of manner is much more her characteristic than animation is--only, under all the quietness, and perhaps by means of it, you are aware of an intense burning soul. She kissed me again when we went away. . . .' 'April 7.--George Sand we came to know a great deal more of. I think Robert saw her six times. Once he met her near the Tuileries, offered her his arm and walked with her the whole length of the gardens. She was not on that occasion looking as well as usual, being a little too much "endimanchee" in terrestrial lavenders and super-celestial blues--not, in fact, dressed with the remarkable taste which he has seen in her at other times. Her usual costume is both pretty and quiet, and the fashionable waistcoat and jacket (which are respectable in all the "Ladies' Companions" of the day) make the only approach to masculine wearings to be observed in her. 'She has great nicety and refinement in her personal ways, I think--and the cigarette is really a feminine weapon if properly understood. 'Ah! but I didn't see her smoke. I was unfortunate. I could only go with Robert three times to her house, and once she was out. He was really very good and kind to let me go at all after he found the sort of society rampant around her. He didn't like it extremely, but being the prince of husbands, he was lenient to my desires, and yielded the point. She seems to live in the abomination of desolation, as far as regards society--crowds of ill-bred men who adore her, 'a genoux bas', betwixt a puff of smoke and an ejection of saliva--society of the ragged red, diluted with the low theatrical. She herself so different, so apart, so alone in her melancholy disdain. I was deeply interested in that poor woman. I felt a profound compassion for her. I did not mind much even the Greek, in Greek costume, who 'tutoyed' her, and kissed her I believe, so Robert said--or the other vulgar man of the theatre, who went down on his knees and called her "sublime". "Caprice d'amitie," said she with her quiet, gentle scorn. A noble woman under the mud, be certain. _I_ would kneel down to her, too, if she would leave it all, throw it off, and be herself as God made her. But she would not care for my kneeling--she does not care for me. Perhaps she doesn't care much for anybody by this time, who knows? She wrote one or two or three kind notes to me, and promised to 'venir m'embrasser' before she left Paris, but she did not come. We both tried hard to please her, and she told a friend of ours that she "liked us". Only we always felt that we couldn't penetrate--couldn't really _touch_ her--it was all vain.