A Lawyer's Defense of a Wine Merchant against a Carpenter's Deposition: A Story about Friendship and Betrayal

SANTO L. ARICÒ

In 1770, Antoine-Louis Séguier, the avocat général (king's advocate) of the Parlement of Paris, defended Jean-Baptiste Dubarle, a Parisian wine merchant, against charges of theft, seduction, kidnapping, and adultery initiated by a carpenter, Eustache Chefdeville. 1 For all of the offenses, Chefdeville demanded monetary reparation.	1
The case, summarized in a mémoire, 2 connects the history of family law in France under the ancien régime to the skillful use of lawyerly forensics. But it also relates to literary portrayals of social scapegraces who betray the esteemed values of friendship and gratitude: in fact, this member of Paris's menu peuple emerges from the pages of the case abstract as a dissembling traitor. Séguier's legal brief, viewed as a work of fiction, projects Chefdeville as an ungrateful betrayer who feigns comradery. In Séguier's telling, this disfigured pariah, albeit socially inferior, takes his place next to the deceptive worldlings described in many eighteenth-century novels. Like them, he violates the sacred laws of sincerity, turning himself into a moral pervert. 3 Séguier's mémoire is rich precisely because it demonstrates how a skilled lawyer attempting to win his case adopts the form of a story characterized by all the literary qualities of the day—love, friendship, avarice, and betrayal. It illustrates a classic legal approach and also reads like a novel from beginning to end.	2
The avocat général's account is presented in a typical judicial framework: exordium, narration, argumentation, and peroration. 4 However, the high point is the story told in the narration, and that moment is crucial. 5 Séguier believes in his client's innocence and in his adversary's guilt and employs the story as an important rhetorical device. 6 What and how Séguier communicates show the workings of a powerful imagination on a factual base, revealing his bias against the accuser. 7 His fiction is not about something that did not really happen. As a trained orator, he simply knows that he cannot produce effective description without using his inventiveness and that it is not possible to do so based solely on facts. 8 He reports all past events in chronological order. However, he pays particular attention to why things happened and consequently shapes a commanding narrative mode by portraying Chefdeville as an extortionist and Dubarle as a victimized altruist. 9	3
In his exordium, Séguier prepares the magistrates to hear favorably his presentation. 10 He captures their attention by summarizing his case in the form of a startling, provocative question.	4
Un mari qui s'est absenté assez longtemps pour qu'on le crût mort, et qui a même affecté de laisser dans l'erreur sur ce point sa femme, et celui auquel il l'avait confiée par écrit avant de disparaître, peut-il, quatre ans après la mort de cette femme, intenter une accusation d'enlèvement et d'adultère contre le Citoyen avec lequelle elle a vécu, se croyant libre, et dans la perspective d'un second mariage? 11
After arousing his listeners' curiosity, Séguier provides a glimpse of his forthcoming characterization of the accuser as an extortionist by exhibiting his moral shock at Chefdeville's unscrupulous desire for money. "Cet accusateur ne s'est pas flatté de réussir, il a seulement espéré mettre Dubarle à contribution ou le perdre" (1). 12 Séguier ends the exordium by positioning himself as an ethical stalwart who will impede diabolic intentions. "Il n'y parviendra point, et le méchant, qui vient ici se déshonorer en public, en remportera la honte gratuitement" (1). 13	5
From a legal point of view, Séguier has no absolute need for a narration in which he reviews past facts. He could have introduced documentary evidence to influence a decision and ignored basic background with which the magistrates were already familiar. However, he chooses to review earlier circumstances because he intends to tell the story in a way that supports his case. In other words, he will emphasize details that favor Dubarle's defense and place Chefdeville in a negative light. His approach differs from pure description or summary. He resorts to fiction writing, since his designation of what the protagonists do and how the action occurs reveals his personal slant. 14 The story told, although true, builds a particular foundation in order to obtain a favorable judgment.	6
The first segment of the actual narration, sequential in nature, emphasizes friendship, companionship, and love. Chefdeville and Dubarle come from the same region, are about the same age, practice similar trades, immigrate to Paris, work together as compagnon carpenters, and become good friends. 15 Chefdeville also meets Marie-Anne Deslions, marries her, and rents a small, fifth-floor room and attic on the rue Saint Denis in the home of Monsieur and Madame Desmazières. 16 The spouses live together for nine years and welcome Dubarle into their home every day.	7
The story then deals with unforeseen tragedy that ends the trio's seemingly amicable situation. In 1759, Chefdeville falls ill and cannot continue working for his master carpenters. Soon misery and sickness force him to use almost all of his money and, reduced to poverty, he asks his friend for help. Dubarle's benevolent response to the crisis is one of unequivocal generosity. "Dubarle lui ouvrit sa bourse" (2). 17 The money borrowed is insufficient; Chefdeville's sickness gets worse; his employers discharge him, "le réduisant à n'avoir ni feu, ni lieu" (2). 18 The protagonist then commits himself to the care of the Hôtel-Dieu. 19 He gives his wife, who finds employment with a wine merchant, written permission to sell their few pieces of furniture. When the sale provides insufficient money to pay for his debts and back rent, Chefdeville again has recourse to his friend who once more lends him money. Dubarle has made four consecutive loans of fifty-five, seventy-five, thirty-four, and sixty livres.	8
The narrative further reinforces the portrait of an altruistic Dubarle who, after his friend leaves the Hôtel-Dieu, welcomes him into his home. Each day, Marie-Anne visits her husband and teaches him her line of work so that he can help her as much as possible. After three months of employment, she praises her occupation, and Chefdeville also applauds the benefits of the wine trade. The only impediment to starting a business in this field is a lack of money. Dubarle once more comes to the rescue of his old friend. In a good financial position—the inheritor of his mother's and his sister's lands and already in possession of personal money—Dubarle proposes to open a cabaret and makes an irrefusable offer to him. If husband and wife live in his home and work for him, he will care for them for the rest of their days. Chefdeville would make purchases; Marie-Anne would run the household; he, Dubarle, would operate the wine business. The proposal, eagerly accepted, is validated by a signed contract, composed by Chefdeville because Dubarle can barely read or write. 20	9
The story then focuses on the first overt betrayal. Both Chefdeville and his wife are of the opinion that Vaugirard is the ideal location for a cabaret. 21 Marie-Anne herself chooses their residence, and Dubarle moves his furniture there. Ready to begin the new business, he decides to make his first purchase of wine. Chefdeville accepts that responsibility, takes Dubarle's money to make the acquisition, disappears, and makes every attempt to erase all traces of his existence. "Il reçut à cet effet une somme d'argent de Dubarle, et partit, mais il ne reparut plus, & ne donna pas même de ses nouvelles" (4). 22	10
