er by the regent to the Company of the Indies. This measure had the
effect of raising for a short time the value of the Louisiana and other
shares of the company, but it failed in placing public credit on any
permanent basis.

A council of state was held in the beginning of May, at which Law,
D'Argenson (his colleague in the administration of the finances), and all
the ministers were present. It was then computed that the total amount of
notes in circulation was 2600 millions of livres, while the coin in the
country was not quite equal to half that amount. It was evident to the
majority of the council that some plan must be adopted to equalise the
currency. Some proposed that the notes should be reduced to the value of
the specie, while others proposed that the nominal value of the specie
should be raised till it was on an equality with the paper. Law is said to
have opposed both these projects, but failing in suggesting any other, it
was agreed that the notes should be depreciated one half. On the 21st of
May, an edict was accordingly issued, by which it was decreed that the
shares of the Company of the Indies, and the notes of the bank, should
gradually diminish in value, till at the end of a year they should only
pass current for one-half of their nominal worth. The parliament refused
to register the edict--the greatest outcry was excited, and the state of
the country became so alarming, that, as the only means of preserving
tranquillity, the council of the regency was obliged to stultify its own
proceedings, by publishing within seven days another edict, restoring the
notes to their original value.

On the same day (the 27th of May) the bank stopped payment in specie. Law
and D'Argenson were both dismissed from the ministry. The weak,
vacillating, and cowardly regent threw the blame of all the mischief upon
Law, who, upon presenting himself at the Palais Royal, was refused
admittance. At nightfall, however, he was sent for, and admitted into the
palace by a secret door,[12] when the regent endeavoured to console him,
and made all manner of excuses for the severity with which in public he
had been compelled to treat him. So capricious was his conduct, that, two
days afterwards, he took him publicly to the opera, where he sat in the
royal box alongside of the regent, who treated him with marked
consideration in face of all the people. But such was the hatred against
Law that the experiment had well nigh proved fatal t