Part 58

Peter: Oh! oh! Mr Theorist, you forget that I am a practical man. My reputation as a speculator is sufficiently well established, I believe, to prevent me from being taken for a noodle. Do you imagine I am going to amuse myself by selling my timber at the price of float-wood?

Paul: It would seem so.

Peter: Simpleton! And what if I can hinder float-wood from being brought into Paris?

Paul: That alters the case. But how can you manage it?

Peter: Here is the whole secret. You know that float-wood, on entering the city, pays 5d. the load. To-morrow, I induce the commune to raise the duty to £4, £8, £12,--in short, sufficiently high to prevent the entry of a single log. Now, do you follow me? If the good people are not to die of cold, they have no alternative but to come to my woodyard. They will bid against each other for my wood, and I will sell it for a high price; and this act of charity, successfully carried out, will put me in a situation to do other acts of charity.

Paul: A fine invention, truly! It suggests to me another of the same kind.

John: And what is that? Is philanthropy to be again brought into play?

Paul: How do you like this Normandy butter?

John: Excellent.

Paul: Hitherto I have thought it passable. But do you not find that it takes you by the throat? I could make better butter in Paris. I shall have four or five hundred cows, and distribute milk, butter, and cheese among the poor.

Peter and John: What! in charity?

Paul: Bah! let us put charity always in the foreground. It is so fine a figure that its very mask is a good passport. I shall give my butter to the people, and they will give me their money. Is that what is called selling?

John: No; not according to the Bourgeois Gentilhomme. But, call it what you please, you will ruin yourself. How can Paris ever compete with Normandy in dairy produce?

Paul: I shall be able to save the cost of carriage.

John: Be it so. Still, while paying that cost, the Normans can beat the Parisians.

Paul: To give a man something at a lower price--is that what you call beating him?

John: It is the usual phrase; and you will always find yourself beaten.

Paul: Yes; as Don Quixote was beaten. The blows will fall upon Sancho. John, my friend, you forget the octroi.

John: The octroi! What has that to do with your butter?

Paul: To-morrow, I shall demand protection, and induce the commune to prohibit butter being brought into Paris from Normandy and Brittany. The people must then either dispense with it, or purchase mine, and at my own price, too.

John: Upon my honour, gentlemen, your philanthropy has quite made a convert of me.

"On apprend à hurler, dit l'autre, avec les loups."

My mind is made up. I shall not be thought unworthy of my colleagues. Peter, this sparkling fire has inflamed your soul. Paul, this butter has lubricated the springs of your intelligence. I, too, feel stimulated by this piece of powdered pork; and tomorrow I shall vote, and cause to be voted, the exclusion of swine, dead and alive. That done, I shall construct superb sheds in the heart of Paris,

"Pour l'animal immonde aux Hébreux défendu."

I shall become a pig-driver and pork-butcher. Let us see how the good people of Paris can avoid coming to provide themselves at my shop.

Peter: Softly, my good friends; if you enhance the price of butter and salt meat to such an extent, you cut down beforehand the profit I expect from my wood.

Paul: And my speculation will be no longer so wondrously profitable, if I am overcharged for my firewood and bacon.

John: And I, what shall I gain by overcharging you for my sausages, if you overcharge me for my faggots and bread and butter?