Eighteen months pass with no news, and sexual attraction between Dubarle and Marie-Anne grows stronger with each passing day. He proposes marriage; she feels inclined to accept. Their impediment resides in the unavailability of any death certificate. Dubarle's respect for Marie-Anne has lasted twelve years. As long as he sees her as a married woman, virtue and upright intentions characterize his conduct. However, he believes his desires legitimate as soon as he judges her to be free. Their daily and prolonged meetings, mutual attachment fostered by a good economic arrangement, and the prospect of marriage induce them to anticipate their marital rights. She has a child in 1762, again in 1763, and finally in 1764. The baptized infants all die, and she loses her life giving birth the third time.	11
A pitiful portrait of Dubarle, alone and suffering, emerges in his trying circumstances. The Church, symbolized by a cruel curé, offers no supportive hand when they cannot find the death certificate but severely censures his marital situation as adulterous. Their pastor uses their secret to force them to leave his parish in Vaugirard. Thus, Dubarle and Marie-Anne move to the nearby rue Barrière de Seve, where her death occurs. 23	12
After his heinous disappearance, Chefdeville secretly wanders from village to village but never loses sight of his wife and former friend. He knows that they have lived in Vaugirard. A few years later, whether because of personal choice or laziness, he commits himself to the Bicêtre. 24 During his confinement, he charges two messengers in succession to deliver letters to his wife at the Lion d'Or cabaret in Vaugirard. The correspondence never reaches its destination because she has already moved to the Barrière de Seve with Dubarle. On the eve of her death, she learns of the letters. Her midwife, who lives in Vaugirard, asks her and Dubarle whether they have ever given lodging to anyone whose name is Marie-Anne Deslions. The dying woman knows then that her husband is still alive and releases a cry of despair. "Pourquoi m'a-t-il abandonnée?" (6). 25 Her desire to see him remains unfulfilled. He vanishes from the Bicêtre before she dies on the next day. Dubarle returns alone to Vaugirard to operate his wine business and cabaret.	13
Dubarle successfully begins to rebuild his life. He marries on 8 February 1767, has a child, and uses a family inheritance, as well as his new wife's dowry, to erect a building on a piece of land acquired in Vaugirard. Chefdeville's awareness of this marvelous recovery—contacts report to him on his former friend's obvious prosperity and good fortune—further energizes his insidious nature. After eight years of absence, he returns to Paris in the company of a skillful extortionist and plays the part of a victim. He claims that Dubarle has inflicted unjust sufferings on him but promises to maintain silence on condition that he divide his fortune with him and his associate. When Dubarle refuses and thwarts his plans, he reacts as a wild man with uncontrollable rage. "Chefdeville n'a plus gardé de mesure" (7). 26	14
The power of Séguier's story in the mémoire resides in its portrayal of evil in the character Chefdeville. The attorney's attitude of wide-eyed shock underscores the incredible seriousness of the crime, making it clear that the plaintiff has violated one of the period's most treasured values—sincerity. 27 For some time, Chefdeville outwardly behaved as a loving husband and honest man, befriending Dubarle, borrowing money from him with the promise of repayment, agreeing to work for him in exchange for room and board. However, his appearances sharply contrast with his plans. He has no intention of repaying the money; he deserts his spouse and conceals his whereabouts. Chefdeville's contacts with "spies" who inform him of his wife's health, her failed pregnancies, and Dubarle's prospering wine business reinforce the portrait of an unscrupulous schemer. That he returns only after his rival's financial gain and his initiation of litigation leave no doubt about his true character. 28	15
If Chefdeville had acted as a self-centered scoundrel right from the beginning, he would not have misled his wife or friend. They would neither have depended on his attachment to their well-being nor have been disappointed in their expectations. However, Chefdeville does not give that impression early in the story. The only information available in Séguier's account is that he and Marie-Anne live together for nine years on the rue St. Denis and that his fellow worker and compatriot Dubarle visits them every day. This appearance of love and friendship indicates a life of harmony and industry. Chefdeville's betrayal is consequently all the more shocking. 29	16
The carpenter's early life in Paris could have been part of his masquerade. Entering the French capital, he understands the importance of presenting himself as a loyal friend and husband. He knows that his neighbors on the rue St. Denis would appreciate that image and favorably judge him. 30 In such a scenario, he falsely presents himself and emerges as a poor man's version of Tartuffe or Iago. 31 He designs his role-simulation to send his wife to work and take advantage of a friend's financial situation. Granted that such classical villains as Tartuffe and Iago are more notorious than Chefdeville and circulate in an aristocratic milieu, they still have one characteristic in common. They are all wolves in sheep's clothing and react to society's expectations by wearing a mask of hypocrisy.	17
The only impediment to the avocat général's effective narration is Chefdeville's version of events, outlined in his complaint at the Chåtelet of Paris in June 1768. 32 The presence of his story in the abstract reflects fair legal procedure but also creates a tension. Chefdeville tells his version in a manner that supports his purpose and, as such, acts as a refutation to Séguier's narrative. Chefdeville presents himself as a cuckold whose good faith in his friend leads to the loss of his wife and possessions. In his account, he marries Marie-Anne Deslions in 1750 and lives with her until 1760. He accuses Dubarle of artfully cultivating a friendship with him and his wife, and, one day, he discovers him "en action indécente avec sa femme" (7). 33 Falling ill with chagrin, he commits himself to the Hôtel-Dieu. After leaving the hospital, he returns home only to discover all of his furniture gone and his wife elsewhere living with Dubarle. No longer sure of his future, he goes to the Bicêtre and remains there for eighteen months. He then returns to his family village, Pricy-sur-Oise, and ultimately goes to live in Viarmes. Having received no news from his wife since 1760, he learns that she has lived with Dubarle for eight years, used the money from the sale of his furniture to open a wine business in Vaugirard and build a house there, mothered several infants, and died in the rue Barrière de Seve. He demands reparation for Dubarle's terrible crimes: "le vol, la séduction, l'enlèvement, et l'adultère" (7). 34	18
Chefdeville strengthens the credibility of his own story when he introduces twelve witnesses whose depositions support his account. Inhabitants of Vaugirard state that Dubarle and a woman lived in their neighborhood for a long time as husband and wife. The parish priest and midwife in Vaugirard also testify about the two letters written from the Bicêtre to Marie-Anne Deslions, whose name they did not recognize. The midwife says that Dubarle's "wife," learning that her husband was alive right before she died, asked to see him. The owner of the apartment on the rue St. Denis declares that Chefdeville and his wife had two rooms on the sixth floor fourteen years earlier and that, after he fell ill, he retired to the Hôtel-Dieu. The landlord adds that Marie-Anne showed him the proxy authorizing her to sell their furniture, gave him a silver goblet whose worth was less than the value of the rent owed, and promised to pay the balance. Upon his return, Chefdeville found his rooms empty and received not a penny from the sale of his furniture.	19
