In the postscript to the /Physiologie du Mariage/, Balzac mentions a gesture of one of these "intellectual" women, who interrupts herself to touch one of her nostrils with the forefinger of her right hand in a coquettish manner. In /La Femme abandonnee/, Madame de Beauseant has the same gesture. Another gesture of Madame de Beauseant in /La Femme abandonnee/ indicates that Balzac had in mind the Duchesse d'Abrantes: ". . . Then, with her other hand, she made a gesture as if to pull the bell-rope. The charming gesture, the gracious threat, no doubt, called up some sad thought, some memory of her happy life, of the time when she could be wholly charming and graceful, when the gladness of her heart justified every caprice, and gave one more charm to her slightest movement. The lines of her forehead gathered between her brows, and the expression of her face grew dark in the soft candle- light. . . ." The Duchesse d'Abrantes had on two occasions rung to dismiss her lovers, M. de Montrond and General Sebastiani. Balzac had doubtless heard her relate these incidents, and they are contained in the /Journal intime/, which she gave him.[*] [*] Madame d'Abrantes presented several objects of a literary nature to Balzac, among others, a book of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a few leaves of which he presented to Madame Hanska for her collection of autographs. In /La Femme abandonnee/, Balzac describes Madame de Beauseant as having taken refuge in Normandy, "after a notoriety which women for the most part envy and condemn, especially when youth and beauty in some way excuse the transgression." Can it be that the novelist thus condones the fault of this noted character because he wishes to pardon the /liaison/ of Madame d'Abrantes with the Comte de Metternich? Is it then because so many traces of Madame d'Abrantes are found in /La Femme abandonnee/, and allusions are made to minute episodes known to them alone, that he dedicated it to her? Was Balzac thinking of the Duchesse d'Abrantes when, in /Un Grand Homme de Province a Paris/, speaking of Lucien Chardon, who had just arrived in Paris at the beginning of the Restoration, he writes: "He met several of those women who will be spoken of in the history of the nineteenth century, whose wit, beauty and loves will be none the less celebrated than those of queens in times past." In depicting Maxime de Trailles, the novelist perhaps had in mind M. de Montrond, about whom the Duchess had told him. Again, many characteristics of her son, Napoleon d'Abrantes, are seen in La Palferine, one of the characters of the /Comedie humaine/.