From its earliest manifestations, the grand magasin was viewed as a baleful monster encroaching on surrounding territory. Jules Vallès notes in 1882 that ‘la terre classique du petit commerce heureux’ has been taken over by big shops: ‘C'est maintenant le grand magasin qui occupe le bas des larges immeubles, hangars luxueux, bazars à mines de caravansérails.’ Zola bequeathed to subsequent generations a series of characteristic tropes for imagining and depicting the successors of the grand magasin. Despite the positive associations Zola is seeking to propagate, from the opening pages Au bonheur des dames is a ‘monstre’ (66, 70, 75, 249, 295) in which Denise feels swallowed up (102). Repeatedly, ‘le colosse’ (223, 459, 460) is described in terms likely to inspire fear: ‘Il dominait, il couvrait un quartier de son ombre’ (459), we are told, and it is said to have ‘égorgé’ (460) the neighbourhood. It will indeed ‘devour’ (499) Paris. In the final chapter we read that ‘tel que le montrait la gravure des réclames, il s'était engraissé, pareil à l'ogre des contes’ (460). Just as Mouret's fictitious store expanded to fill an entire block, Valmy-Baysse depicts Paris-Universel similarly extending its reach: ‘Paris Universel, au fur et à mesure du développement de ses magasins, a, maison par maison, conquis un îlot parisien’ (Les Comptoirs de Vénus, 24).