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DARNTON, Robert. Trade in The Taboo - The Life of A Clandestine Bookdealer in Provincial France

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Sebastião De Castro Junior
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173 views74 pages

DARNTON, Robert. Trade in The Taboo - The Life of A Clandestine Bookdealer in Provincial France

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Sebastião De Castro Junior
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Printed: 7/9/2014 2:06 PM OCLC In Process Date: iA c-€ I HARVARD LIBRARY Borrower: HLS Lending String: HLS Patron: Darnton, Robert Journal Title: The widening circle :essays on the Circulation of literature in eighteenth-century Europe /Robert Darnton, Bernhard Fabian, Roy McKeen Wiles ; edited by Paul J. Korshin. Volume: Issue: Month/Year: 1976 Pages: 11-83 Call #: WID WIDLC Z1003 .WS2 x Location: HLS ODYSSEY ENABLED Charge Maxcost: Billing Category: Exempt Borrowing Library: Harvard University - Widener Library ke oO Email: 2 Article Author: 3 Notes: 2 Article Title: Trade in the Taboo: The Life ofa Transaction Date:7/9/2014 2:03:38 PM 2 => Ciandestine Bookdealer in Provincial France S & D Processing Notes: = smprins viaScan ad Delve Servie ae 1 Notaseited SS special instructions: Duplicate AY table of contents CD Multipte articles 2 Exceeds 10% of worl Emo ae = i im al Onneeee 2 Too fragile 1D Checked out/on hold Exceeds 100 pages Initials Contents Introduction Paul J. Korshin 1 ‘Trade in the Taboo: The Life of a Clandestine Book Dealer in Prerevolutionary France Robert Darnton u ‘The Relish for Reading in Provincial England Two Centuries Ago Roy McKeen Wiles 2 English Books and Their ighteenth-Century German Readers Bernhard Fabian uz Contributors 197 199 Index of Names Trade in the Taboo: The Life of a Clandestine Book Dealer in Prerevolutionary France Robert Darnton tt Ithough the clandestine book trade of the Old Regime has received its share of scholarship,’ no one has been able to discover very much about the actual books that circulated “under the cloak” or the shady characters who hhandled them. The literary underground has been studied only from the per- spective of the state—inevitably so, because the documentation has come almost entirely from the bureaucracy charged with suppressing illegal books. But in the papers of the Société typographique de Neuchatel, one of the most important publishers of the late eighteenth century, the clandestine book dealers emerge as full-blown personalities, grappling with very human problems—disease, debt, loneliness, failure, and above all the frustrations of a difficult trade. By exploring the world of one of them, this essay is meant to show how the underground operated and what material it conveyed to ordinary readers in an ordinary town. ‘Parr One: BruzaRp Dz MAUVELAIN Early Relations with the STN: Author publisher, Publisher-Book Dealer ‘The Société typographique de Neuchitel, Switzerland (STN), was one of many publishing houses that grew up around the borders of France in order to supply Frenchmen with books that could not be produced legally or safely within the Kingdom, Some of these publishers specialized in liores philosophiques, as they were known in the trade—obscene, irreligious, or seditious works. Others printed cheap, pirated editions of books that French publishers had marketed with a privilége, a kind of copyright. The STN did a litle of each, and it often received manuscripts from obscure authors who wanted their work printed cheaply and safely in Neuchitel, then smuggled back to them in France for distribution through underground channels. One such proposal arrived in a letter from Tonnerre dated 14 April 1781 and signed “De Mauvelain, écuyer.” Mauve- Jain wanted to print “une petite brochure sur les moines” in duodecimo format at 4 pressrun of 600 copies. The STN had been recommended to him by a friend, Jacques-Pierre Brissot de Warvlle, the future leader of the Girondists, who was ‘then struggling to establish himself as a man of letters and had hired the STN to print his first philosophic works. In order to get a favorable reception, Mauvelain stressed his intimacy with Brissot: “Le nom de M. de Warvlle . . . sera ya caution vis & vis de vous.” He offered to pay the STN’s standard charge, of oni’ sou for every sheet printed, and he promised to make half the payment’ upon receiving the edition and half six months Jater.? The STN accepted, although B uu Robert Darnton somewhat reluctantly, because