The Parisian magistrates are obviously moved by Chefdeville's story and initially give him their support. The authorities arrest Dubarle and place his material possessions under sealed security. For four months Chefdeville rejoices in victory. Dubarle is incarcerated and separated from his wife and children; his wine business, as well as his reputation, lies in ruins. "Le commerce perdu et l'honneur diffamé ne se rétabliront jamais d'une plaie aussi cruelle" (8). 35 The court allows Chefdeville license to inspect his rival's confiscated possessions. Preliminary judicial action thus indicates that he, the carpenter, is the victim and that he should be compensated by Dubarle for the evil Dubarle has done.	20
Why the magistrates gave more credence to Chefdeville's story remains open to speculation. The literature of the period is filled with warnings against leaving a village in search of a supposedly better life in the capital. The most outspoken critic of migration to Paris for economic gain is Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In Emile, he speaks against formal education for the poor and in favor of proximity to physical nature, which will distance them from cultural sophistication and teach them all they need to know for their happiness. In addition, maintains Rousseau, closeness to fields, mountains, forests, and lakes prepares villagers for all of life's conditions. Those who ignore his advice, leave the land, and move to Paris for a better life are headed straight for annihilation. "Or il est moins raisonable d'élever un pauvre pour être riche qu'un riche pour être pauvre; car à proportion du nombre des deux états il y a plus de ruinés que de parvenus." 36 In La Nouvelle Héloïse, where he maintains that agriculture and the life of a villager comprise the most natural human condition, he repeats his warning more forcefully.	21
Or de mille sujets qui sortent du village il n'y en a pas dix qui n'aillent se perdre à la ville, ou qui n'en portent les vices plus loin que les gens dont ils les ont appris.... Les malheureux qu'elle [la fortune] n'a point favorisés ne reprennent plus leur ancien état et se font mendiants ou voleurs, plutôt que de redevenir paysans. 37
Rousseau's words of caution could easily have been a blueprint of what happened later to Chefdeville. He leaves his native Pricy-sur-Oise and works as a compagnon carpenter in the booming building industry in the western sections of Paris. Six thousand new houses were being built for wealthy Parisians "fleeing the essentially medieval center where, above street-level workshops and stores, the various social strata of the population lived in descending layers of wealth in tenement buildings." 38	22
Like any normal migrant, Chefdeville plans on making money in the lucrative construction trade. However, his horrible living conditions must have affected his morale. 39 He lives in a sixth-floor apartment with one room and an attic. Although he does not describe what he had, his possessions must have resembled those of a stonemason whose furniture was limited to: "A poor stove ... a very poor cot and trestle-bed, a mattress in a very bad state, two thin woolen blankets, a bolster made of ticking, a butter-pot, a little pottery soup-bowl ... a small box containing old rags and tools." 40 After a fourteen- to sixteen-hour day, Chefdeville probably relaxed in a tavern on the rue St. Denis, close to his home, before sharing a meager meal prepared by his wife for him and their friend Dubarle. 41	23
Harsh working conditions for minimal pay and unfair treatment by his supervisors may have also contributed to Chefdeville's bitterness, disillusionment, and ultimate downfall, as well as the magistrates' sympathy for him. In carpentry guilds, masters imposed too many dues, ignored efficient work procedures, and placed their own interest above the public good, as well as the advantage of their lower-ranked compagnons. 42 Guilds often placed obstacles in the path of ambitious beginners, desirous of achieving mastership. They made it expensive and required the production of a chef d'oeuvre. Masters took aim at the weaker financial and political condition of their compagnons and inflicted unjust burdens on them. 43	24
Unable to rise through the ranks after nine years of apprenticeship and compagnonnage, Chefdeville grows discouraged. Then, in his debilitated state, sickness incapacitates him. No name is given to his malady. The abstract uses the words valétudinaire and incapable de travailler chez les maîtres (2). 44 Leaving Pricy-sur-Oise, Chefdeville has no idea of the horrific fate awaiting him in Paris and, when it pounds upon him, he could have easily succumbed to despair, reacted with bitterness, or remained determined to better his social condition, no matter what the cost.	25
An additional factor that could have contributed to Chefdeville's debilitation and increased the magistrates' favor was Dubarle's success. He, too, is a compagnon carpenter but somehow manages to save his earnings better. When his friend needs help, he has the cash—money that he could have saved by economizing on one meal a day for nine years at Chefdeville's home. His stable position is strengthened by his family. His mother and sister are obviously members of the wealthy peasantry. 45 When they die, he inherits their land and is able to buy property and start a wine business in a tavern. Later, after Marie-Anne's death, his second wife's dowry helps him to build a home on that same property. He seems to get all "the breaks," while the underdog Chefdeville suffers one calamity after another.	26
In addition, Dubarle must have been a good businessman, despite his illiteracy. After lending money, he expects it to be returned and has legal papers signed to that effect. Thus, Chefdeville suffers the humiliation of signing promissory notes to someone who has been a daily visitor to his modest home for the first nine years of his married life. Soon afterwards, a contract binds him and his wife to be Dubarle's employees for the rest of their lives. At that moment, he could have easily felt such mortification that he loses all scruples, takes advantage of Dubarle's trust, steals whatever money he is able to obtain, and disappears into a state of anonymity. The entire sequence of events could easily have been viewed as conducive to a victim's unreasonable, almost insane, reaction.	27
Chefdeville's account—more than Séguier's—must have moved the magistrates' sensitivity. His story resonates with the frustrations of a poor man's dreams, the miserable treatment received from maître carpenters, unexpected sickness, the humiliation of indebtedness to a friend, and Dubarle's financial cunning, even though uneducated—all moving characteristics of a melodramatic story. Both he and Séguier communicate as authors of fiction in that they shape the events of a crime into a story. Although they contradict each other, they structure the heart of their narrations to support their points of view. Neither one nor the other feigns his incidents but rather molds and crafts them with very specific perspectives. 46	28
Séguier must have been smart enough to know that his opponent's version of events was winning the court battle. He has to take quick action and thus switches strategies. He leaves his storytelling and has recourse to hard-core evidence and objective legal procedures, all designed as formal argumentation to prove that Dubarle is innocent and his accuser a corruptor of truth. 47	29
