[*] As to Octave Mirbeau’s calumnious story, denied by both the
    Countess Mniszech and Gigoux’s nephew and heir, the Princess
    Radziwill states that when Balzac died, her aunt did not know
    Gigoux and had never seen him.  He was introduced to her only in
    1860 by her daughter, who asked him to paint her mother’s
    portrait; and they became good friends.

The story is told that when Dr. Nacquart informed Balzac that he must die, the novelist exclaimed:  “Go call Bianchon!  Bianchon will save me!  Bianchon!” The Princess Radziwill states, however, that she has heard her aunt say often that this story is not true.  But were it true, Balzac’s condition was such that no physician could have saved him, even though possessing all the ability portrayed by the novelist in the notable and omnipresent Dr. Horace Bianchon, who had saved so many characters of the Comedie humaine, who had comforted in their dying hours all ranks from the poverty-stricken Pere Goriot to the wealthy Madame Graslin, from the corrupt Madame Marneffe to the angelic Pierette Lorrain, whose incomparable fame had spread over a large part of Europe.

Madame Hanska has been reproached also for the medical treatment given Balzac in Russia.  It is doubtless true that lemon juice is not considered the proper treatment for heart disease in this enlightened age, but seventy years ago, in the wilds of Russia, there was probably no better medical aid to be secured; and even if Dr. Knothe and his son were “charlatans,” it will be remembered that Balzac not only had a penchant for such, but that he was very fond of these two physicians and thought their treatment superior to that which was given at Paris.

M. de Fiennes complained that grass was allowed to grow on Balzac’s grave.  To this M. Eugene de Mirecourt replied that what M. de Fiennes had taken for grass was laurel, thyme, buckthorn and white jasmine; the grave of Balzac was constantly and religiously kept in good order by his widow.  One could ask any of the gardeners of Pere-Lachaise thereupon.

Whatever the attitude of Balzac’s wife towards him during his life, she acted most nobly indeed in the matter of his debts.  Instead of accepting the inheritance left her in her husband’s will and selling her rights in all his works, the beautiful etrangere accepted courageously the terrible burden left to her, and paid the novelist’s mother an annuity of three thousand francs until her death, which occurred March, 1854.  She succeeded in accomplishing this liquidation, which was of exceptional difficulty, and long before her death every one of Balzac’s creditors had been paid in full.

There seems to be no authoritative proof that Balzac’s married life was either happy or unhappy.  The Princess Radziwill always understood from her aunt that they were as happy as one could expect, considering that Balzac’s days were numbered.  The present writer is fain to say, with Mr. Edward King:  “He died happy, for he died in the full realization of a pure love which had upheld him through some of the bitterest trials that ever fall to the lot of man.”