success which should put an end for ever to his
pecuniary embarrassments. References to projected plays, to the
difficulty he found in writing them, and to his hope of finally
freeing himself from debt by producing a masterpiece at the theatre,
occur constantly in his letters. "Marie Touchet" and "Philippe le
Reserve"--afterwards to become "Les Ressources de Quinola"--were the
names of some of the plays he intended to write. In February, 1837, as
we have already seen, he planned out "La Premiere Demoiselle," which
he abandoned for the time, but which he worked at with much energy
during his ill-fated expedition to Sardinia, and continued at Les
Jardies during the summer and autumn of 1838. Before starting for
Sardinia he wrote to Madame Carraud: "If I fail in what I undertake, I
shall throw myself with all my might into writing for the theatre." He
kept his word, and "La Premiere Demoiselle," a gloomy bourgeois
tragedy, which soon received the name of "L'Ecole des Menages," was
the result.

With the distrust in himself, which always in matters dramatic mingled
with his optimistic self-confidence, Balzac determined to have a
collaborator, and chose a young man named Lassailly, who was
peculiarly unfitted for the difficult post. In doing this he only gave
one instance out of many of the wide gulf which separated Balzac the
writer, gifted with the psychological powers which almost amounted to
second sight, and Balzac in ordinary life, many of whose misfortunes
had their origin in an apparent want of knowledge of human nature,
which caused him to make deplorable mistakes in choosing his
associates.

The agreement between Balzac and his collaborator stipulated that the
latter should be lodged and fed at the expense of Balzac, and should,
on his side, be always at hand to help his partner with dramatic
ideas. Balzac performed _his_ part of the treaty nobly, and Lassailly
remembered long afterwards the glories of the fare at Les Jardies; but
his life became a burden to him from his incapacity to do what was
expected of him, and he was nearly killed by Balzac's nocturnal
habits. He was permitted to go to bed when he liked; but at two or
three in the morning Balzac's peremptory bell would summon him to
work, and he would rise, frightened and half stupefied with sleep, to
find his employer waiting for him, stern and pale from his vigil.
"For," Leon Gozlan says, "the Balzac fighting with the demon of his
nightly work had nothi