The Alkahest

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About this book

The Alkahest carries the credit "By Honore De Balzac Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley" and a dedication "To Madame Josephine Delannoy nee Doumerc". The dedication asks that "this, my book, may live longer than I" and is signed "DE BALZAC". The contents list names, among others, numbered chapters up to "CHAPTER XVI" and an "ADDENDUM".

A description of a house says its facade "had been carefully cleaned twice a year" from the time it was built. The same description says the house has, "At the peak", a vane "in the shape of a weaver's shuttle threaded with flax". The text says that when Balthazar's debts were all paid, he had about two hundred thousand francs with which to carry on his experiments. Balthazar speaks of a diamond, saying "the first rays of my glory would have shone from that diamond upon my native country".

About the author

Honoré de Balzac

Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) was a French novelist whose vast Human Comedy, a connected series of novels and stories, is a monument of literary realism and one of the great achievements of world literature.