for, that one consolation surely remained. He would ask the doctor,
would be content with no vague and soothing generalities, but would
insist on knowing the exact truth. It could not--ah, it could not be
as black as the nightmares of his imagination!

He approached the subject cautiously on the doctor's next visit.[*]
Perhaps, he said, he had after all never realised sufficiently the
acuteness of his malady. He certainly felt terribly ill, and knew that
he was losing ground; while, in spite of all his efforts, he was
unable to eat anything. His duty required that he should bequeath a
certain legacy to the public, and he had calculated carefully, and had
discovered that he would be able in six months to accomplish his task.
Could the doctor promise him that length of time? There was no answer
to this searching question, but a shake of the head from the pitying
doctor. "Ah," cried Balzac sorrowfully, "I see quite well that you
will not allow me six months. . . . Well, at any rate, you will at
least give me six weeks? . . . Six weeks with fever is an eternity.
Hours are like days . . . and then the nights are not lost." Again the
doctor shook his head, and Balzac once more lowered his claims for a
vestige of life. "I have courage to submit," he said proudly; "but six
days . . . you will certainly give me that? I shall then be able to
write down hasty plans that my friends may be able to finish, shall
tear up bad pages and improve good ones, and shall glance rapidly
through the fifty volumes I have already written. Human will can do
miracles." Balzac pleaded pathetically, almost as though he thought
his interlocutor could grant the boon of longer life if he willed to
do so. He had aged ten years since the beginning of the interview, and
he had now no voice left to speak, and the doctor hardly any voice for
answering. The latter managed, however, to tell his patient that
everything must be done to-day, because in all probability to-morrow
would not exist for him; and Balzac cried with horror, "I have then
only six hours!" fell back on his pillows, and spoke no more.

[*] The following account of Balzac's interview with his doctor is
taken from an article written by Arsene Houssaye in the _Figaro_
of August 20th, 1883. It is right to add that the Vicomte de
Spoelberch de Lovenjoul, the great authority on Balzac, throws
grave doubts on the accuracy of the story.

He died the next day, and Victor Hugo gives