collapse of the government of Louis Philippe, a crisis
+long threatened, long prepared, and become inevitable.
+
+"The whole system," wrote Heine prophetically of the existing monarchy,
+five years before its fall, "is not worth a charge of powder, if indeed
+some day a charge of powder does not blow it up." February, 1848, saw
+the explosion, the flight of the Royal Family, and the formation of a
+Provisional Government, with Lamartine at its head.
+
+It is hard to realize in the present day, when we contemplate these
+events through the sobering light of the deplorable sequel, how immense
+and wide-spreading was the enthusiasm that at this particular juncture
+seemed to put the fervent soul of a George Sand or an Armand Barbes into
+the most lukewarm and timid. "More than one," writes Madame d'Agoult,
+"who for the last twenty years had been scoffing at every grand thought,
+let himself be won by the general emotion." The prevailing impression
+can have fallen little short of the conviction that a sort of millennium
+was at hand for mankind in general and the French in particular, and
+that all human ills would disappear because a bad government had been
+got rid of, and that without such scenes of blood and strife as had
+disfigured previous revolutions.
+
+The first task was firmly to establish a better one in its place. Madame
+Sand, though with a strong perception of the terrible difficulties
+besetting a ministry which, to quote her own words, would need, in order
+to acquit itself successfully, "the genius of a Napoleon and the heart
+of Christ," never relaxed an instant in the enforcement, both by example
+and exhortation, of her conviction that it was the duty of all true
+patriots and philanthropists to consecrate their energies to the cause
+of the new republic.
+
+"My heart is full and my head on fire," she writes to a fellow-worker in
+the same cause. "All my physical ailments, all my personal sorrows are
+forgotten. I live, I am strong, active, I am not more than twenty years
+old." The exceptional situation of the country was one in which,
+according to her opinion, it behooved men to be ready not only with
+loyalty and devotion, but with fanaticism if needed. She worked hard
+with her son and her local allies at the ungrateful task of
+revolutionizing Le Berry, which, she sighs, "is very drowsy." In March
+she came up to Paris and placed her services as journalist and partizan
+generally at the disposal of Ledru-Rollin, Minister of the Interior
+under the new Government. "Here am I already doing the work of a
+statesman," she writes from Paris to her son at Nohant, March 24. Her
+indefatigable energy, enabling her as it did to disdain repose, was
+perhaps the object of envy to the statesmen themselves. At their disgust
+when kept up all night by the official duties of their posts, she laughs
+without mercy. Night and day her pen was occupied, now drawing up
+circulars for the administration, now lecturing the people in political
+pamphlets addressed to them. To the _Bulletin de la Republique_, a
+government journal started with the laudable purpose of preserving a
+clear understanding between the mass of the people in the provinces and
+the central government, she became a leading contributor. For the festal
+invitation performances given to the people at the "Theatre de la
+Republique," where Rachel sang the Marseillaise and acted in _Les
+Horaces_, Madame Sand wrote a little "occasional" prologue, _Le Roi
+Attend_, a new and democratic version of Moliere's _Impromptu de
+Versailles_. The outline is as follows:--Moliere is discovered impatient
+and uneasy; the King waits, and the comedians are not ready. He sinks
+asleep, and has a vision, in which the muse emerges out of a cloud,
+escorted by AEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Shakespeare, and
+Beaumarchais, to each of whom are assigned a few lines--where possible,
+lines of their own--in praise of equality and fraternity. They vanish,
+and Moliere awakes; his servant announces to him that the King
+waits--but the King this time is, of course, the people, to whom Moliere
+now addresses his flattering speech in turn.
+
+But the fervor of heroism that fired everybody in the first days of
+successful revolution, that made the leaders disinterested, the masses
+well-behaved, reasonable, and manageable, was for the majority a flash
+only; and the dreamed-of social ideal, touched for a moment was to
+recede again into the far distance. It was Madame Sand's error, and no
+ignoble one, to entertain the belief that a nation could safely be
+trusted to the guidance of a force so variable and uncontrollable as
+enthusiasm, and that the principle of self-devotion could be relied upon
+as a motive power. The divisions, intrigues, and fatal complications
+that quickly arose at head-quarters confirmed her first estimation of
+the practical dangers ahead. She clung to her belief in the sublime
+virtues of the masses, and that they would prove themselves grander,
+finer, more generous than all the mighty and the learned ones upon
+earth. But each of the popular leaders in turn was pronounced by her
+tried and found wanting. None of the party chiefs presented the
+desirable combination of perfect heroism and political genius. Michel,
+the apostle who of old had converted her to the cause, she had long
+scorned as a deserter. Leroux, in the moment of action, was a nonentity.
+Barbes "reasons like a saint," she observes, "that is to say, very ill
+as regards the things of this world." Lamartine was a vain trimmer;
+Louis Blanc, a sectarian; Ledru-Rollin, a weathercock. "It is the
+characters that transgress," she complains naively as one after the
+other disappointed her. Her own shortcomings on the score of patience
+and prudence were, it must be owned, no less grave. Her
+clear-sightedness was unaccompanied by the slightest dexterity of
+action. Years before, in one of the _Lettres d'un Voyageur_, she had
+passed a criticism on herself as a political worker, the accuracy of
+which she made proof of when carried into the vortex. "I am by nature
+poetical, but not legislative, warlike, if required, but never
+parliamentary. By first persuading me and then giving me my orders some
+use may be made of me, but I am not fit for discovering or deciding
+anything."
+
+Such an influence, important for raising an agitation, was null for
+controlling and directing the forces thus set in motion. In the
+application of the theories she had accepted she was as weak and obscure
+as she was emphatic and eloquent in the preaching of them. Little help
+could she afford the republican leaders in dealing with the momentous
+question how to fulfill the immense but confused aspirations they had
+raised, how to show that their principles could answer the necessities
+of the moment.
+
+The worst, perhaps, that can be said of Madame Sand's political
+utterances is that they encouraged the people in their false
+belief--which belief she shared--that the social reforms so urgently
+needed could be worked rapidly by the Government, providing only it were
+willing. Over-boldness of expression on the part of advanced sections
+only increased the timidity and irresolution of action complained of in
+the administration. As the ranks of the Ministry split up into factions,
+Madame Sand attached herself to the party of Ledru-Rollin--in whom at
+that time she had confidence,--a party that desired to see him at the
+head of affairs, and that included Jules Favre, Etienne Arago, and
+Armand Barbes. No more zealous political partizan and agent than Madame
+Sand. The purpose in view was to preserve a cordial _entente_ between
+these trusted chiefs and the masses whose interests they represented and
+on whose support they relied. To this end she got together meetings of
+working-men at her temporary Parisian abode, addressing them in speech
+and in print, and seemingly blind in the heat of the struggle to the
+enormous danger of playing with the unmanageable, unreasoning instincts
+of the crowd. She still cherished the chimera dear to her
+imagination--the prospective vision of the French people assembling
+itself in large masses, and deliberately and pacifically giving
+expression to its wishes.
+
+Into the _Bulletin de la Republique_ there crept soon a tone of
+impatience and provocation, improper and dangerous in an official organ.
+The 16th number, which appeared on April 16, at a moment when the
+pending general elections seemed likely to be overruled by
+reactionaries, contained the startling declaration that if the result
+should thus dissatisfy the Paris people, these would manifest their will
+once more, by adjourning the decision of a false national
+representation.
+
+This sentence, which came from the pen of Madame Sand, was interpreted
+into a threat of intimidation from the party that would make
+Ledru-Rollin dictator, and created a considerable stir. There was,
+indeed, no call for a fresh brand of discord in the republican ranks.
+Almost simultaneously came popular demonstrations of a menacing
+character. Ledru-Rollin disavowed the offending _Bulletin_; but the
+growing uneasiness of the _bourgeoisie_, the unruly discontent among the
+workmen, the Government, embarrassed and utterly disorganized, was
+powerless to allay. Madame Sand began to perceive that the republic of
+her dreams, the "republican republic," was a forlorn hope, though still
+unconscious that even heavier obstacles to progress existed in the
+governed many than in the incapacity or personal ambition of the
+governing few. She writes to her son from Paris, April 17:--
+
+     I am sad, my boy. If this goes on, and in some sense there should
+     be no more to be done, I shall return to Nohant to console myself
+     by being with you. I shall stay and see the National Assembly,
+     after which I think I shall find nothing more here that I can do.
+
+At the _Fete de la Fraternite_, April 20th, the spectacle of a million
+of souls putting aside and agreeing to forget all dissensions, all
+wrongs in the past and fears for the future, and uniting in a burst of
+joyous exultation, filled her with enthusiasm and renewed hope. But the
+demonstration of the 15th of May, of which she was next a spectator,
+besides its mischievous effect in alarming the quiet classes and
+exciting the agitators afresh, gave fatal evidence of the national
+disorganization and uncontrollable confusion everywhere prevailing, that
+had doomed the republic from the hour of its birth.
+
+Madame Sand, though she strenuously denied any participation or sympathy
+with this particular manifestation, was closely associated in the
+public mind with those who had aided and abetted the uprising. During
+the gathering of the populace, which she had witnessed, mingling
+unrecognized among the crowd, a female orator haranguing the mob from
+the lower windows of a _cafe_ was pointed out to her, and she was
+assured that it was George Sand. During the repressive measures the
+administration was led to take she felt uncertain whether the arrest of
+Barbes might not be followed by her own. Some of her friends advised her
+to seek safety in Italy, where at that time the partisans of liberty
+were more united and sanguine. She turned a deaf ear. But she was
+severed now from all influential connection with those in authority.
+Before the end of May she left for Nohant, with her hopes for the rapid
+regeneration of her country on the wane. "I am afraid for the future,"
+she writes to the imprisoned Barbes, shortly after these events. "I
+suffer for those who do harm and allow harm to be done without
+understanding it.... I see nothing but ignorance and moral weakness
+preponderating on the face of the globe."
+
+Through the medium of the press, notably of the journal _La Vraie
+Republique_, she continued to give plain expression to her sentiments,
+regardless of the political enmities she might excite, and of the
+personal mortification to which she was exposed, even at Nohant, which
+with its inmates had recently become the mark for petty hostile
+"demonstrations." Alluding to these, she writes:--
+
+     Here in this Berry, so romantic, so gentle, so calm and good, in
+     this land I love so tenderly, and where I have given sufficient
+     proof to the poor and uneducated that I know my duties towards
+     them, I myself in particular am looked upon as the enemy of the
+     human race; and if the Republic has not kept its promises, it is I,
+     clearly, who am the cause.
+
+The term "communist," caught up and passed from mouth to mouth, was
+flung at Madame Sand and her son by the peasants, whose ideas as to its
+significance were not a little wild. "A pack of idiots," she writes to
+Madame Marliani, "who threaten to come and set fire to Nohant. Brave
+they are not, neither morally nor physically; and when they come this
+way and I walk through the midst of them they take off their hats; but
+when they have gone by they summon courage to shout, 'Down with the
+communists.'"
+
+The ingratitude of many who again and again had received succor from her
+and hers, she might excuse on account of their ignorance, but the extent
+of their ignorance was an obstacle to immediate progress whose weight
+she had miscalculated.
+
+"I shall keep my faith," she writes to Joseph Mazzini at this
+crisis--"the idea, pure and bright, the eternal truth will ever remain
+for me in my heaven, unless I go blind. But hope is a belief in the near
+triumph of one's faith. I should not be sincere if I said that this
+state of mind had not been modified in me during these last months."
+
+The terrible insurrection of June followed, and overwhelmed her for the
+time. It was not only that her nature, womanly and poetical, had the
+greatest horror of bloodshed. The spectacle of the republicans
+slaughtering each other, of the evil passions stirred, the frightful
+anarchy, ended but at a frightful cost, the complete extinction of all
+hopes,--nothing left rampant but fear, rancor and distrust,--was
+heart-rendering to her whose heart had been thrown into the national
+troubles. Great was the panic in Berry, an after-clap of the
+disturbances in the capital. Madame Sand's position became more
+unpleasant than ever. She describes herself as "_blasee d
+outrages_--threatened perpetually by the coward hatreds and imbecile
+terrors of country places." But to all this she was well-nigh insensible
+in her despair over the public calamities oppressing her nation--the end
+of all long-struggling aspirations in "frightful confusion, complete
+moral anarchy, a morbid condition, in most which the courageous of us
+lost heart and wished for death.
+
+"You say that the _bourgeoisie_ prevails," she writes to Mazzini, in
+September, 1848, "and that thus it is quite natural that selfishness
+should be the order of the day. But why does the _bourgeoisie_ prevail,
+whilst the people is sovereign, and the principle of its sovereignty,
+universal suffrage, is still standing? We must open our eyes at last,
+and the vision of reality is horrible. The majority of the French people
+is blind, credulous, ignorant, ungrateful, wicked, and stupid; it is
+_bourgeoisie_ itself!"
+
+Under no conceivable circumstances is it likely that Madame Sand would
+not very soon have become disgusted with active politics, for which her
+temperament unfitted her in every respect. Impetuous and
+uncompromisingly sincere, she was predestined to burn her fingers; proud
+and independent, to become something of a scape-goat, charged with all
+the follies and errors which she repudiated, as well as with those for
+which she was more or less directly responsible.
+
+For some time to come she remained in comparative seclusion at Nohant.
+She had not ceased her propaganda, though obliged to conduct it with
+greater circumspection. After the horrors of civil warfare, had come the
+cry for order at any price, and France had declared for the rule of
+Louis Bonaparte. During the course of events that consolidated his
+power, Madame Sand withdrew more and more from the strife of political
+parties. She had been, and we shall find her again, inclined to hope for
+better things for France from its new master than time showed to be in
+store. Other republicans besides herself had been disposed to build high
+their hopes of this future "saviour of society" in his youthful days of
+adversity and mysterious obscurity. When in confinement at the fortress
+of Ham, in 1844, Louis Napoleon sent to George Sand his work on the
+Extinction of Pauperism. She wrote back a flattering letter in which,
+however, with characteristic sincerity, she is careful to remind him
+that the party to which she belonged could never acknowledge any
+sovereign but the people; that this they considered to be incompatible
+with the sovereignty of one man; that no miracle, no personification of
+popular genius in a single individual, could prove to them the right of
+that individual to sovereign power.
+
+Since then she had seen the people supreme, and been forced to own that
+they knew not what they wanted, nor whither they were going, divided in
+mind, ferocious in action. Among the leaders, she had seen some
+infatuated by the allurements of personal popularity, and the rest
+showing, by their inability to cope with the perplexities of
+administrative government, that so far philosophical speculations were
+of no avail in the actual solution of social problems.
+
+The result of her disenchantment was in no degree the overthrow of her
+political faith. A conviction was dawning on her that her social ideal
+was absolutely impracticable in any future that she and her friends
+could hope to live to see. But the belief on which she founded her
+social religion was one in which she never wavered; a certainty that a
+progress, the very idea of which now seemed chimerical, would some day
+appear to all as a natural thing; nay, that the stream of tendency would
+carry men towards this goal in spite of themselves.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+PASTORAL TALES.
+
+
+"So you thought," wrote Madame Sand to a political friend, in 1849,
+"that I was drinking blood out of the skulls of aristocrats. Not I! I am
+reading Virgil and learning Latin." And her best propaganda, as by and
+by she came to own, was not that carried on in journals such as _La
+Vraie Republique_ and _La Cause du Peuple_. Through her works of
+imagination she has exercised an influence more powerful and universal,
+if indirect.
+
+Among the more than half a hundred romances of George Sand, there stands
+out a little group of three, belonging to the period we have now
+reached--the _mezzo cammin_ of her life--creations in a special style,
+and over which the public voice, whether of fastidious critics or
+general readers, in France or abroad, has been and remains unanimous in
+praise.
+
+In these, her pastoral tales, she hit on a new and happy vein which she
+was peculiarly qualified to work, combining as she did, intimate
+knowledge of French peasant life with sympathetic interest in her
+subject and lively poetic fancy. Here she affronts no prejudices,
+advances no startling theories, handles no subtle, treacherous social
+questions, and to these compositions in a perfectly original _genre_ she
+brought the freshness of genius which "age cannot wither," together with
+the strength and finish of a practiced hand.
+
+Peasants had figured as accessories in her earlier works. The rustic
+hermit and philosopher, Patience, and Marcasse the rat-catcher, in
+_Mauprat_, are note-worthy examples. In 1844 had appeared _Jeanne_, with
+its graceful dedication to Francoise Meillant, the unlettered
+peasant-girl who may have suggested the work she could not read--one of
+a family of rural proprietors, spoken of by Madame Sand in a letter of
+1843 as a fine survival of a type already then fast vanishing--of
+patriarchally constituted family-life, embodying all that was grand and
+simple in the forms of the olden time.