the small size of the printing would reduce its profit margin (it preferred pressruns of at least 750 copies). Mauvelain wrote ‘back that he was delighted to establish relations with them. He would expand his pamphlet with a “lettre sur les maisons de force en France,” and that was only the beginning of his plans for publishing: “Nous avons beaucoup de projets, M, de Warvlle et moi, Je me propose daller fixer mes tabernacles auprés de lui a Paris dans le courant de Yannée et de travailler de concert. Nous avons formé conjointement celui diller & Gendve et auprés de vous, Monsieur, en septembre ou octobre,"* Mauvelain’s next letter, dated 5 June 1781, promised the manuscript within a month or two and explained that he philosophized so assiduously that he had damaged his health: “Etre trop longtemps assis rend les humeurs stag- nantes; les couloirs sengorgent; de la naissent les maurx de téte, les dérangements On 23 May, Mauvelain sent in an order for six Fastes de Louis XV, si Espion décalis, six Suite de TEspion anglois, and six Lettres de cachet. Two weeks Tater he ordered another half dozen of each and also six Mémoires sur la Bastille and a Vie prioée de Louis XV. Clearly he was buying in bulk, not merely Trade in the Taboo 7 procuring a few odd volumes for friends. And now he offered to serve as the STN's middleman for all its shipments through Champagne. Writing in an off hhand manner as one gentleman who took pleasure in obliging another, he sug- {gested that the director of the STN send everything bound for Paris and vicinity directly to him, He would have the crates relayed safely to their destination: “Mettez-les tout bonnement & mon adresse. Cest Yalfaire de mon domestique et voila tout.” At the same time, Mauvelain seemed especially eager to discredit Bouvet, whom he now described as an unregenerate scoundrel. Bouvet had ought his house on credit, Mauvelain explained, and was now so deep in debt that he had moved to a miserable “bicoque” in order to rent the rest of it. He might flee from his creditors at any moment. “II va faire le métier de libraire roulant: ainsi il waura plus de boutique & Troyes, et on craint quill ne sen aille un de ces jours.”* OF course Mauvelain did not mean to give the impression that he was destroying the STN’s confidence in Bouvet in order to replace him. On the con- trary, while stepping up his orders of prohibited books, Mauvelain increased his emphasis on his role as a man of leters. He continued to drop Brissot’s name, and he proclaimed his admiration for the abbé Raynal, who had passed through Neuchatel in the summer of 1783, having had to flee from France because of the scandal aroused by the 1780 edition of his Histoire philosophique et politique de Tétablissement des Européens dans les deux Tndas. “Crest notre maitre tous,” Mauvelain exclaimed. “Devant lui nous devons baisser pavllon. Dites-lui combien, je Thonore et Ie respecte au-dela de toute expression et que je soupire ardemment aprés la nouvelle édition.”"® “Nous” obviously meant “we philosophes.” Mauvelain wanted to be associated with France's leading literary figures and kept close track of them: “Est-l vrai, Monsieur, comme il en court le bruit ii, que Mercier est mort entre les bras de Tabbé Raynal, qui s'est dion marié?"" There was no mistaking where his sympathies lay, and he also made sure that there were no misimpressions about the company he kept. His letters frequently mentioned notables and aristocrats, suggesting that he philosophized as a gentleman and not as one of the obscure, impoverished “pauvres diables” satirized by Voltaire. Mauvelain informed the STN that the marquis de Florian, then visiting Femey, ‘was one of his relatives and that he had a brother who was @ magistrate at Sermur- en-Auxois. Not that Mauvelain had any absurd respect for titles. Quite the contrary: a friend had recently written a “Histoire de la ville de Bar-sur-Aube,” and Mauvelain had persuaded him to give the printing job to the STN. But the friend would not hand over the manuscript until an expected title had been bestowed on him, because he wanted his namé to look as grand as possible on the title page, “comme si le titre d’homme de lettres n’tait pas le plus honorable ct le plus distingué de tous,” Mauvelain commented scornfully. “Je le préfére & tous. . . . O curas hominum, 6 quantum [est in] rebus inane!" So, despite his distinguished social position, Mauvelain was content to be known as a man of letters; that was a central theme in his correspondence, In June 1783 he announced that he was finishing a two-volume “Histoire de Chilons- sur-Mare,” which had been delayed only because of “une douleur sur les yeux 18 Robert Darnton que ma causé Ia lecture de vieilleschartes.""