"Once, a long time ago, in a similar case," resumed Desroches, "a too
honest debtor took fright at the idea of a solemn declaration in a
court of law, and declined to pay Maxime after notice was given. That
time we made it hot for the creditor by piling on writs of attachment,
so as to absorb the whole amount in costs--"

"Oh, what is that?" cried Malaga; "it all sounds like gibberish to me.
As you thought the sturgeon so excellent at dinner, let me take out
the value of the sauce in lessons in chicanery."

"Very well," said Desroches. "Suppose that a man owes you money, and
your creditors serve a writ of attachment upon him; there is nothing
to prevent all your other creditors from doing the same thing. And now
what does the court do when all the creditors make application for
orders to pay? _The court divides the whole sum attached,
proportionately among them all._ That division, made under the eye of
a magistrate, is what we call a _contribution_. If you owe ten
thousand francs, and your creditors issue writs of attachment on a
debt due to you of a thousand francs, each one of them gets so much
per cent, 'so much in the pound,' in legal phrase; so much (that
means) in proportion to the amounts severally claimed by the
creditors. But--the creditors cannot touch the money without a special
order from the clerk of the court. Do you guess what all this work
drawn up by a judge and prepared by attorneys must mean? It means a
quantity of stamped paper full of diffuse lines and blanks, the
figures almost lost in vast spaces of completely empty ruled columns.
The first proceeding is to deduct the costs. Now, as the costs are
precisely the same whether the amount attached is one thousand or one
million francs, it is not difficult to eat up three thousand francs