+
+In _Jeanne_, Madame Sand had first ventured to make a peasant-girl the
+central figure of her novel, though still so far deferring to the
+received notions of what was essential in order to interest the "gentle"
+reader as to surround her simple heroine with personages of rank and
+education. Jeanne herself, moreover, is an exceptional and a highly
+idealized type--as it were a sister to Joan of Arc, not the inspired
+warrior-maid, but the visionary shepherdess of the Vosges. Yet the
+creation is sufficiently real. The author had observed how favorable was
+the life of solitude and constant communion with nature led by many of
+these country children in their scattered homesteads, to the development
+of remarkable and tenacious individuality. So with the strange and
+poetical Jeanne, too innately refined to prosper in her rough human
+environment, yet too fixedly simple to fare much better in more
+cultivated circles. She is the victim of a sort of celestial stupidity
+we admire and pity at once. In this study of a peasant heroine resides
+such charm as the book possesses, and the attempt was to lead on the
+author to the productions above alluded to, _La Mareau Diable_,
+_Francois le Champi_, and _La Petite Fadette_. Of this popular trio the
+first had been published already two years before the Revolution, in
+1846; the second was appearing in the Feuilleton of the _Journal des
+Debats_ at the very moment of the breaking of the storm, which
+interrupted its publication awhile. When those tumultuous months were
+over, and Madame Sand, thrown out of the hurly-burly of active politics,
+was brought back by the course of events to Nohant, she seems to have
+taken up her pen very much where she had laid it down. The break in her
+ordinary round of work made by the excitements of active statesmanship
+was hardly perceptible, and in 1849 _Le Champi_ was followed by _La
+Petite Fadette_.
+
+_La Mare au Diable_, George Sand's first tale of exclusively
+peasant-life, is usually considered her masterpiece in this _genre_. It
+was suggested to her, she tells us, by Holbein's dismal engraving of
+death coming to the husbandman, an old, gaunt, ragged, over-worked
+representative of his tribe--grim ending to a life of cheerless poverty
+and toil!
+
+Here was the dark and painful side of the laborer's existence--a true
+picture, but not the whole truth. There was another and a bright side,
+which might just as allowably be represented in art as the dreary one,
+and which she had seen and studied. In Berry extreme poverty was the
+exception, and the agriculturist's life appeared as it ought to be,
+healthy, calm, and simple, its laboriousness compensated by the soothing
+influences of nature, and of strong home affections.
+
+This little gem of a work is thoroughly well-known. The ploughing-scene
+in the opening--ploughing as she had witnessed it sometimes in her own
+neighborhood, fresh, rough ground broken up for tillage, the plough
+drawn by four yoke of young white oxen new to their work and but
+half-tamed, has a simplicity and grandeur of effect not easy to parallel
+in modern art. The _motif_ of the tale is that you often go far to
+search for the good fortune that lies close to your door. Never was so
+homely an adage more freshly and prettily illustrated; yet how slight
+are the materials, how plain is the outline! Germain, the well-to-do,
+widowed laborer, in the course of a few miles' ride, a journey
+undertaken in order to present himself and his addresses to the rich
+widow his father desires him to woo, discovers the real life-companion
+he wants in the poor girl-neighbor, whom he patronizingly escorts on her
+way to the farm where she is hired for service. It all slowly dawns upon
+him, in the most natural manner, as the least incidents of the journey
+call out her good qualities of head and heart--her helpfulness in
+misadventure, forgetfulness of self, unaffected fondness for children,
+instinctively recognized by Germain's little boy, who, with his
+unconscious childish influence, is one of the prettiest features in the
+book. Germain, by his journey's end, has his heart so well engaged in
+the right quarter that he is proof against the dangerous fascinations of
+the coquettish widow.
+
+There is a breath of poetry over the picture, but no denaturalization
+of the uncultured types. Germain is honest and warm-hearted, but not
+bright of understanding; little Marie is wise and affectionate, but as
+unsentimentally-minded as the veriest realist could desire. The native
+caution and mercenary habit of thought of the French agricultural class
+are indicated by many a humorous touch in the pastorals of George Sand.
+
+Equally pleasing, though not aiming at the almost antique simplicity of
+the _Mare au Diable_, is the story of _Francois le Champi_, the
+foundling, saved from the demoralization to which lack of the softening
+influences of home and parental affection predestine such unhappy
+children, through the tenderness his forlorn condition inspires in a
+single heart--that of Madeline Blanchet, the childless wife, whose own
+wrongs, patiently borne, have quickened her commiseration for the wrongs
+of others. Her sympathy, little though it lies in her power to manifest
+it, he feels, and its incalculable worth to him, which is such that the
+gratitude of a whole life cannot do more than repay it.
+
+Part of the narrative is here put into the mouth of a peasant, and told
+in peasant language, or something approaching to it. Over the propriety
+of this proceeding, adopted also in _Les Maitres Sonneurs_, French
+critics are disagreed, though for the most part they regret it. It is
+not for a foreigner to decide between them. One would certainly regret
+the absence of some of the extremely original and expressive words and
+turns of speech current among the rural population, forms which such a
+method enabled her to introduce into the narrative as well as into the
+dialogue.
+
+_La Petite Fadette_ is not only worthy of its predecessors but by many
+will be preferred to either. There is something particularly attractive
+in the portraits of the twin brothers--partly estranged by character,
+wholly united by affection,--and in the figure of Fanchon Fadet, an
+original in humble life, which has made this little work a general
+favorite wherever it is known.
+
+These prose-idylls have been called "The Georgics of France." It is
+curious that in a country so largely agricultural, and where nature
+presents more variety of picturesque aspect than perhaps in any other in
+Europe, the poetic side of rural life should have been so sparingly
+represented in her imaginative literature. French poets of nature have
+mostly sought their inspiration out of their own land, "In France,
+especially," observes Theophile Gautier, "all literary people live in
+town, that is in Paris the centre, know little of what is unconnected
+with it, and most of them cannot tell wheat from barley, potatoes from
+beetroot." It was a happy inspiration that prompted Madame Sand to fill
+in the blank, in a way all her own, and her task as we have seen was
+completed, revolutions notwithstanding. She owns to having then felt the
+attraction experienced in all time by those hard hit by public
+calamities, "to throw themselves back on pastoral dreams, all the more
+naive and childlike for the brutality and darkness triumphant in the
+world of activity." Tired of "turning round and round in a false circle
+of argument, of accusing the governing minority, but only to be forced
+to acknowledge after all that they were put there by the choice of the
+majority," she wished to forget it all: and her poetic temperament which
+unfitted her for success in politics assisted her in finding consolation
+in nature.
+
+Moreover a district like Le Berry, singularly untouched by corruptions
+of the civilization, and preserving intact many old and interesting
+characteristics, was a field in which she might draw from reality many
+an attractive picture. She was as much rallied by town critics about her
+shepherdesses as though she had invented them. And yet she saw them
+every day, and they may be seen still by any wanderer in those lanes,
+and at every turn, Fanchons, Maries, Nanons, as she described them,
+tending their flock of from five to a dozen sheep, or a few geese, a
+goat and a donkey, all day long between the tall hedgerows, or on the
+common, spinning the while, or possibly dreaming. A certain refinement
+of cast distinguishes the type. Eugene Delacroix, in a letter describing
+a village festival at Nohant, remarks that if positive beauty is rare
+among the natives, ugliness is a thing unknown. A gentle, passive cast
+of countenance prevails among the women: "They are all St. Annes," as
+the artist expresses it. The inevitable changes brought about by
+steam-communication, which have as yet only begun to efface the local
+habits and peculiarities, must shortly complete their work. George
+Sand's pastoral novels will then have additional value, as graphic
+studies of a state of things that has passed away.
+
+It does not appear that the merit of these stories was so quickly
+recognized as that of _Indiana_ and _Valentine_. The author might
+abstract herself awhile from passing events and write idylls, but the
+public had probably not yet settled down into the proper state of mind
+for fully enjoying them. Moreover Madame Sand's antagonists in politics
+and social science, as though under the impression that she could not
+write except to advance some theory of which they disapproved,
+pre-supposed in these stories a set purpose of exalting the excellence
+of rustic as compared with polite life--of exaggerating the virtues of
+the poor, to throw into relief the vices of the rich. The romances
+themselves do not bear out such a supposition. In them the author
+chooses exactly the same virtues to exalt, the same vices to condemn, as
+in her novels of refined society. She shows us intolerance, selfishness,
+and tyranny of custom marring or endangering individual happiness among
+the working-classes, as with their superiors. There are Philistines in
+her thatched cottages, as well as in her marble halls. Germain, in _La
+Mare au Diable_, has some difficulty to discover for himself, as well as
+to convince his family and neighbors, that in espousing the penniless
+Marie he is not marrying beneath him in every sense. Francois le Champi
+is a pariah, an outcast in the estimation of the rustic world. Fanchon
+Fadet, by her disregard of appearances and village etiquette,
+scandalizes the conservative minds of farmers and millers very much as
+Aurore Dupin scandalized the leaders of society at La Chatre. Most
+prominence is given to the more pleasing characters, but the existence
+of brutality and cupidity among the peasant classes is nowhere kept out
+of sight. Her long practical acquaintance with these classes indeed was
+fatal to illusions on the subject. The average son of the soil was as
+far removed as any other living creature from her ideal of humanity, and
+at the very time when she penned _La Petite Fadette_ she was
+experiencing how far the ignorance, ill-will, and stupidity of her
+poorer neighbors could go.
+
+Thus she writes from Nohant to Barbes at Vincennes, November 1848:
+"Since May, I have shut myself up in prison in my retreat, where, though
+without the hardships of yours, I have more to suffer than you from
+sadness and dejection, ... and am less in safety." Threatened by the
+violence and hatred of the people, she had painfully realized that she
+and her party had their most obstinate enemies among those whom they
+wished and worked to save and defend.
+
+Her profound discouragement finds expression in many of her letters from
+1849 to 1852. The more sanguine hopes of Mazzini and other of her
+correspondents she desires, but no longer expects, to see fulfilled. She
+compares the moral state of France to the Russian retreat; the soldiers
+in the great army of progress seized with vertigo, and seeking death in
+fighting with each other.
+
+To her son, who was in Paris at the time of the disturbances in May,
+1849, she writes:--
+
+     Come back, I implore you. I have only you in the world, and your
+     death would be mine. I can still be of some small use to the cause
+     of truth, but if I were to lose you it would be all over with me. I
+     have not got the stoicism of Barbes and Mazzini. It is true they
+     are men, and they have no children. Besides, in my opinion it is
+     not in fight, not by civil war, that we shall win the cause of
+     humanity in France. We have got universal suffrage. The worse for
+     us if we do not know how to avail ourselves of it, for that alone
+     can lastingly emancipate us, and the only thing that would give us
+     the right to take up arms would be an attempt on their part to take
+     away our right to vote.
+
+During the two years preceding the _coup d'etat_ of December, 1851, life
+at Nohant had resumed its wonted cheerfulness of aspect. Madame Sand was
+used to surround herself with young people and artistic people; but now,
+amid their light-heartedness, she had for a period to battle with an
+extreme inward sadness, confirmed by the fresh evidence brought by these
+years of the demoralization in all ranks of opinion. "Your head is not
+very lucid when your heart is so deeply wounded," she had remarked
+already, after the disasters of 1848, "and how can one help suffering
+mortally from the spectacle of civil war and the slaughter among the
+people?"
+
+To that was now added a loss of faith in the virtues of her own party,
+as well as of the masses. It is no wonder if she fell out of love for
+awhile with the ideals of romance, with her own art of fiction, and the
+types of heroism that were her favorite creations. But if the shadow of
+a morbid pessimism crept over her mind, she could view it now as a
+spiritual malady which she had yet the will and the strength to live
+down; as years before she had surmounted a similar phase of feeling
+induced by personal sorrow.
+
+Already, in 1847, she had begun to write her _Memoirs_, and reverting to
+them now, she found there work that suited her mood, as dealing with the
+past, more agreeable to contemplate just then than the present or the
+future.
+
+However, in September, 1850, we find her writing to Mazzini,--after
+dwelling on the present shortcomings of the people, and the mixture of
+pity and indignation with which they inspired her: "I turn back to
+fiction and produce, in art, popular types such as I see no longer; but
+as they ought to be and might be." She alludes to a play on which she
+was engaged, and continues: "The dramatic form, being new to me, has
+revived me a little of late; it is the only kind of work into which I
+have been able to throw myself for a year."
+
+The events of December, 1851, surprised her during a brief visit to
+Paris. Her hopes for her country had sunk so low, that she owns herself
+at the moment not to have regarded the _coup d'etat_ as likely to prove
+more disastrous to the cause of progress than any other of the violent
+ends which threatened the existing political situation. She left the
+capital in the midst of the cannonade, and with her family around her at
+Nohant awaited the issue of the new dictatorship.
+
+The wholesale arrests that followed immediately, and filled the country
+with stupefaction, made havoc on all sides of her. Among the victims
+were comrades of her childhood, numbers of her friends and acquaintance
+and their relatives--as well in Berry as in the capital--many arrested
+solely on suspicion of hostility to the President's views, yet none the
+less exposed to chances of death, or captivity, or exile.
+
+The crisis drove Madame Sand once more to quit the privacy of her
+country life, but this time in the capacity of intercessor with the
+conqueror for his victims. She came up to Paris, and on January 20,
+1852, addressed a letter to the President, imploring his clemency for
+the accused generally in an admirably eloquent appeal to his sentiments
+as well of justice as of generosity. The plea she so forcibly urged,
+that according to his own professions mere opinion was not to be
+prosecuted as a crime, whereas the so-called "preventive measures" had
+involved in one common ruin with his active opponents those who had been
+mere passive spectators of late events, was, of course, unanswerable.
+The future Emperor granted her two audiences within a week at the
+Elysee, in answer to her request, and he succeeded on the first occasion
+in convincing her that the acts of iniquity and intimidation perpetrated
+as by his authority were as completely in defiance of his public
+intentions as of his private principles. As a personal favor to herself,
+he readily offered her the release of any of the political prisoners
+that she choose to name, and promised that a general amnesty should
+speedily follow. She left him, reassured to some extent as to the fate
+in store for her country. The second interview she had solicited in
+order to plead the cause of one of her personal friends, condemned to
+transportation. The mission was a delicate one, for her client would
+engage himself to nothing for the future, and Madame Sand, in
+petitioning for his release, saw no better course open to her than as
+expressed by herself, frankly to denounce him to the President as his
+"incorrigible personal enemy." Upon this the President granted her the
+prisoner's full pardon at once. Madame Sand was naturally touched by
+this ready response of the generous impulse to which she had trusted. To
+those who cast doubts on the sincerity of any good sentiment in such a
+quarter, she very properly replied that it was not for her to be the
+first to discredit the generosity she had so successfully appealed to.
+
+But between her republican friends, loth to owe their deliverance to the
+tender mercies of Louis Napoleon, and her own desire to save their lives
+and liberties, and themselves and their families from ruin and despair,
+she found her office of mediator a most unthankful one. She persisted
+however in unwearying applications for justice and mercy, addressed both
+to the dictator directly, and through his cousin, Prince Napoleon
+(Jerome), between whom and herself there existed a cordial esteem. She
+clung as long as she could to her belief in the public virtue of the
+President, or Emperor as he already began to be called here and there.
+But the promised clemency limited itself to a number of particular cases
+for whom she had specially interceded.
+
+The subsequent conditions of France precluded all free emission of
+socialist or republican opinions, but Madame Sand desired nothing better
+than to send in her political resignation; and it is impossible to share
+the regret of some of her fellow-republicans at finding her again
+devoting her best energies to her art of fiction, and in November, 1853,
+writing to Mazzini such words of wisdom as these:--
+
+     You are surprised that I can work at literature. For my part, I
+     thank God that he has let me preserve this faculty; for an honest
+     and clear conscience like mine still finds, apart from all debate,
+     a work of moralization to pursue. What should I do if I relinquish
+     my task, humble though it be? Conspire? It is not my vocation; I
+     should make nothing of it. Pamphlets? I have neither the wit nor
+     the wormwood required for that. Theories? We have made too many,
+     and have fallen to disputing, which is the grave of all truth and
+     all strength. I am, and always have been, artist before everything
+     else. I know that mere politicians look on artists, with great
+     contempt, judging them by some of those mountebank-types which are
+     a disgrace to art. But you, my friend, you well know that a real
+     artist is as useful as the _priest_ and the _warrior_, and that
+     when he respects what is true and what is good, he is in the right
+     path where the divine blessing will attend him. Art belongs to all
+     countries and to all time, and its special good is to live on when
+     all else seems to be dying. That is why Providence delivers it from
+     passions too personal or too general, and has given to its
+     organization patience and persistence, an enduring sensibility, and
+     that contemplative sense upon which rests invincible faith.
+
+Her novel, _Les Maitres Sonneurs_, the first-fruits of the year 1853, is
+what most will consider a very good equivalent for party pamphlets and
+political diatribes.