* He planned to hire the STN to do the printing, of course, but in August he warned of a further delay: the Academy ‘of Chilons wanted to make him a member, and he ought to hold back the prospectus of the book until he had joined the academy. In April 1784, he sent the copy for the prospectus, promising that the text would follow in “quelques mois.” Bu, like all of Mauvelain’s projects, this work somehow evaporated before it reached the STN’s presses. He ceased to mention it in his letters and instead dangled other proposals before the printers. ‘The Marquis de Thyard, one of Mauvelain’s well-born friends, had written ‘a biography of an ancestor, Pontus de Thyard, a bishop of Chalons in the seventeenth century, and Mauvelain had persuaded him to let the STN print it~ fn attractive commission, since the marquis would pay for everything and Mauvelain would act as intermediary, handling the distribution of the book. After inspecting the manuscript, the STN snid that it was too short to form a volume, Mauvelain offered to flesh it out by providing a genealogy of the Thyard family, and the STN executed the work in late 1784, apparently to the satisfaction of everyone (more on ths later). In November 1783, Mauvelain said that he himself had begun work on a history of the contréleurs-généraux of France. He evidently {intended to write a political tract, which would capitalize on the polemics aroused by Necker’ recent ministry and on the interest in the increasingly sensitive sub- ject of state finance, “Cela sera piquant et se vendra bien,” Mauvelain explained, adding that of course it would have to be anonymous.* But he wanted to be paid for the manuscript; and the STN preferred to pirate not to purchase its copy, © it refused. Sic months later Mauvelain announced that he would soon supply the STN with “un petit roman et une plaisanterie sous le nom d'un eapucin."® They nevet materialized, however; nor did two other novels, which he later claimed to have ready for press Eventually he began to sound somewhat like an under- ‘ground literary agent rather than a gentleman philosophe. He had procured 2 spicy, ireligious manuscript from one of his contacts, he wrote on 16 June 1784: “Le livre est bon, Touvrage excellent, et sape tout ce que la Bible, In Genése en seignent sur la eréation. Ilse vendra bien, je vous le promets.” An accompanying memorandum (now missing) outlined the work at length. The STN would advance all the printing costs; and once they had been covered by the sales, i would split its profits with the author. “Je me réserve pour mon droit six cexemplaires de chaque manuscrit [procured for the STN],” Mauvelain added ‘The STN did not bite It also refused Mauvelain’s offer of “Pidces érotiques,” an anthology of obscene Latin and Italian literature, which had been compiled and translated by “un de mes amis.” The unnamed friend would not pay one sou for the printing, but he would supply the manuscript free of charge, or rather in ‘exchange for a few dozen printed copies, which was a common form of payment for hack writers, who often peddled their own works. Manvelain strongly endorsed the project: “I y a des choses charmantes; cela se vendra,":* and campaigned insistently for it: “Cela se vendra, croyez-moi. Ces livres IA sont de débit."® The rman of letters had evolved into a clandestine businessman, Trade in the Taboo 9 Faiore and the “Insurance” Business By that time-the summer of 1784~Mauvelain had corresponded so long, with the STN and had sent in so many orders for prohibited books that there was no need to hide the fact that he dealt heavily in the illegal book trade. This role, too, emerged openly in 1784, and it greatly overshadowed his occasional ventures as a manuscript salesman. Bat just as they began to involve regular, large-scale transactions, Mauve- lain’s relations with the STN became embroiled in a crisis that was disrupting the underground book business throughout France." Before the summer of 1783, foreign suppliers did not have to overcome insurmountable obstacles to get their books into France, because they could count on allies among the provincial bookdealers. For a century, the provincials had suffered from the monopolistic practices of the great publishing houses in Paris. They were happy, therefore, to trade with foreign publishers, who could provide cheap pirated and