during their extensive travels in 1846 that Balzac began
calling the party "Bilboquet's troup of mountebanks": Madame Hanska
became Atala; Anna, Zephirine; George, Gringalet; and Balzac,
Bilboquet. Although Madame Hanska cautioned him about his extravagance
in gathering works of art, he persisted in buying them while
traveling, so it became necessary to find a home in which to place his
collection. It is an interesting fact that while making this
collection, he was writing _Le Cousin Pons_, in which the hero has a
passion for accumulating rare paintings and curios with which he fills
his museum and impoverishes himself. Balzac had purposed calling this
book _Le Parasite_, but Madame Hanska objected to this name, which
smacked so strongly of the eighteenth century, and he changed it. As
he was also writing _La Cousine Bette_ at this time, we can see not
only that his power of application had returned to him, but that he
was producing some of his strongest work.

For some time Balzac had been looking for a home worthy of his
_fiancee_ and had finally decided on the Villa Beaujon, in the rue
Fortunee. Since this home was created "for her and by her," it was
necessary for her to be consulted in the reconstruction and decoration
of it, so he brought her secretly to Paris, and her daughter and
son-in-law returned to Wierzchownia. This was not only a long
separation for so devoted a mother and daughter, but there was some
danger lest her incognito be discovered; Balzac, accordingly, took
every precaution. It is easy to picture the extreme happiness of the
novelist in conducting his _Louloup_ over Paris, in having her near
him while he was writing some of his greatest masterpieces, and,
naturally, hoping that the everlasting debts would soon be defrayed
and the marriage ceremony performed, but fortunately, he was not
permitted to know beforehand of the long wait and the many obstacles
that stood in his way.

Just what happened during the spring and summer of 1847 is uncertain,
as few letters of this period exist in print. Miss Sandars (_Balzac_),
states that about the middle of April Balzac conducted Madame Hanska
to Forbach on her return to Wierzchownia, and when he returned to
Paris he found that some of her letters to him had been stolen, 30,000
francs being demanded for them at once, otherwise the letters to be
turned over to the Czar. Miss Sandars states also that this trouble
hastened the progress of his heart disease,