Two of the novelist's most important books appeared in 1833, his _Country Doctor_ and _Eugenie Grandet_. The former he disposed of to a new publisher, Mame, who was to print it, at first, unsigned, his old publisher Gosselin having pre-emption rights, that had not been redeemed. Referring to it in a letter to Mame, towards the end of 1832, he said: "I have long been desirous of the popular glory which consists in selling numerous thousands of a small volume like _Atala_, _Paul and Virginia_, the _Vicar of Wakefield_, _Manon Lescaut_, etc. The book should go into all hands, those of the child, the girl, the old man, and even the devotee. Then once, when the book is known, it will have a large sale, like the _Meditations_ of Lamartine, for instance, sixty thousand copies. My book is conceived in this spirit; it is something which the porter and the grand lady can both read. I have taken the Gospel and the Catechism, two books that sell well, and so I have made mine. I have laid the scene in a village, and the whole of the story will be readable, which is rare with me." How high his hopes of its quality and saleableness were (the two things were oddly mixed up in his mind), he imparted to Zulma Carraud. "The _Country Doctor_ has cost me ten times more labour than _Louis Lambert_," he informed her. "There is not a sentence or an idea in it that has not been revised, re-read, corrected again and again. It's terrible. But when one wishes to attain the simple beauty of the Gospel, surpass the _Vicar of Wakefield_ and put the _Imitation of Jesus Christ_ into action, one must spare no effort. Emile de Girardin and our good Borget (his co-tenant at the time) wager the sale will be four hundred thousand copies. Emile intends to bring out a franc edition, so that it may be sold like a Prayer Book." What with his writing for the _Revue de Paris_, to which he was contributing _Ferragus_, and the pains he gave himself with the _Country Doctor_, he was unable to deliver the latter work to Mame at the date stipulated, and the publisher brought a lawsuit against him, the first of a series of legal disputes he was destined to wage with publishing firms and magazine editors during his agitated life. Notwithstanding the advertisement produced him by the lawsuit, the _Country Doctor_ fell flat in the market. Most of the newspapers spoke contemptuously of it. One reason given was its loose construction, there being no plot, and the two love stories being thrust in towards the end to explain the doctor's altruism and the vicarious paternity of the Commandant Genestas.