THE OCTROI AT ISSOIRE. 437 



Then the guild of butcliers put in similar claims. To buy raw 

 hides of the herdsmen out on the Puy-de-D6me was a part of the 

 same suicidal policy. The octroi was therefore assessed on all 

 imported skins. The butchers established their own stock-yards 

 within the city walls, and were saved from the pauper competition 

 of the mountain cattle. Then the mountain herdsmen drove the 

 cattle on to Clermont, and Issoire was left in peace. 



But some of the boot-makers complained that this policy was 

 injuring their business by greatly raising the price of hides, 

 whether produced in Issoire or at Clermont. So the mayor sent a 

 letter to the Issoire " Gazette," a long letter which the school- 

 master had helped him to compose, and in which he showed con- 

 clusively that the purpose of the octroi was to make things, not 

 dearer, but cheaper. Said he : " The ultimate result of the octroi 

 is always in the end to reduce prices. The sole purpose of the 

 octroi on hides, for example, is to educate our people in the art, so 

 to speak, of raising hides. By this education, they may, by supe- 

 rior intelligence, experience in the business, and the acquirement 

 of knowledge on the subject, be enabled to produce cowhides in 

 such abundance, by new and improved methods, that they may 

 sell them much cheaper than they do now, sell more of them, and 

 yet realize a larger profit on each hide than they can do at present. 

 If there is a fair prospect that this can be accomplished, who shall 

 say that it is not a part of wise statesmanship to attempt this re- 

 sult ? Cattle-raising is now carried on in the most primitive way, 

 by driving the cattle about as though they were wild beasts from 

 place to place on remote and uninhabited hills. The octroi will 

 tend to encourage each householder in Issoire to keep his own 

 cow, produce his own leather, thus diversifying his business and 

 giving him some new product to sell every year, some new de- 

 mand for labor." 



And the thoughtful men of Issoire, the leaders of public opin- 

 ion, saw the force of this argument, and they were satisfied to 

 submit to temporary inconvenience for the sake of the industrial 

 education of the people. 



But the boot-trade was already growing slack. The market 

 had supplied boots for all, but the people perversely refused to 

 take them. The shop-windows were full of boots, temptingly dis- 

 played in rows of assorted sizes ; nevertheless, every person in 

 Issoire, except those engaged in boot-making, seemed bent on 

 wearing his last year's boots rather than pay twenty francs for 

 a new pair. The high price of leather and hides since the ex- 

 clusion of the mountain cattle began to reduce the profits in boot- 

 making, and so some of the factories threw a poorer article on the 

 market, without, however, any corresponding reduction in price. 

 And people found that it was cheaper to go to Clermont again 



