between a Richelieu, a Mazarin,
or a Potemkin, each with his hundreds of millions of francs, and a
conscientious Robert Lindet that could make nothing out of assignats
and national property, or one of the virtuous imbeciles who ruined Louis
XVI.? Go on, Bixiou."

"I will not go into the details of the speculation which we owe to
Nucingen's financial genius. It would be the more inexpedient because
the concern is still in existence and shares are quoted on the Bourse.
The scheme was so convincing, there was such life in an enterprise
sanctioned by royal letters patent, that though the shares issued at a
thousand francs fell to three hundred, they rose to seven and will
reach par yet, after weathering the stormy years '27, '30, and '32. The
financial crisis of 1827 sent them down; after the Revolution of July
they fell flat; but there really is something in the affair, Nucingen
simply could not invent a bad speculation. In short, as several banks
of the highest standing have been mixed up in the affair, it would be
unparliamentary to go further into detail. The nominal capital amounted
to ten millions; the real capital to seven. Three millions were allotted
to the founders and bankers that brought it out. Everything was done
with a view to sending up the shares two hundred francs during the first
six months by the payment of a sham dividend. Twenty per cent, on ten
millions! Du Tillet's interest in the concern amounted to five hundred
thousand francs. In the stock-exchange slang of the day, this share of
the spoils was a 'sop in the pan.' Nucingen, with his millions made by
the aid of a lithographer's stone and a handful of pink paper, proposed
to himself to operate certain nice little shares carefully hoarded in
his private office till the time came for putting them on the market.
The shareholders' money floated the concern, and paid for splendid
business premises, so they began operations. And Nucingen held in
reserve founders' shares in Heaven knows what coal and argentiferous
lead-mines, also in a couple of canals; the shares had been given to him
for bringing out the concerns. All four were in working order, well got
up and popular, for they paid good dividends.

"Nucingen might, of course, count on getting the differences if the
shares went up, but this formed no part of the Baron's schemes; he left
the shares at sea-level on the market to tempt the fishes.

"So he had massed his securities as Napoleon massed his