Abstract: In one of his greatest novels Balzac describes the sudden accession to fortune of César Birotteau, the hairdresser, and his lamentable fall, due to overweening confidence and neglect of the business to which he owed his elevation. It is the tragedy of the man who rests too long upon his laurels, and has failed to learn life's lesson, that a breathing space to prepare for further effort is the only rest possible for one who would not slip back in the struggle. Such tragedies are common, though it requires a Balzac, a Shakespeare, or an Æschylus to make them manifest. Sometimes, however, they may be dimly perceived in the utterances of the victims, themselves barely conscious of the significance of the facts which they relate.