prohibited works; and they favored that trade by neglecting to detect the illegal books that flowed through their provincial guilds and by cooperating with smugglers, usually through the fraudulent discharge of an acquit & caution, a customs permit that the state used to regulate book imports. But on 12 June 1783 the government ordered that all acquits be discharged after the books were inspected in the Parisian booksellers’ guild, no matter what their destination. The order meant that shipments to the provinces would have to make an enormous detour through the capital, that the Parisian booksellers would reinforce the government author- ities in cracking down on the illegal trade in the provinces, and that many of the old smuggling techniques would no longer work. Like other foreign pub- lishers, the STN considered the order a disaster, “Téquivalent dune prohibition absolue,” for its French trade.* It had learned this lesson the hard way, because in August 1783, soon after the order of 12 June had gone into effect, a border patrol of the Ferme Générale near Pontarlier had seized a shipment from the STN to Lépagnez. of Besancon, one of its closest customers in the provinces. In issuing the order, the government had announced its intention of stopping the flow of prohibited works into France. Tt clearly meant what it said, and the Pontarlier route, which was the STN’s favorite and one of the most important in the underground traffic from Switzerland to France, looked especially. dangerous. Mauvelain's shipments had all taken this route, and they had succeeded 0 well that, as mentioned, he had proposed to act as the STN’s agent for all of its traffic through Champagne. The order of 12 June dashed those plans, for in July the STN reported that it could no longer get any books to him. Throughout the summer of 1783, however, he held on to the hope that “les nouvelles entraves ne peuvent pas durer.” He absolutely had to get his books, he lamented, or he would be “tourmenté par mes amis."® Perhaps the STN had exaggerated the seriousness of the crisis. He had heard that the latest edition of Le Tableau de Paris was circulating in Paris, despite the government's attempts to confiscate 2» Robert Darnton ite? and two new prohibited works, Les Muses du foyer de TOpéra and La Chronique scandaleuse, had just appeared on the market, He ordered them on 6 August and kept his ear to the ground, hoping that some way could be found to restore communications with Neuchitel.* By the end of the summer, it seemed that Mauvelain's perserverance ‘would be rewarded, On 16 August 1783, the STN signed a contract with Faivre of Pontarlier for smuggling its books across the French border. Faivre was a typical entrepreneur of the underground book trade. His origins can not be traced, but he had worked for a while in the book business in Neuchatel, where the STN had known him as “un homme fort actif, intrigant méme, mais qui ne pposséde rien au-deld de son savoir-faire.”* In 1771 he established himself as a bookseller in Pontarlier and immediately took up smuggling books across the border for ten livres the quintal. He did not do well enough to avoid bankruptcy in 1773; but he put his business together again in 1776, working out of Pontarlier as a traveling salesman—not an impoverished colporteur, it seems, but a semi- indigent libraire roulant with horse and carriage, who also sent his wife and daughter around the countryside on “missions.” When the crisis of June 1783 put {premium on professional smugeling, Faivre was happy to offer his services to the STN, His contract provided that he should get its erates fom Les Verridres, on the Swiss side of the border, to Fontarlier for fifteen livres per quintal in assurance. Such smuggling was literally a kind of insurance. ‘The smuggler or “assureur” bound himself to reimburse his client for the full value of any books that might be seized by the agents of the Ferme Générale who administered the customs stations and policed the borders. Faivre occasionally managed to bribe some customs officers in his area, but he generally relied on teams of porteurs who carried the books on their backs in loads of about fifty pounds (poids de marc). After a free drink in a tavern at Les Verriéres, Switzerland, they would pick up their packs at a secret warehouse and make their way at night along mountainous trails to Faivre's hidden stockroom in or near Pontarlier, France. Mauvelain was delighted to learn that the STN had rebuilt its clandestine route to France. On 1 September, he sent in a