+
+When composing _La Mare au Diable_, in 1846, Madame Sand looked forward
+to writing a series of such peasant tales, to be collectively entitled
+_Les Veillees du Chanvreur_, the hemp-beaters being, as will be
+recollected, the Scheherazades of each village. Their number was never
+to be thus augmented, but the idea is recalled by the chapter-headings
+of _Les Maitres Sonneurs_, in which Etienne Despardieu, or Tiennet, the
+rustic narrator, tells, in the successive _veillees_ of a month, the
+romance of his youth. It is a work of a very different type to the rural
+tales that had preceded it, and should be regarded apart from them. It
+is longer, more complex in form and sentiment, more of an ideal
+composition. _Les Maitres Sonneurs_, is a delightful pastoral, woodland
+fantasy, standing by itself among romances much as stands a kindred work
+of imagination, "As You Like It," among plays, yet thoroughly
+characteristic of George Sand, the nature-lover, the seer into the
+mysteries of human character, and the imaginative artist. The agreeable
+preponderates in the story, but it has its tragic features and its
+serious import. A picturesque and uncommon setting adds materially to
+its charm. Every thread tells in this delicate piece of fancy-work, and
+the weaver's art is indescribable. But one may note the ingenuity with
+which four or five interesting yet perfectly natural types are brought
+into a group and contrasted; improbable incidents so handled as not to
+strike a discordant note, the characteristics of the past introduced
+without ever losing hold of the links, the points of identity between
+past and present. The scene is the hamlet of Nohant itself; the time is
+a century ago, when the country, half covered with forest, was wilder,
+the customs rougher, the local coloring stronger than even Madame Sand
+in her childhood had known them. The personages belong to the rural
+proprietor class. The leading characters are all somewhat out of the
+common, but such exist in equal proportions in all classes of society,
+and there is ample evidence besides George Sand's of notable examples
+among the French peasantry. The plot and its interest lie in the
+development of character and the fine tracing of the manner in which the
+different characters are influenced by circumstances and by each other.
+If the beauty of rustic maidens, and of rustic songs and dance-music, as
+here described, seem to transcend probability, it must be remembered it
+is a peasant who speaks of these wonders, and as wonders they might
+appear to his limited experience. As a musical novel, it has the
+ingenious distinction of being told from the point of view of the sturdy
+and honest, but unartistic and non-musical Tiennet; a typical
+Berrichon. Madame Sand was of opinion that during the long occupation of
+Berry by the English the two races had blended extensively, and she
+would thus account for some of the heavier, more inexpansive qualities
+of our nation having become characteristic of this French province.
+
+More than one English reader of _Les Maitres Sonneurs_ may have been
+struck by the picture there presented of peasant-folk in a state of
+peace and comfort, such as we do not suppose to have been common in
+France before the Revolution. Madame Sand has elsewhere explained how,
+as a fact, Nohant, and other estates in the region round about, had
+enjoyed some immunity from the worst abuses of the _ancien regime_.
+Several of these properties, as it happened, had fallen to women or
+minors--widows, elderly maiden ladies, who, and their agents, spared the
+holders and cultivators of the soil the exactions which, by right or by
+might, its lords were used to levy. "So the peasants," she writes, "were
+accustomed not to put themselves to any inconvenience; and when came the
+Revolution they were already so well relieved virtually from feudal
+bonds that they took revenge on nobody." A new _seigneur_ of Nohant,
+coming to take possession, and thinking to levy his utmost dues, in
+cash and in kind, found his rustic tenants turn a deaf ear to his
+summons. Ere he could insist the storm burst, but it brought no
+convulsion, and merely confirmed an independence already existing.
+
+_Les Maitres Sonneurs_, whilst illustrating some of the most striking
+merits of George Sand, is free from the defects often laid to her
+charge; and although of all her pastorals it must suffer the most when
+rendered in any language but the original, it is much to be regretted
+that some good translation of this work should not put it within the
+reach of all English readers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+PLAYS AND LATER NOVELS.
+
+
+There are few eminent novelists that have not tried their hands at
+writing for the stage; and Madame Sand had additional inducements to do
+so, beyond those of ambition satiated with literary success, and tempted
+by the charm of making fresh conquest of the public in a more direct and
+personal fashion.
+
+From early childhood she had shown a strong liking for the theatre. The
+rare performances given by travelling acting-companies at La Chatre had
+been her greatest delight when a girl. At the convent-school she had
+arranged Moliere from memory for representation by herself and her
+school-fellows, careful so to modify the piece as to avoid all
+possibility of shocking the nuns. Thus the Sisters applauded _Le Malade
+Imaginaire_ without any suspicion that the author was one whose works,
+for them, were placed under a ban, and whose very name they held in
+devout abhorrence. She inherited from her father a taste for acting,
+which she transmitted to her children. We have seen her during her
+literary novitiate in Paris, a studious observer at all theatres, from
+the classic boards of the Francais down to the lowest of popular stages,
+the Funambules, where reigned at that time a real artist in pantomime,
+Debureau. His Pierrot, a sort of modified Pulchinello, was renowned; and
+attracted more fastidious critics to his audience than the Paris
+artisans whose idol he was. Since then Madame Sand had numbered among
+her personal friends such leading dramatic celebrities as Madame Dorval,
+Bocage, and Pauline Garcia. "I like actors," she says playfully, "which
+has scandalized some austere people. I have also been found fault with
+for liking the peasantry. Among these I have passed my life, and as I
+found them, so have I described them. As these, in the light of the sun,
+give us our daily bread for our bodies, so those by gaslight give us our
+daily bread of fiction, so needful to the wearied spirit, troubled by
+realities." Peasants and players seem to be the types of humanity
+farthest removed from each other, and it is worthy of remark that George
+Sand was equally successful in her presentation of both.
+
+Her preference for originality and spontaneity before all other
+qualities in a dramatic artist was characteristic of herself, though
+not of her nation. Thus it was that Madame Dorval, the heroine of
+_Antony_ and _Marion Delorme_, won her unbounded admiration. Even in
+Racine she clearly preferred her to Mlle. Mars, as being a less studied
+actress, and one who abandoned herself more to the inspiration of the
+moment. The effect produced, as described by Madame Sand, will be
+understood by all keenly alive, like herself, to the enjoyment of
+dramatic art. "She" (Madame Dorval) "seemed to me to be myself, more
+expansive, and to express in action and emotion all that I seek to
+express in writing." And compared with such an art, in which conception
+and expression are simultaneous, her own art of words and phrases would
+at such moments appear to her as but a pale reflection.
+
+Bocage, the great character actor of his time, was another who likewise
+appealed particularly to her sympathies, as the personation, on the
+boards, of the protest of the romantic school against the slavery of
+convention and tradition. Her acquaintance with him dated from the first
+representation of Hugo's _Lucrece Borgia_, February, 1833, when Bocage
+and the author of _Indiana_, then strangers to each other, chanced to
+sit side by side. In their joint enthusiasm over the play they made the
+beginning of a thirty years' friendship, terminated only by Bocage's
+death in 1862. "It was difficult not to quarrel with him," she says of
+this popular favorite; "he was susceptible and violent; it was
+impossible not to be reconciled with him quickly. He was faithful and
+magnanimous. He forgave you admirably for wrongs you had never done him,
+and it was as good and real as though the pardon had been actual and
+well-founded, so strong was his imagination, so complete his good
+faith."
+
+The assistance of Madame Dorval, added to the strength of the Comedie
+Francaise company, did not, however, save from failure Madame Sand's
+first drama, _Cosima_, produced, as will be remembered, in 1840. She
+allowed nearly a decade to elapse before again seriously competing for
+theatrical honors, by a second effort in a different style, and more
+satisfactory in its results.
+
+This, a dramatic adaptation by herself of her novel, _Francois le
+Champi_, was produced at the Odeon in the winter of 1849. Generally
+speaking, to make a good play out of a good novel, the playwright must
+begin by murdering the novel; and here, as in all George Sand's dramatic
+versions of her romances, we seem to miss the best part of the original.
+However, the curious simplicity of the piece, the rustic scenes and
+personages, here faithfully copied from reality, unlike the conventional
+village and villager of opera comique, and the pleasing sentiment that
+runs through the tale, were found refreshing by audiences upon whom the
+sensational incidents and harrowing emotions of their modern drama were
+already beginning to pall. The result was a little stage triumph for
+Madame Sand. It helped to draw to her pastoral tales the attention they
+deserved, but had not instantly won in all quarters. Theophile Gautier
+writes playfully of this piece: "The success of _Francois le Champi_ has
+given all our vaudeville writers an appetite for rusticity. Only let
+this go on a little, and we shall be inundated by what has humorously
+been called the 'ruro-drama.' Morvan hats and Berrichon head-dresses
+will invade the scenes, and no language be spoken but in dialect."
+
+Madame Sand was naturally encouraged to repeat the experiment. This was
+done in _Claudie_ (1851) and _Le Pressoir_ (1853), ruro-dramas both, and
+most favorably received. The first-named has a simple and pathetic
+story, and, as usual with Madame Sand's plays, it was strengthened at
+its first production by the support of some of the best acting talent in
+Paris--Fechter, then a rising _jeune premier_, and the veteran Bocage
+ably representing, respectively, youth and age. Old Berrichon airs were
+introduced with effect, as also such picturesque rustic festival customs
+as the ancient harvest-home ceremony, in which the last sheaf is brought
+on a wagon, gaily decked out with poppies, cornflowers and ribbons, and
+receives a libation of wine poured by the hand of the oldest or youngest
+person present.
+
+"But what the theatre can never reproduce," laments Madame Sand, "is the
+majesty of the frame--the mountain of sheaves solemnly approaching,
+drawn by three pairs of enormous oxen, the whole adorned with flowers,
+with fruit, and with fine little children perched upon the top of the
+last sheaves."
+
+Henceforward a good deal of her time and interest continued to be
+absorbed by these dramatic compositions. But though mostly eliciting
+during her lifetime a gratifying amount of public favor and applause,
+the best of them cannot for an instant be placed in the same high rank
+as her novels. For with all her wide grasp of the value of dramatic art
+and her exact appreciation of the strength and weakness of the acting
+world, her plays remain, to great expectations, uniformly disappointing.
+Her specialty in fiction lies in her favorite art of analyzing and
+putting before us, with extreme clearness, the subtlest ramifications,
+the most delicate intricacies of feeling and thought. A stage audience
+has its eyes and ears too busy to give its full attention to the finer
+complications of sentiment and motive; or, at least, in order to keep
+its interest alive and its understanding clear, an accentuation of
+outline is needed, which she neglects even to seek.
+
+Her assertion, that the niceties of emotion are sufficient to found a
+good play upon, no one now will dream of disputing. But for this an art
+of execution is needed of which she had not the instinct. The action is
+insufficient, or rather, the sense of action is not conveyed. The
+slightness of plot--a mere thread in most instances--requires that the
+thread shall at least be never allowed to drop. But she cuts or slackens
+it perpetually, long arguments and digressions intervening, and the
+dialogue, whose monotony is unrelieved by wit, nowhere compensates for
+the limited interest of the action. Awkward treatment is but half felt
+when subject and situations are dramatically strong; but plays with so
+airy and impalpable a basis as these need to be sustained by the utmost
+perfection of construction, concision and polish of dialogue.
+
+Her novel _Mauprat_ has many dramatic points, and she received a score
+of applications for leave to adapt it to the stage. She preferred to
+prepare the version herself, and it was played in the winter of 1853-4,
+with moderate success. But it suffers fatally from comparison with its
+original. An extreme instance is _Flaminio_ (1854), a protracted drama,
+drawn by Madame Sand from her novelette _Teverino_. This is a
+fantasy-piece whose audacity is redeemed, as are certain other
+blemishes, by the poetic suggestiveness of the figure of Madeline, the
+bird-charmer; whilst the picturesque sketch of Teverino, the idealized
+Italian bohemian, too indolent to turn his high natural gifts to any
+account, has proved invaluable to the race of novelists, who are not yet
+tired of reproducing it in large. The work is one addressed mainly to
+the imagination.
+
+In the play we come down from the clouds; the poetry is gone, taste is
+shocked, fancy uncharmed, the improbabilities become grotesque, and the
+whole is distorted and tedious. Madame Sand's personages are never weary
+of analyzing their sentiments. Her flowing style, so pleasant to read,
+carries us swiftly and easily through her dissertations in print, before
+we have time to tire of them. On the stage such colloquies soon appear
+lengthy and unnatural. The climax of absurdity is reached in _Flaminio_,
+where we find the adventurer expatiating to the man of the world on
+"the divinity of his essence."
+
+There is scarcely a department of theatrical literature in which Madame
+Sand does not appear as an aspirant. She was a worshipper of
+Shakespeare, acknowledging him as the king of dramatic writers. For her
+attempt to adapt "As You Like It" to suit the tastes of a Parisian
+audience, she disarms criticism by a preface in the form of a letter to
+M. Regnier, of the Comedie Francaise, prefixed to the printed play. Here
+she says plainly that to resolve to alter Shakespeare is to resolve to
+murder, and that she aims at nothing more than at giving the French
+public some idea of the original. In "As You Like It" the license of
+fancy taken is too wide for the piece to be safely represented to her
+countrymen, since it must jar terribly on "that French reason which,"
+remarks Madame Sand, "we are so vain of, and which deprives us of so
+many originalities quite as precious as itself." The fantastic, which
+had so much attraction for her (possibly a result of her part German
+origin), is a growth that has hard work to flourish on French soil. The
+reader will remember the fate of Weber's _Freischuetz_, outrageously
+hissed when first produced at Paris in its original form. Nine days
+later it was reproduced, having been taken to pieces and put together
+again by M. Castil-Blaze, and thus as _Robin des Bois_ it ran for 357
+nights. The reckless imagination that distinguishes the Shakespearian
+comedy and does not shrink before the introduction of a lion and a
+serpent into the forest of Arden, and the miraculous and instantaneous
+conversion of the wretch Oliver into a worthy suitor for Celia, needed
+to be toned down for acceptance by the Parisians. But Madame Sand was
+less fortunate than M. Castil-Blaze. Her version, produced at the
+Theatre Francais, in 1856, failed to please, although supported by such
+actors as Delaunay, Arnold-Plessy, and Favart. Macready, who had made
+Madame Sand's acquaintance in 1845, when he was giving Shakespearian
+performances in Paris, and whom she greatly admired, dedicating to him
+her little theatrical romance _Le Chateau des Desertes_, was present at
+this representation and records it as a failure. But of her works for
+the stage, which number over a score, few like her _Comme il vous
+plaira_ missed making some mark at the time, the prestige of her name
+and the exceptionally favorable circumstances under which they were
+produced securing more than justice for their intrinsic merit. It was
+natural that she should over-estimate their value and continue to add to
+their number. These pieces would be carefully rehearsed on the little
+stage in the house at Nohant, often with the aid of leading professional
+actors; and there, at least, the success was unqualified.
+
+Her ingenious novel _Les Beaux Messieurs Bois Dore_, dramatized with the
+aid of Paul Meurice and acted in 1862, was a triumph for Madame Sand and
+her friend Bocage. The form and spirit of this novel seem inspired by
+Sir Walter Scott, and though far from perfect, it is a striking instance
+of the versatility of her imaginative powers. The leading character of
+the septuagenarian Marquis, with his many amiable virtues, and his one
+amiable weakness, a longing to preserve intact his youthfulness of
+appearance as he has really preserved his youthfulness of heart, is both
+natural and original, comic and half pathetic withal. The part in the
+play seemed made for Bocage, and his heart was set upon undertaking it.
+But his health was failing at the time, and the manager hesitated about
+giving him the role. "Take care, my friend," wrote Bocage to Madame
+Sand; "perhaps I shall die if I play the part; but if I play it not, I
+shall die of that, to a certainty." She insisted, and play it he did, to
+perfection, she tells us. "He did not act the Marquis de Bois Dore; he
+was the personage himself, as the author had dreamt him." It was to be
+his last achievement, and he knew it. "It is my end," he said one
+night, "but I shall die like a soldier on the field of honor." And so he
+did, continuing to play the role up till a few days before his death.
+
+More lasting success has attended Madame Sand in two of the lightest of
+society comedies, _Le Mariage de Victorine_ and _Le Marquis de
+Villemer_, which seem likely to take a permanent place in the
+_repertoire_ of the French stage. The first, a continuation that had
+suggested itself to her of Sedaine's century-old comedy, _Le Philosophe
+sans le savoir_, escapes the ill fate that seems to attend sequels in
+general. It is of the slightest materials, but holds together, and is
+gracefully conceived and executed. First produced at the Gymnase in
+1851, it was revived during the last year of Madame Sand's life in a
+manner very gratifying to her, being brought out with great applause at
+the Comedie Francaise, preceded on each occasion by Sedaine's play, and
+the same artists appearing in both.
+
+The excellent dramatic version of her popular novel _Le Marquis de
+Villemer_, first acted in 1864, is free from the defects that weaken
+most of her stage compositions. It is said that in preparing it she
+accepted some hints from Alexander Dumas the younger. Whatever the
+cause, the result is a play where characters, composition and dialogue
+leave little to be desired.
+
+_L'autre_, her latest notable stage success, brings us down to 1870,
+when it was acted at the Gymnase, Madame Sarah Bernhardt impersonating
+the heroine. This not very agreeable play is derived, with material
+alterations, from Madame Sand's agreeable novel _La Confession d'une
+jeune Fille_, published in 1864.
