has no rage like love to hatred turned." Madame de Castries was the
daughter of the Duchesse (nee Fitz-James) and the Duc de Maille. She
did not become a duchess until in 1842, and bore the title of marquise
previous to that time. Separated from her husband as the result of a
famous love affair, the Marquise gathered round her a group of
intellectual people, among whom were the writers Balzac, Musset,
Sainte-Beuve, etc., and continued active in literary and artistic
circles until her death (1861).

On Balzac's return to Paris after a prolonged visit with his friends
at Sache during the month of September, 1831, he received an anonymous
letter, dated at Paris, a circumstance which was with him of rather
frequent occurrence, as with many men of letters.

This lady criticized the _Physiologie du Mariage_, to which Balzac
replies, defending his position:

"The _Physiologie du Mariage_, madame, was a work undertaken for
the purpose of defending the cause of women. I knew that if, with
the view of inculcating ideas favorable to their emancipation and
to a broad and thorough system of education for them, I had gone
to work in a blundering way, I should at best, have been regarded
as nothing more than an author of a theory more or less plausible.
I was therefore, obliged to clothe my ideas, to disguise them
under a new shape, in biting, incisive words that should lay hold
on the mind of my readers, awaken their attention and leave
behind, reflections upon which they might meditate. Thus then any
woman who has passed through the 'storms of life' would see that I
attribute the blame of all faults committed by the wives, entirely
to their husbands. It is, in fact, a plenary absolution. Besides