her the
"strongest sentiment known, the affection of a woman for a woman, had
not the heroic constancy of the Church," and could not enter the room.
Religion alone, in the guise of a Sister of Mercy, watched over her.

CHAPTER X

1836

Balzac starts the _Chronique de Paris_--Balzac and Theophile
Gautier--Lawsuit with the _Revue de Paris_--Failure of the
_Chronique_--Strain and exhaustion--Balzac travels in Italy
--Madame Marbouty--Return to Paris--Death of Madame de Berny
--Balzac's grief and family anxieties--He is imprisoned for
refusal to serve in Garde Nationale--Werdet's failure--Balzac's
desperate pecuniary position and prodigies of work--Close of
the disastrous year 1836.

Balzac opened the first day of the year 1836 by becoming proprietor of
the _Chronique de Paris_, an obscure Legitimist publication, which had
been founded in 1834 by M. William Duckett. It started under Balzac's
management with a great flourish of trumpets, the Comte (afterwards
Marquis) de Belloy and the Comte de Gramont taking posts as his
sectaries; while Jules Sandeau, Emile Regnault, Gustave Planche,
Theophile Gautier, Charles de Bernard, and others, became his
collaborators. Balzac's special work was to provide a series of papers
on political questions, entitled "La France et l'Etranger," papers
which show his extraordinary versatility; and his helpers were to
provide novels and poems, satire, drama, and social criticism; so that
the scope of the periodical was a wide one.

At first, Balzac was most sanguine about the success of his new
enterprise, and was very active and enthusiastic in working for it. On
March 27th, he wrote to Madame Hanska about the embarrassment caused
him by his plate having been pawned during his unfortunate absence in
Vienna, nearly a year ago. It was worth five or six thousand francs,
and he required three thousand to redeem it. This sum he had never
been able to raise, while, to add to his difficulties, on the 31st of
the month he would owe about eight thousand four hundred francs.
Nevertheless, he _must_ have the silver next day or perish, as he had
asked some people to dine who would, he hoped, give sixteen thousand
francs for sixteen shares in the _Chronique_. If borrowed plate were
on his table he was terribly afraid that the whole transaction would
fail; as one of the people invited was a painter, and painters are an
"