opportunities for observing were less limited than those of the physician, had the same presentiment.  After a long and anxious struggle she decided to disregard the strongly-urged advice of the physician and to obey the voice that said to her, even in her sleep:  “Bleeding will kill him; but if you save him from it, he will not die,” She was persuaded that this voice was the voice of Providence, and that by obeying it she saved her friend’s life.  What Chopin stood most in need of in his weakness and languor was a strengthening diet, and that, unfortunately, was impossible to procure:—­

What would I not have given to have had some beef-tea and a glass of Bordeaux wine to offer to our invalid every day!  The Majorcan food, and especially the manner in which it was prepared when we were not there with eye and hand, caused him an invincible disgust.  Shall I tell you how well founded this disgust was?  One day when a lean chicken was put on the table we saw jumping on its steaming back enormous Mattres Floh, [footnote:  Anglice “fleas.”] of which Hoffmann would have made as many evil spirits, but which he certainly would not have eaten in gravy.  My children laughed so heartily that they nearly fell under the table.

Chopin’s most ardent wish was to get away from Majorca and back to France.  But for some time he was too weak to travel, and when he had got a little stronger, contrary winds prevented the steamer from leaving the port.  The following words of George Sand depict vividly our poor Carthusian friends’ situation in all its gloom:—­

As the winter advanced, sadness more and more paralysed my efforts at gaiety and cheerfulness.  The state of our invalid grew always worse; the wind wailed in the ravines, the rain beat against our windows, the voice of the thunder penetrated through our thick walls and mingled its mournful sounds with the laughter and sports of the children.  The eagles and vultures, emboldened by the fog, came to devour our poor sparrows, even on the pomegranate tree which shaded my window.  The raging sea kept the ships in the harbours; we felt ourselves prisoners, far from all enlightened help and from all efficacious sympathy.  Death seemed to hover over our heads to seize one of us, and we were alone in contending with him for his prey.

If George Sand’s serenity and gaiety succumbed to these influences, we may easily imagine how much more they oppressed Chopin, of whom she tells us that—­

the mournful cry of the famished eagle and the gloomy desolation of the yew trees covered with snow saddened him much longer and more keenly than the perfume of the orange trees, the gracefulness of the vines, and the Moorish song of the labourers gladdened him.

The above-quoted letters have already given us some hints of how the prisoners of Valdemosa passed their time.  In the morning there were first the day’s provisions to be procured and the rooms to be tidied—­which