was accommodating to the utmost degree. He seems to despise Lousteau,
but rather for his insouciance and neglect of his opportunities of
making himself a position than for anything else.

I have often felt disposed to ask those who would assert Balzac's
absolute infallibility as a gynaecologist to give me a reasoned
criticism of the heroine of this novel. I do not entirely "figure to
myself" Dinah de la Baudraye. It is perfectly possible that she should
have loved a "sweep" like Lousteau, there is certainly nothing
extremely unusual in a woman loving worse sweeps even than he. But
would she have done it, and having done it, have also done what she
did afterwards? These questions may be answered differently; I do not
answer them in the negative myself, but I cannot give them an
affirmative answer with the conviction which I should like to show.

Among the minor characters, the _substitut_ de Clagny has a touch of
nobility which contrasts happily enough with Lousteau's unworthiness.
Bianchon is as good as usual; Balzac always gives Bianchon a favorable
part. Madame Piedefer is one of the numerous instances in which the
unfortunate class of mothers-in-law atones for what are supposed to be
its crimes against the human race; and old La Baudraye, not so
hopelessly repulsive in a French as he would be in an English novel,
is a shrewd old rascal enough.

But I cannot think the scene of the Parisians _blaguing_ the
Sancerrois is a very happy one. That it is in exceedingly bad taste
might not matter so very much; Balzac would reply, and justly, that he
had not intended to represent it as anything else. That the fun is not
very funny may be a matter of definition and appreciation. But what
scarcely admits of denial or discussion is that it is tyrannously too