+
+If, however, her works for the stage, which fill four volumes, added but
+little, in proportion to their quantity, to her permanent fame, her
+dramatic studies added fresh interest and variety to her experience,
+which brought forth excellent fruit in her novels. Actors, their art and
+way of life have fared notoriously badly in fiction. Such pictures have
+almost invariably fallen into the extreme of unreality or that of
+caricature, whether for want of information or want of sympathy in those
+who have drawn them.
+
+The subject, always attractive for Madame Sand, is one in which she is
+always happy. Already in the first year of her literary career her keen
+appreciation of the art and its higher influences had prompted her
+clever novelette _La Marquise_. Here she illustrates the power of the
+stage as a means of expression--of the truly inspired actor, though his
+greatness be but momentary, and his heroism a semblance, to strike a
+like chord in the heart of the spectator--and, in a corrupt and
+artificial age, to keep alive some latent faith in the ideal. Since
+then the stage and players had figured repeatedly in her works.
+Sometimes she portrays a perfected type, such as Consuelo, or Imperia in
+_Pierre qui roule_, but always side by side with more earthly and faulty
+representatives such as Corilla and Anzoleto, or Julia and Albany, in
+Narcisse, incarnations of the vanity and instability that are the chief
+dangers of the profession, drawn with unsparing realism. In _Le Chateau
+des Desertes_ we find further many admirable theories and suggestive
+ideas on the subject of the regeneration of the theatre. But it fared
+with her theatrical as with her political philosophy: she failed in its
+application, not because her theories were false, but for want of
+practical aptitude for the craft whose principles she understood so
+well.
+
+It is impossible here to do more than cast a rapid glance over the
+literary work accomplished by George Sand during the first decade of the
+empire. It includes more than a dozen novels, of unequal merit, but of
+merit for the most part very high. The _Histoire de ma Vie_ was
+published in 1855. It is a study of chosen passages out of her life,
+rather than a connected autobiography. One out of the four volumes is
+devoted to the story of her father's life before her birth; two more to
+the story of her childhood and girlhood. The fourth rather indicates
+than fully narrates the facts of her existence from the time of her
+marriage till the Revolution of 1848. It offers to her admirers
+invaluable glimpses into her life and mind, and is a highly interesting
+and characteristic composition, if a most irregular chronicle. It has
+given rise to two most incompatible-sounding criticisms. Some have been
+chiefly struck by its amazing unreserve, and denounced the
+over-frankness of the author in revealing herself to the public. Others
+complain that she keeps on a mask throughout, and never allows us to see
+into the recesses of her mind. Her passion for the analysis of sentiment
+has doubtless led her here, as in her romances, to give very free
+expression to truths usually better left unspoken. But her silence on
+many points about which her readers, whether from mere curiosity or some
+more honorable motive, would gladly have been informed, was then
+inevitable. It could not have been broken without wounding the
+susceptibilities of living persons, which she did right in respecting,
+at the cost of disappointment to an inquisitive public.
+
+In January, 1855, a terrible domestic sorrow befell her in the loss of
+her six-years-old grandchild, Jeanne Clesinger, to whom she was devoted.
+It affected her profoundly. "Is there a more mortal grief," she
+exclaims, "than to outlive, yourself, those who should have bloomed upon
+your grave?" The blow told upon her mentally and physically; she could
+not rally from its effects, till persuaded to seek a restorative in
+change of air and scene, which happily did their work.
+
+"I was ill," she says, when writing of these events to a lady
+correspondent, later in the same year; "my son took me away to Italy....
+I have seen Rome, revisited Florence, Genoa, Frascati, Spezia,
+Marseilles. I have walked a great deal, been out in the sun, the rain,
+the wind, for whole days out of doors. This, for me, is a certain
+remedy, and I have come back cured."
+
+Those who care to follow the mind of George Sand on this Italian journey
+may safely infer from _La Daniella_, a novel written after this tour,
+and the scene of which is laid in Rome and the Campagna, that the
+author's strongest impression of the Eternal City was one of
+disillusion. Her hero, a Berrichon artist on his travels, confesses to a
+feeling of uneasiness and regret rather than of surprise and admiration.
+The ancient ruins, stupendous in themselves, seemed to her spoilt for
+effect by their situation in the center of a modern town. "Of the Rome
+of the past not enough exists to overwhelm me with its majesty; of the
+Rome of the present not enough to make me forget the first, and much too
+much to allow me to see her."
+
+But the Baths of Caracalla, where the picture is not set in a frame of
+hideous houses, awakened her native enthusiasm. "A grandiose ruin," she
+exclaims, "of colossal proportions; it is shut away, isolated, silent
+and respected. There you feel the terrific power of the Caesars, and the
+opulence of a nation intoxicated with its royalty over the world."
+
+So in the Appian Way, the road of tombs, the fascination of
+desolation--a desolation there unbroken and undisfigured by modern
+buildings or otherwise--she felt to the full. But whatever came under
+her notice she looked on with the eye of the poet and artist, not of the
+archaeologist, and approved or disapproved or passed over it accordingly.
+
+The beauties of nature, at Tivoli and Frascati, appealed much more
+surely to her sympathies. But of certain sites in the Campagna much
+vaunted by tourists and hand-books she remarks pertinently: "If you were
+to pass this village" (Marino) "on the railway within a hundred miles of
+Paris, you would not pay it the slightest attention." Such places had
+their individuality, but she upheld that there is not a corner in the
+universe, "however common-place it may appear, but has a character of
+its own, unique in this world, for any one who is disposed to feel or
+comprehend it." In one of her village tales a sagacious peasant
+professes his profound contempt for the man who cannot like the place he
+belongs to.
+
+Neither the grottoes and cascades of Tivoli, the cypress and ilex
+gardens of Frascati and Albano, nor the ruins of Tusculum, were ever so
+pleasant to her eyes as the poplar-fringed banks of the Indre, the
+corn-land sand hedgerows of Berry, and the rocky borders of the Creuse
+at Crozant and Argenton. She had not ceased making fresh picturesque
+discoveries in her own neighborhood. Of these she records an instance in
+her pleasant _Promenades autour d'un village_, a lively sketch of a few
+days' walking-tour on the banks of the Creuse, undertaken by herself and
+some naturalist friends in June, 1857. In studying the interesting and
+secluded village of Gargilesse, with its tenth-century church and crypt
+with ancient frescoes, its simple and independent-minded population, in
+following the course of a river whose natural wild beauties, equal to
+those of the Wye, are as yet undisfigured here by railroad or the hand
+of man, lingering on its banks full of summer flowers and butterflies,
+exploring the castles of Chateaubrun and La Prugne au Pot, George Sand
+is happier, more herself, more communicative than in Rome, "the museum
+of the universe."
+
+The years 1858 to 1861 show her to us in the fullest conservation of her
+powers and in the heyday of activity. The group of novels belonging to
+this period, the climax of what may be called her second career, is
+sufficiently remarkable for a novelist who was almost a sexagenarian,
+including _Elle et Lui_, _L'Homme de Neige_, _La Ville Noire_,
+_Constance Verrier_, _Le Marquis de Villemer_ and _Valvedre_. _Elle et
+Lui_, in which George Sand at last broke silence in her own defense on
+the subject of her rupture with Alfred de Musset, first appeared in the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1859. Though many of the details are
+fictitious, the author here told the history of her relations with the
+deceased poet much too powerfully for her intention to be mistaken or to
+escape severe blame. That a magnanimous silence would have been the
+nobler course on her part towards the child of genius whose good genius
+she had so signally failed to be, need not be disputed. It must be
+remembered, however, that De Musset on his side had not refrained during
+his lifetime from denouncing in eloquent verse the friend he had
+quarreled with, and satirizing her in pungent prose. Making every
+possible allowance for poetical figures of speech, he had said enough to
+provoke her to retaliate. It is impossible to suppose that there was not
+another side to such a question. But Madame Sand could not defend
+herself without accusing her lost lover. She often proved herself a
+generous adversary--too generous, indeed, for her own advantage--and in
+this instance it was clearly not for her own sake that she deferred her
+apology.
+
+It is even conceivable that the poet, when in a just frame of mind, and
+not seeking inspiration for his _Nuit de Mai_ or _Histoire d'un Merle
+blanc_, would not have seen in _Elle et Lui_ a falsification of the
+spirit of their history. The theorizing of the outside world in such
+matters is of little worth; but the novel bears, conspicuously among
+Madame Sand's productions, the stamp of a study from real life, true in
+its leading features. And the conduct of the heroine, Therese, though
+accounted for and eloquently defended, is by no means, as related,
+ideally blameless. After an attachment so strong as to induce a
+seriously-minded person, such as she is represented, to throw aside for
+it all other considerations, the hastiness with which, on discovering
+her mistake, she entertains the idea of bestowing her hand, if not her
+heart, on another, is an exhibition of feminine inconsequence which no
+amount of previous misconduct on the part of her lover, Laurent, can
+justify. Further, Therese is self-deceived in supposing her passion to
+have died out with her esteem. She breaks with the culprit and engages
+her word to a worthier man. But enough remains over of the past to
+prevent her from keeping the promise she ought never to have made. When
+she sacrifices her unselfish friend to return to the lover who has made
+her miserable, she is sincere, but not heroic. She is too weak to shake
+off the influence of the fatal infatuation and shut out Laurent from her
+life, nor yet can she accept her heart's choice for better or worse,
+even when experience has left her little to learn with regard to
+Laurent. Clearly both friend and lover, out of a novel, would feel
+wronged. Therese's excuse lies in the extremely trying character of her
+companion, whose vagaries may be supposed to have driven her beside
+herself at times, just as her airs of superiority and mute reproach may
+have driven him not a little mad. Those who wish to know in what spirit
+Madame Sand met the attacks upon her provoked by this book, will find
+her reply in a very few words at the conclusion of her preface to _Jean
+de la Roche_, published the same year.
+
+Most readers of _Elle et Lui_ have been so preoccupied with the
+question of the rights and wrongs of the originals in their behavior to
+each other, so inclined to judge of the book according to its supposed
+accuracy or inaccuracy as a matter of history, that its force, as a
+study of the attraction that so often leads two exceptional but
+hopeless, irreconcilable spirits to seek in each other a refuge from the
+isolation in which their superiority places them, has been somewhat
+overlooked. Laurent, whether a true portrait or not, is only too true to
+nature; excessive in his admirable powers and in his despicable
+weakness. Therese is an equally faithful picture of a woman not quite up
+to the level of her own principles, which are so high that any lapse
+from them on her part brings down more disasters on herself and on
+others than the misdemeanors of avowedly unscrupulous persons.
+
+Within a few months of _Elle et Lui_ had appeared _L'Homme de Neige_,[D]
+a work of totally different but equally characteristic cast. The
+author's imagination had still all its old zest and activity, and
+readers for whom fancy has any charm will find this Scandinavian romance
+thoroughly enjoyable. The subject of the marionette theater, here
+introduced with such brilliant and ingenious effect, she had studied
+both historically and practically. She and her son found it so
+fascinating that, years before this time, a miniature stage had been
+constructed by the latter at Nohant, over which he presided, and which
+they and their friends found an endless source of amusement. Madame Sand
+wrote little dramas expressly for such representations, and would sit up
+all night, making dresses for the puppets. In an agreeable little
+article she has devoted to the subject, she describes how from the
+crudest beginnings they succeeded in elaborating their art to a high
+pitch; the _repertoire_ of their lilliputian theater including more than
+twenty plays, their "company" over a hundred marionettes.
+
+To the next year, 1860, belong the pleasant tale of artisan life, _La
+Ville Noire_, and the well-known and popular _Marquis de Villemer_,
+notable as a decided success in a _genre_ seldom adopted by her, that of
+the purely society novel.
+
+Already Madame Sand had outlived the period of which she was so
+brilliant a representative. After the Romantic movement had spent its
+force, a reaction had set in that was influencing the younger school of
+writers, and that has continued to give the direction to successful
+talent until the present day. Of the so-called "realism," Madame Sand
+said that it was nothing new. She saw there merely another form of the
+same revolt of nature against affectation and convention which had
+prompted the Romantic movement, whose disciples had now become guilty of
+affectation in their turn. _Madame Bovary_ she pronounced with truth to
+be but concentrated Balzac. She was ready to perceive and do justice to
+the great ability of the author, as to original genius in any school;
+thus of Tourguenief she speaks with enthusiasm: "Realist to see all,
+poet to beautify all, great heart to pity and understand all." But she
+deplored the increasing tendency among artists to give the preference
+among realities to the ugliest and the most painful. Her personal
+leanings avowedly were towards the other extreme; but she was too
+large-minded not to recognize that truth in one form or another must
+always be the prime object of the artist's search. The manner of its
+presentation will vary with the age.
+
+     Let the realists, if they like, go on proclaiming that all is
+     prose, and the idealists that all is poesy. The last will have
+     their rainy days, the first their days of sunshine. In all arts the
+     victory remains with a privileged few, who go their own ways; and
+     the discussions of the "schools" will pass away like old fashions.
+
+On the generation of writers that George Sand saw growing up, any
+opinion pronounced must be premature. But with regard to herself, it
+should now be possible to regard her work in a true perspective. As with
+Byron, Dickens, and other popular celebrities, a phase of infinite
+enthusiasm for her writings was duly succeeded by a phase of determined
+depreciation. The public opinion that survives when blind friendship and
+blind enmity have done their worst is likely to be the judgment of
+posterity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+ARTIST AND MORALIST.
+
+
+On what, in the future, will the fame of George Sand mainly rest?
+According to some critics, on her gifts of fertile invention and fluent
+narration alone, which make her novels attractive in spite of the
+chimerical theories, social, political and religious, everywhere
+interwoven. According to other judges again, her fictions transcend and
+are likely to outlive other fictions by virtue of certain eternal
+philosophic verities which they persistently set forth, and which give
+them a serious interest the changes in novel-fashions cannot effect.
+
+The conclusion seems inevitable that whilst the artistic strength of
+George Sand's writings is sufficient to command readers among those most
+out of harmony with her views, to minds in sympathy with her own these
+romances, because they express and enforce with earnestness, sincerity
+and fire, the sentiments of a poetic soul, a generous heart, and an
+immense intelligence, on subjects of consequence to humanity, have a
+higher value than can attach to skillful development of plot and
+intrigue, mere display of literary cleverness, or of the storings of
+minute observation.
+
+Her opinions themselves have been widely misapprehended, perhaps because
+her personality--or rather that imaginary personage, the George Sand of
+the myths--has caused a confusion in people's minds between her ideal
+standard and her individual success in keeping up to it. We would not
+ignore the importance of personal example in one so famous as herself.
+We may pass by eccentricities not inviting to imitation; for if any of
+her sex ever thought to raise themselves any nearer to the level of
+George Sand by smoking or wearing men's clothes, such puerility does not
+call for notice. Still, the influence she strenuously exerted for good
+as a writer for the public would have worked more clearly had she never
+seemed to swerve from the high principles she expressed, or been led
+away by the disturbing forces of a nature calm only on the surface.
+Nothing is more baffling than the incomplete revelations of a very
+complex order of mind, with its many-sided sympathies and its apparent
+contradictions. The self-justification she puts forward for her errors
+is sometimes sophistical, but not for that insincere. She is not trying
+to make us her dupes; she is the dupe herself of her dangerous
+eloquence. But her moral worth so infinitely outweighed the alloy as to
+leave but little call, or even warrant, for dwelling on the latter. "If
+I come back to you," said her old literary patron Delatouche, into whose
+disfavor she had fallen awhile, when he came years after to ask for the
+restitution of the friendship he had slighted, "it is that I cannot help
+myself, and your qualities surpass your defects."
+
+To pass from herself to her books, no one has made more frank, clear and
+unchanging confession of their heart's faith or their head's principles.
+Her creed was that which has been, and ever will be in some guise, the
+creed of minds of a certain order. She did not invent it. Poets,
+moralists, theologians, have proclaimed it before her and after her. She
+found for it a fresh mode of expression, one answering to the needs of
+the age to which she belonged.
+
+It is in the union of rare artistic genius with an almost as rare and
+remarkable power of enthusiasm for moral and spiritual truth that lies
+her distinguishing strength. Most of her novels--all her best
+novels--share this characteristic of seeming to be prompted by the
+double and equal inspiration of an artistic and a moral purpose.
+Wherever one of these preponderates greatly, or is wanting altogether,
+the novel falls below her usual standard.
+
+For in several qualities reckoned important her work is open to
+criticism. "Plan, or the want of it," she acknowledges, with a sort of
+complacency, "has always been my weak point." Thus whilst in many of her
+compositions, especially the shorter novels, the construction leaves
+little to be desired, _Consuelo_ is only one among many instances in
+which all ordinary rules of symmetry and proportion are set at naught.
