France -- Civilization; France -- Politics and government; France -- Social life and customs -- 19th century
whomsoever he pleases, who assigns to each his portion, who regulates
meals as he thinks best for his own and the common interest, and who
introduces into the entire service order, watchfulness and economy.
Instead of a prodigal and negligent grand-seignior, here at last is
a modern administrator who orders supplies, distributes portions and
limits consumption, a contractor who feels his responsibility, a man of
business able to calculate. Henceforth, each is to pay for his portion,
estimated according to his ration, and each is to enjoy his ration
according to his quota.--Judge of this by one example: In his own house,
customarily a center of abuses and sinecures, there must be no more
parasites. From the grooms and scullions of his palace up to its
grand officials, even to the chamberlains and ladies of honor, all his
domestics, with or without titles, work and perform their daily tasks
in person, administrative or decorative, day or night, at the appointed
time, for exact compensation, without pickings or stealing and without
waste. His train and his parades, as pompous as under the old monarchy,
admit of the same ordinary and extraordinary expenses--stables, chapel,
food, hunts, journeys, private theatricals, renewals of plate and
furniture, and the maintenance of twelve palaces or châteaux. While,
under Louis XV., it was estimated that "coffee with one roll for each
lady of honor cost the King 2,000 livres a year," and under Louis XVI.,"
the grand broth night and day" which Madame Royale, aged two years,
sometimes drank and which figured in the annual accounts at 5201
livres,[3212] under Napoleon "in the pantries, in the kitchens, the
smallest dish, a mere plate of soup, a glass of sugared water, would
not have been served without the authorization or check of grand-marshal
Duroc. Every abuse is watched; the gains of each are calculated and
regulated beforehand."[3213] Consequently, this or that journey to
Fontainebleau which had cost Louis XVI. nearly 2 million livres, cost
Napoleon, with the same series of fêtes, only 150,000 francs, while the
total expense of his civil household, instead of amounting to 25 million
livres, remains under 3 million francs.[3214] The pomp is thus equal,
but the expense is ten times less; the new master is able to derive
a tenfold return from persons and money, because he squeezes the full
value out of every man he employs and every crown he spends. Nobody has
surpassed him in the art of turning money and men to account, and he is
as shrewd, as careful, as sharp in procuring them as he is in profiting
by them.
II. Equitable Taxation.
The apportionment of charges.--New fiscal principle and new
fiscal machinery.
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