intellect. In short, the German "Revival" was beginning, and Madame de Staël in bringing Auguste Schlegel to Switzerland had broken a large piece off the mountain of learning, like somebody in the fairy tale who carried away a slice from the Island of Jewels.
In October 1804 Madame de Staël started with Schlegel and her three children for Italy, and it is to this journey that the world owes Corinne. It is said that Schlegel first taught Madame de Staël to appreciate art—that is, painting, sculpture, and architecture. For music she had always had a passion, and both sang and played agreeably. But plastic beauty had as yet been a sealed book to her, and she had not even any great appreciation of scenery. A spontaneous feeling for all these she perhaps never acquired. Ste. Beuve, indeed, complains that the spot on Misenum where she places Corinne on one occasion, was the least picturesque of many beautiful points of view. Nevertheless, Italy revived her. She found hope and thought and voice anew beneath that magic sky. There was nothing but the still-abiding sense of loss to mar the pleasure of her visit. The diplomatic agents of Napoleon abstained from interference with her, and Joseph had given her letters introducing her to all the best society in Rome. Unlike her own Corinne, however, she found it very uninteresting, and wrote complainingly to Bonstetten that Humboldt was her most congenial companion. The Roman princes she found extremely dull, and preferred the cardinals, as being more cultivated, or more probably more men of the world. For the rest, she was received with the liveliest respect, and even enthusiasm; was made a member of the Arcadian Academy, and had endless
