/Facino Cane/ was dedicated to Louise:
"As a mark of affectionate gratitude."
CHAPTER V
SENTIMENTAL FRIENDSHIPS
MADAME DE BERNY
"I have to stand alone now amidst my troubles; formerly I had beside me in my struggles the most courageous and the sweetest person in the world, a woman whose memory is each day renewed in my heart, and whose divine qualities make all other friendships when compared with hers seem pale. I no longer have help in the difficulties of life; when I am in doubt about any matter, I have now no other guide than this final thought, 'If she were alive, what would she say?' Intellects of this order are rare."
Balzac loved to seek the sympathy and confidence of people whose minds were at leisure, and who could interest themselves in his affairs. With his artistic temperament, he longed for the refinement, society and delicate attentions which he found in the friendships of various women. "The feeling of abandonment and of solitude in which I am stings me. There is nothing selfish in me; but I need to tell my thoughts, my efforts, my feelings to a being who is not myself; otherwise I have no strength. I should wish for no crown if there were no feet at which to lay that which men may put upon my head."
One of the first of these friendships was that formed with Madame de Berny, nee (Laure-Louise-Antoinette) Hinner. She was the daughter of a German musician, a harpist at the court of Louis XVI, and of Louise- Marguerite-Emelie Quelpec de Laborde, a lady in waiting at the court of Marie Antoinette. M. Hinner died in 1784, after which Madame Hinner was married to Francois-Augustin Reinier de Jarjayes, adjutant-general of the army. M. Jarjayes was one of the best known persons belonging to the Royalist party during the Revolution, a champion of the Queen, whom he made many attempts to save. He was one of her most faithful friends, was intrusted with family keepsakes, and was made lieutenant- general under Louis XVIII. Madame Jarjayes was much loved by the Queen; she was also implicated in the plots. Before dying, Marie Antoinette sent her a lock of her hair and a pair of earrings. Laure Hinner was married April 8, 1793, to M. Gabriel de Berny, almost nine years her senior, who was of the oldest nobility. Madame de Berny, her husband, her mother and her stepfather were imprisoned for nine months, and were not released until after the fall of Robespierre.
The married life of Madame de Berny was unhappy; she was intelligent and sentimental; he, capricious and morose. She seems to have realized the type of the /femme incomprise/; she too was an /etrangere/, and bore some traits of her German origin. Coming into Balzac's life at about the age of forty, this /femme de quarante ans/ became for him the /amie/ and the companion who was to teach him life. Still beautiful, having been reared in intimate court circles, having been the confidante of plotters and the guardian of secrets, possessed of rare trinkets and souvenirs—what an open book was this /memoire vivante/, and with what passion did the young interrogator absorb the pages! Here he found unknown anecdotes, ignored designs, and here the sources of his great plots, /Les Chouans/, /Madame de la Chanterie/, and /Un Episode sous la Terreur/.
All this is what she could teach him, aided perhaps by his mother, who lived until 1837. Here is the secret of Balzac's royalism; here is where he first learned of the great ladies that appear in his work, largely portrayed to him by the /amie/ who watched over his youth and guided his maturity.