settled definitely in one way or another.

In _L'Education Sentimentale, roman d'un jeune homme_, published in
1869, Flaubert returns momentarily to the style which brought him such
rapid and deserved celebrity. In 1877 appeared _Trois Contes_, three
short stories written in the impersonal style of _Salammbo_, contrasting
strangely with _La Legende de Saint Julien l'Hospitalier_ and
_Herodias_, wherein Flaubert shows himself supreme in the art of
word-painting.

Death came to him on May 8, 1880, as he was writing the last chapters of
a new work, _Bouvard et Pecuchet_, which was published in part after he
died and later appeared in book form (1881).

At the age of twenty-five, Flaubert met the only woman who in any way
entered his sentimental life. She was an author, the wife of Lucien
Colet, and the "Madame X" of the Correspondence. Their friendship lasted
eight years and ended unpleasantly, Flaubert being too absorbed by his
worship for art to let passion sway him.

He remained unmarried because his love for his mother and family made
calls upon him that he would not neglect. He was indifferent to women,
treated them with paternal indulgence, and often avowed that "woman is
the undoing of the just." Yet a warm friendship existed between him and
George Sand, and many of his letters are addressed to her, touching upon
various questions in art, literature, and politics.

The misanthropy which haunted Flaubert, of which so much has been said,
was not innate, but was acquired through the constant contemplation of
human folly. It was natural for him to be cheerful and kind-hearted,
and of his generosity and disinterestedness not enough can be said. At
the close of his life financial difficulties assailed him, for he had
given a great part of his fortune to the support of a niece, restricting
his own expenses and living as modestly as possible. In 1879, M. Jules
Ferry, then Minister of Public Instruction, offered him a place in the
Bibliotheque Mazarine, but the appointment was not confirmed.

Flaubert's method of production was slow and laborious. Sometimes weeks
were required to write a few pages, for he accumulated masses of notes
and, it must be said, so much erudition as at times to impede action. He
thought no toil too great, did it but aid him in his pursuit of literary
perfection, and when the work that called for such expenditure of
strength and thought was finished, he looked for no reward save that of
a satis