The Portland daily press., 1874-08-13
George Sand.

The Paris correspondent of the Arcadian
sends the following interesting souvenir of
one whom he considers to be the greatest of
living women. l saw George Sand to-day
She had evidently come in from the country
on business, and was going round to the vari-
Gus museums to while away time. / met
her in the saloons of the Louvre, and could
not help being struck by the change which
had come over her. You know not very long
since she was still beautiful, although she was
short, fat ond -~1---AAg--Ar h-:D- -fs.t,
squatty and very ugly-her features are SO
shockingly coarse, and even her once !ovcIy
eyes have lost their quondam briiliancy.
The expression of her countensnce is still
fine, but there is grief written On every line
of it, and what is still worse, tlat lndescrib-
able Je ne sdis quOi which irdicateS disap-
pointment. She seemed to ne to be looking
at the pictures as if she vas in kind of
dreamy, somnambuliStic state, as though her
eyes indeed saw them, but her thoughts were
far removed from all that surrounded Eer.
She went over the Louvre, thence to the
Alsace- Lorraine exhibition, and in the eve
ming she attended scientific lecture. So
learned by the papers. Not an hour OF her
time is ever wasted. She is up at 2o'clock,
and writes until l O'Clock; then she break
fasts, reads, drives, sees her friends and docs
all those things she has to do. Eleven O'Clock
beholds her in bed, and they tell me she falls
asleep as SOOn DIS ucT uettu tOltCucS luc plliOW'
To my mind she is the greatest female genius
that ever lived. l admire her grand powers,
but ellie m'est pas sympdthiQue. was once
| introduced to her, but although fascinated by
| her charming conversation, l was not as
| much pleased with her as expected TO be.
| Her manners are very quiet and unpretend-
| ing, but she has akind of searching, unsteady
| gaze, and sort of eager way of questioning
| you, as if she wished to force from you,
| against your will, the secrets of your heart
| which is very unpleasant, to say the least Of
! it. Her last novel, ''Ma Saur Jenne," is
| one of her best, so they say. have not read
| it, Some months ago she wrote some fairy
| tales in the Revue, which were absolutely
| charming. She is great naturalist. and
| keeps herbarium, in which she arranges
| flowers OF all kinds in a very scientific man
| ner. She is in correspondence with all the
| botanists of the world, and has published
| some works on this science which are worth
reading. Age and George Sand do not agree
| together. She knows she is getting old, and
| she hates death; she fears it. She believes
| firmly in the Immortality of the soul, and,
| after her fashion, is religious. Many times
during her queer career has she left the
world and gone back to her old convent.
| at Neuilly, the superior of which is still her
best Mend. "Ah! my FRIEND" said she once
to me, 'believe me, it is no happiness to pos
sess an imagination like my own-it is per-
feet curse, My greatest pleasure in life is to
stop thinking and rest my POOR brain, and
can rarely DO So" She is writing a book
now on that poor little wretched morsel of q
BILE book but, after all, only the narrative o
the lives of thousands of children, not royal
indeed but paupers, who were happiest un