ere sent to a school kept by Priests where
Victor was not very happy, and from which he got small profit. Next year
the whole family returned to Paris, and in 1815, at the age of thirteen,
he was definitely sent to a boarding-school to prepare for the Ecole
Polytechnique. But his was a precocious genius, and he devoted himself,
even at school, to verse-writing with greater ardour than to study.
He wrote in early youth more than one poem for a prize competition,
composed a romance which some years later he elaborated into the story
_Bug-Jargal_, and in 1820, when only eighteen, joined his two
brothers, Abel and Eugene, in publishing a literary journal called _Le
Conservateur Litteraire_. About the same time he became engaged to
Adele Foucher, and wrote for her the romance of _Han d'Islande_, which,
however, was not published till later. In 1822 he and Adele were
married, and in the same year he published his first volume of _Odes_.
He was now fully launched on a literary career, and for twenty years or
more the story of his life is mainly the story of his literary output.
In 1827 he published his drama of _Cromwell_, the preface to which, with
its note of defiance to literary convention, caused him to be definitely
accepted as the head of the Romantic School of poetry. _Les Orientales_,
_Le dernier jour d'un condamne_, _Marion de Lorme_, and _Hernani_
followed in quick succession. The revolution of 1830 disturbed for a
moment his literary activity, but as soon as things were quiet again he
shut himself in his study with a bottle of ink, a pen, and an immense
pile of paper. For six weeks he was never seen, except at dinner-time,
and the result was _Notre-Dame de Paris_. During the next ten years
four volumes of poetry and four dramas were published; in 1841 came his
election to the Academy, and in 1843 he published _Les Burgraves_, a
drama which was less successful than his former plays, and which marks
the close of his career as a dramatist. In the same year there came to
him the greatest sorrow of his life. His daughter Leopoldine, to whom
he was deeply attached, was drowned with her husband during a pleasure
excursion on the Seine only a few months after their marriage.

In 1845 Hugo began to take an active part in politics. Son of a Vendean
mother, he had been in early life a fervent royalist, and even in 1830
he could write of the fallen royal family with respectful sympathy. Yet
by that time his democratic leanings h