phase was quickly over, the horses were sold, and Balzac appeared no
more in the box reserved for dandies at the Opera. Of the fashionable
outfit, the only property left was the microscopic groom--an orphan,
of whom Balzac took the greatest care, and whom he visited daily
during the boy's last illness, a year or two after. Thenceforward he
reverted to his usual indifference about appearances, his only vanity
being the spotless cleanliness of his working costume--a loose
dressing-gown of white flannel or cashmere, made like the habit of a
Benedictine monk, which was kept in round the waist by a silk girdle,
and was always scrupulously guarded from ink-stains.

Naive as a child, anxious for sympathy, frankly delighted with his own
masterpieces, yet modest in a fashion peculiar to himself, Balzac gave
a dominant impression of kindliness and bonhomie, which overshadowed
even the idea of intellect. To his friends he is not in the first
place the author of the "Comedie Humaine," designed, as George Sand
rather grandiloquently puts it, to be "an almost universal examination
of the ideas, sentiments, customs, habits, legislation, arts, trades,
costumes, localities--in short, of all that constitutes the lives of
his contemporaries"[*]--that claim to notice recedes into the
background, and what is seen clearly is the _bon camarade_, with his
great hearty laugh, his jollity, his flow of language, and his jokes,
often Rabelaisian in flavour. Of course there was another side to the
picture, and there were times in his hardset and harassing life when
even _his_ vivacity failed him. These moods were, however, never
apparent in society; and even to his intimate men friends, such as
Theophile Gautier and Leon Gozlan, Balzac was always the delightful,
whimsical companion, to be thought of and written of afterwards with
an amused, though affectionate smile. Only to women, his principal
confidantes, who played as important a part in his life as they do in