+Sometimes the leading idea assumed naturally and easily a perfect form;
+if simple, as in _Andre_ and her pastorals, it usually did so; but if
+complex, she troubled herself little over the task of symmetrical
+arrangement. M. Maxime Du Camp reports that she said to him: "When I
+begin a novel I have no plan; it arranges itself whilst I write, and
+becomes what it may." This fault shocks less in England, where genius is
+apt to rebel against the restrictions of form, and such irregularity has
+been consecrated, so to speak, by the masterpieces of the greatest among
+our imaginative writers. And even the more precise criticism of her
+countrymen has owned that this carelessness works by no means entirely
+to her disadvantage. In fictions more faultless as literary compositions
+the reader, whilst struck with admiration for the art with which the
+whole is put together, is apt to lose something of the illusion--the
+impression of nature and conviction. The faults of no writer can be more
+truly defined as the _defauts de ses qualites_ than those of George
+Sand. Shorn of her spontaneity, she would indeed be shorn of her
+strength. We are carried along by the pleasant, easy stream of her
+musical eloquence, as by an orator who knows so well how to draw our
+attention that we forget to find him too long. Her stories may be read
+rapidly, but to be enjoyed should be read through. Dipped into and their
+parts taken without reference to the whole, they can afford
+comparatively but little pleasure.
+
+In translation no novelist loses more than George Sand,--who has so much
+to lose! The qualities sacrificed, though almost intangible, are
+essential to the force of her charm. The cement is taken away and the
+fabric coheres imperfectly; and whilst the beauties of her manner are
+blurred, its blemishes appear increased; the lengthiness, over-emphasis
+of expression, questionable taste of certain passages, become more
+marked. Although nevertheless many of her tales remain pleasant reading,
+they suffer as much as translated poetry, and only a very inadequate
+impression of her art as a novelist can be arrived at from any rendering
+of it in a foreign tongue.
+
+Her dialogue has neither brilliancy nor variety. Her characters
+characterize themselves by the sentiments they express; their manner of
+expression is somewhat uniform--it is the manner of George Sand; and
+although pleasant humor and good-natured fun abound in her pages, these
+owe none of their attractions to witty sayings, being curiously bare of
+a _bon mot_ or an epigram.
+
+But we find there the rarer merits of a poetic imagination, a vast
+comprehension of nature, admirable insight into human character and
+power of clear analysis; a whole science of sentiment and art of
+narrative, and a charm of narrative style that soothes the nerves like
+music.
+
+She has given us a long gallery of portraits of extraordinary variety.
+It is true that her creations for the most part affect us rather as
+masterly portraits than as living, walking men and women. This is
+probably owing to the above-noted sameness of style of dialogue, and the
+absence generally of the dramatic quality in her novels. On the other
+hand they are extremely picturesque, in the highest sense, abounding in
+scenes and figures which, without inviting to the direct illustration
+they are too vivid to need, are full of suggestions to the artist. The
+description in _Teverino_ of Madeleine, the bird-charmer, kneeling at
+prayer in the rude mountain chapel, or outside on the rocks, exercising
+her natural magic over her feathered friends; in _Jeanne_, of the
+shepherd-girl discovered asleep on the Druidical stones; the noon-day
+rest of the rustic fishing-party in _Valentine_--Benedict seated on the
+felled ash-tree that bridges the stream, Athenais gathering
+field-flowers on the banks, Louise flinging leaves into the current,
+Valentine reclining dreamily among the tall river-reeds,--are a few
+examples taken at random, which it would be easy to multiply _ad
+infinitum_.
+
+Any classification of her works in order of time that professes to show
+a progressive change of style, a period of super-excellence or of
+distinct decadence, seems to us somewhat fanciful. From _Indiana_ and
+its immediate successors, denounced by so many as fraught with peril to
+the morals of her nation, down to _Nanon_ (1872), which might certainly
+carry off the prize of virtue in a competition in any country, George
+Sand can never be said to have entirely abandoned one "manner" for
+another, or for any length of time to have risen above or sunk below a
+certain level of excellence. _Andre_, extolled by her latest critics as
+"a delicious eclogue of the fields," was contemporary with the
+bombastic, false Byronism of _Jacques_; the feeble narrative of _La Mare
+au Diable_ with the passion-introspection of _Lucrezia Floriani_. The
+ever-popular _Consuelo_ immediately succeeded the feeble _Compagnon du
+Tour de France_. _La Marquise_, written in the first year of her
+literary life, shows a power of projection out of herself, and of
+delicate analysis, hardly to be surpassed; but _Francia_, of forty
+years' later date, is an equally perfect study. From the time of
+_Indiana_ onwards she continued to produce at the rate of about two
+novels a year; and at intervals, rare intervals, the product was a
+failure. But we shall find her when approaching seventy still writing
+on, without a trace of the weakness of old age.
+
+The charge of "unreality" so commonly brought against her novels it may
+be well briefly to examine. Such little fantasy-pieces in Hoffmann's
+manner as _Le Chateau des Desertes_, _Teverino_, and others, making no
+pretense to be exact studies of nature, cannot fairly be censured on
+this head. Like fairy tales they have a place of their own in art. One
+of the prettiest of these is _Les Dames Vertes_, in which the fable
+seems to lead us over the borders of the supernatural; but the secret of
+the mystification, well kept till the last, is itself so pleasing and
+original that the reader has no disappointing sense as of having had a
+hoax played upon his imagination.
+
+In character drawing no one can, on occasion, be a more uncompromising
+realist than George Sand. Andre, Horace, Laurent in _Elle et Lui_,
+Pauline, Corilla, Alida in _Valvedre_, might be cited as examples. But
+her theory was unquestionably not the theory which guides the modern
+school of novel writers. She wrote, she states explicitly, for those
+"who desire to find in a novel a sort of ideal life." She made this her
+aim, but without depreciation of the widely different aims of other
+authors. "You paint mankind as they are," she said to Balzac; "I, as
+they ought to be, or might become. You write the comedy of humanity. I
+should like to write the eclogue, the poem, the romance of humanity."
+She has been taxed with flattering nature and human nature because her
+love of beauty--defined by her as the highest expression of
+truth--dictated her choice of subjects. An artist who paints roses
+paints from reality as entirely as he who paints mud. Her principle was
+to choose among realities those which seemed best worth painting.
+
+The amount of idealization in her peasant sketches was naturally
+over-estimated by those who, never having studied the class, could not
+conceive of a peasant except conventionally, as a drunken boor. The very
+just portrait of Cecilia Boccaferri, the conscientious but obscure
+artist in _Le Chateau des Desertes_, might seem over-flattered to such
+as imagine that all opera-singers must be persons of riotous living. The
+types she prefers to present, if exceptional, are not impossible or
+non-existent. An absolutely faultless heroine, such as Consuelo, she
+seldom attempts to bring before us; an ideal hero; never.
+
+Further, even when the idealism is greatest the essence is true. Her
+most fanciful conceptions, most improbable combinations, seem more
+natural than do every-day scenes and characters treated by inferior
+artists. This is only partly due to the inimitable little touches of
+nature that renew the impression of reality at every page. Her
+imagination modified her material, but only in order the more vividly to
+illustrate truths positive and everlasting. So did Shakespeare when he
+drew Prospero and Miranda, Caliban and Ariel. Art, as regarded by George
+Sand, is a search for ideal truth rather than a study of positive
+reality. This principle determined the spirit of her romances. She was
+the highest in her _genre_; let the world decide which _genre_ is the
+highest.
+
+When, after the publication of _Indiana_, _Valentine_, _Lelia_ and
+_Jacques_, the moral tendency of her works was so sharply attacked, it
+was contended on her behalf by some friendly critics that art and
+social morality have no necessary connection--a line of defense she
+would have been the last to take up for herself. In the present day her
+judges complain rather of her incessant moralizing, and on the whole
+with more reason. She indignantly denied that her novels had the evil
+tendencies imputed to them. Certainly the supposition of the
+antagonistic spirit of her writings to Christianity and marriage
+vanishes in proportion to the reader's acquaintance with her works. But
+against certain doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church
+which she believed to be pernicious in their influence, she from the
+first declared war, and by her frank audacity made bitter enemies. M.
+Renan relates that when he was a boy of fifteen his ecclesiastical
+superiors showed him George Sand, emblematically portrayed for the
+admonition of the youth under their care, as a woman in black trampling
+on a cross! Now, it is not merely that her own faith was eminently
+Christian in character, and that the Christian ideal seemed to her the
+most perfect that has yet presented itself to the mind of man; but if
+unable to accept for herself the doctrine of revelation as commonly
+interpreted, she is utterly without the aggressiveness of spirit, the
+petty flippancy, that often betray the intellectual bigot under the
+banner of free thought. She was too large-minded to incline to ridicule
+the serious convictions of earnest seekers for truth, and she respected
+all sincerity of belief--all faith that produced beneficence in action.
+
+The alleged hostility of her romances to marriage resumes itself into a
+declared hostility to the conventional French system of match-making.
+Much that she was condemned for venturing to put forward we should
+simply take for granted in England, where--whichever system work the
+best in practice--to the strictest Philistine's ideas of propriety there
+is nothing unbecoming in a love-match. The aim and end of true love in
+her stories is always marriage, whether it be the simple attachment of
+Germain, the field-laborer, for the rustic maiden of his choice, the
+romantic predilection of the rich young widow in _Pierre qui roule_ for
+the handsome actor Laurence, or the worship of Count Albert for the
+_cantatrice_ Consuelo. Her ideal of marriage was, no doubt, a high one,
+"the indissoluble attachment of two hearts fired with a like love;" a
+love "great, noble, beautiful, voluntary, eternal." Among French
+novelists she should rather be noted for the extremely small proportion
+of her numerous romances that have domestic infelicity for a theme.
+
+Her remark that their real offense was that they were a great deal too
+moral for some of their critics, hit home, inasmuch as in her attack on
+the ordinary marriage system of France she struck directly at the
+fashionable immorality which is its direct result, and which she saw,
+both in life and in literature, pass free of censure. It is the selfish
+intriguer who meets with least mercy in her pages, and who is there held
+up, not only to dislike, but to ridicule.
+
+Persons perplexed by the fact that particular novels of hers which,
+judged by certain theories, ought to be morally hurtful, do yet produce
+a very different effect, have accounted for it in different ways. One
+explains it by saying that if there is poison on one page there is
+always the antidote on the next. Another observes that a certain
+morality of misfortune is never absent from her fictions. In other
+words, she nowhere presents us with the spectacle of real happiness
+reaped at the expense of a violation of conscience. And in the rare
+cases where the purpose of the novel seems questionable, she defeats her
+own end. For truth always preponderates over error in her conceptions,
+and the result is a moral effect.
+
+The want of delicacy that not unfrequently disfigures her pages and
+offends us, offends also as an artistic fault. As a fact it is taste
+rather than conscience that she is thus apt to shock. For the almost
+passing coarseness of expression or thought is nothing more than the
+overflow, the negligent frankness of a rich and active but healthy
+nature, not the deliberate obliquity of a corrupt fancy or perverted
+mind. Such unreserve, unfortunately, has too commonly been the
+transgression of writers of superabundant energy. But her sins are
+against outward decorum rather than against the principles upon which
+the rules of decorum are based. No one was better capable of
+appreciating and indicating with fine touches, delicacy and niceties of
+taste and feeling in others. Her sympathy with such sensitiveness is a
+corrective that should render harmless what might vitiate taste if that
+qualification were absent. And her stories, though including a very few
+instances where the subject chosen seems to most English minds too
+repulsive to admit of possible redemption, and the frequent incidental
+introduction of situations and frank discussion of topics inadmissible
+in English fiction of that period--an honorable distinction it seems in
+some danger of losing in the present--can hardly be censured from the
+French standpoint, as fair critics now admit. It is inconceivable that a
+public could be demoralized by _Indiana_ and _Valentine_, at a time when
+no subject seemed wicked and morbid enough to satisfy popular taste.
+The art of George Sand in the main was sound and healthy, and in flat
+opposition to the excesses both of the ultra-romantic and ultra-realist
+schools.
+
+Clear-sighted critics, perceiving that the impression produced by her
+works is not one to induce men and women to defy the laws of their
+country, nor likely to undermine their religious faith, have gone more
+to the heart of the matter. The dangerous tendency is more insidious,
+they say, and more general. Virtue, and not vice, is made attractive in
+her books; but it is an easy virtue, attained without self-conquest. All
+her characters, good and bad, act alike from impulse. Those who seek
+virtue seek pleasure in so doing, and her philosophy of life seems to be
+that people should do as they like. The morality she commends to our
+sympathy and admiration is a morality of instinct and emotion, not of
+reason and principle. Self-renunciation, immolation of desire in
+obedience to accepted precept, is ignored. Sentiment is supreme. Duty,
+as a motive power, is set aside.
+
+George Sand, who as a writer from first to last appeared as a crusader
+against the evil, injustice and vice that darken the world, did
+undoubtedly choose rather to speak out of her heart to our hearts, than
+out of her head to our heads, and considered moreover that such was the
+more effectual way. Her idea of virtue lay not in the curbing of evil
+instincts, but in their conversion or modification by the evoking of
+good impulses, that "guiding and intensifying of our emotions by a new
+ideal" which has been called the great work of Christianity.
+
+It is not--or not in the first place--that people should do as they
+like, but that they should like to do right; and further, that human
+nature in that ideal life the sentiment of which pervades her works, and
+in which she saw "no other than the normal life as we are called to know
+it," does not desire what is hurtful to it.
+
+The goodness that consists in doing right or refraining from doing wrong
+reluctantly, or in obedience to prescribed rules, or from mechanical
+habit, had for her no life or charm. The object to be striven for should
+be nothing less than the "perfect harmony of inward desire and outward
+obligation."
+
+Virtue should be chosen, though we seem to sacrifice happiness; but that
+the two are in the beginning identical, that, as expressed by Mr.
+Herbert Spencer, "whether perfection of nature, virtuousness of action,
+or rectitude of motive, be assigned as the proper aim, the definition of
+perfection, virtue, rectitude, brings us down to happiness experienced
+in some form, at some time, by some person as the fundamental idea," is
+a philosophic truth of which a large _apercu_ is observable in the works
+of George Sand. Self-sacrifice should spring from direct desire,
+altruism be spontaneous--a need--becoming a second and better nature;
+not won by painful effort, but through the larger development of the
+principle of sympathy. Strong in her own immense power of sympathy, she
+applied herself to the task of awakening and extending such sympathies
+in others. This she does by the creation of agreeable, interesting and
+noble types, such as may put us out of conceit with what is mean and
+base. Goodness, as understood and portrayed by her, must recommend
+itself not only to the judgment but to the heart. She worked to
+popularize high sentiments, and to give shape and reality to vague ideas
+of human excellence. Her idea of virtue as a motive, not a restraint,
+not the controlling of low and evil desires, but the precluding of all
+temptations to yield to these, by the calling out of stronger, higher
+desires, so far from being a low one, is indeed the very noblest; yet
+not on that account a chimera to those who hold, like her, to the
+conviction that "what now characterizes the exceptionally high may be
+expected eventually to characterize all. For that which the highest
+human nature is capable of is within the reach of human nature at
+large." "We gravitate towards the ideal," she writes, "and this
+gravitation is infinite, as is the ideal itself." And her place remains
+among those few great intelligences who can be said to have given
+humanity an appreciable impulse in the direction of progress.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+LATER YEARS.
+
+
+When, in 1869, Madame Sand was applied to by M. Louis Ulbach--a literary
+friend who proposed to write her biography--for some account of her life
+from that time onwards where her memoirs break off, she replied, in a
+letter now appended to those memoirs, as follows:--
+
+     For the last five-and-twenty years there is nothing more that is of
+     interest. It is old age, very quiet and very happy, _en famille_,
+     crossed by sorrows entirely personal in their nature--deaths,
+     defections, and then the general state of affairs in which we have
+     suffered, you and I, from the same causes. My time is spent in
+     amusing the children, doing a little botany, long walks in
+     summer--I am still a first-rate pedestrian--and writing novels,
+     when I can secure two hours in the daytime and two in the evening.
+     I write easily and with pleasure. This is my recreation, for my
+     correspondence is numerous, and there lies work indeed! If one had
+     none but one's friends to write to! But how many requests, some
+     touching, some impertinent! Whenever there is anything I can do, I
+     reply. Those for whom I can do nothing I do not answer. Some
+     deserve that one should try, even with small hope of succeeding.
+     Then one must answer that one will try. All this, with private
+     affairs to which one must really give attention now and then, makes
+     some ten letters a day.
+
+The old age of George Sand, brighter, fuller and more active than the
+youth of most men and women, was in itself a most signal proof of the
+stability and worth of her mental organization. Life, which deteriorates
+a frail character, told with a perfecting and elevating power upon hers.
+
+Of her earlier personal beauty few traces remained after middle age
+except a depth of expression in her eyes, the features having become
+thickened by age. Some among those who, like Dickens, first saw her in
+her later years and still looked for the semblance of a heroine of
+romance, failed to find the muse Lelia of their imaginations under the
+guise of a middle-aged _bourgeoise_. But such impressions were
+superficial. Her portrait in black and white by Couture, engraved by
+Manceau, seems to reconcile these apparent discrepancies. Beauty is not
+here, but the face is so powerful and comprehensive that we perceive
+there at once the mirror of a mind capable of embracing both the prose
+and the poetry of life; and by many this portrait is preferred to the
+earlier likenesses.
