Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/530

510 fTAngibauU (1845) are echoes of the socialism of Pierre Leroux. She threw herself heart and soul into the re publican struggle of 1848, composed manifestoes for her friends, addressed letters to the people, and even started a newspaper. But her political ardour was short-lived ; she cared little about forms of government, and, when the days of June dashed to the ground her hopes of social regenera tion, she quitted once for all the field of politics and returned to her quiet country ways and her true vocation as an interpreter of nature, a spiritualizer of the commonest sights of earth and the homeliest household affections. In 1849 she writes from Berri to a political friend, &quot; You thought that I was drinking blood from the skulls of aristocrats. No, I am studying Virgil and learning Latin ! &quot; To a youth of storm and stress succeeded an old age so calm and happy that it has no history. For more than a quarter of a century she continued year by year to gladden the Avorld by some new creation, and the last of her works, the posthumous Contes d line Grand mcre, is as fresh and vigorous and far more beautiful than Indiana. Only once was the serenity of her life troubled. The Journal of a Traveller during the War will be quoted by future historians not only as a record of that agonizing crisis through which the French nation passed, but also as a prophecy of its recovery, which, by the indomitable spirit it expressed, brought its own fulfilment. In writing the life of Madame Dudevant we have glanced at some of the most important of her works. To chronicle the titles only of all her novels would require an Homeric catalogue. It is only possible to give a general estimate of her style and of her place in French literature. But first we must call attention to her latest group of novels, which we omitted in the life as deserving a separate notice. With Jeanne (1852) began that series of pastorals, or stories of village life, by which George Sand is best known to the English public, and by which, we believe, she will be longest remembered. JSTo description is needed of works so weil known as La petite Fadette, La mare au diable, Les Maitres Sonneurs, Le meunier d Angibaidt, Nanon, and Francois le Champi. With these may be classed the fairy- stories which she wrote for her grandchildren in the last years of her life, Le geant Yeous, La reine Coax, Le nuage rose, Les ailes de courage. They are too recent to be much known in England, but we may safely predict that they will be as familiar to our grandchildren as La petite Fadette is to us. Without attempting to analyze, we may shortly indi cate the peculiar charm and originality of her idyllic novels. 1. Like Wordsworth, with the inward eye she sees into the life of things ; she seizes with her pencil the visionary gleam ; she shows the mystical influences which emanate from the world of sense, the witchery of the sky, the quiet soul of the river, the beauty born of murmuring sound, the grey landes stretching far away to the blue horizon, the deep-meadowed champaigns with orchard lawns and bowery hollows. 2. Like Wordsworth, too, she had found love in huts where poor men dwell, and like him she is &quot; a leader in that greatest movement of modern times, care for our humbler brethren, her part being to make us reverence them for what they are, what they have in common with us, or in greater measure than ourselves.&quot; 3. To interpret for her readers these pictures of primitive life she has invented a style of her own, not that, like Fontenelle, she makes her shepherds talk the language of the court, but she expresses the feelings of peasants in words so simple that a peasant might have used them, and yet so pure that they would pass muster with the Academic. Like Courier she is archaic, but her archaisms are not extracted from books, but relics of classical French which still lingered on in the quiet nooks of central France. In conclusion, a few words must be said of her style, though much of its delicate harmony must elude a foreign critic, for it is by her style that she will chiefly live. It is simple and unaffected, yet full of subtle turns and pictur esque expressions. Her dialogue is sparkling, her narrative clear and flowing, her descriptions exact, and her eloquence grandiose yet never meretricious. Topin is reminded of &quot; the language of Eousseau, with something more of ease and finesse, the grace of Bernadin St Pierre, without his over-refinement, the warmth and eloquence of our greatest orators, and that without effort or straining.&quot; Nisard pronounces George Sand the master of French prose writers. To Thackeray her diction recalled the sound of country bells falling sweetly and sadly on the ear; it stirred the nerves of Mill like a symphony of Haydn or Mozart. One of the greatest of English novelists seems by the name she has adopted to provoke comparison with George Sand. In psychological analysis and insight into the problems of modern life, she is at least her equal ; in her range of knowledge, in self-control, and in practical common sense she is greatly her superior; but in unity of design, in harmony of treatment, in that purity and simplicity of language so felicitous and yet so unstudied, in all those qualities which make the best of George Sand s novels master pieces of art, she is as much her inferior. George Eliot is a great moralist, a great teacher; George Sand, whatever we may think of her doctrine and her morality, is by universal consent a supreme artist. She has stayed in many camps, and lent her pen to many causes, she has had many friends and many lovers, but to one cause only has she remained constant the cause of human progress ; and the only master in whose service she has never wearied is art.  DUDLEY, a parliamentary and municipal borough of England, in a detached portion of the county of Worcester shire surrounded by the county of Stafford, It lies in the centre of the &quot; Black Country,&quot; about eight miles W.N.W. of Birmingham, at a junction on the Great Western railway. The town is generally well-built, its streets are well-paved, and there is a fair supply of water. The principal buildings are the parish church of St Thomas, rebuilt in 1819 at a cost of .23,000, and restored in 1862; several other chupches, of which the most recent is St Luke s, erected in 1876 ; the town-hall, the county court, the Guest hospital (formerly the blind asylum), endowed (1868) by Joseph Guest,. with a legacy of 20,000 (1861), the school of art, the new dispensary (1868), and the mechanics institute (1861). Among the educational establishments, are a free grammar-school, a subscription library, and a geological society with a small scientific museum. On a hill to the north are the extensive remains of an ancient castle, sur rounded by beautiful grounds ; and in the market-place stands a fountain, erected by the earl of Dudley at a cost of 3000, on the occasion of his marriage. The presence of coal, iron-ore, and limestone gives its peculiar character to the industries of the place, According to the census of 1871, 5442 men were engaged in the iron manu facture, 1040 as makers of engines or machines, and 3501 in the coal-mines ; while the nail manufacture alone gave employment to 1267 males and 3019 females. Among the various articles produced are fire-irons, stoves, shovels, edge tools, chains, anchors, and especially anvils and vices. The glass-works, brass foundries, and brickworks are also of importance ; and tanning, brewing, and malting are exten sively carried on. The parliamentary borough has an area of 7715 acres, and returns one member to Parliament. In 1871 the population of the municipal borough, which has an area of 3680 acres, was 43,782; that of the parlia mentary borough, was 82,249.