g but the plague, the gallows, the devil, childbeds, and the like.
Nor were the romances less extravagant than the dramas. The lyrical
poetry, too, had its defects and blemishes. But if it had laid itself
open to the blame of being "very unequal and very mixed," it also called
for the praise of being "rich, richer than any lyrical poetry France
had known up to that time." And if the romanticists, as one of them,
Sainte-Beuve, remarked, "abandoned themselves without control and
without restraint to all the instincts of their nature, and also to all
the pretensions of their pride, or even to the silly tricks of
their vanity," they had, nevertheless, the supreme merit of having
resuscitated what was extinct, and even of having created what never
existed in their language. Although a discussion of romanticism without
a characterisation of its specific and individual differences is
incomplete, I must bring this part of my remarks to a close with a few
names and dates illustrative of the literary aspect of Paris in 1831.
I may, however, inform the reader that the subject of romanticism will
give rise to further discussion in subsequent chapters.

The most notable literary events of the year 1831 were the publication
of Victor Hugo's "Notre Dame de Paris," "Feuilles d'automne," and
"Marion Delorme"; Dumas' "Charles VII"; Balzac's "La peau de chagrin";
Eugene Sue's "Ata Gull"; and George Sand's first novel, "Rose et
Blanche," written conjointly with Sandeau. Alfred de Musset and
Theophile Gautier made their literary debuts in 1830, the one with
"Contes d'Espagne et d'ltalie," the other with "Poesies." In the course
of the third decade of the century Lamartine had given to the world
"Meditations poetiques," "Nouvelles Meditations poetiques," and
"Harmonies poetiques et religieuses"; Victor Hugo, "Odes et Ballades,"
"Les Orientales," three novels, and the dramas "Cromwell" and "Hernani";
Dumas, "Henri III et sa Cour," and "Stockholm, Fontainebleau et Rome";
Alfred de Vigny, "Poemes antiques et modernes" and "Cinq-Mars"; Balzac,
"Scenes de la vie privee" and "Physiologie du Mariage." Besides the
authors just named there were at this time in full activity in one
or the other department of literature, Nodier, Beranger, Merimee,
Delavigne, Scribe, Sainte-Beuve, Villemain, Cousin, Michelet, Guizot,
Thiers, and many other men and women of distinction.

A glance at the Salon of 1831 will suffice to give us an idea of the
then state of