new order for the usual array of prohibited books and, in an expansive mood, he asked the STN to include a few dozen Neuchitel cheeses, which he would repay with “des hures, langues et fromages de cochon de Troyes.” By this time his letters had revealed that he ‘was an enormously fat man, who enjoyed all the pleasures of life and especially the local charcuterie, which still makes Troyes a paradise for the visiting re- searcher. Nothing had arrived by November, however, when Mauvelain’s patience began to run out. His customers had threatened to cancel their orders, hhe complained. Many prohibited books had already begun to circulate again in ‘Troyes, but his shipments were still stuck in Switzerland. Nothing had reached him by the end of the year, and he consoled himself only with the thought that the Garde des Sceaux, the top official in charge of the book trade, was rumored tobe dying Meanwhile, Faivre was having difficulty in recruiting porters for his smuggling operation: “Jusques & presént, je n'ai pas pu trouver qui que ce soit Trade in the Taboo 1 pour faire passer votre balle qui est aux Verriéres que des gueux divrogne od il nly a pas a se fier sur le passage,” he wrote to the STN on 4 October 1783. “Je ne peux rien vous promettre. Les ordres sont si forts que je ne peux rien gagner sur Tesprit de qui que ce soit pour me donner la main pour le passage des balles."* By the end of 1783, however, he had bribed a customs agent and had put together a team of porters, although at a greater expense than he had anticipated: “Je vous préviens,” he wrote to the STN, “que je ne peux pas étre assureur de vos balles a 15 livres [per quintal], parce quil me faut payer aux porteurs 15 livres du cent pesant. II me faut [donner] & ces porteurs du vin et 8 louis dor & ceux avec qui je me suis abouché. Mais avec ces 8 louis, je veux entrer 50 & 60 balles et plus.”** The STN refused to accept any increase in the insurance and began haggling over other terms in the arrangement; so its crates remained in Les Verrigres, while Faivre smuggled successfully for other Swiss firms, notably Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel, a new publishing house in Neuchitel. Finally, the STN sent an agent to settle with Faivre; and on 23 January 1784 they signed a new contract, which maintained the old rate of 15 livres per uintal but also stipulated that Faivre could act as a middleman in the Tucrative business of forwarding the STN’s legal shipments. Informed at last that the route was defnitely open, Mauvelain agreed to ay the insurance costs, as the STN required; and once again he began to pile up his orders, asking for more and more prohibited books. He apparently the STN as his major source of supply for everything he thought would sell in his region, for he did not merely order from its catalogues but told it to procure books that it did not have in stock from other Swiss firms and to send legal and illegal books together by their new route, “en faisant assurer Ie tout & 19 livres pour cent pesant, car 400 livres pesant ne feront que 60 livres de frais, ce qui sera 3 sols par volume, C'est une bagatelle, au lieu que le voyage par Paris, sans compter les frais, causera un retard considerable,”” In fact, the high proportion of liores philosophiques in Mauvelain's orders showed that they made up the bulk of his business—and soon he began to do business in bulk. The great jump in the size of Mauvelain’s orders came in the spring of 1784, when Faivre finally succeeded in getting the first shipments through to him, Heavy snows had made the mountain trails impassable until April, and even then, Faivre wrote to the STN, “Les amas de neiges quil y a encore ont beaucoup fatigué mes porteurs. Ils mont passé 6 balles cette nuit, tant de Lausanne que de chez vous et de Berne. Ils viennent de se remettre en route pour en’ entrer autant."