So matters went on, Clemenceau striving his utmost, in opposition, to enforce the genuine democratic policy of abstention from Imperialism abroad and strengthening of the forces of the Republic at home which the successive Opportunist Administrations in power refused to accept. In each and every case, Tunis, Tonquin, Annam, Madagascar and Egypt, he considered first, foremost and all the time what would most benefit Frenchmen in France, and refused to be led astray by any will-o'-the-wisps of Eastern origin, however gloriously they might disport themselves under the sun of finance. But now came a still more awkward matter close at home. There are not the same facilities for shutting down inquiries into the financial peccadilloes or corrupt malversations of public men in France as there are in England. Monetary scandals will out, though political blunderings may be glossed over, as in the cases of the Duc de Broglie, M. Jules Ferry and M. Albert Grévy. The President, M. Grévy, was very unfortunate in his relations. His brother, the Governor-General of Algeria, had shown himself dreadfully incompetent in that capacity. But M. de Freycinet, M. Jules Ferry and the whole Ministerial set had entered into a conspiracy of silence and misrepresentation, throwing the blame of his mistakes upon anybody but the Governor-General himself, in order to uphold the dignity of the President quite uninjured. Now, however, the President's son-in-law, M. Wilson, was found out in very ignoble transactions. He was actually detected in the flagitious practice of trading in decorations, the Legion of Honour and the like, not for what are considered on this side of the Channel as perfectly legitimate purposes, the furtherance, namely, of Party gains or Ministerial advantages, but in order to increase his own income. The thing became a public scandal. Those who could not afford to buy the envied distinctions were specially incensed. But out of regard for the President, out of consideration for their personal advancement in the future, because when you start this sort of thing you never know how far it will go, because other Ministers in and out of office had had relations of their own addicted to similar trading in other directions--for all these reasons, good and bad, nobody cared to take the matter up seriously.