“As to the missionary, he is a simple priest, who speaks without blushing of the Cross, of the blood of his Divine Master, of the corrupted flesh, etc.; in one word, he is really a priest. I am aware that it is difficult to depict such a character without awakening ideas of ridicule in the minds of certain readers. Where I do not draw a tear, I may raise a smile; that must depend upon individual sentiment.” “I must say a last word as to ‘Atala.’ The subject is not entirely of my invention. It is certain that there was a savage at the galleys and at the court of Louis XIV.; it is certain that a French missionary accomplished the facts I have related; it is certain that I saw savages in the American forests carrying away the bones of their forefathers, and a young mother exposing the body of her child upon the branches of a tree. Some other circumstances narrated are also veritable, but as they are not of general interest, it is needless for me to speak of them.” [From the Preface to “Alain” and “René” published in 1805. ] “I have been stopped in the corrections neither by the consideration of the cost of the book, nor by that of the length of the work. A few years have sufficed to make me acquainted with the weak or defective portions of that episode. Obedient upon this point to the critics, even so far as to reproach myself with an excess of docility, I have proved to those who attacked me that I never remain voluntarily in error, and that, at all times and upon all subjects, I am ready to give way to lights superior to my own. ‘Atala’ has been reprinted eleven times--five times separately and six times in the ‘Genius of Christianity.’ If those eleven editions were compared, scarcely two would be found to be altogether alike. “The twelfth, which I now publish, has been revised with the greatest care. I have consulted the friends prompt to censure me; I have weighed each phrase, examined every word. The style, freed from certain epithets which embarrassed it, proceeds perhaps more naturally and with greater simplicity. I have introduced more order and logic into certain ideas, and I have effaced even the slightest inaccuracies of language. M. de la Harpe observed to me, on the subject of ‘Atala,’ ‘If you will shut yourself up with me only for a few hours, that time will suffice for wiping out the spots that cause your critics to cry out so loudly.’ I have passed four years in the revision of this episode; but it is now as I intend it to remain. It is at present the only ‘Atala’ I shall ever in future acknowledge.” *****