Cousin Betty | Page 3

statement. You may however, if you wish, distribute this etext in
machine readable binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
including any form resulting from conversion by word pro- cessing or
hypertext software, but only so long as *EITHER*:
[*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and does *not*
contain characters other than those intended by the author of the work,
although tilde (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may be used
to convey punctuation intended by the author, and additional characters
may be used to indicate hypertext links; OR
[*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at no expense into
plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent form by the program that displays
the etext (as is the case, for instance, with most word processors); OR
[*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at no additional
cost, fee or expense, a copy of the etext in its original plain ASCII form
(or in EBCDIC or other equivalent proprietary form).
[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this "Small
Print!" statement.
[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the net profits
you derive calculated using the method you already use to calculate
your applicable taxes. If you don't derive profits, no royalty is due.
Royalties are payable to "Project Gutenberg
Association/Carnegie-Mellon University" within the 60 days following
each date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) your annual
(or equivalent periodic) tax return.
WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU
DON'T HAVE TO?
The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, scanning
machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty free copyright
licenses, and every other sort of contribution you can think of. Money

should be paid to "Project Gutenberg Association / Carnegie-Mellon
University".
*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN
ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*

Etext prepared by Dagny, [email protected] and John Bickers,
[email protected]

Cousin Betty
by Honore de Balzac
Translated by James Waring

DEDICATION
To Don Michele Angelo Cajetani, Prince of Teano.
It is neither to the Roman Prince, nor to the representative of the
illustrious house of Cajetani, which has given more than one Pope to
the Christian Church, that I dedicate this short portion of a long history;
it is to the learned commentator of Dante.
It was you who led me to understand the marvelous framework of ideas
on which the great Italian poet built his poem, the only work which the
moderns can place by that of Homer. Till I heard you, the Divine
Comedy was to me a vast enigma to which none had found the
clue--the commentators least of all. Thus, to understand Dante is to be
as great as he; but every form of greatness is familiar to you.
A French savant could make a reputation, earn a professor's chair, and a
dozen decorations, by publishing in a dogmatic volume the improvised
lecture by which you lent enchantment to one of those evenings which
are rest after seeing Rome. You do not know, perhaps, that most of our
professors live on Germany, on England, on the East, or on the North,
as an insect lives on a tree; and, like the insect, become an integral part
of it, borrowing their merit from that of what they feed on. Now, Italy
hitherto has not yet been worked out in public lectures. No one will
ever give me credit for my literary honesty. Merely by plundering you I
might have been as learned as three Schlegels in one, whereas I mean
to remain a humble Doctor of the Faculty of Social Medicine, a

veterinary surgeon for incurable maladies. Were it only to lay a token
of gratitude at the feet of my cicerone, I would fain add your illustrious
name to those of Porcia, of San-Severino, of Pareto, of di Negro, and of
Belgiojoso, who will represent in this "Human Comedy" the close and
constant alliance between Italy and France, to which Bandello did
honor in the same way in the sixteenth century--Bandello, the bishop
and author of some strange tales indeed, who left us the splendid
collection of romances whence Shakespeare derived many of his plots
and even complete characters, word for word.
The two sketches I dedicate to you are the two eternal aspects of one
and the same fact. Homo duplex, said the great Buffon: why not add
Res duplex? Everything has two sides, even virtue. Hence Moliere
always shows us both sides of every human problem; and Diderot,
imitating him, once wrote, "This is not a mere tale"--in what is perhaps
Diderot's masterpiece, where he shows us the beautiful picture of
Mademoiselle de Lachaux sacrificed by Gardanne, side by side with
that of a perfect lover dying for his mistress.
In the same way, these two romances form