with an intention of permanent absence, but with the intention of a
periodical return thither. In time, however, her presence there became
unwelcome, and she found those arrangements of which, as she says, she
had no right to complain, but which she could not recognize. Friends
intervened, advising an effectual reintegration of the broken marriage;
but against this, she says, her conscience, no less than her heart,
rebelled. There existed, indeed, no virtual bond between herself and
her late husband. Whatever may have been the beginning of their
estrangement, it seems certain that he acquiesced in her independence
with easy satisfaction. He wrote to her,--"I shall not put up at your
lodgings when I come to Paris, because I wish as little to be in your
way as I wish to have you in mine." At the same time, by visiting
her there, and appearing with her in public, he had given a certain
recognition to her position. There was, therefore, no room for penitence
on the one side, for forgiveness on the other, and, through these, for
a renewable moral relation between the two. The law took cognizance of
these facts, when, some years later, M. Dudevant brought an action
for civil divorce, wishing to recover possession of his children. His
complicity in what had taken place, and the amicable nature of the
separation, were so fully established, that the court, recognizing in
the parties neither husband nor wife, followed the pleadings of Nature,
and bestowed the children where, in the present instance, they were
likely to find the warmest cherishing. Under this decision, she gave
up the estate of Nohant to M. Dudevant, who, becoming weary of its
management, returned it to her, by a later compromise, in exchange for
other property, and the home of her childhood now shelters her declining
years.

For the history draws near its close; more travels, more novels, more
successes, more sorrows, much fond talk of her friends, many of whom