“Silk and pearls!” she exclaims; “oh, how heavy they are, but I am sure that they are very fine.  Lace, too, and silver; oh, such a quantity of silver.  How rich and fine and happy I shall be.  And then Fulgence is so fond of me.” (She gets sadder and sadder.) “And father is so pleased.  How strange.  I feel stifled.” (She sits down in Antoine’s chair.) “Is this joy? . . .  I feel . . .  Ah, it hurts to be as happy as this. . . .”  She bursts into tears.  This suppressed emotion to which she finally gives vent, and this forced smile which ends in sobs are very effective on the stage.  The question is, how can Victorine’s tears be dried?  She wants to marry young Vanderke, the son of her father’s employer, instead of the clerk.  The only thing is, then, to arrange this marriage.

“Is it a crime, then, for my brother to love Victorine?” asks Sophie, “and is it mad of me to think that you will give your consent?”

“My dear Sophie,” replies Monsieur Vanderke, “there are no unequal marriages in the sight of God.  A servitor like Antoine is a friend, and I have always brought you up to consider Victorine as your companion and equal.”

This is the way the father of the family speaks.  Personally, I consider him rather imprudent.

As this play is already a sequel to another one, I do not wish to propose a sequel to Le Mariage de Victorine, but I cannot help wondering what will happen when Vanderke’s son finds himself the son-in-law of an old servant-man, and also what will occur if he should take his wife to call on some of his sister’s friends.  It seems to me that he would then find out he had, made a mistake.  Among the various personages, only one appears to me quite worthy of interest, and that is poor Fulgence, who was so straightforward and honest, and who is treated so badly.

But how deep Victorine was!  Even if we admit that she did not deliberately scheme and plot to get herself married by the son of the family, she did instinctively all that had to be done for that.  She was very deep in an innocent way, and I have come to the conclusion that such deepness is the most to be feared.

I see quite well all that is lacking in these pieces, and that they are not very great, but all the same they form a “theatre” apart.  There is unity in this theatrical work of George Sand.  Whether it makes a hero of the natural son, rehabilitates the seduced girl, or cries down the idea of mesalliances, it is always the same fight in which it is engaged; it is always fighting against the same enemies, prejudice and narrow-mindedness.  On the stage, we call every opinion contrary to our own prejudice or narrow-mindedness.  The theatre lives by fighting.  It matters little what the author is attacking.  He may wage war with principles, prejudices, giants, or windmills.  Provided that there be a battle, there will be a theatre for it.