Page:History of the French in India.djvu/82

 60 THE PERPETUAL COMPANY OF THE INDIES. chap, publicly annulled and burnt in that year. The interest 11 on the remaining capital at 8 per cent, was provided 1726. by the sum paid to the Company by the farmers- general for the tobacco monopoly. The Company was able, therefore, to hope for additional profits from the mercantile operations we have recorded. But its expenses were considerable. It had laid out large sums on Port L'Orient, and had made it one of the finest harbours in France ; it had been compelled to place upon an efficient footing its marine establish- ments there and in India ;* to build large ships, purchase lodges and com/ptoirs, and to erect magazines ; it had been forced likewise to expend 15,000,000 francs on the swamps of Louisiana. Still, until exhausting- wars, with their consequent ruin to commercial traffic and their large calls upon the Company for assistance, increased expenditure, and cut off all prospect of receipts, the Perpetual Company of the Indies oc- cupied a position, which if insignificant when compared with that it had assumed in the golden era of the Con- troller-Generalship of Law, was still considerable and promising. To revert to the colony. With its prosperity Governor Beauvallier had begun, and, after him, to a far greater extent, Lenoir had carried on, those improvements in the town which had been in contemplation ever since the time of Martin. As in the course of years the number of its inhabitants, drawn thither by the increased traffic, had greatly augmented, it was resolved, first of all, to surround the city with a wall. For this purpose a tax was laid upon the inhabitants, equal to one day's pay per mensem. This moderate impost produced a sufficient sum to en- able the authorities to commence the work, and even, after a considerable time, to complete three sides of the town. It was reserved for Dupleix, under a very press- ing emergency, to erect the side, in his day the most
 * Dictionnaire de Commerce, vol. ii.