But his health was failing at the time, and the manager hesitated about
giving him the role. "Take care, my friend," wrote Bocage to Madame
Sand; "perhaps I shall die if I play the part; but if I play it not, I
shall die of that, to a certainty." She insisted, and play it he did, to
perfection, she tells us. "He did not act the Marquis de Bois Dore; he
was the personage himself, as the author had dreamt him." It was to be
his last achievement, and he knew it. "It is my end," he said one
night, "but I shall die like a soldier on the field of honor." And so he
did, continuing to play the role up till a few days before his death.

More lasting success has attended Madame Sand in two of the lightest of
society comedies, _Le Mariage de Victorine_ and _Le Marquis de
Villemer_, which seem likely to take a permanent place in the
_repertoire_ of the French stage. The first, a continuation that had
suggested itself to her of Sedaine's century-old comedy, _Le Philosophe
sans le savoir_, escapes the ill fate that seems to attend sequels in
general. It is of the slightest materials, but holds together, and is
gracefully conceived and executed. First produced at the Gymnase in
1851, it was revived during the last year of Madame Sand's life in a
manner very gratifying to her, being brought out with great applause at
the Comedie Francaise, preceded on each occasion by Sedaine's play, and
the same artists appearing in both.

The excellent dramatic version of her popular novel _Le Marquis de
Villemer_, first acted in 1864, is free from the defects that weaken
most of her stage compositions. It is said that in preparing it she
accepted some hints from Alexander Dumas the younger. Whatever the
cause, the result is a play where characters, composition and dialogue
leave little to be desired.

_L'autre_, her latest notable stage success, brings us down to 1870,
when it was acted at the Gymnase, Madame Sarah Bernhardt impersonating
the heroine. This not very agreeable play is derived, with material
alterations, from Madame Sand's agreeable novel _La Confession d'une
jeune Fille_, published in 1864.

If, however, her works for the stage, which fill four volumes, added but
little, in proportion to their quantity, to her permanent fame, her
dramatic studies added fresh interest and variety to her experience,
which brought forth excellent fruit in her novels. Actors, their art and
way of life have fared notoriously badly in fiction. Such pict