Relying on his skill as an experienced prosecutor, Séguier carefully and with maximum effectiveness selects arguments to refute the plaintiff's claims. 48 He first produces Chefdeville's proxy given to his wife on 4 November 1759 by which he authorizes her to sell his possessions in order to pay his debts. 49 Séguier points out that he owes Dubarle 125 pounds, which would absorb the value of the furniture, that he is at the Hôtel-Dieu when he gives his wife the proxy, and that everything must have been sold soon afterwards, since his apartment premises have to be vacated by 8 January 1760. As Séguier then suggests, Chefdeville lies when, five months later, he says that he was surprised to find everything gone and no longer in possession of his own home. His wife has simply followed his instructions. His claims and accusations, nine years after the fact, have no truthful foundation.	30
Séguier next introduces two of Chefdeville's promissory notes, which prove that, after he leaves the Hôtel-Dieu, Dubarle lends him 34 pounds on 25 November 1759 and 60 pounds on 20 January 1760 to pay for his rent. If Chefdeville's furniture has been taken from him against his will, he would not deal with Dubarle as a creditor. He would not unconditionally sign the notes. "Le faux de l'imputation est donc évident" (11). 50	31
Séguier also addresses the accusation that Dubarle builds his house in Vaugirard with the money obtained from selling Chefdeville's possessions. He produces legal records that prove Dubarle first acquires his property with the two hundred pounds received from his double inheritance. His documentation further establishes that he still owes on the building construction. What he pays in 1767 is from his wife's dowry and a certified loan from public funds. "Il n'a donc point dépouillé Chefdeville" (11). 51 Séguier supports his own logic by a denigrating reference to the accuser's living conditions on the sixth floor of his tenement on the rue St. Denis. Surviving on borrowed money and seeking help at the Hôtel-Dieu, he must not have owned furniture of any value.	32
Having disproved the accusation of stealing, Séguier confronts the more significant charge of kidnapping by reference to undisputable facts. 52 He points out that Chefdeville presses Dubarle to begin his wine business, open a cabaret in Vaugirard, employ his wife to perform domestic chores, and charge him with "toutes les commisssions du dehors" (12). 53 After arranging a contractual relationship, he takes money from Dubarle, disappears, and hides traces of his location for eight years. During this period, he withdraws to the Bicêtre and addresses letters to Marie-Anne Deslions at the Lion d'Or in Vaugirard. He knows that his wife lives in the home of Dubarle, still hides his location, and thus nullifies the basis of his charges. "S'il l'eût cru ravie, s'il eût cherché à la reprendre, ou seulement à vivre avec elle, qui l'empêchait de se présenter?" (12). 54 Silently living as an independent beggar, idler, and wanderer, engaged in household servitude and odd jobs, he chooses not to reclaim his wife. "Voilà l'homme qui vient aujourd'hui crier au rapt et à l'enlèvement; sans doute il n'y eut jamais de calomnie plus indigne" (12). 55 His silence as a hidden spectator invalidates any indictment of kidnapping.	33
Séguier's final refutation addresses the most serious of all the charges—adultery—by a series of strong arguments, skillfully reserved for the final assault. He distinguishes between public justice and Chefdeville's rights. Referring to Roman and French jurisprudence, he reminds the magistrates of a basic tenet. A husband who has disregarded the sacred ties of matrimony, in this case by placing his wife in the arms of another, loses the right to accuse her of adultery. The law does not avenge a dishonor prepared and approved by a husband. In addition, he cannot accuse her after death when he stays silent while she is alive. Citing the contract whereby Chefdeville agrees to his wife's employment as a domestic, Séguier concludes that she has to be on the premises of Dubarle's home, and her presence there is not a reprehensible act. He pushes the point even further through his sardonic tone. The agreement says nothing about Chefdeville's disappearance for eight years, the abandonment of his spouse, and his delivering two people into a vulnerable situation that presumes the husband's death and the prospect of a new marriage. The accuser has led both of them into a trap.	34
Having established the questionable nature of Chefdeville's character, Séguier concludes that magistrates cannot believe him when he states that he surprised his wife in adultery. He urges them to see him only as the author of the involuntary error of Dubarle and Marie-Anne. Chefdeville's letters prove that he knows she has shown herself in public as Dubarle's wife. Yet, he allows her to die with the disturbing knowledge that he is still alive. His shame is that, after having facilitated their crime, he accuses a wife who has been faithful to him for ten years and a generous friend who has done his utmost to respect her. His motive is unmistakable. As long as he knows Dubarle has little money, he remains silent, even three years after his wife's death. As soon as he suspects good fortune, his devious conduct changes even more. With great haste, he shows himself and energetically attempts to destroy Dubarle's family, fill his spouse with terror, discredit his good name, and extort his hard-earned money. "Il lui a dit: payes, ou je te perds en me déshonorant" (14). 56	35
As Séguier indicates, the couple's intention of marrying is proof of their good faith and their belief that Chefdeville has died. They publicly present themselves as husband and wife. Their only sin consists in their anticipation of sacramental rights and, after she dies, he choses not to soil her memory with the legal designation "concubine." Instead, he gives her the title of spouse on her mortuary record. "Voilà son crime" (14). 57	36
Referring to precedent, his strongest legal tool, Séguier maintains that French law excuses a wife who remarries, even when she believes her husband to be alive. He cites the famous Arrêt de Maillard and "le plaidoyer immortel de M. Bignon, lors Avocat Général" (16). 58 The earlier judgment, he argues, goes further than Roman jurisprudence in protecting a wife's rights. After her husband's long absence, Madame de Maillard married M. de la Boissière. However, they used a false death certificate. In addition, Madame de Maillard gave birth to two infants out of wedlock. The judgment nevertheless protected her by declaring her husband abusive. Not only did judges reject charges of adultery but also discussed the legal status of the two children in sixty-two hearings and seemed to favor legitimacy. Séguier connects the Maillard case to his client's predicament and, in one sentence, pleads for a similar conclusion. "Dubarle ose se croire dans une situation aussi favorable" (16). 59	37
The able lawyer brings his case to a close in an emotional peroration that catapults a positive image before the magistrates. 60 He portrays an ethical Dubarle, emphasizes that any virtuous man would have weakened in his place, and makes it clear that he has offered to satisfy justice. (Dubarle has agreed to make a contribution to the poor in the amount set by the court.) Séquier depicts an upright man whose repentance and new-found legitimacy prove that he was never born to embrace vice. "Epoux et père, sa femme et l'enfant qu'elle porte dans les bras, achèvent en cet instant de solliciter en sa faveur" (16). 61 The abstract makes no mention of the final verdict. However, it leaves the strong impression that Séguier's excellent legal defense has rehabilitated the wine merchant and brought shame to the carpenter.	38
