those joys which a sad mother refused to the Eugenie of these
pages. If Frenchmen are accused of bring frivolous and inconstant,
I, you see, am Italian in my faithfulness and attachments. How
often, as I write the name of Eugenie, have my thoughts carried me
back to the cool stuccoed drawing-room and little garden of the
_Viccolo dei Capuccini_, which used to resound to the dear child's
merry laughter, to our quarrels, and our stories. You have left
the _Corso_ for the _Tre Monasteri_, where I know nothing of your
manner of life, and I am forced to picture you, no longer amongst
the pretty things, which doubtless still surround you, but like
one of the beautiful heads of Raffaelle, Titian, Correggio or
Allori which, in their remoteness, seem to us like abstractions.
If this book succeeds in making its way across the Alps, it will
prove to you the lively gratitude and respectful friendship of
your humble servant,

"DE BALZAC."


LA PRINCESSE BAGRATION--LA COMTESSE BOSSI--MADAME KISSELEFF
--LA PRINCESSE DE SCHONBURG--MADAME JAROSLAS POTOCKA
--LA BARONNE DE PFAFFINS--LA COMTESSE DELPHINE POTOCKA

Several women whom Balzac knew, but who apparently had no special
influence over his life, are mentioned here; he evidently did not care
enough for them or did not know them well enough to include their
names in the dedicatory register of the _Comedie humaine_. This,
however, by no means exhausts the list of his acquaintances among
women. Many of them he had met through his intimacy with his "Polar
Star"; he was indeed so popular that he once exclaimed to her that he