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Paris is a kind of City of Refuge for provincial bankrupts, an almost impenetrable retreat; the writ of the pursuing bailiff has no force beyond the limits of his jurisdiction, and there are other obstacles rendering it almost invalid.
These were as many as four thousand men, made up of a mixed assemblage of every description of persons, exiles, bankrupts, the greater part of them felons, who had supported themselves by rapine and robbery, both when they lived in their native towns, under the restraint of the laws, and also after that a coincidence in their fortunes, brought about by causes different in each case, had congregated them at Agathyrna.
It might, therefore, deserve the consideration of parliament, whether, in extending their clemency to the poor, it should not be equally diffused to bankrupts and other insolvents; whether proper distinction ought not to be made between the innocent bankrupt who fails through misfortune in trade, and him who becomes insolvent from fraud or profligacy: and finally, whether the inquiry and trial of all such cases would not properly fall within the province of chancery, a tribunal instituted for the mitigation of common law.
The assignees are obliged to make dividends, and not detain the estate in their own hands, as was the case in former days, till sometimes they became bankrupts themselves, so that the creditors are sure now what is put into the hands of the assignees, shall in due time, and without the usual delay, be fairly divided.
The severity of the law was certainly intended against fraudulent bankrupts only; and the statute of bankruptcy is, doubtless, favourable to insolvents, as it discharges from all former debts those who obtained their certificates. As British subjects, they are surely entitled to the same indulgence which is granted to other insolvents.
They included bankrupts, hypochondriacs, persons who were what is called "out of a situation" from fault or lucklessness, the inefficient of the professional class shabby-genteel men, who did not know how to get rid of the weary time between breakfast and dinner, and the yet more weary time between dinner and dark.
Then after that was I an usurer, And with extorting, cozening, forfeiting, And tricks belonging unto brokery, I fill'd the jails with bankrupts in a year, And with young orphans planted hospitals, And every moon made some or other mad; And now and then one hang'd himself for grief, Pinning upon his breast a long great scroll, How I with interest tormented him."
There we halted to say farewell. To say farewell! Yes. The Primrose Way had come to an end, but we were comrades and friends still, and in order that in the gloom of the slow-moving days and the blackness and thick horror of the years to come we might have some thought in common, we then and there promised what could we poor, broken bankrupts promise?
But this feeling very soon wore off, and he found himself laughing and talking with Giles the stationer, and Burrows the printer, and Sloman the official assignee, as though a bankruptcy were an excellent joke; and as though he, as one of the bankrupts, had by far the best of it.
Most people waste vital forces by too much talking or by over-exertion. Americans, especially, overcheck their deposits of vitality, and as bankrupts they struggle to transact daily duties. Wise management of nerve forces would enable them to accomplish more and enjoy life better." "I am a bankrupt then," said Mrs. Harris, "but how about my daughter Lucille?"
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