Her fine eyebrows and these great placid eyes
gave her an air of strength and dignity which was not borne
out by the lower part of her face. Her nose was rather thick
and not over shapely. Her mouth was also rather coarse and her
chin small. She spoke with great simplicity, and her manners
were very quiet.
But she attracted with imperious power all that she met. Liszt
felt this attraction at one time--and it is whispered that Chopin
was jealous of him. Pouf! the woman who could conquer Franz Liszt
in his youth must have been a sorceress. He, too, was versatile.
In 1838, Sand's boy Maurice being ill, she proposed a visit to
Majorca. Chopin went with the party in November and full accounts
of the Mediterranean trip, Chopin's illness, the bad weather,
discomforts and all the rest may be found in the "Histoire de Ma
Vie" by Sand. It was a time of torment. "Chopin is a detestable
invalid," said Sand, and so they returned to Nohant in June 1839.
They saw Genoa for a few days in May, but that is as far as
Chopin ever penetrated into the promised land--Italy, at one time
a passion with him.
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