s only
a catchpenny exemplar and very far from the best) into a seriously
organized work. Chance was kind or intention was wise in not allowing
him to do so; but the value of the things for the critical reader is
not less. Here are tales--extensions of the scheme and manner of the
_Oeuvres de Jeunesse_, or attempts at the _goguenard_ story of 1830--a
thing for which Balzac's hand was hardly light enough. Here are
interesting evidences of striving to be cosmopolitan and polyglot--the
most interesting of all of which, I think, is the mention of certain
British products as "mufflings." "Muffling" used to be a domestic joke
for "muffin;" but whether some wicked Briton deluded Balzac into the
idea that it was the proper form or not it is impossible to say. Here
is a _Traite de la Vie Elegante_, inestimable for certain critical
purposes. So early as 1825 we find a _Code des Gens Honnetes_, which
exhibits at once the author's legal studies and his constant attraction
for the shady side of business, and which contains a scheme for
defrauding by means of lead pencils, actually carried out (if we may
believe his exulting note) by some literary swindlers with unhappy
results. A year later he wrote a _Dictionnaire des Enseignes de
Paris_, which we are glad enough to have from the author of the
_Chat-que-Pelote_; but the persistence with which this kind of
miscellaneous writing occupied him could not be better exemplified than
by the fact that, of two important works which closely follow this in
the collected edition, the _Physiologie de l'Employe_ dates from 1841
and the _Monographie de la Presse Parisienne_ from 1843.

It is well known that from the time almost of his success as a novelist
he was given, like too many successful novelists (_not_ like Scott), to
rather undignified and foolish attacks on critics. The explanation may
or may not be found in the fact that we have abundant critical work of
his, and that it is nearly all bad. Now and then we have an acute remark
in his own special sphere; but as a rule he cannot be complimented on
these performances, and when he was half-way through his career this
critical tendency of his culminated in the unlucky _Revue Parisienne_,
which he wrote almost entirely himself, with slight assistance from his
friends, MM. de Belloy and de Grammont. It covers a wide range, but
the literary part of it is considerable, and this part contains that
memorable and disastrous attack on Sainte-Beuve,