



Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny





THE MUSE OF THE DEPARTMENT


By Honore De Balzac



Translated by James Waring




                            DEDICATION

            To Monsieur le Comte Ferdinand de Gramont.

  MY DEAR FERDINAND,--If the chances of the world of literature
  --_habent sua fata libelli_--should allow these lines to be an
  enduring record, that will still be but a trifle in return for the
  trouble you have taken--you, the Hozier, the Cherin, the
  King-at-Arms of these Studies of Life; you, to whom the Navarreins,
  Cadignans, Langeais, Blamont-Chauvrys, Chaulieus, Arthez,
  Esgrignons, Mortsaufs, Valois--the hundred great names that form
  the Aristocracy of the "Human Comedy" owe their lordly mottoes and
  ingenious armorial bearings. Indeed, "the Armorial of the Etudes,
  devised by Ferdinand de Gramont, gentleman," is a complete