eized on the 28th. Placards were posted. Application was
made for an order empowering them to sell on the spot. Announcements of
the sale appeared in the papers, and Doublon flattered himself that the
inventory should be verified and the auction take place on the 2nd of
September.

By this time David Sechard owed Metivier five thousand two hundred and
seventy-five francs, twenty-five centimes (to say nothing of interest),
by formal judgment confirmed by appeal, the bill of costs having been
duly taxed. Likewise to Petit-Claud he owed twelve hundred francs,
exclusive of the fees, which were left to David's generosity with the
generous confidence displayed by the hackney coachman who has driven you
so quickly over the road on which you desire to go.

Mme. Sechard owed Petit-Claud something like three hundred and fifty
francs and fees besides; and of old Sechard, besides four hundred and
thirty-four francs, sixty-five centimes, the little attorney demanded a
hundred crowns by way of fee. Altogether, the Sechard family owed about
ten thousand francs. This is what is called "putting fire into the bed
straw."

Apart from the utility of these documents to other nations who thus may
behold the battery of French law in action, the French legislator ought
to know the lengths to which the abuse of procedure may be carried,
always supposing that the said legislator can find time for reading.
Surely some sort of regulation might be devised, some way of forbidding
lawyers to carry on a case until the sum in dispute is more than eaten
up in costs? Is there not something ludicrous in the idea of submitting
a square yard of soil and an estate of thousands of acres to the same
legal formalities? These bare outlines of the history of the various
stages of procedure should open the eyes of Frenchmen to the meaning of
the words "legal formalities, justice, and costs," little as the immense
majority of the nations know about them.

Five thousand pounds' weight of type in the printing office were worth
two thousand francs as old metal; the three presses were valued at six
hundred francs; the rest of the plant would fetch the price of old iron
and firewood. The household furniture would have brought in a thousand
francs at most. The whole personal property of Sechard junior therefore
represented the sum of four thousand francs; and Cachan and Petit-Claud
made claims for seven thousand francs in costs already incurred, to say
nothing of exp