Chefdeville ultimately surfaces as a fiendish betrayer with no scruples, totally lacking in gratitude and sincerity, and motivated by egotistical desires. He has dismissed all moral categories in his quest for self-preservation and a degree of power. Unable to rise to a better life like many members of the bourgeoisie, he has only one means to success—money. Tortured by envy of Dubarle's security, Chefdeville loses all control when he falls ill and embarks on a path of systematic and compulsive deception. He alienates himself from society through his disappearance and ensuing silence. He waits for an appropriate moment, returns for wealth—his only chance for a comfortable life—and then files his deposition.	39
Séguier's narration of Chefdeville's treacherous conduct, supported by arguments and refutations, is at the heart of his discourse. The skillful lawyer must have been sensitive to the popularity of courtroom literature, which French readers eagerly devoured. He could have seized the opportunity to project a new image of himself as protector of the innocent against deception and betrayal. 62 Lawyers, including Séguier, knew well, as they penned their briefs, that the publication of a mémoire, especially if it related to a highly publicized case, was greeted by a mass of avid readers. 63 This guarantee of a built-in, anxiously waiting audience motivates Séguier to compose the best possible story and thus manipulate public opinion in favor of his own case.	40
The mémoire's novelty as a social and literary phenomenon consists in its presentation of Chefdeville as a master of pretense. This protagonist would never have found a place next to such geniuses of deceit as Rameau's nephew, Versac, Valmont, or Madame de Merteuil nor would he have earned the same masquerade-status as Meilcour, Mme. de Lursay, and Marianne's suitor Claville. Chefdeville's milieu has nothing in common with the salon frequenters depicted in Les Lettres Persanes, their attachment to life within a public sphere of values, and their enslavement to formalized codes of words, gestures, and conduct. 64 Their attachment disfigures them; their real personalities are often not recognizable, as is the case with Séguier's depiction of Chefdeville. The carpenter's is not the world of regulated civility criticized by Jean-Jacques Rousseau for its superficial conversation and lack of profundity. Yet the carpenter possesses in the fiber of his being the same capacity for disguise that characterizes the capital's mondains. Charges traditionally hurled against the elite segment of the population—unnaturalness, shallowness, lack of spontaneity, falseness—also appropriately define the conduct of the accuser in Séguier's mémoire.	41
The story about Chefdeville's masquerade stands on its own merit as an example of a lawyer's persuasiveness. The avocat général, well trained in the use of rhetoric, knows how to plead a case with maximum effectiveness. He centers his presentation on moral life at the lower end of the social scale and, in the process, brings fiction into his defense. His outrage toward the carpenter's machinations places him in the company of such authors as Rousseau, Françoise de Graffigny, Choderlos de Laclos, and Restif de la Bretonne whose wrath satirizes the lack of sincerity between people. Séguier vents his displeasure in his mémoire, one of countless examples of courtroom literature that abounds in French archives. However, his brief is a special case and not just because of his skillful arrangement and blending of oratorical techniques to defend the wine merchant Dubarle. Its fictional qualities hypnotize readers who cannot put its pages down until every line is devoured. 65 Séguier has so successfully used fictional qualities in a legal framework that they take on an independent life of their own. He has created a miniature novel—not The Return of Martin Guerre but The Return of Eustache Chefdeville.	42
Santo L. Aricò is professor of French and Italian at the University of Mississippi. Notes       1. There are three names at the end of the trial brief: Monsieur Séguier, Avocat Général (first name); M. Le Prestre, Avocat (second name); Souchay, Procureur (third name). Early in his career as avocat général and counselor for the Parlement of Paris, Séguier (1726-1792) established his reputation as an eloquent orator and, during the reign of Louis XVI, became the senior avocat général and a staunch supporter of the monarchy. As the most prestigious name on the side of the defense, Séguier was the main orator and author of the brief. Le Prestre and Souchay were supporting members of his legal team who did the actual penning and publication of the brief. "Generally in collaboration with the procureur [Souchay], the barrister [avocat Le Prestre] did not simply submit them [legal briefs] to the judges, but often had them printed and distributed to the public." David A. Bell, Lawyers and Citizens: The Making of a Political Elite in Old Regime France (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), 31.       Séguier's importance is further enhanced by his position. The king's men (gens du roi) in the French parliament were the procureur-général and two or three avocats généraux. These royal attorneys were special pleaders for monarchical and public interests. The procureur-général, as the king's chief solicitor, oversaw the pleading of the avocats généraux in any litigation involving the Crown's interests. In all his activities, he was seconded by the other gens du roi, especially the senior avocat général. See Bailey Stone, The French Parlements and the Crisis of the Old Regime (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1986), 24. Thus, even though avocat Le Prestre's and procureur Souchay's signatures are on the case abstract, Séguier's name before both of theirs means that he is the man of prestige who has pleaded the case for Dubarle. It was not unusual for an avocat général to take cases that dealt with public order rather than royal litigation. See Julian Swann, Politics and the Parlement of Paris under Louis XV, 1754-1774 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 5: "The gens du roi ... had wide-ranging responsibilities for maintaining public order." Criminal cases and appeals were under the rubric of public order. See Richard Mowery Andrews, Law, Magistracy, and Crime in Old Regime Paris (1735-1789), vol. 2, The System of Criminal Justice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 91: "He (procureur-général) was public prosecutor in all criminal cases judged by the Grand-Chambre in first instance or on appeal, and he could initiate those cases." Andrews also makes clear that the procureur-général or his deputies (i.e., avocats généraux) reviewed appeals cases. Dubarle's case was an appeal against Chefdeville's charges. Thus, Séguier, in his capacity as avocat général, seconds or substitutes for his immediate superior, the procureur-général. In other words, Séguier was a member of the public ministry who replaced the public prosecutor (procureur-général) at hearings in the Supreme Court of Appeals and in other appeal courts.        Legal precedent also exists to show that an avocat général not only defends a monarch's interests. In Dubarle's defense/appeal Séguier reminds magistrates of Monsieur Bignon's famous defense of Madame de Maillard against charges of adultery. The judgment in the famous Arrêt de Maillard (15 March 1674) ruled against adultery and showed a willingness to declare legitimate the children involved. The Maillard defense was pleaded by Bignon who was avocat général. In like manner, Séguier, building a case against Chefdeville's adultery charges, is within the framework of his duties, not in contradiction with the royal aspects of his job, and consistent with precedent.       