They mingled nursery-tales with myths that were
quite sensible, and the history of nations with children's stories. They
were called poets.

George Sand did not employ a versified form for her stories, but she
belonged to the family of these poets. She was a poet herself who had
lost her way and come into our century of prose, and she continued her
singing.

Like these early poets, she was primitive. Like them, she obeyed a god
within her. All her talent was instinctive, and she had all the ease
of instinctive talent. When Flaubert complained to George Sand of the
"tortures" that style cost him, she endeavoured to admire him.

"When I see the difficulty that my old friend has in writing his novel,
I am discouraged about my own case, and I say to myself that I am
writing poor sort of literature."

This was merely her charity, for she never understood that there could
be any effort in writing. Consequently she could not understand that it
should cause suffering. For her, writing was a pleasure, as it was the
satisfaction of a need. As her works were no effort to her, they left no
trace in her memory. She had not intended to write them, and, when once
written, she forgot them.

"_Consuelo and La Comtesse de Rudolstadt_, what are these books?" she
asks. "Did I write them? I do not remember a single word of them."

Her novels were like fruit, which, when ripe, fell away from her. George
Sand always returned to the celebration of certain great themes which
are the eternal subjects of all poetry, subjects such as love and
nature, and sentiments like enthusiasm and pity. The very language
completes the illusion. The choice of words was often far from perfect,
as George Sand's vocabulary was often uncertain, and her expression
lacked precision and relief. But she had the gift of imagery, and her
images were always delightfully fresh. She never lost that rare faculty
which she possessed of being surprised at things, so that she looked at
everything with youthful eyes. There is a certain movement which carries
the reader on, and a rhythm that is soothing. She develops the French
phrase slowly perhaps, but without any confusion. Her language is like
those rivers which flow along full and limpid, between flowery banks
and oases of verdure, rivers by the side of which the traveller loves to
linger and to lose himself in dreams.

The share which belongs to George Sand in the history of the French
novel is that of having impre