Into the gulf which opened between them she cast her immaturity, her tirades, her faults of taste, her man's clothes, and thenceforward was altogether feminine, altogether natural. Into the same gulf he cast his Don Juan costume, his bravado, his admiration for Rolla, his boyish insolence, and thenceforward was the man, the emancipated intellectual force. X ALFRED DE MUSSET Alfred de Musset lived to be forty-seven, but all his works, except three charming little plays and a few poems, were written before he was thirty. The whole series of remarkable and admirable productions was given to the world during the six years following on his rupture with George Sand. Although she had deceived him, his inclination to dwell upon deceit and treachery becomes ever slighter; and along with it he loses his affectation of world-weariness. In his works, even in his choice of subjects, we can trace the author's personal struggle to throw off his mask of vice and to free himself from the attraction vice has for him. The first important work De Musset produced after his return from Italy was the drama _Lorenzaccio_, the idea of which he had conceived in Florence. Lorenzo de Medici is cousin to Alexander de Medici, the bestially cruel and sensual Duke of Florence. By nature Lorenzo is a pure, high-strung, energetic character. He early determines, taking Brutus as his model, to rid the world of a tyrant. To attain his aim he plays the part of a heartless libertine, becomes Alexander's follower, tool, counsellor, and pander. As Hamlet assumed madness, Lorenzo assumes the mask of a weak, cowardly sensualism, in order to allay suspicion and secure his victim. But the disguise under which he conceals his real nature adheres to him like a Nessus garment; he gradually becomes nearly everything that he only desired to appear; against his will he inhales and absorbs the corruption with which he himself has assisted to impregnate the atmosphere of the court and capital; when he reflects on his life he loathes himself. And yet he is misunderstood; for through all the wickedness and the feigned, sickly cowardice, he is pursuing his plan of murdering Alexander at the right moment and re-establishing the Republic.