migrating
to England, he remained in London for eight years, supporting
himself with difficulty by translating and teaching and
writing. Returning to France, Chateaubriand was appointed by
Napoleon secretary to the embassy in Rome, but the execution
of the Duke d'Enghien so repelled him that he resigned and set
out on a long Oriental journey. Living in privacy till the
fall of Napoleon, he then returned to his native land, and
from 1822 to 1824 was ambassador to the British Court. His
whole political career was eccentric and uncertain, and he
himself declared that he was by heredity and honour a
Bourbonist, by conviction a Monarchist, but by temperament a
Republican. He died on July 4, 1848. "Atala," which appeared
in 1801, formed the first part of a prose epic, "The Natchez,"
on the wild and picturesque life of the Red Indians, the idea
for which Chateaubriand had conceived while wandering about
America. It at once raised its author to the highest position
in the French literary world of the age of Napoleon. In 1802,
Chateaubriand published a work of still greater importance--at
least, from a social point of view--"The Genius of
Christianity"--which magnificent and gorgeous piece of
rhetoric produced a profound change in the general attitude of
Frenchmen in regard to religion, undid to some extent the
destructive work of Voltaire, and was instrumental in inducing
Napoleon to come to terms with the Pope. But it is on "Atala"
that Chateaubriand's title to be one of the greatest masters
of French prose literature depends.

_I.--The Song of Death_

"It is surely a singular fate," said the old, blind Red Indian chief to
the young Frenchman, "which has brought us together from the ends of the
earth. I see in you a civilised man, who, for some strange reason,
wishes to become a savage. You see in me a savage, who, also for some
strange reason, has tried to become a civilised man. Though we have
entered on life from two opposite points, here we are, sitting side by
side. And I, a childless man, have sworn to be a father to you, and you,
a fatherless boy, have sworn to be a son to me."

Chactas, the chief of the Natchez, and Rene, the Frenchman, whom he had
adopted into his tribe, were sitting at the prow of a pirogue, which,
with its sail of sewn skins outstretched to the night wind, was gli