Felicite, like other women, was induced to
believe that beauty of body was that of soul. She fell in love with a
face, and learned, to her cost, the folly of a man of gallantry, who
saw nothing in her but a mere woman. It was some time before she
recovered from the disgust she felt at this episode. Her distress was
perceived by a friend, a man, who consoled her without personal
after-thought, or, at any rate, he concealed any such motive if he had
it. In him Felicite believed she found the heart and mind which were
lacking to her former lover. He did, in truth, possess one of the most
original minds of our age. He, too, wrote under a pseudonym, and his
first publications were those of an adorer of Italy. Travel was the
one form of education which Felicite lacked. A man of genius, a poet
and a critic, he took Felicite to Italy in order to make known to her
that country of all Art. This celebrated man, who is nameless, may be
regarded as the master and maker of "Camille Maupin." He bought into
order and shape the vast amount of knowledge already acquired by
Felicite; increased it by study of the masterpieces with which Italy
teems; gave her the frankness, freedom, and grace, epigrammatic, and
intense, which is the character of his own talent (always rather
fanciful as to form) which Camille Maupin modified by delicacy of
sentiment and the softer terms of thought that are natural to a woman.
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