The Count of Sainte-H l ne: A Balzacian Melodrama takes place in 1817-1818 in Paris, during the Bourbon Restoration when Louis XVIII had been placed on the throne of France at the decree of the Congress of Vienna after the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815. This play is based on one of the most sensational cases solved by the first great detective in history, Eug ne-Fran ois Vidocq, the ex-convict who became head of the French S ret (the Security...