Joie de Vivre.

After a last and disastrous land speculation, Saccard was obliged to
leave his great house in the Parc Monceau, which he abandoned to his
creditors. At first undecided as to his movements, he took a flat in the
mansion in Rue Saint-Lazare, which belonged to Princess d'Orviedo. There
he met Hamelin, the engineer, and his sister Caroline, with whom he soon
became on intimate terms. Hamelin having spent much time in the East,
had formed many schemes for great financial ventures, and Saccard was
so impressed with these that he formed a syndicate for the purpose of
carrying some of them out. With this view the Universal Bank was formed,
and was at first very successful. By persistent advertising, and other
means, the shares of the Bank were forced to an undue price, and then
Saccard began to speculate in them on behalf of the Bank itself. The
great financier Gundermann, with whom Saccard had quarrelled, then began
a persistent attack on the Bank, selling its shares steadily day after
day. Saccard continued to buy as long as he was able; but the end came,
the price broke, and he, as well as the Bank, which was now one of
its own largest shareholders, was ruined. Since his previous failure,
Saccard had not been on friendly terms with his brother Eugene Rougon,
and, some time before the collapse of the Bank, had made violent attacks
upon him in his newspaper. Consequently Rougon did nothing to assist him
in the criminal proceedings which followed the final catastrophe; he did
not, however, wish to have a brother in jail, and arranged matters
so that an appeal was allowed. Next day Saccard escaped to Belgium.
L'Argent.

After the fall of the Second Empire, he returned to Paris, despite the
sentence he had incurred. Some complicated intrigue must have been at
work, for not only did he obtain a pardon, but once more took part in
promoting large undertakings, with a finger in every pie and a share of
every bribe. In 1872 he was actively engaged in journalism, having been
appointed Director of the _Epoque_, a Republican journal which made a
great success by publishing the papers found in the Tuileries. Covetous
of his son's fortune, he hastened a disease from which Maxime suffered,
by encouraging him in vicious courses, and in the end got possession
of the whole estate. By a singular irony, Aristide, now returned to his
original Republicanism, was in a position to protect his brother Eugene,
whom in earlier days he