_The Legend of the Centuries_ gave that epic fragment which is a picture
of history. His was one of the most powerful imaginations that the world
has ever seen, as well as a _creator of style_, who made a style for
himself all in vision and colour, and also in melody and orchestration.
Although in prose he lacked one part of his resources, he utilised
the rest magnificently, and _Notre Dame_ and _The Miserable_ are works
which excite admiration, at least in parts. Later, he will be dealt with
as a dramatist.

ALFRED DE VIGNY.--Alfred de Vigny was the most philosophical of these
three great poets, though inferior to the other two in creative
imaginativeness. He meditated deeply on the existence of evil on earth,
on the misfortunes of man, and the sadness of life, and his most
despairing songs, which were also his most beautiful, left a profound
echo in the hearts of his contemporaries. Some of his poems, such as
_The Bottle in the Sea_, _The Shepherd's House_, _The Fury of Samson_,
are among the finest works of French literature.

MUSSET; THEOPHILE GAUTIER.--The second generation of romanticism, which
appeared about 1830, possessed Alfred de Musset and Theophile Gautier as
chief representatives. They bore little mutual resemblance, be it said,
the former only knowing how to sing about himself, his pleasures, his
illusions, his angers, and, above all, his sorrows, always with sincerity
and in accents that invariably charmed and sometimes lacerated; the
latter, supremely artist, always seeking the fair exterior and delighting
in reproducing it as though he were a painter, a sculptor, or a musician,
and excellent and dexterous in these "transpositions of art," whether
they were in verse or prose.

THE PROSE WRITERS: CHATEAUBRIAND.--The French prose writers of this first