+
+Nor is there anything more remarkable in her correspondence than the
+extremely interesting series of letters, extending from February, 1863,
+to within three months of her death in 1876, and addressed to Gustave
+Flaubert, at this period her familiar friend. The intercourse of two
+minds of so different an intellectual and moral order as those of the
+authors of _Consuelo_ and of _Madame Bovary_ offers to all a curious
+study. To the admirers of George Sand these letters are invaluable, both
+from a literary point of view and as a record of her inner life from
+that time onwards, when, as expressed by herself, she resolutely buried
+youth, and owned herself the gainer by an increasing calm within. The
+secret of her future happiness she found in living for her children and
+her friends. That she retained her zest for intellectual pleasures she
+ascribed to the very fact that she never allowed herself to be absorbed
+for long in these and in herself.
+
+"Artists are spoilt children," she writes to Flaubert, "and the best of
+them are great egoists. You tell me I love them too well; I love them as
+I love woods and fields, all things, all beings that I know a little and
+make my constant study. In the midst of it all I pursue my calling; and
+how I love that calling of mine, and all that nourishes and renovates
+it!"
+
+We must now take up the thread of outward events again, which we have
+slightly anticipated.
+
+In the autumn of 1860 Madame Sand had a severe attack of typhoid fever.
+She was then on the point of beginning her little tale, _La Famille de
+Germandre_; "_le roman de ma fievre_," she playfully terms it
+afterwards, when retracing the circumstances in a letter to her old
+friend Francois Rollinat:--
+
+     The day before that upon which I was suddenly taken very seriously
+     ill, I had felt quite well. I had scribbled the beginning of a
+     novel; I had placed all my personages; I knew them thoroughly; I
+     knew their situations in the world, their characters, tendencies,
+     ideas, relations to each other. I saw their faces. All that
+     remained to be known was what they were going to do, and I did not
+     trouble my head about that, having time to think it over to-morrow.
+
+Struck down on the morrow, she was for many days in a precarious
+condition; and in the confused fancies of fever found herself wandering
+with _La Famille de Germandre_ about the country, alighting in ruined
+castles, and encountering the most whimsical adventures in flood and
+field.
+
+It would have been an easy death, she remarked afterwards, had she died
+then, as she might, in her dream; but she came to herself to find her
+son and friends in such anxiety on her account, so overjoyed at her
+convalescence, that she could not but be glad of the life that was given
+back to her. Early in 1861 we find her recruiting her forces by a stay
+at Tamaris, near Toulon, completing the novel interrupted by illness;
+resuming her long walks and botanic studies, and thoroughly enjoying the
+sense of returning vital powers.
+
+She stood always in great dread of the idea of possibly losing her
+activity as she advanced in years. The infirmities of old age, however,
+she was happily to be spared, preserving her energy and mental
+faculties, as will be seen, till just before her death. But though she
+was restored to health and strength, this illness seems to have left its
+traces on her constitution.
+
+Her son's marriage to Mdlle. Calamatta, spoken of by Madame Sand as a
+heart's desire of hers at length fulfilled, took place in 1862, not many
+months after his return from half a year of travel in Africa and
+America, in the company of Prince Napoleon. The event proved a fresh
+source of the purest happiness to her, and was not to separate her from
+her son. The young people settled at Nohant, which remained her
+head-quarters. There a few years later we find her residing almost
+exclusively, except when called by matters of business to her
+_pied-a-terre_ in Paris, where she never lingered long. To the two
+little grand-daughters, Aurore and Gabrielle, whom she saw spring up in
+her home, she became passionately devoted. Most of her compositions
+henceforward are dated from Nohant, where, indeed, more than fifty years
+of her life were spent.
+
+As regards decorum of expression and temperance of sentiments, the later
+novels of George Sand have earned more praise than censure; but some
+readers may feel that in fundamental questions of taste the comparison
+between them and their forerunners is not always entirely to their
+advantage. The fervor of youth has a certain purifying power to redeem
+from offense matter, even though over-frankly treated, which becomes
+disagreeable in cold analysis, however sober the wording, and clear and
+admirable the moral pointed.
+
+_Mademoiselle La Quintinie_, which appeared in 1863, was suggested by M.
+Octave Feuillet's _Sibille_. The point of M. Feuillet's novel is, that
+Sibille, an ardent Catholic, stifles her love, and renounces her lover
+on account of his heterodox opinions. Madame Sand gives us the
+reverse--a heroine who is reflectively rather than mystically inclined,
+and whose lover by degrees succeeds in effecting her conversion to his
+more liberal views. Here, as elsewhere, the author's mind shows a
+sympathetic comprehension of the standpoint of enlightened Protestantism
+curiously rare among those who, like herself, have renounced Romanism
+for the pursuit of free thought and speculation. But even those who
+prefer the _denoument_ of George Sand's novel to that of M. Feuillet's
+will not rank _Mademoiselle La Quintinie_ very high among the author's
+productions. It is colorless, and artistically weak, however
+controversially strong.
+
+Madame Sand, according to her own reckoning in 1869, had made at least
+L40,000 by her writings. Out of this she had saved no fortune. She had
+always preferred to live from day to day on the proceeds of her work,
+regulating her expenses accordingly, trusting her brain to answer to any
+emergency and bring her out of the periodical financial crises in which
+the uncertainty of literary gains and the liberality of her expenditure
+involved her. She continued fond of travelling, especially of exploring
+the nooks and corners of France, felt by her to be less well known than
+they deserve, and fully as picturesque as the spots tourists go far to
+visit. Here she sought fresh frames for her novels. "If I have only
+three words to say about a place," she tells us, "I like to be able to
+refer to it in my memory so as to make as few mistakes as possible."
+
+In January, 1869, we find her writing of herself in a playful strain to
+her friend Flaubert:--
+
+     The individual called George Sand is quite well, enjoying the
+     marvelous winter now reigning in Berry, gathering flowers, taking
+     note of interesting botanic anomalies, stitching at dresses and
+     mantles for her daughter-in-law, costumes for the marionettes,
+     dressing dolls, reading music, but, above all, spending hours with
+     little Aurore, who is a wonderful child. There is not a being on
+     earth more tranquil and happier in his home than this old
+     troubadour retired from business, now and then singing his little
+     song to the moon, singing well or ill he does not particularly
+     care, so long as he gives the _motif_ that is running in his
+     head.... He is happy, for he is at peace, and can find amusement in
+     everything.
+
+M. Plauchut, another literary friend and a visitor at Nohant during this
+last decade of her lifetime, gives a picture of the order of her day; it
+is simplicity itself.
+
+Nine o'clock, in summer and in winter alike, was her hour of waking.
+Letters and newspapers would then occupy her until noon, when she came
+down to join the family _dejeuner_. Afterwards she would stroll for an
+hour in the garden and the wood, visiting and tending her favorite
+plants and flowers. At two o'clock she would come indoors to give a
+lesson to her grandchildren in the library, or work there on her own
+account, undistracted by the romps around her. Dinner at six was
+followed by a short evening walk, after which she played with the
+children, or set them dancing indoors. She liked to sit at the piano,
+playing over to herself bits of music by her favorite Mozart, or old
+Spanish and Berrichon airs. After a game of dominoes or cards she would
+still sit up so late, occupying herself with water-color painting or
+otherwise, that sometimes her son was obliged to take away the lights.
+These long evenings, the same writer bears witness, sometimes afforded
+rare opportunities of hearing Madam Sand talk of the events and the men
+of her time. In the absolute quiet of the country, among a small circle
+of responsive minds, she, so silent otherwise, became expansive. "Those
+who have never heard George Sand at such hours," he concludes, "have
+never known her. She spoke well, with great elevation of ideas, charming
+eloquence, and a spirit of infinite indulgence." When at length she
+retired, it was to write on until the morning hours according to her old
+habit, only relinquished when her health made this imperative.
+
+She had allowed her son and her daughter-in-law to take the cares of
+household management off her hands. This left her free, as she
+expressed it, to be a child again, to hold aloof from things immediate
+and transitory, reserving her thoughts and contemplations for what is
+general and eternal. She found a poet's pleasure in abstracting herself
+from human life, saying: "There are hours when I escape from myself,
+when I live in a plant, when I feel myself grass, a bird, a tree-top, a
+cloud, a running stream." Shaking off, as it were, the sense of
+personality, she felt more freely and fully the sense of kinship with
+the life and soul of the universe.
+
+It was her habit every evening to sum up in a few lines the impressions
+of the day, and this journal, for the conspicuous absence of incident in
+its pages, she compares to the log-book of a ship lying at anchor. But
+one terrible and little anticipated break in its tranquil monotony was
+yet to come.
+
+George Sand lived to see her country pass through every imaginable
+political experience. Born before the First Republic had expired, she
+had witnessed the First Empire, the restored Monarchy, the Revolution of
+1830, the reign of Louis Philippe, the convulsions of 1848, the
+presidency of Louis Bonaparte, and the Second Empire. She was still to
+see and outlive its fall, the Franco-German War, the Commune, and to
+die, as she was born, under a republic.
+
+To some of her friends who had reproached her with showing too much
+indulgence for the state of things under Imperial rule, she replied that
+the only change in her was that she had acquired more patience in
+proportion as more was required. The _regime_ she condemned--and amid
+apparent prosperity had foretold the corrupting influence on the nation
+of the established ideal of frivolity, and that a crash of some kind
+must ensue. Her judgment on the Emperor, after his fall, is worth
+noting, if only because it is dispassionate. Since his elevation to the
+Imperial dignity she had lost all old illusions as to his public
+intentions. With regard to these, on the occasion of her interviews with
+him at the Elysee, he had completely deceived her, and designedly, she
+had at first thought. Nor had she concealed her disgust.
+
+     I left Paris, and did not come to an appointment he had offered me.
+     They did not tell me "The King might have had to wait!" but they
+     wrote "The Emperor waited." However, I continued to write to him,
+     whenever I saw hopes of saving some victim, to ponder his answers
+     and watch his actions; and I became convinced that he did not
+     intentionally impose upon any one. He imposed on himself and on
+     everybody else.... In private life he had genuine qualities. I
+     happened to see in him a side that was really generous and sincere.
+     His dream of grandeur for France was not that of a sound mind, but
+     neither of an ordinary mind. Really France would have sunk too low
+     if she had submitted for twenty years to the supremacy of a
+     _cretin_, working only for himself. One would then have to give her
+     up in despair for ever and ever. The truth is that she mistook a
+     meteor for a star, a silent dreamer for a man of depth. Then seeing
+     him sink under disasters he ought to have foreseen, she took him
+     for a coward.
+
+George Sand's _Journal d'un Voyageur pendant la guerre_ has a peculiar
+and painful interest. It is merely a note-book of passing impressions
+from September, 1870, to January, 1871; but its pages give a most
+striking picture of those effects of war which have no place in military
+annals.
+
+The army disasters of the autumn were preceded by natural calamities of
+great severity. The heat of the summer in Berry had been tremendous, and
+Madame Sand describes the havoc as unprecedented in her experience--the
+flowers and grass killed, the leaves scorched and yellowed, the baked
+earth under foot literally cracking in many places; no water, no hay, no
+harvest, but destructive cattle-plague, forest-fires driving scared
+wolves to seek refuge in the courtyard of Nohant itself--the remnant of
+corn spared by the sun, ruined by hail-storms. She and all her family
+had suffered from the unhealthiness of the season. Thus the political
+catastrophe found her already weakened by anxiety and fatigue, and
+feeling greatly the effort to set to work again. Finally, an outbreak of
+malignant small-pox in the village forced her to take her little
+grandchildren and their mother from Nohant out of reach of the
+infection. September and October were passed at or in the neighborhood
+of Boussac, a small town some thirty miles off. Sedan was over, and the
+worst had begun; the protracted suspense, the long agony of hope.
+
+Those suffered most perhaps who, like herself, had to wait in enforced
+inaction, amid the awful dead calm that reigned in the provinces, yet
+forbidden to forget their affliction for a moment. The peasant was gone
+from the land--only the old and infirm were left to look after the
+flocks, to till and sow the field. Madame Sand notes, and with a kind of
+envy, the stolid patience and industry, the inextinguishable confidence,
+of poor old Jacques Bonhomme when things are at the worst. "He knows
+that in one way or another it is he who will have to pay the expenses of
+the war; he knows next winter will be a season of misery and want, but
+he believes in the spring"--in the bounty of nature to repair war's
+ravages.
+
+During this time of unimaginable trouble some of the strongest minds
+were unhinged. It is no small honor to George Sand that hers should
+have preserved its balance. The pages of this journal are distinguished
+throughout by a wonderful calm of judgment and an equitable tone--not
+the calm of indifference, but of a broad and penetrating intelligence,
+no longer to be blinded by the wild excitement and passions of the
+moment, or exalted by childish hopes one hour to be thrust into the
+madness of despair the next.
+
+Although tempted now and then to regret that she had recovered from her
+illness ten years ago, surviving but to witness the abasement of France,
+she was not, like others, panic-struck at the prospect of invasion, as
+though this meant the end of their country. "It will pass like a squall
+over a lake," she said.
+
+But it was a time when they could be sure of nothing except of their
+distress. The telegraph wires were cut; rumors of good news they feared
+to believe would be succeeded by tales of horror they feared to
+discredit. Tidings would come that three hundred thousand of the enemy
+had been disposed of in a single engagement and King William taken
+prisoner; then of fatal catastrophes befallen to private
+friends--stories which often proved equally unfounded.
+
+She had friends shut up in Paris of whom she knew not whether they were
+alive or dead. The strain of anxiety and painful excitement made sleep
+impossible to her except in the last extremity of fatigue. Yet she had
+her little grandchildren to care for; and when they came around her,
+clamoring for the fairy tales she was used to supply, she contented them
+as well as she could and gave them their lessons as usual, anxious to
+keep them from realizing the sadness the causes of which they were too
+young to understand.
+
+It was the first time that she had known a distress that forbade her to
+find a solace in nature. She describes how one day, walking out with
+some friends and following the course of the river Tarde, she had half
+abandoned herself to the enjoyment of the scene--the cascade, the
+dragon-flies skimming the surface, the purple scabious flowers, the
+goats clambering on the boulders of rock that strewed the borders and
+bed of the stream--when one of the party remarks: "Here's a retreat
+pretty well fortified against the Prussians."
+
+And the present, forgotten for an instant in reverie, came back upon her
+with a shock.
+
+Letters in that district took three or four days to travel thirty miles.
+Newspapers were rarely to be procured; and when procured, made up of
+contradictions, wild suggestions, and the pretentious speeches of
+national leaders, meant to be reassuring, but marked by a vagueness and
+violence from which Madame Sand rightly augured ill.
+
+The red-letter days were those that brought communications from their
+friends in Paris by the aerial post. On October 11, two balloons,
+respectively called "George Sand" and the "Armand Barbes," left the
+capital. "My name," she remarks, "did not bring good luck to the
+first--which suffered injuries and descended with difficulty, yet
+rescued the Americans who had gone up in it." The "Barbes" had a
+smoother but a more famous flight; alighting and depositing M. Gambetta
+safely at Tours.
+
+As the autumn advanced Madame Sand and her family were enabled to return
+to Nohant. But what a return was that! The enemy were quartered within
+forty miles, at Issoudun; the fugitives thence were continually seen
+passing, carrying off their children, their furniture and their
+merchandise to places of security. Already the enemy's guns were said to
+have been heard at La Chatre. Madame Sand walked in her garden daily
+among her marigolds, snapdragon and ranunculus, making curious
+speculations as to what might be in store for herself and her
+possessions. She remarks:--
+
+     You get accustomed to it, even though you have not the consolation
+     of being able to offer the slightest resistance.... I look at my
+     garden, I dine, I play with the children, whilst waiting in
+     expectation of seeing the trees felled roots upwards; of getting no
+     more bread to eat, and of having to carry my grandchildren off on
+     my shoulders; for the horses have all been requisitioned. I work,
+     expecting my scrawls to light the pipes of the Prussians.
+
+But the enemy, though so near, never passed the boundaries of the "Black
+Valley." The department of the Indre remained uninvaded, though
+compassed on all sides by the foreign army; and George Sand was able to
+say afterwards that she at least had never seen a Prussian soldier.
+
+A sad Christmas was passed. On the last night of 1870 a meeting of
+friends at Nohant broke up with the parting words, "All is lost!"
+
+"The execrable year is out," writes Madame Sand, "but to all appearances
+we are entering upon a worse."
+
+On the 15th of January, 1871, her little drama _Francois le Champi_,
+first represented in the troublous months of 1849, was acted in Paris
+for the benefit of an ambulance. She notes the singular fate of this
+piece to be reproduced in time of bombardment. A pastoral!
+
+The worst strain of suspense ended January 29, with the capitulation of
+Paris. Here the _Journal d'un Voyageur_ breaks off. It would be sad
+indeed had her life, like that of more than one of her compeers, closed
+then over France in mourning. Although it was impossible but that such
+an ordeal must have impaired her strength, she outlived the war's
+ending, and the horrible social crisis which she had foreseen must
+succeed the political one. Happier than Prosper Merimee, than Alexandre
+Dumas, and others, she saw the dawn of a new era of prosperity for her
+country, whose vital forces, as she had also foretold, were to prevail
+in the end over successive ills--the enervation of corruption, of
+military disaster, and the "orgie of pretended renovators" at home, that
+signalized the first months of peace abroad.
