ore air to breathe.
What is the use of wings if there is no air in which one can soar? I no
longer feel as if I belonged to the present generation. Yes, 1830 was a
glorious epoch, but I was too young by two or three years; I was not
carried away by the current; I was not ready for it. I ought to have
produced a very different sort of work."

There was then some talk of Flaubert, of his literary methods, of his
indefatigable patience, and of the seven years he devoted to a work of
four hundred pages. "Just listen," observed Gautier, "to what Flaubert
said to me the other day: 'It is finished. I have only ten more pages to
write; but the ends of my sentences are all in my head.' So that he
already hears in anticipation the music of the last words of his
sentences before the sentences themselves have been written. Was it not
a quaint expression to use? I believe he has devised a sort of literary
rhythm. For instance, a phrase which begins in slow measure must not
finish with a quick pace, unless some special effect is to be produced.
Sometimes the rhythm is only apparent to himself, and escapes our
notice. A story is not written for the purpose of being read aloud: yet
he shouts his to himself as he writes them. These shouts present to his
own ears harmonies, but his readers seem unaware of them."

Gautier's daughters have a charm of their own, a species of Oriental
languor, deep dreamy eyes, veiled by heavy eyelids, and a regularity in
their gestures and movements which they inherit from their father; but
this regularity is tempered in them by womanly grace. There is a charm
about them which is not all French; nevertheless there is a French
element about it, their little tomboyish tricks and expressions, their
habit of pouting, the shrugging of their shoulders, the irony which
escapes through the thin veil of childishness intended to conceal it.
All these points distinguish them from ordinary society girls, and make
clear a strong individuality of character which renders them fearless in
expressing their likings and antipathies. They display liberty of
speech, and have often the manner of a woman whose face is hidden by a
mask; and yet one finds here simplicity, candor, and a charming absence
of reserve, utterly unknown to the ordinary young girl.

* * * * *

November 23D [1863].--We have been to thank Michelet for the flattering
lines he wrote about us.

He lives in the Rue de l'Ouest,