During this week-end visit, Madame Dudevant related to Balzac the story of Liszt and Madame d’Agoult, which he reproduced in Beatrix, since in her position, she could not do so herself.  In the same book, George Sand is portrayed as Mademoiselle des Touches, with the complexion, pale olive by day, and white under artificial light, characteristic of Italian beauty.  The face, rather long than oval, resembles that of some beautiful Isis.  Her hair, black and thick, falls in plaited loops over her neck, like the head-dress with rigid double locks of the statues at Memphis, accentuating very finely the general severity of her features.  She has a full, broad forehead, bright with its smooth surface on which the light lingers, and molded like that of a hunting Diana; a powerful, wilful brow, calm and still.  The eyebrows, strongly arched, bend over the eyes in which the fire sparkles now and again like that of fixed stars.  The cheek-bones, though softly rounded, are more prominent than in most women, and confirm the impression of strength.  The nose, narrow and straight, has high-cut nostrils, and the mouth is arched at the corners.  Below the nose the lip is faintly shaded by a down that is wholly charming; nature would have blundered if she had not placed there that tender smoky tinge.

Balzac admitted that this was the portrait of Madame Dudevant, saying that he rarely portrayed his friends, exceptions being G. Planche in Claude Vignon, and George Sand in Camille Maupin (Mademoiselle des Touches), both with their consent.

Madame Dudevant was an excessive smoker, and during Balzac’s visit to her, she had him smoke a hooka and latakia which he enjoyed so much that he wrote to Madame Hanska, asking her to get him a hooka in Moscow, as he thought she lived near there, and it was there or in Constantinople that the best could be found; he wished her also, if she could find true latakia in Moscow, to send him five or six pounds, as opportunities were rare to get it from Constantinople.  Later, on his visit to Sardinia, he wrote her from Ajaccio:  “As for the latakia, I have just discovered (laugh at me for a whole year) that Latakia is a village of the island of Cyprus, a stone’s throw from here, where a superior tobacco is made, named from the place, and that I can get it here.  So mark out that item."[*]

[*] Lettres a l’Etrangere.  This contradicts the statement of S. de
    Lovenjoul, Bookman_, that Balzac had a horror of tobacco and is
    known to have smoked only once, when a cigar given him by Eugene
    Sue made him very ill.  He evidently had this excerpt of a letter
    in mind:  “I have never known what drunkenness was, except from a
    cigar which Eugene Sue made me smoke against my will, and it was
    that which enabled me to paint the drunkenness for which you blame
    me in the Voyage a Java.”  This visit to George Sand was made
    five years after this letter