2. The English translation of "mémoire" is legal brief or abstract. A mémoire was also regarded as a noncanonical form of literature. See Sarah Maza, Private Lives and Public Affairs: The Causes Célèbres of Prerevolutionary France (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 2: "Newsletters and gazettes usually reported on the appearance of a major cause célèbre brief, evaluated its qualities and shortcomings, and described the reading public's reaction to it. I discovered that these public trial briefs were issued in quantities that outstripped those of most other kinds of printed matter at the time."       The distinction between legal and literary narratives is of key importance. Literary narratives are produced by the imagination and not necessarily based on fact. In other words, there may be some factual basis but it is possible that the action/content never really happened. Legal narratives are produced by the imagination and necessarily based on fact. Lawyers use facts as they construct their narrative, which they then tell in a rich, creative manner that emphasizes their point of view. The critics L. H. Larue and Natalie Zemon Davis make this important distinction. See below, notes 5-9.       3. In The Novel of Worldliness (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), Peter Brooks discusses the protagonists of Crébillon fils, Marivaux, and Laclos (as well as Stendhal) and their espousement of high society's social code, even at the risk of disfigurement and masquerade.       4. The functions of the various segments of a forensic discourse determine the classical system of partitioning it into four usual parts: exordium, narration or statement of fact, confirmation, and peroration. See Santo L. Aricò, Rousseau's Art of Persuasion in "La Nouvelle Héloïse" (Lanham: University Press of America, 1994), 52. For five parts of a classical arrangement—exordium, narration, confirmation, refutation, and peroration—see Edward J. Corbett, Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), 303. In this article I consider the refutation as an integral part of the confirmation.       5. L. H. LaRue states: "I suggest that one should listen for that moment in legal discourse when a story is told. These moments are crucial." Constitutional Law as Fiction: Narrative in the Rhetoric of Authority (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), 11.       6. LaRue emphasizes the importance of stories in the persuasive process. "Since persuasion is so important, my metaphor 'law as fiction' is apt. Without persuasion, law could not be law, and without fiction, there would be no persuasion." Ibid., 11.       7. In his remarks about historians, applicable also to lawyers, LaRue notes that historians write accounts based on fact and then adds that good historical accounts are also "produced by the imagination." He emphasizes that witnesses who wrote the documents that historians use may have been biased, "So that one must cross-examine these documents carefully." Ibid., 13.       8. LaRue points out that, in common speech, fiction is a story about something that did not really happen and adds that "it would be disastrous to leave it at that." His dictionary definition—fiction "is produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact"—implies "a sharp dichotomy between two kinds of stories: those produced by the imagination and not necessarily based on fact, versus those not produced by the imagination and necessarily based on fact." LaRue hesitates to accept the dichotomy. "Can we produce stories without using the imagination? And is it possible to have stories that are based solely on the facts?" Ibid.       9. I accept as my own LaRue's definition of the word "story." He uses that of the novelist Reynolds Price and quotes his discussion of biblical narratives: "From Genesis we gather that Adam ... invented narrative; when God hunts out the human pair after their fall, Adam says, 'I heard Your voice in the garden and feared, since I'm naked, and hid myself'—a chronologically consecutive account of more than one past event, with attention to cause and self-defense: thus a narrative." Ibid., 15.       Price's original definition is in his A Palpable God: Thirty Stories Translated from the Bible: With an Essay on the Origins and Life of Narrative (New York: Atheneum, 1978), 8. Natalie Zemon Davis also summarizes how archival documents may be considered fictional. "By 'fictional' I do not mean their feigned elements, but rather, using the other and broader sense of the root word fingere, their forming, shaping, and molding elements: the crafting of a narrative." Fiction in the Archives: Pardon Tales and Their Tellers in Sixteenth-Century France: (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987), 3.       10. Kibedi A. Varga stresses this preparatory function when he cites the classical rhetorician Bordaloue's definition of exordium: "qui prépare l'auditeur à écouter favorablement le sujet" ("that which prepares the hearer to favorably hear the subject"). Rhétorique et littérature: Etudes de structures classiques (Paris: Didier, 1970), 71. All translations of French citations are my own.       11. "A husband who has absented himself long enough forpeople to consider him dead, and who has even left his wife in error on that point and the one to whom he had entrusted her by written agreement before disappearing, can he, four years after the death of this wife, charge with kidnapping and adultery the Citizen with whom she lived, believing herself free to marry a second time." Mémoire pour Jean-Baptiste Dubarle, marchand de vin à Vaugirard, accusé et appelant. Contre le nommé Chefdeville, compagnon menuisier, accusateur et intimé (Paris: Ch. Est. Chenault, 1770), 1. All further references to the Mémoire are documented by a page number in parentheses, immediately after the quotation. The English translation appears in the footnotes.       Various techniques assure an audience that a subject merits its attention. Séguier uses the introduction inquisitive, which indicates that the content is important. His question acts as a hook—a provocative or startling hyperbole to capture interest. For a discussion of attention-getting techniques, see Corbett, Classical Rhetoric, 303, 312.       12. "This accuser did not flatter himself with the thought of succeeding, he only hoped to make Dubarle contribute money or cause his downfall." Séguier gives the magistrates an idea of his case without revealing everything. This preparation informs spectators of the end or object of a discourse and disposes them to be receptive to what is said. See Corbett, Classical Rhetoric, 303.       13. "He will not succeed, and the evil one, who comes here publically to dishonor himself, will carry away his shame free of charge." Séguier's last statement in the exordium is an example of an introduction paradoxical (Chefdeville's actions, although improbable, must be admitted) and an introduction corrective (Chefdeville has done wrong, and Séguier will thwart his evil plans). For a discussion of the techniques, see Corbett, Classical Rhetoric, 303-7.       14. The rhetorician Jean Baptiste Crevier insisted that the distinction between something that has already taken place and the manner in which it has occurred is of major importance. See Crevier, La Rhétorique française (Paris: Saillant et Desaint, 1765), 348-49; British and Continental Rhetoric and Elocution (Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1976), Reel 11. René Bary proposed that three elements characterize an expository presentation: the subject matter, its various parts, and the arrangement of the material. See Bary, La Rhétorique française (Paris: Chez Pierre Le Petit, 1659), 244; British and Continental Rhetoric and Elocution, Reel 9.       15. The term compagnon indicates the rank of the two carpenters. They were no longer apprentices but had not yet become master carpenters. They were at an intermediary stage.       