Georgiana added Stephen's name to the list of attendants.
Aside from art and music having no borders, capitalists had no borders either. The current situation was complicated, and bankers did not dare invest recklessly. By comparison, investing in Du Pont's gunpowder factories and agriculture in France was relatively safe, so the bankers were willing to put up the money.
Investing in manufacturing in France carried great risks because it had to compete with British goods. From the perspective of profit and tariffs alone, lowering tariffs could increase imports and achieve high sales volume through lower prices. In the short term, that was beneficial.
But political economy involved politics as well as economics. As a ruler, Napoleoni had to consider political issues and long-term interests. France was not, after all, a military government. Beet sugar was an industry capable of changing the world order, yet people in France could sometimes be so inflexible. Just as it was impossible to promote beet cultivation among farmers in France, it was equally impossible to make sailors in France aim at a ship's hull rather than its rigging, even if the British told them so outright.
It was like someone accustomed to using his right hand—it was difficult to train him to use his left. Stephen said he was not afraid of leaks; on the contrary, it would make him seem very knowledgeable.
It would not be right to say that people in France were slow-witted. Reselling was easy: goods came in through the left hand and went out through the right, and money was easily made. The crucial thing was the process. This was not merely a matter of profit; it also involved cotton from the eastern Mediterranean, looms in Lyon, countless cotton-spinning workers, engineers, steelworks, steelworkers, processing industries, and more.
The slaves of