+
+In January, 1872, we again find her writing cheerily to Flaubert:--
+
+     Mustn't be ill, mustn't be cross, my old troubadour. Say that
+     France is mad, humanity stupid, and that we are unfinished animals
+     every one of us, you must love on all the same, yourself, your
+     race, above all, your friends. I have my sad hours. I look at my
+     blossoms, those two little girls smiling as ever, their charming
+     mother, and my good, hard-working son, whom the end of the world
+     will find hunting, cataloguing, doing his daily task, and yet as
+     merry as Punch in his rare leisure moments.
+
+In a later letter she writes in a more serious strain:--
+
+     I do not say that humanity is on the road to the heights; I believe
+     it in spite of all, but I do not argue about it, which is useless,
+     for every one judges according to his own eyesight, and the general
+     outlook at the present moment is ugly and poor. Besides, I do not
+     need to be assured of the salvation of our planet and its
+     inhabitants in order to believe in the necessity of the good and
+     the beautiful; if our planet departs from this law it will perish;
+     if its inhabitants discard it they will be destroyed. As for me, I
+     wish to hold firm till my last breath, not with the certainty or
+     the demand to find a "good place" elsewhere, but because my sole
+     pleasure is to maintain myself and mine in the upward way.
+
+The last five years of her life saw her pen in full activity. In the
+_Revue des Deux Mondes_, _Malgretout_, the novel of 1870, was succeeded
+by _Flamarande_ and _Les Deux Freres_--compositions executed with
+unflagging energy and animation of style; _La Tour de Percemont_, and a
+series of graceful fairy-stories entitled _Contes d'une grand'mere_.
+_Nanon_ (1872), a rustic romance of the First Revolution, is a highly
+remarkable little work, possibly suggested by her recent experiences of
+the effect of public disturbances on remote country places.
+
+She was also a constant contributor to the newspaper _Le Temps_. A
+critical notice by her hand of M. Renan's _Dialogues et Fragments
+Philosophiques_, reprinted from those columns, bears date May, 1876,
+immediately before she succumbed to the illness which in a few days was
+to cut short her life.
+
+At the beginning of this year she had written on this subject to
+Flaubert, in the brave spirit she would fain impart to her weaker
+brethren:--
+
+     Life is perhaps eternal, and work in consequence eternal. If so,
+     let us finish our march bravely. If otherwise, if the individual
+     perish utterly, let us have the honor of having done our task. That
+     is duty, for our only obvious duties are to ourselves and our
+     fellow-creatures. What we destroy in ourselves we destroy in them.
+     Our abasement abases them; our falls drag them down; we owe to them
+     to stand fast, to save them from falling. The desire to die early
+     is a weakness, as is the desire to live long.
+
+George Sand, like most persons of an exceptional constitution, had
+little faith in the efficacy for herself of medical science. She was
+persuaded that the prescribed remedies did her more harm than good, and
+on more than one occasion, when her health had caused her children
+uneasiness, they had had to resort to an affectionate _ruse_ to induce
+her to take advice. Her habit of disregarding physical ailments,
+fighting against them as a weakness, and working on in their despite,
+led her to neglect for too long failing health that should have been
+attended to. During the whole of May, 1876, Madame Sand, though
+suffering from real illness, continued to join in the household routine
+and to proceed with her literary work as usual. Not till the last days
+of the month did she, unable any longer to make light of her danger, at
+length consent to send for professional advice. It was then too late.
+She was suffering from internal paralysis. The medical attention which,
+sought earlier, might, in the opinion of the doctors, have prolonged her
+life for years, could now do nothing to avert the imminent fatal
+consequences of her illness. "It is death," she said; "I did not ask for
+it, but neither do I regret it." For beyond the sorrow of parting it had
+no particular terrors for her; she had viewed and could meet it in
+another spirit. "Death is no more," she had written; "it is life renewed
+and purified."
+
+She lingered for a week, in great suffering, but bearing all with
+fortitude and an unflinching determination not to distress those around
+her by painful complaining. Up to her last hour she preserved
+consciousness and lucidity. The words, "_Ne touchez pas a la verdure_,"
+among the last that fell from her lips, were understood by her children,
+who knew her wish that the trees should be undisturbed under which, in
+the village cemetery, she was soon to find a resting-place--a wish that
+had been sacredly respected.
+
+Her suffering ceased a short while before death, which came to her so
+quietly that the transition was almost imperceptible to the watchers by
+her side. It was on the morning of the 8th of June. She was within a
+month of completing her seventy-second year. Although her life's work
+had long since been mainly accomplished, yet the extinction of that
+great intelligence was felt by many--as fitly expressed by M.
+Renan--"like a diminution of humanity."
+
+Two days later she was buried in the little cemetery of Nohant, that
+adjoins her own garden wall. The funeral was conducted with extreme
+simplicity, in accordance with her taste and spirit. The scene was none
+the less a memorable one. The rain fell in torrents, but no one seemed
+to regard it; the country-people flocking in from miles around, old men
+standing bare-headed for hours, heedless of the deluge. The peasant and
+the prince, Parisian leaders of the world of thought and letters, and
+the humblest and most unlearned of her poorer neighbors, stood together
+over her grave.
+
+Six peasants carried the bier from the house to the church, a few paces
+distant. The village priest came, preceded by three chorister-boys and
+the venerable singing-clerk of the parish, to perform the ceremony. A
+portion of the little churchyard, railed off from the rest and planted
+with evergreen-trees, contains the graves of her grandmother, her
+father, and the two little grandchildren she had lost. A plain granite
+tomb in their midst now marks the spot where George Sand was laid,
+literally buried in flowers.
+
+A great spirit was gone from the world; and a good spirit, it will be
+generally acknowledged: an artist in whose work the genuine desire to
+leave those she worked for better than she found them, is one inspiring
+motive. Such endeavor may seem to fail, and she affirmed: "A hundred
+times it does fail in its immediate results. But it helps,
+notwithstanding, to preserve that tradition of good desires and of good
+deeds, without which all would perish."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[A] The biography of Alfred De Musset, by Paul De Musset, translated
+from the French by Harriet W. Preston. Boston, Roberts Brothers.
+
+[B] Mauprat, translated by Miss Vaughan. Boston, Roberts Brothers.
+
+[C] The Miller of Angibault. Translated by M. E. Dewey. Boston, Roberts
+Brothers.
+
+[D] The "Snow Man," translated by Virginia Vaughan. Boston: Roberts
+Brothers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+GEORGE SAND'S NOVELS.
+
+
+  I. MAUPRAT. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+ II. ANTONIA. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+III. MONSIEUR SYLVESTRE. Translated by FRANCIS GEORGE SHAW.
+
+ IV. THE SNOW MAN. Translated by VIRGINIA VAUGHAN.
+
+  V. THE MILLER OF ANGIBAULT. Translated by MARY E. DEWEY.
+
+ VI. MY SISTER JEANNIE. Translated by S. R. CROCKER.
+
+_A standard Library Edition, uniformly bound, in neat 16mo volumes. Each
+volume sold separately. Price $1.50._
+
+
+SOME NOTICES OF "MAUPRAT."
+
+"An admirable translation. As to 'Mauprat,' with which novel Roberts
+Brothers introduce the first of French novelists to the American public,
+if there were any doubts as to George Sand's power, it would for ever
+set them at rest.... The object of the story is to show how, by her
+(Edmee's) noble nature, he (Mauprat) is subsequently transformed from a
+brute to a man; his sensual passion to a pure and holy love."--_Harper's
+Monthly._
+
+"The excellence of George Sand, as we understand it, lies in her
+comprehension of the primitive elements of mankind. She has conquered
+her way into the human heart, and whether it is at peace or at war, is
+the same to her; for she is mistress of all its moods. No woman before
+ever painted the passions and the emotions with such force and fidelity,
+and with such consummate art. Whatever else she may be, she is always an
+artist.... Love is the key-note of 'Mauprat,'--love, and what it can
+accomplish in taming an otherwise untamable spirit. The hero, Bernard
+Mauprat, grows up with his uncles, who are practically bandits, as was
+not uncommon with men of their class, in the provinces, before the
+breaking out of the French Revolution. He is a young savage, of whom the
+best that can be said is, that he is only less wicked than his
+relatives, because he has somewhere within him a sense of generosity and
+honor, to which they are entire strangers. To sting this sense into
+activity, to detect the makings of a man in this brute, to make this
+brute into a man, is the difficult problem, which is worked out by
+love,--the love of Bernard for his cousin Edmee, and hers for him,--the
+love of two strong, passionate, noble natures, locked in a
+life-and-death struggle, in which the man is finally overcome by the
+unconquerable strength of womanhood. Only a great writer could have
+described such a struggle, and only a great artist could have kept it
+within allowable limits. This George Sand has done, we think; for her
+portrait of Bernard is vigorous without being coarse, and her situations
+are strong without being dangerous. Such, at least, is the impression we
+have received from reading 'Mauprat,' which, besides being an admirable
+study of character, is also a fine picture of French provincial life and
+manners."--_Putnam's Monthly._
+
+"Roberts Brothers propose to publish a series of translations of George
+Sand's better novels. We can hardly say that all are worth appearing in
+English; but it is certain that the 'better' list will comprise a good
+many which are worth translating, and among these is 'Mauprat,'--though
+by no means the best of them. Written to show the possibility of
+constancy in man, a love inspired before and continuing through
+marriage, it is itself a contradiction to a good many of the popular
+notions respecting the author,--who is generally supposed to be as
+indifferent to the sanctities of the marriage relation as was her
+celebrated ancestor, Augustus of Saxony.... The translation is
+admirable. It is seldom that one reads such good English in a work
+translated from any language. The new series is inaugurated in the best
+possible way, under the hands of Miss Vaughan, and we trust that she may
+have a great deal to do with its continuance. It is not every one who
+can read French who can write English so well."--_Old and New._
+
+_Sold everywhere. Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of the advertised price,
+by the Publishers_,
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS. BOSTON.
+
+_Messrs. Roberts Brothers' Publications._
+
+
+FAMOUS WOMEN SERIES.
+
+
+EMILY BRONTE.
+
+BY A. MARY F. ROBINSON.
+
+One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.
+
+"Miss Robinson has written a fascinating biography.... Emily Bronte is
+interesting, not because she wrote 'Wuthering Heights,' but because of
+her brave, baffled, human life, so lonely, so full of pain, but with a
+great hope shining beyond all the darkness, and a passionate defiance in
+bearing more than the burdens that were laid upon her. The story of the
+three sisters is infinitely sad, but it is the ennobling sadness that
+belongs to large natures cramped and striving for freedom to heroic,
+almost desperate, work, with little or no result. The author of this
+intensely interesting, sympathetic, and eloquent biography, is a young
+lady and a poet, to whom a place is given in a recent anthology of
+living English poets, which is supposed to contain only the best poems
+of the best writers."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+"Miss Robinson had many excellent qualifications for the task she has
+performed in this little volume, among which may be named, an
+enthusiastic interest in her subject and a real sympathy with Emily
+Bronte's sad and heroic life. 'To represent her as she was,' says Miss
+Robinson, 'would be her noblest and most fitting monument.' ... Emily
+Bronte here becomes well known to us and, in one sense, this should be
+praise enough for any biography."--_New York Times._
+
+"The biographer who finds such material before him as the lives and
+characters of the Bronte family need have no anxiety as to the interest
+of his work. Characters not only strong but so uniquely strong, genius
+so supreme, misfortunes so overwhelming, set in its scenery so forlornly
+picturesque, could not fail to attract all readers, if told even in the
+most prosaic language. When we add to this, that Miss Robinson has told
+their story _not_ in prosaic language, but with a literary style
+exhibiting all the qualities essential to good biography, our readers
+will understand that this life of Emily Bronte is not only as
+interesting as a novel, but a great deal more interesting than most
+novels. As it presents most vividly a general picture of the family,
+there seems hardly a reason for giving it Emily's name alone, except
+perhaps for the masterly chapters on 'Wuthering Heights,' which the
+reader will find a grateful condensation of the best in that powerful
+but somewhat forbidding story. We know of no point in the Bronte
+history--their genius, their surroundings, their faults, their
+happiness, their misery, their love and friendships, their
+peculiarities, their power, their gentleness, their patience, their
+pride,--which Miss Robinson has not touched upon with conscientiousness
+and sympathy."--_The Critic._
+
+"'Emily Bronte' is the second of the 'Famous Women Series,' which
+Roberts Brothers, Boston, propose to publish, and of which 'George
+Eliot' was the initial volume. Not the least remarkable of a very
+remarkable family, the personage whose life is here written, possesses a
+peculiar interest to all who are at all familiar with the sad and
+singular history of herself and her sister Charlotte. That the author,
+Miss A. Mary F. Robinson, has done her work with minute fidelity to
+facts as well as affectionate devotion to the subject of her sketch, is
+plainly to be seen all through the book."--_Washington Post._
+
+Sold by all Booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the Publishers,
+
+
+MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS'
+
+Classic Series.
+
+
+A collection of world-renowned works selected from the literatures of
+all nations, printed from new type in the best manner, and neatly and
+durably bound. Handy books, convenient to hold, and an ornament to the
+library shelves.
+
+READY AND IN PREPARATION.
+
+SIR WALTER SCOTT'S "LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL," "MARMION," and "THE
+LADY OF THE LAKE." The three poems in one volume.
+
+"There are no books for boys like these poems by Sir Walter Scott. Every
+boy likes them, if they are not put into his hands too late. _They
+surpass everything for boy reading._"--_Ralph Waldo Emerson._
+
+OLIVER GOLDSMITH'S "THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD." With Illustrations by
+Mulready.
+
+DEFOE'S "ROBINSON CRUSOE." With Illustrations by Stothard.
+
+BERNARDIN DE SAINT-PIERRE'S "PAUL AND VIRGINIA." With Illustrations
+by Lalauze.
+
+SOUTHEY'S "LIFE OF NELSON." With Illustrations by Birket Foster.
+
+VOLTAIRE'S "LIFE OF CHARLES THE TWELFTH." With Maps and Portraits.
+
+MARIA EDGEWORTH'S "CLASSIC TALES." With a biographical Sketch by
+Grace A. Oliver.
+
+LORD MACAULAY'S "LAYS OF ANCIENT ROME." With a Biographical Sketch
+and Illustrations.
+
+BUNYAN'S "PILGRIM'S PROGRESS." With all of the original
+Illustrations in fac-simile.
+
+CLASSIC HEROIC BALLADS. Edited by the Editor of "Quiet Hours."
+
+CLASSIC TALES. By Anna Letitia Barbauld. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.
+
+CLASSIC TALES. By Ann and Jane Taylor. With a Biographical Sketch
+by Grace A. Oliver.
+
+AND OTHERS.
+
+MESSRS. ROBERTS BROTHERS' PUBLICATIONS.
+
+Famous Women Series.
+
+GEORGE ELIOT.
+
+BY MATHILDE BLIND.
+
+One vol. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00.
+
+"Messrs. Roberts Brothers begin a series of Biographies of Famous
+Women with a life of George Eliot, by Mathilde Blind. The idea of
+the series is an excellent one, and the reputation of its
+publishers is a guarantee for its adequate execution. This book
+contains about three hundred pages in open type, and not only
+collects and condenses the main facts that are known in regard to
+the history of George Eliot, but supplies other material from
+personal research. It is agreeably written, and with a good idea of
+proportion in a memoir of its size. The critical study of its
+subject's works, which is made in the order of their appearance, is
+particularly well done. In fact, good taste and good judgment
+pervade the memoir throughout."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"Miss Blind's little book is written with admirable good taste and
+judgment, and with notable self-restraint. It does not weary the
+reader with critical discursiveness, nor with attempts to search
+out high-flown meanings and recondite oracles in the plain 'yea'
+and 'nay' of life. It is a graceful and unpretentious little
+biography, and tells all that need be told concerning one of the
+greatest writers of the time. It is a deeply interesting if not
+fascinating woman whom Miss Blind presents," says the New York
+_Tribune_.
+
+"Miss Blind's little biographical study of George Eliot is written
+with sympathy and good taste, and is very welcome. It gives us a
+graphic if not elaborate sketch of the personality and development
+of the great novelist, is particularly full and authentic
+concerning her earlier years, tells enough of the leading motives
+in her work to give the general reader a lucid idea of the true
+drift and purpose of her art, and analyzes carefully her various
+writings, with no attempt at profound criticism or fine writing,
+but with appreciation, insight, and a clear grasp of those
+underlying psychological principles which are so closely interwoven
+in every production that came from her pen."--_Traveller._
+
+"The lives of few great writers have attracted more curiosity and
+speculation than that of George Eliot. Had she only lived earlier
+in the century she might easily have become the centre of a mythos.
