e which in
point of fact admirably illustrates his meaning, the scene from the
'Rouge et Noir', where Julien endeavors to take the hand of Mme. de
Renal, which he characterizes as "a little mute drama of great power,"
adding in conclusion:--"Give that episode to an author for whom the
_milieu_ exists, and he will make the night, with its odors, its voices,
its soft voluptuousness, play a part in the defeat of the woman. And
that author will be in the right; his picture will be more complete." It
is this tendency to leave nature out of consideration which gives
Stendhal's characters a flavor of abstraction, and caused Sainte-Beuve
to declare in disgust that they were "not human beings, but ingeniously
constructed automatons." Yet it is unfair to conclude with Zola, that
Stendhal was a man for whom the outside world did not exist; he was not
insensible to the beauties of nature, only he looked upon them as a
secondary consideration. After a sympathetic description of the Rhone
valley, he had to add, "But the interest of a landscape is insufficient;
in the long run, some moral or historical interest is indispensable."
Yet he recognized explicitly the influence of climate and environment
upon character, and seems to have been sensible of his own shortcomings
as an author. "I abhor material descriptions," he confesses in
'Souvenirs d'Egotisme': "the _ennui_ of making them deters me from
writing novels."

Nevertheless, aside from his short 'Chroniques' and 'Nouvelles,' and
the posthumous 'Lamiel' which he probably intended to destroy, Stendhal
has left four stories which deserve detailed consideration: 'Armance,'
'Le Rouge et Le Noir,' 'La Chartreuse de Parme,' and the fragmentary
novel 'Lucien Leuwen.'

As has been justly pointed out by Stendhal's sympathetic biographer,
Edouard Rod, the heroes of the four books are essentially of one type,
and all more or less faithful copies of himself; having in common a need
of activity, a thirst for love, a keen sensibility, and an unbounded
admiration for Napoleon--and differing only by reason of the several
_milieus_ in which he has placed them. The first of these, 'Armance,'
appeared in 1827. The hero, Octave, is an aristocrat, son of the Marquis
de Malivert, who "was very rich before the Revolution, and when he
returned to Paris in 1814, thought himself beggared on an income of
twenty or thirty thousand." Octave is the most exaggerated of all
Stendhal's heroes; a mysterious, sombr