rio shared, a drawing-room between
them, but in reality it became more the Comtesse d'Agoult's _salon_ than
George Sand's. Lamennais, Henri Heine, Mickiewicz, Michel of Bourges
and Charles Didier were among their visitors, and we are told that this
_salon_, improvised in a hotel was "a reunion of the _elite_, over which
the Comtesse d'Agoult presided with exquisite grace." She was a true
society woman, a veritable mistress of her home, one of those who could
transform a room in a hotel, a travelling carriage, or even a prison
into that exquisite thing, so dear to French polite society of yore--a
_salon_.

Among the _habitues_ of Madame d'Agoult's _salon_ was Chopin. This is
a new chapter in George Sand's life, and a little later on we shall be
able to consider, as a whole, the importance of this intercourse with
great artists as regards her intellectual development.

Before finishing our study of this epoch in her life, we must notice how
much George Sand's talent had developed and blossomed out. _Mauprat_ was
published in 1837, and is undoubtedly the first of her _chefs-d'oeuvre_.
In her uninterrupted literary production, which continued regularly in
spite of and through all the storms of her private life, there is much
that is strange and second-rate and much that is excellent. _Jacques_
is an extraordinary piece of work. It was written at Venice when she was
with Pagello. George Sand declared that she had neither put herself nor
Musset into this book. She was nevertheless inspired by their case,
and she merely transposed their ideal of renunciation. _Andre_ may be
classed among the second-rate work. It is the story of a young noble who
seduces a girl of the working-class. It is a souvenir of Berry, written
in a home-sick mood when George Sand was at Venice. _Simon_ also belongs
to the second-rate category. The portrait of Michel of Bourges can
easily be traced in it. George Sand had intended doing more for Michel
than this. She composed a revolutionary novel in three volumes, in his
honour, entitled: _Engelwald with the high forehead_. Buloz neither
cared for _Engelwald_ nor for his high forehead, and this novel was
never published.

According to George Sand, when she wrote _Mauprat_ her idea was
the rehabilitation of marriage. "I had just been petitioning for a
separation," she says. "I had, until then, been fighting against the
abuses of marriage, and, as I had never developed my ideas sufficiently,
I had given