ticence and a wider
experience of life. Of the very abundant fruitage of these last years,
not many rank with the masterpieces of her earlier periods, although
such novels as "Tamaris" (1862), "La Confession d'une Jeune Fille"
(1865), and "Cadio," seemed to her admirers to show no decline of force
or fire. Still finer, perhaps, were "Le Marquis de Villemer" (1861) and
"Jean de la Roche" (1860). Her latest production, which appeared after
her death, was the "Contes d'une Grand'mere," a collection full of
humanity and beauty. George Sand died at Nohant on the 8th of June,
1876. She had great qualities of soul, and in spite of the naive
irregularities of her conduct in early middle life, she cannot
be regarded otherwise than as an excellent woman. She was brave,
courageous, heroically industrious, a loyal friend, a tender and wise
mother. Her principle fault has been wittily defined by Mr. Henry James,
who has remarked that in affairs of the heart George Sand never "behaved
like a gentleman."

E. G.

PREFACE

When I wrote my novel _Mauprat_ at Nohant--in 1846, if I remember
rightly--I had just been suing for a separation. Hitherto I had written
much against the abuses of marriage, and perhaps, though insufficiently
explaining my views, had induced a belief that I failed to appreciate
its essence; but it was at this time that marriage itself stood before
me in all the moral beauty of its principle.

Misfortune is not without its uses to the thoughtful mind. The more
clearly I had realized the pain and pity of having to break a sacred
bond, the more profoundly I felt that where marriage is wanting, is
in certain elements of happiness and justice of too lofty a nature to
appeal to our actual society. Nay, more; society strives to take from
the sanctity of the institution by treating it as a contract of material
interests, attacking it on all sides at once, by the spirit of its
manners, by its prejudices, by its hypocritical incredulity.

While writing a novel as an occupation and distraction for my mind, I
conceived the idea of portraying an exclusive and undying love, before,
during, and after marriage. Thus I drew the hero of my book proclaiming,
at the age of eighty, his fidelity to the one woman he had ever loved.

The ideal of love is assuredly eternal fidelity. Moral and religious
laws have aimed at consecrating this ideal. Material facts obscure it.
Civil laws are so framed as to make it impossible or illu