For most men, dedicating their lives to their country was a duty.
But few would offer up their wives for their country.
Daughters could be used for political marriages, yet Napoleon Bonaparte seemed to have invented a story for himself: Severus had let Georgiana approach the First Consul of France for Britain's sake.
He truly needed gold. The toll taxes squeezed from the provinces had quickly been spent, yet the thirty-million-franc budget for the Saint-Martin Canal was still nowhere to be seen.
Besides food, people needed clean water to live. Britain's situation was now dreadful. Because of the Bread and Blood Movement, Britain's food prices had become the highest in Europe. No sane person could possibly consider that sort of first place an honour.
Britain had its poor tax. That had originally been one of the ways Britain's system was superior to France's: even if the poor did not have enough money to buy bread, they would not starve to death. Now it had become a loophole. Chancellor Addington could not print paper notes without limit. Cutting the Royal Navy's military budget would allow that money to be used for the starving people at home.
Wasn't the French Navy gone? The natural barrier of the English Channel could keep out France's army. Besides, compared to Napoleon, who was "far away on the horizon," the domestic unrest at hand needed to be put down more urgently.
Commoners took paper notes and believed they were money, each one dazzled by them. It was impossible to fool Napoleon with paper notes. Britain needed its gold reserves to buy French grain.
Even the French Navy had been unable to break through the blockade of British warships, much less a few bankers. Money could clear the way in most situations, but not when faced with