I have often felt disposed to ask those who would assert Balzac's absolute infallibility as a gynaecologist to give me a reasoned criticism of the heroine of this novel. I do not en tirely figure to myself Dinah de la Baudraye. It is per fectly possible that she should have loved a sweep like Lousteau; there is certainly nothing extremely unusual in a woman loving worse sweeps even than he. But would she have done it, and having done it, have also done what she did afterwards? These questions may be answered differently; I do not answer them in the negative myself, but I cannot give them an affirmative answer with the conviction which I should like to show.