1790 1795 For a bushel of flour 40 cents 45 dollars For a bushel of oats 18 cents 10 dollars For a cartload of wood 4 dollars 500 dollars For a bushel of coal 7 cents 2 dollars For a pound of sugar 18 cents 12 1/2 dollars For a pound of soap 18 cents 8 dollars For a pound of candles 18 cents 8 dollars For one cabbage 8 cents 5 1/2 dollars For a pair of shoes 1 dollar 40 dollars For twenty-five eggs 24 cents 5 dollars But these prices about the middle of 1795 were moderate compared with those which were reached before the close of that year and during the year following. Perfectly authentic examples were such as the following: A pound of bread 9 dollars A bushel of potatoes 40 dollars A pound of candles 40 dollars A cartload of wood 250 dollars So much for the poorer people. Typical of those esteemed wealthy may be mentioned a manufacturer of hardware who, having retired from business in 1790 with 321,000 _livres_, found his property in 1796 worth 14,000 _francs_. [76] For this general distress arising from the development and collapse of "fiat" money in France, there was, indeed, one exception. In Paris and a few of the other great cities, men like Tallien, of the heartless, debauched, luxurious, speculator, contractor and stock-gambler class, had risen above the ruins of the multitudes of smaller fortunes. Tallien, one of the worst demagogue "reformers," and a certain number of men like him, had been skillful enough to become millionaires, while their dupes, who had clamored for issues of paper money, had become paupers. The luxury and extravagance of the currency gamblers and their families form one of the most significant features in any picture of the social condition of that period. [77] A few years before this the leading women in French society showed a nobility of character and a simplicity in dress worthy of Roman matrons. Of these were Madame Boland and Madame Desmoulins; but now all was changed. At the head of society stood Madame Tallien and others like her, wild in extravagance, daily seeking new refinements in luxury, and demanding of their husbands and lovers vast sums to array them and to feed their whims. If such sums could not be obtained honestly they must be had dishonestly. The more closely one examines that period, the more clearly he sees that the pictures, given by Thibaudeau and Challamel and De Goncourt are not at all exaggerated. [78]