Changes
likewise were to be effected in the courtyard, to which the pillars of
the chapel nave had been removed; and a statue of the late owner was
to be erected there, close to a tree, the seed of which had been
planted on the occasion of his marriage. The facade of the house on
the Rue Fortunee, now the Rue Balzac, was also to be embellished, and
the central pavilion made to represent the novelist's apotheosis, with
a monumental bass-relief and a niche. Only a small portion of these
alterations was completed. On Madame de Balzac's death, in 1882, the
property was bought by the Baroness Salomon de Rothschild; and, before
the end of the century, it was demolished and the ground it covered
was incorporated into the Baroness's own gardens. All that now marks
the site is the small dome forming the corner of the Rue Balzac and
the Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honore.
Whatever menaces of rupture between the lovers may have darkened their
horizon in the spring and summer of 1847 had vanished before the
autumn. At the end of September, Balzac went by invitation to
Wierzchownia, and remained its guest for over four months. The sight
of Russia's huge oak forests, of which the Mniszech family possessed
some twenty thousand acres, suggested to him another of the grandiose
schemes for gaining a large fortune that he was for ever elaborating
in his brain.
Pages:
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375