ney, and that is the sort of society the
Charter has given us,--in my opinion, at any rate. Nothing convinces the
'intelligent masses' as much as a row of figures. All things in the long
run, say the statesmen of the Left, resolve themselves into figures.
Well then, let us figure" [the minister here goes off into a corner with
a deputy, to whom he talks in a low voice]. "There are forty thousand
government clerks in France. The average of their salaries is fifteen
hundred francs. Multiply forty thousand by fifteen hundred and you have
sixty millions. Now, in the first place, a publicist would call the
attention of Russia and China (where all government officials steal),
also that of Austria, the American republics, and indeed that of the
whole world, to the fact that for this price France possesses the
most inquisitorial, fussy, ferreting, scribbling, paper-blotting,
fault-finding old housekeeper of a civil service on God's earth. Not a
copper farthing of the nation's money is spent or hoarded that is not
ordered by a note, proved by vouchers, produced and re-produced on
balance-sheets, and receipted for when paid; orders and receipts are
registered on the rolls, and checked and verified by an army of men
in spectacles. If there is the slightest mistake in the form of these
precious documents, the clerk is terrified, for he lives on such
minutiae. Some nations would be satisfied to get as far as this;
but Napoleon went further. That great organizer appointed supreme
magistrates of a court which is absolutely unique in the world. These
officials pass their days in verifying money-orders, documents, roles,
registers, lists, permits, custom-house receipts, payments, taxes
received, taxes spent, etc.; all of which the clerks write or
copy. These stern judges push the gift of exactitude, the genius of
inquisition, the sharp-sightedness of lynxes, the perspicacity of
account-books to the point of going over all the additions in search of
subtractions. These sublime martyrs to figures have been known to return
to an army commissary, after a delay of two years, some account in which
there was an error of two farthings. This is how and why it is that the
French system of administration, the purest and best on the globe
has rendered robbery, as his Excellency has just told you, next to
impossible, and as for peculation, it is a myth. France at this present
time possesses a revenue of twelve hundred millions, and she spends it.
Tha