16. All of the houses on the rue St. Denis had five or six floors. The crowded street, along with the neighboring rue de Ferronnerie and rue aux Fers, must have created a claustrophobic atmosphere and contributed to unsanitary conditions. In 1763, the Chåtelet Commissioners Hugues and Machurin attributed an unbearable stench from the Innocents Cemetery near les Halles to the fact that it was enclosed on all sides by the five- and six-story houses of the rue St. Denis and its neighboring streets. See Jean Chagniot, Nouvelle Histoire de Paris au XVIIIe Siècle (Paris: Hachette, 1988), 176. The rue St. Denis, along with Saint Honoré and Dauphine, was one of the city's main traffic arteries. It was noisy and congested. See Albert Babeau, Paris en 1789 (Paris: Librairie de Paris, Nouvelle Edition), 28.       17. "Dubarle opened his purse for his use."       18. "Reducing him to have neither heat nor residence."       19. When Chefdeville entered Hôtel-Dieu, this oldest hospital in Paris was located on the south side of Notre Dame Square. It counted twelve hundred beds in twenty-one wards. It was, along with Salpetrière, the most important hospital in the city. Hôtel-Dieu was severely criticized because of its poor hygiene, filth, overcrowding, lack of personnel, and disturbingly high death rate. It burned in 1772 and was rebuilt on the same spot. It was rebuilt again from 1868 to 1878 on the other side of the church square.       20. Séguier made it clear that Chefdeville's writing in the contract was substandard but nevertheless included it as objective evidence. "Voici sa teneur: quelqu'intelligible qu'il soit, nous en copierons servilement le texte" (4). "Here are its terms: as comprehensible as it may be, we servilely reproduce the text."       Pardevant Chefdeville & Sieur Dubarle, & Marie-Anne       Deslions, femme de Chefdeville, nous consanton au bien meûmébleblier tous trois, au       que le Sieur Dubarle gourat de ladit fame de Chefdeville, au fait que bon lui sanblera,       & que le dit bien en gant seron commun entre nous; foi quoi nous signons tous trois.       Chefdeville, Dubarle, Marie-Anne Lomé. (4) The contract gives Marie-Anne's name as Lomé. But Séquier's mémoire refers to her as Deslions. Neither I nor two curators at the Bibliothèque Historique de la Ville de Paris were able to logically transcribe Chefdeville's language into contemporary French.       21. Vaugirard, currently in Paris's Fifteenth and Sixth Arrondissement, was in Dubarle's time a Left-Bank village-suburb that was annexed into Paris in 1860.       22. "He received a sum of money from Dubarle for that purpose, and left, but he did not show up again, and did not even give them any news about himself."       23. Barrière de Seve is currently spelled Barrière de Sèvres.       24. Bicêtre: a Parisian prison, severe enough to be referred to as "une maison de force" ("a force prison"). It was also an institution that received the elderly and infirm. One of its duties was to receive blind or feeble soldiers who had not accumulated enough time in the military or who had a reputation of questionable morality and could not therefore be admitted to the Invalides. See Chagniot, Nouvelle Histoire de Paris, 291, 482.       25. "Why has he abandoned me?" Marie-Anne used Jean-Baptiste's family name. Thus, neighbors in Vaugirard knew her as Marie-Anne Dubarle. When she gave birth to her last child, the midwife, who had helped deliver the first two infants in Vaugirard, went to the Barrière de Seve. There she asked whether the spouses had ever given lodging in the Vaugirard cabaret to the woman in question. The midwife had heard the story of the two letters in her village and must have wondered about the possibility of a lodger by that name.       26. "Chefdeville no longer maintained his self-control."       27. In Sincerity and Authenticity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972), Lionel Trilling states that at a certain point in history "the moral life of Europe added to itself a new element, the state or quality of the self which we call sincerity" (2).       28. "The word [sincerity] as we now use it refers primarily to a congruence between avowal and actual feeling." Ibid., 2. In Séguier's account there is no congruence between Chefdeville's external behavior and actual feeling.       29. Trilling's statement summarizes the dynamic. "If sincerity is the avoidance of being false to any man through being true to one's own self, we can see that this state of personal existence is not to be attained without the most arduous effort." Ibid., 5-6. In Séguier's story, this effort, most important in moral life, was absent in Chefdeville's life.       30. Trilling develops the analogy with acting. "In this enterprise of presenting the self, of putting ourselves on the social stage, sincerity itself plays a curiously compromised part. Society requires of us that we present ourselves as being sincere, and the most efficacious way of satisfying this demand is to see to it that we really are sincere, that we actually are what we want our community to know we are. In short, we play the role of being ourselves, we sincerely act the part of the sincere person, with the result that a judgment may be passed upon our sincerity that is not authentic." Ibid., 11. In Séguier's story, Chefdeville is insincere in his sincere appearance.       31. Trilling discusses falsely presenting a self and the character Iago as an example. "'I am not what I am' could have been said not alone by Iago but by a multitude of Shakespeare's virtuous characters." Ibid., 13.       32. Chåtelet was the name given to two fortresses in Paris, the Grand and the Petit. The Grand, demolished in 1802, was where Chefdeville went to file his suit against Dubarle. It was located on the Right Bank of the Seine in front of the Pont-au-Change. It was the seat of criminal jurisdiction for the viscountcy and provostship of Paris. The Petit was on the Left Bank of the Seine in front of the Petit-Pont and was used as a prison.       33. "in indecent action with his wife"       34. "theft, seduction, kidnapping, and adultery"       35. "His destroyed business and defamed honor will never recover from such a cruel wound."       36. "It is less reasonable to raise a poor man to be rich than a rich man to be poor; because in proportion to the number in the two states there are more ruined people than successful ones." Oeuvres complètes de Jean-Jacques Rousseau, ed. Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade (Paris: Gallimard, 1959), 4: 267.       37. "Of a thousand who leave the village there are not ten of them who do not destroy themselves in the city, or who do not practice the vices more strongly than the people from whom they have learned them.... The unhappy ones that she [fortune] has not favored do not go back to their former state and become beggars or thieves, rather than become peasants again." Ibid., 2: 5       38. Peter McPhee, A Social History of France: 1780-1880 (London: Routledge, 1992), 12.       39. McPhee states that Paris was an amalgam of neighborhoods distinguished by geography, social structure, and the presence of migrants from particular regions. "Inside the new and hated customs walls were faubourgs ... which remained semi-rural, the home of impoverished migrants ... three quarters of the families of the faubourg St. Antoine lived in one or two rooms." Ibid., 13.       40. Ibid., 12.       41. McPhee summarizes the after-work dynamic: "Men relaxed from 14-16 hour days in one of Paris' 3,000 taverns (cafés were considered bourgeois) and women from their paid and unpaid work over cards or in the street." Ibid., 13.       42. "In articles on specific trades and on artisinal production (as in the article 'Communautés') the encyclopedists were generally critical of the guilds, faulting them for excessive regulation, indifference to progress in their trades, and the tendency to promote the particular over the public interest." Cynthia Maria Truant, The Rites of Labor: Brotherhoods of Compagnonnage in Old and New Regime France (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994), 49.       