Living in History
Green. "Trade, my lord," said Dinde Desponde, the great Lombard banker, to the Duke of Burgundy, "finds its way everywhere, and rules the world." As for commercial honour,—a thing as fine as the honour of the aristocrat or of the soldier,—what can be better for England than to know that after the great fire of 1666 not a single London shopkeeper evaded his liabilities; and that this fact was long the boast of a city proud of its shopkeeping? As for jurisprudence,—Sully was infinitely more concerned with it than he was with combat or controversy. It is with stern satisfaction that he recounts the statutes passed in his day for the punishment of fraudulent bankrupts, whom we treat so leniently; for the annulment of their gifts and assignments, which we guard so zealously; and for the conviction of those to whom such property had been assigned. It was almost as dangerous to steal on a large scale as on a small one
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