THE COLLECTION OF ANTIQUITIES

BY

HONORE DE BALZAC


Translated
By
Ellen Marriage



DEDICATION

To Baron Von Hammer-Purgstall, Member of the Aulic Council, Author
of the History of the Ottoman Empire.

Dear Baron,--You have taken so warm an interest in my long, vast
"History of French Manners in the Nineteenth Century," you have
given me so much encouragement to persevere with my work, that you
have given me a right to associate your name with some portion of
it. Are you not one of the most important representatives of
conscientious, studious Germany? Will not your approval win for me
the approval of others, and protect this attempt of mine? So proud
am I to have gained your good opinion, that I have striven to
deserve it by continuing my labors with the unflagging courage
characteristic of your methods of study, and of that exhaustive
research among documents without which you could never have given
your monumental work to the world of letters. Your sympathy with