43. In the article "Ma”trises," explains Truant, Faiguet de Villeneuve "criticized the obstacles that guilds placed in the way of becoming a master, especially the high costs and the requirement that the compagnon produce a chef d'oeuvre." She points out that Villeneuve made an important connection between economic status and political rights. According to Villeneuve, states Truant, "it was particularly unfair to impose such burdens because the compagnon was 'as much as anyone else a member of the republic, and he should benefit equally from the protection of the laws.'" Ibid. Truant summarizes and quotes from Faiguet de Villeneuve's "Ma”trises" in the ninth volume (pages 910-15) of Encyclopédie; ou, Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts, et des métiers, par une société de gens de lettres, 17 vols. text and 11 vols. plates (Paris: 1751-72). Truant also points out that Villeneuve's article is classified both under the categories of arts and commerce and under politics. To strengthen further the case against masters and guilds, she refers readers to Denis Diderot's articles, "Compagnon" and "Compagnonnage," in the Encyclopédie, 3: 744.       44. "valetudinarian"; "incapable of working with masters"       45. In Restif de la Bretonne's La Paysanne Pervertie (Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1972) the writer portrays members of the wealthy peasantry. His characters Ursule and Edmond's peasant family own property and enjoy a good life. But both Ursule and Edmond, like Chefdeville, leave their village, province, and country life in search of a more socially acceptable existence and suffer catastrophic consequences.       46. Natalie Zemon Davis's comment about historical narrative applies to Chefdeville and Séguier's story. "I think we can agree with Roland Barthes, Paul Ricoeur, and Lionel Gossman that shaping choices of language, detail, and order are needed to present an account that seems to both writer and reader true, real, meaningful, and/or explanatory." Davis, Fiction in the Archive, 3.       47. Classical rhetoricians refer to argumentation as the confirmation. "La confirmation est la partie centrale du discours, surtout dans les genres judiciaire et délibératif." "The confirmation is the central part of the discourse, especially in judiciary and deliberative kinds." Varga, Rhétorique et littérature, 78.       48. "La confirmation se définit comme l'arrangement des arguments." "The confirmation is defined as the arrangements of arguments." Ibid. Varga points out that classical treatises discuss syllogisms and other forms of reasoning in his chapter on confirmation.       49. "Je donne pouvoir et consentement à mon épouse de tout vendre quel bon lui sembrera pour payer mes dettes auquel je suis embarassé pour honneur à mes faire, auquel je dit confiante, et j'ai signé, Eustache Chefdeville. A Paris ce 4 novembre 1759" (3)."I give power and consent to my spouse whom I address as confidant to sell all that she feels appropriate to pay the debts encumbering me and to satisfy my honor, and I have signed, Eustache Chefdeville. In Paris on this 4 November 1759."       50. "The falsehood of the charge is thus evident."       51. "Thus he did not plunder Chefdeville."       52. Séguier's movement from strong to stronger arguments reflects a classical technique of persuasion. In a work of the early eighteenth century, the Parisian scholar Charles Rollin quoted Quintilian who verified the validity of beginning with weak proofs and ending with strong ones. "L'ordre et l'arrangement des preuves doivent être différents selon l'exigeance des matières que l'on traite, de sorte pourtant que jamais le discours n'aillent en déclinant, et ne finisse par de minces et de faibles raisons, après qu'on en a employé d'abord de fortes." "The order and arrangement of proofs should be different as the subject may require, so that the discourse never gets weaker and ends with puny and feeble reasons, after first using strong ones. Rollin, Traité des Etudes (1732-33; Paris: Librairie de Firmin Didot Frères, 1846), 1: 430-31.       53. "all of the external errands"       54. "If he had believed her taken away by force, if he had tried to get her back, or simply to live with her, who would have prevented him from returning?"       55. "That is the man who comes here today crying out abduction and kidnapping; without a doubt there has never been a more indignant calumny."       56. "He told him: Pay up, or I will destroy you while dishonoring myself."       57. "That is his crime."       58. "the immortal speech for the defense by M. Bignon, Avocat Général at the time"       59. "Dubarle dares to believe himself in a situation just as favorable."       60. According to Varga, most classical treatises on rhetoric state that a peroration is composed of two parts: the first recapitulates and the second appeals to emotions. Rhétorique et littérature, 79. Séguier chose to close his delivery on an emotional note rather than review hard-core evidence.       61. "His wife and the child she carries in her arms entreat on behalf of this husband and father."       62. No stranger to controversy, Séguier opposed the Turgot Edicts. Turgot, minister of finance under Louis XVI, strove to implement liberal economic reforms. He suppressed customs within France and wanted to free commerce and industry by eliminating les ma”trises (ensembles of foremen and team heads) and les jurandes (the responsibilities of jurymen). Séguier opposed his reforms and led the struggle in the Parlement of Paris, creating the impression that he protected those who profited from the old way of doing business. Séguier favored a political system in which the government exercised a political and decision-making role in economic matters. However, he did recognize the abuse of the corporate system in Paris and made appropriate recommendations. By taking Dubarle's defense earlier in his career, Séguier perhaps softened the image as champion of the economically powerful and took on the look of protector of the innocent, lower-level bourgeois. See Chagniot, Nouvelle Histoire de Paris, 38, 285, 350.       63. Maza discusses the widespread interest in trial briefs: "The trial briefs and other courtroom literature examined in this book also belong to the category of works that, though now forgotten, were immensely popular and influential in their time—published in the tens of thousands, eagerly awaited, devoured by readers, and dissected by critics." Maza, Private Lives and Public Affairs, 8. She develops arguments in her book based on the heavily fictionalized qualities of the most popular mémoires. She also stresses the relationship between author and readers—"about how the former appealed with increasing openness to the latter to serve as judges and witnesses to the truth and righteousness of a given case." Ibid., 9. Maza mentions "several texts describing mob scenes around bookseller's shops and lawyers' houses when an eagerly awaited trial brief was finally made available to the public." Ibid., 2.       64. The ethos and manners of Parisian high society attach "primary or even exclusive importance to ordered social existence, to life within a public system of values and gestures, to the social techniques that further this life and one's position in it, and hence to knowledge about society and its forms of comportment." Brooks, The Novel of Worldliness, 4.       65. This was my experience when I accidentally discovered the brief in the Bibliothèque Historique de la Ville de Paris. It read like a short, intense novel that magnetized my attention and that I visualized as a powerful movie.

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