And he did, with many things else that happened to him in his dealings with his fellows. There is biography too, as well as autobiography in the _Comedy_--this notwithstanding his disclaimers. Exact portraiture he avoided for obvious reasons, but intentional portraiture he indulged in largely; and life and character were sufficiently near the truth for shrewd contemporaries to recognize the originals. To add one or two examples to the number already given. Claire Brunne (Madame Marbouty) seems to have suggested his _Muse of the County_, a Berrichon blue-stocking; Madame d'Agoult and Liszt became Madame de Rochfide and the musician Conti in _Beatrix_; a cousin of Madame Hanska, Thaddeus Wylezinski, who worshipped her discreetly, is depicted under the traits of Thaddeus Paz, a Polish exile in the _False Mistress_, who assumes a feigned name to conceal his love; Lamartine furnished the conception of the poet Canalis in _Modeste Mignon_, the resemblance being at first so striking that the novelist afterwards toned it away a little; and Monnier, the caricaturist, certainly supplied the essential elements in Bixiou, who is so well drawn in _Cousin Bette_ and the _Firm of Nucingen_. The Baron Nucingen himself has some of the features of the James de Rothschild whom Balzac knew; and Rastignac embodied the author's impression of Thiers in the statesman's earlier years. One might go further and couple Delacroix the painter's name with that of Joseph Bridau in _A Bachelor's Household_, Frederick Lemaitre, the actor's, with Medal's in _Cousin Pons_, Emile de Girardin's with du Tillet's in _Cesar Birotteau_. At last, however, owing to the mingling of one personality with another, identification is increasingly difficult, unless the novelist comes to our assistance, as in the story _Cousin Bette_, where he confesses Lisbeth the old maid, to be made up out of three persons, Madame Valmore, Madame Hanska's aunt, and his own mother.