+As it is, many of the anecdotes commonly repeated about her are
+made up largely of fable. It is, therefore, well, before it is too
+late, to reduce the true story of her career to the lowest terms,
+and this service has been well done by the author of the present
+volume."--_Philadelphia Press._
+
+Sold by all booksellers, or mailed, post-paid, on receipt of price, by
+the publishers,
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.
+
+A SELECTION FROM
+
+Messrs. ROBERTS BROTHERS'
+
+Latest New Publications.
+
+
+FIGURES OF THE PAST. From the Leaves of Old Journals. By Josiah Quincy
+(Class of 1821, Harvard College). 16mo. Price, $1.50
+
+"There are chapters on life in the Academy at Andover, on Harvard
+Sixty Years Ago, on Commencement Day in 1821, the year of the
+author's graduation, and on visits to and talks with John Adams,
+with reminiscences of Lafayette, Judge Story, John Randolph,
+Jackson and other eminent persons, and sketches of old Washington
+and old Boston society. The kindly pen of the author is never
+dipped in gall--he remembers the pleasing aspects of character, and
+his stories and anecdotes are told in the best of humor and leave
+no sting. The book is of a kind which we are not likely to have
+again, for the men of Mr. Quincy's generation, those at least who
+had his social opportunities, are nearly all gone. These pictures
+of old social and political conditions are especially suggestive as
+reminding us that a single life, only lately closed, linked us with
+days, events and men that were a part of our early history and
+appear remote because of the multitude of changes that have
+transformed society in the interval."--_Boston Journal._
+
+
+WHIST, OR BUMBLEPUPPY? By Pembridge.
+
+From the Second London Edition. 16mo. Cloth. Price, .50
+
+DEFINITION OF BUMBLEPUPPY--Bumblepuppy is persisting to play whist,
+either in utter ignorance of all its known principles, or in
+defiance of them, or both.
+
+"'Whist, or Bumblepuppy?' is one of the most entertaining, and at
+the same time one of the soundest books on whist ever written. Its
+drollery may blind some readers to the value of its advice; no man
+who knows anything about whist, however, will fail to read it with
+interest, and few will fail to read it with advantage. Upon the
+ordinary rules of whist, Pembridge supplies much sensible and
+thoroughly amusing comment. The best player in the world may gain
+from his observations, and a mediocre player can scarcely find a
+better counsellor. There is scarcely an opinion expressed with
+which we do not coincide."--_London Sunday Times._
+
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI. By T. Hall Caine. With
+Portrait. One vol. 8vo. Cloth, gilt. Price, $3.00
+
+"Mr. Caine's 'Recollections of Rossetti' throws light upon many
+events in Rossetti's life over which there hung a veil of
+mystery.... A book that must survive."--_London Athenaeum._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+PHYLLIS BROWNE. A Story. By Flora L. Shaw. Author of "Castle Blair" and
+"Hector." 16mo. Cloth. Illustrated. Price, $1.00
+
+"'Castle Blair' and 'Hector' are such good stories that a third, by
+the same author, Flora L. Shaw, will be equally welcomed. 'Hector'
+was one of the most charming books ever written about a boy.
+'Phyllis Browne' is the new story. She is evidently the author's
+ideal girl, as Hector was her ideal boy, and a noble, splendid girl
+she is. Yet the book is not a child's book; it is _about_ children,
+but not for them. The story is far more interesting than most
+novels are, and far more exciting. The rash generosity of the
+children is beautiful; their free, trustful lives are noble and
+sweet; but when they undertake to right social wrongs, and
+gallantly set their brave hearts and childish inexperience against
+the established wrongs of society, they come to grief, but in no
+common-place way. Their dangers are as unusual and on as large a
+scale as their characters and courage are. The book is full of
+tender and loving things; it makes the heart larger, and brings
+back the splendid dreams of one's own youth," says the Boston
+correspondent of the _Worcester Spy_.
+
+
+THE MARQUIS OF CARABAS. A Romance. By Harriet Prescott Spofford, author
+of "The Amber Gods," "The Thief in the Night," etc. 16mo. Cloth. Price,
+$1.00
+
+"This is the latest offering of the author of 'The Amber Gods,' and
+it is as odd as striking, and as impressive in its shadowy
+implication as anything she has ever written. Handled differently,
+the incidents would seem theatrical; as told by Mrs. Spofford, the
+story is like the vivid passages of a drama from which, once seen,
+you cannot escape. Pleasant or unpleasant they force themselves
+upon the consideration and lay hold of the imagination. So it is
+with 'The Marquis of Carabas.'"--_Chicago Inter-Ocean._
+
+"'The Marquis of Carabas,' by Harriet Prescott Spofford, is a work
+of unique quality, being really a poem in the guise of a prose
+novel. The thought is tense and sublimated, and the style glowing,
+musical and polished. There is abundant invention in the story, and
+nothing of common-place and indolent imitation which in the case of
+ordinary raconteurs contributes so largely to swell the bulk of
+results. The narrative fascinates one, but the fascination is not
+of a stream flowing largely and naturally through the landscape; it
+is rather that of silver bells, whose clear, finely modulated
+chimes touch the finer issues of feeling, but not without some
+obtrusive sense of study and premeditation."--_Home Journal._
+
+
+LANDOR'S IMAGINARY CONVERSATIONS. With a portrait. A new edition. 5
+volumes. 16mo.
+
+Cloth. Oxford style. Price, $5.00
+Imitation half calf,    6.25
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+PEARLS OF THE FAITH; or, Islam's Rosary; being the "Ninety-nine
+Beautiful Names of Allah." By Edwin Arnold. 16mo. Cloth. Uniform with
+"The Light of Asia." Price, $1.00
+
+"Mr. Edwin Arnold has finished his Oriental trilogy. The first part
+is 'The Light of Asia.' The second part is 'The Indian Song of
+Songs,' The trilogy is completed by 'Pearls of the Faith,' in which
+the poet tells the beads of a pious Moslem. The Mohammedan has a
+chaplet of three strings, each string containing 33 beads, each
+bead representing one of the 'Ninety-nine beautiful names of Allah.
+These short poems have no connection; they vary in measure, but are
+all simple and without a touch of obscurity. All the legends and
+instructions inculcate the gentle virtues that make life
+lovely--courtesy, humility, hospitality, care for the poor and the
+ill, kindness to dumb animals, perfect manners in social
+intercourse. Many of the poems are suitable for Christian
+Sunday-schools.... The view of Mohammedanism given by these poems
+is very pleasant; the precepts for life here are sweet and noble;
+the promises for heaven are definite; they appeal directly to the
+love of what is known as pleasure in this life, and that must be
+renounced in this life, but in the next it may be enjoyed to the
+uttermost without evil consequences."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+
+ART AND NATURE IN ITALY. By Eugene Benson. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00
+
+"Mr. Benson's long residence in that country has operated to imbue
+his mind with the spirit of the region. He treats _con amore_ of
+its art in its historical and in its modern aspects, and he
+presents its scenes of nature in their most fascinating form. Mr.
+Benson is not only one of the most appreciative of students and
+observers, but he has a rare grace of manner as well. He writes
+little of late, but his productions are always acceptable to
+cultivated people."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"This book is a record of impressions and reflections on art and
+nature in Italy. The great beauty and the historic associations of
+the country are set forth in very pleasing language by one who
+fully appreciates them. He particularly describes those portions of
+that beautiful land in which its most distinguished artists have
+lived, showing how its natural features, its enchanting scenery,
+must have had a molding influence upon their tastes and their
+works. His estimates of art and artists and his criticisms are, in
+the main, just and satisfactory."--_Western Christian Advocate._
+
+
+NORSE STORIES, RETOLD FROM THE EDDAS. By Hamilton W. Mabie. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.00
+
+"Is one of the most charming little books for children I have ever
+seen. The myths are splendidly told, and every household in America
+ought to have a copy of the book."--_Prof. R. B. Anderson._
+
+"The old Norse stories bear being told again and again. Mr. Mabie
+keeps their freshness, fascination and simplicity in his new
+version of them, and one reads with unabated pleasure of Odin's
+search for wisdom, of the wooing of Gerd, and of all the strange
+adventures of Thor, of the beautiful Balder, of the wicked Loke,
+and, best of all, of the new earth that was created after long
+years of darkness, in which there was no sun, no moon, no stars, no
+Asgard, no Hel, no Jotunheim; in which gods, giants, monsters and
+men were all dead--the earth upon which the gods look lovingly,
+upon which men are industrious and obedient, and know that the
+All-Father helps them."--_Boston Daily Advertiser._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+THE WISDOM OF THE BRAHMIN. A Didactic Poem. Translated from the German
+of Friedrich Rueckert. By Chas. T. Brooks. Six cantos. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25
+
+"The Brahmin," says the translator, "is a poem of vast range,
+expressing the world-wisdom which the author had been for years
+storing up in his large heart, and evolving out of his creative
+soul." Says Dr. Beyer, in his Life of Rueckert: "'The Wisdom of the
+Brahmin' is a poetic house-treasure of which our nation may justly
+be proud. So much has been said and sung of late years of 'The
+Light of Asia,' the 'Sympathy of Religions,' and the like, that the
+present seemed to be an auspicious moment to venture a volume of
+Rueckert's greatest work."
+
+"'These twenty books are a sea of thoughts and contemplations full
+of Brahminic tranquility and German depth and fullness, in simple
+gnomes, sentences, epigrams, parables, fables and tales.'
+Gottsschall declares the work to be 'a poetic treasure of which the
+German nation may justly be proud.' The translator, speaking of his
+own experiences, says the poem has affected him as 'a sparkling
+flood of heart-searching and soul-lifting thought and sentiment,
+such as no other work within our knowledge has ever
+presented.'"--_Home Journal._
+
+
+SOCRATES. The Apology and Crito of Plato, and the Phaedo of Plato.
+Uniform with "Marcus Aurelius," "Imitation of Christ," etc. 18mo.
+Flexible cloth, red edges. Price, 50 cents each. Two series in one
+volume. Cloth, red edges. Price, 75 cents.
+
+"If, as is strongly asserted, there may be found in the writings of
+Plato all the wisdom and learning of the ancients, as well as the
+treasure-house from which all succeeding writers have borrowed
+their best ideas, then are these little books worth their weight in
+gold, for they contain some of the choicest gems to be found in the
+collected works of the famous Greek philosopher. They are companion
+volumes, the text being taken unabridged from Professor Jewett's
+revised translation of Plato. They tell the whole story of the
+trial, imprisonment and death of Socrates. The Apology gives the
+defense, the Crito relates the offer of escape, the Phaedo describes
+the last hours. The more studiously and the more frequently these
+books are read the more keen will be the appreciation of their
+intellectual and moral excellence."--_Providence Journal._
+
+
+JEAN INGELOW'S NOVELS. Off the Skelligs; Fated to be Free; Sarah de
+Berenger; Don John. A new edition. 4 vols. 16mo. Imitation half calf.
+Price, $5.00
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+THE JEAN INGELOW BIRTHDAY BOOK. With red-line border and divisions, 12
+illustrations and portrait.
+
+16mo. Cloth, gilt and illuminated. Price, $1.00
+Full calf or morocco, $3.50
+
+"This is a dainty little volume having a selection from Jean
+Ingelow for each day of the year. The extracts are of both prose
+and verse. There are graceful illustrations for each month suited
+in subject to the season. The book will be welcomed by admirers of
+this writer and must prove a popular gift-book for the birthday
+season."--_Chicago Advance._
+
+"We have seen no more tasteful book this year than 'The Jean
+Ingelow Birthday Book,' which Messrs. Roberts Brothers publish. It
+is somewhat larger in form than are the birthday books with which
+the public is familiar, is printed on very fine paper, and has a
+page with the usual quotations and the usual blanks, the whole
+encircled with a carmine line border, the date of the days of the
+months being printed in the same color. The work is illustrated
+with handsome engravings, and has a steel-engraved portrait of Jean
+Ingelow. The binding is a real gem. Nothing could well be more
+attractive in the way of cloth ornament than is its combination of
+design and color."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+
+UNDER THE SUN. By Phil. Robinson, the new English Humorist. With a
+Preface by Edwin Arnold, author of "The Light of Asia." 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.50
+
+This is a volume of essays, humorous and pathetic, of incidents, scenes,
+and objects grouped under the heads: Indian Sketches, The Indian
+Seasons, Unnatural History, Idle Hours under the Punkah.
+
+"Under the Sun," by Phil. Robinson, is one of the most delightful
+of recent books. The style is fascinating in its strength and
+picturesqueness, and there is now and then a delicious quaintness
+that recalls Charles Lamb. A volume such as this is rare in our
+day, when the art of essay writing is almost lost and forgotten.
+Freshness, vigor, humor, pathos, graphic power, a keen love for
+nature, a gentle love for animals, and a pleasing originality are
+among the more charming characteristics of this work, which may be
+read again and again with renewed satisfaction. Its scenes are laid
+in India, and whether the author discourses of the elephant, the
+rhinoceros, some bird that has attracted his attention, a tree, or
+a flower; whether he describes an exciting hunt, or tells a
+marvellous story; whether he moralizes or gives free rein to his
+fancy, he is always brilliant, fascinating, vivacious and masterly.
+It is difficult to write of this remarkable book without
+superlatives; but it is not too much to insist that it is
+impossible to exaggerate its peculiar merits, or to bestow too
+large a share of praise upon it. It is not a book for the few, but
+for the many, and all will find delight in its perusal."--_Saturday
+Evening Gazette._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+
+A LITTLE PILGRIM. Reprinted from Macmillan's Magazine. 16mo. Cloth. Red
+edges. Price, $ .75
+
+"An exquisitely written little sketch is found in that remarkable
+production, 'The Little Pilgrim,' which is just now attracting much
+attention both in Europe and America. It is highly imaginative in
+its scope, representing one of the world-worn and weary pilgrims of
+our earthly sphere as entering upon the delights of heaven after
+death. The picture of heaven is drawn with the rarest delicacy and
+refinement, and is in agreeable contrast in this respect to the
+material sketch of this future home furnished in Miss Stuart
+Phelps's well-remembered 'Gates Ajar.' The book will be a balm to
+the heart of many readers who are in accord with the faith of its
+author; and to others its reading will afford rare pleasure from
+the exceeding beauty and affecting simplicity of its almost perfect
+literary style."--_Saturday Evening Gazette._
+
+"The life beyond the grave, when the short life in this world is
+ended, is to many a source of dread--to all a mystery. 'A Little
+Pilgrim' has apparently solved it, and, indeed, it seems on reading
+this little book as if there were a great probability about it. A
+soft, gentle tone pervades its every sentence, and one cannot read
+it without feeling refreshed and strengthened."--_The Alta
+California._
+
+
+THE GREAT EPICS OF MEDIAEVAL GERMANY. An Outline of their Contents and
+History. By George Theodore Dippold, Professor at Boston University and
+Wellesley College. 16mo. Cloth. Price, $1.50
+
+Professor Francis J. Child, of Harvard College, says: "It is an
+excellent account of the chief German heroic poems of the Middle
+Ages, accompanied with spirited translations. It is a book which
+gives both a brief and popular, and also an accurate, account of
+this important section of literature, and will be very welcome here
+and at other colleges."
+
+"No student of modern literature, and above all no student who aims
+to understand the literary development of Europe in its fullest
+range, can leave this rich and ample world of early song
+unexplored. To all such Professor Dippold's book will have the
+value of a trustworthy guide.... It has all the interest of a
+chapter in the growth of the human mind into comprehension of the
+universe and of itself, and it has the pervading charm of the vast
+realm of poetry through which it moves."--_Christian Union._
+
+
+MY HOUSEHOLD OF PETS. By Theophile Gautier. Translated from the French
+by Susan Coolidge. With illustrations by Frank Rogers. 16mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.25
+
+"This little book will interest lovers of animals, and the quaint
+style in which M. Gautier tells of the wisdom of his household pets
+will please every one. The translator, too, is happy in her work,
+for she has succeeded in rendering the text into English without
+loss of the French tone, which makes it fascinating. These
+household pets consisted of white and black cats, dogs, chameleons,
+lizards, magpies, and horses, each of which has a character and
+story of its own. Illustrations and a pretty binding add to the
+attractions of the volume."--_Worcester Spy._
+
+"The ease and elegance of Theophile Gautier's diction is wonderful,
+and the translator has preserved the charm of the French author
+with far more than the average fidelity. 'My Household of Pets' is
+a book which can be read with pleasure by young and old. It is a
+charming volume.--_St. Louis Spectator._
+
+***Our publications are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent
+post-paid on receipt of advertised price.
+
+ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Famous Women.
+
+GEORGE SAND.
+
+_The next volumes in the Famous Women Series will be_:
+
+MARGARET FULLER. By Julia Ward Howe.
+
+MARIA EDGEWORTH. By Miss Zimmern.
+
+_Already published_:
+
+GEORGE ELIOT. By Miss Blind.
+
+EMILY BRONTE. By Miss Robinson.
+
+GEORGE SAND. By Miss Thomas.
+
+MARY LAMB. By Mrs. Gilchrist.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Famous Women: George Sand, by Bertha Thomas
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAMOUS WOMEN: GEORGE SAND ***
+
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