r names." Although Balzac hoped at one time to have
_Les petits Bourgeois_ completed by July 1844, it was left
unfinished at his death, and was completed and published in 1855.

During the winter of 1844, Madame Hanska wrote a story and then threw
it into the fire. In doing this she carried out a suggestion given her
by Balzac several years before, when he wrote her that he liked to
have a woman write and study, but she should have the courage to burn
her productions. She told the novelist what she had done, and he
requested her to rewrite her study and send it to him, and he would
correct it and publish it under his name. In this way she could enjoy
all the pleasure of authorship in reading what he would preserve of
her beautiful and charming prose. In the first place, she must paint a
provincial family, and place the romantic, enthusiastic young girl in
the midst of the vulgarities of such an existence; and then, by
correspondence, _make a transit_ to the description of a poet in
Paris. A friend of the poet, who is to continue the correspondence,
must be a man of decided talent, and the _denouement_ must be in his
favor against the great poet. Also the manias and the asperities of a
great soul which alarm and rebuff inferior souls should be shown; in
doing this she would aid him in earning a few thousand francs.

Her story, in the hands of this great wizard, grew like a mushroom,
without pain or effort, and soon developed into the romantic novel,
_Modeste Mignon_. She had thrown her story into the fire, but the fire
had returned it to him and given him power, as did the coal of fire on
the lips of the great prophet, and he wished to give all the glory to
his adored collaborator.

When reading this book, Madame Hanska objected to Balzac's having made
the father of the heroine scold her for beginning a secret
correspondence with an author, feeling that Balzac was disapproving of
her conduct in writing to him first, but Balzac assured her that such
was not his intention, and that he considered this _demarche_ of hers
as _royale and reginale_. Another trait, which she probably did not
recognize, was that just as the great poet Canalis was at first
indifferent to the letters of the heroine, and allowed Ernest de la
Briere to answer them, so was Balzac rather indifferent to hers, and
Madame Carraud--as already stated--is supposed to have replied to one
of them.

There is no doubt that Balzac had his _Louloup_ in