us put an
end to his troubles and hers. But such was not Balzac's inclination,
and he rightly considered himself the most deeply concerned in the
matter.

All the while he was prodigiously productive, but the profits from his
works were exceedingly small. This fact was due to his method of
composition, according to which some of his works were revised a dozen
times or more, and also to the Belgian piracies, from which all
popular French authors suffered. In addition to this, his extravagant
tastes developed from year to year, and thus prevented him from
materially reducing his debts.

Unlike most Frenchmen, Balzac was particularly fond of travel in
foreign countries, and when allured by the charms of a beautiful
woman, he forgot his financial obligations and allowed nothing to
prevent his responding to the call of the siren. Thus he was enticed
by the Marquise de Castries to go to Aix and from there to Geneva in
1832, and one year later he rushed to Neufchatel to meet Madame
Hanska, with whom he became so enamored that a few months afterwards
he spent several weeks with her at this same fatal city of Geneva
where the Marquise had all but broken his heart. In the spring of 1835
he followed a similar desire, this time going as far as the beautiful
city of the blue Danube.

The charms of his sirens were not enough, however, to keep so
indefatigable a writer from his work. He permitted himself to enjoy
social diversions for only a few hours daily and some of his most
delightful novels were written during these visits, where it seemed
that the very shadow of feminine presence gave him inspiration. It
should be added, too, that in the limited time given to society during
these journeys, he not only worshipped at the shrine of his particular
enchantress of the moment, but managed to meet many other women of
social prominence.

As his fame spread, his extravagance increased; with his famous cane,
he was seen frequently at the opera, at one time sharing a box with
the beautiful Olympe. But his business relations with his publisher,
Madame Bechet, which seemed to be promising at first, ended unhappily,
and the rapidly declining health of his _Dilecta_, Madame de Berny,
not to mention the failure of another publisher Werdet, which there is
not space here to recount, cast a gloom from time to time over his
optimistic spirit. He now became the proprietor of the _Chronique de
Paris_, but aside from the literary friendships invo