CHAPTEE XL. 



CREDITS MOBILIER, FAST FREIGHTS, ETC. 



&quot; CEEDIT MOBILIER&quot; DEFINED. 



In the French language, from which &quot; Credit Mobilier &quot; 

 is derived, the term may be made to mean an innocent lend 

 ing of money upon movable property, as upon chattels; but 

 usage has really given it a more specific, limited significa 

 tion. Under the empire of Napoleon III, certain of his 

 cliques erected a system by which money was loaned, not 

 only on real estate, but also upon personal property. This 

 property might or might not be at the time valuable; in 

 fact much of it was very doubtful ; but, like the loans of 

 the pawnbroker, who runs a credit mobilier shop on a small 

 scale, if the risks were great, the interest corresponded. 

 Money was thus lent upon enterprises, such as commercial 

 railroads, and the like, while they were yet in embryo, and 

 often of very uncertain outcome. 



It was, in many cases, the lending of a credit upon credit 

 for th stock of the Credit Mobilier; and the stock to which 

 it lent its credit might be upon the market at the same 

 time. In this case it was credit built upon credit ; a row of 

 bricks, one leaning upon the other an inverted pyramid 

 built upon quicksand, liable, at any time, to fall by the mov 

 ing of a single brick, or to topple by the shiftings of the 

 quicksand. Upon this system of credit built upon credit, 

 (474) 