*" By 22 April, his men had carried eighteen crates over the mountains— dangerous, back-breaking work, which had not been made easier by the STN’s packers: “Mes porteurs vous prient de faire les balles par Ia suite qu‘elles ne pesent les plus gros 60 livres et des petites de 40 livres,” Faivre wrote. And at Jast on 26 April, he reported, "Vos balles pour Troyes en Champagne marqués MT 183, BM 13, tous les deux pour M. Bruzard de Mauvelain avoeat & Troyes, sont parties ce matin pour Besangon pour y prendre la route par Langres et la Champagne.” ‘The two crates arrived safely at Troyes on 7 May 1784. Although he 2 Robert Darnton found the insurance and transport costs steep (60 livres in all), Mauvelain was overjoyed: the new route worked, and he immediately placed a gigantic order for all sorts of books, including Les Petits Soupers du Comte de Vergennes and Le Passe-temps Antoinette, two of the latest libels about the queen and the ministers. These were the very works that the government had attempted to suppress by its order of 12 June 1783. Only someone deeply involved in the literary underground would have known that they existed in the spring of 1784. Mauvelain, who hoped to sell them in large numbers, clearly specialized in such literature. He chided the STN for failing to supply all the prohibited books he hhad ordered: it should get what it lacked from other Swiss houses and should not send merely pirated editions of inoffensive works, “Je vous dirai franchement, Monsieur, que mes amis sont fachés de ne recevoir que des livres courants en France, quill est inutile, disent-ils, de faire venir de si loin [ce] qui leur cofitent aussi cher par Ies frais et peut-étre plus quis ne seraient en France. Ils veulent en étre dédommagés par des lives prokibés, qui sont rares et qu’on se procure plus diffcilement ici." Mauvelain did not send a bill of exchange upon reception of the ‘merchandise, as was customary in the book trade; but he offered to send the STN a gift of another boar’s head and some tongues, and the tone of his letters became still more intimate: “Soyons amis, Monsieur, je vous prie."* On 10 May, he had written to F, 8, Ostervald, who handled the correspondence of the STN, that he wanted to come to Neuchatel “vous embrasser. Cest un désir violent qui me tourmente.” On 17 May, he announced that he would make the trip in September, bearing money and charcuterie. Meanwhile, he would see to the col- lection of Bouvet's debt, which had gone unpaid for a year. ‘The STN had supplied Bouvet with two shipments of books in early 1783. Far from being “un des plus fort libraires de ce pays,”* as Mauvelain had first described him, Bouvet seems to have been a marginal type, who teetered on the brink of bankruptey and gambled in the risky but profitable trade of prohibited books as a means of saving himself. In September 1783, Mauvelain told the STN that it would not get a sou out of Bouvet unless they took him to court. In December he reported that two or three of Bouvet’ creditors had had him con- demned for nonpayment, and he advised the STN to do the same by making out a bill of exchange to him (Mauvelain) drawing on Bouvet so that he could force the collection of the debt. The STN sent the bill of exchange, but Mauvelain then decided not to require its payment, “par complaisance pour sa femme,” as he explained mysteriously. He said that he favored negotiation, and by July 1784 it looked as though that strategy might succeed, for Bouvet had decided to sell his house (Mauvelain had moved out of it long ago) in order to pay his debts. The STN could make sure that it got its share of the money from the sale, Mauvelain wrote, if it sent another bill of exchange on Bouvet in Mauvelain’s name; he would insist on its payment this time. The STN complied, and in ‘August Mauvelain reported that the maneuver was working. But then he dropped the subject. The STN did not discover what had become of its bills of ‘exchange until the spring of 1785, when it was too late to rescue them. Trade in the Taboo 3 In the autumn of 1784, after Mauvelain’s letters had ceased to mention Bouvet, their main subject was the duplicity of the other booksellers of Troyes and Mauvelain’s determination to save the STN from getting swindled by them. This theme was calculated to get a warm response in Neuchétel, because the STN had been burned in its dealings with Sainton and André, two other Troyens who specialized in the illegal book trade. Sainton had done business with the STN in a small way since 1776, when he had said that he was eager to trade with them if they were good at smuggling: “Je prends beaucoup douvrages philosophiques. Ainsi envoyez men une note.” He had not paid his bills by July, 1784. So the Neuchatelois hardly needed Mauvelain's warning: “Ne faites point daffaires avec Sainton. Il est trés diffculteux et trés difficile au paiement.”*" Mauvelain also told the STN not to trust André, who had the dubious distinction of being Bouvet’s brother-in-law and who had refused to pay the STN for a copy of its pirated edition of the Description des arts et métiers, because it had been seized by the police. The two booksellers were “coquins,” Mauvelain explained: they purposefully entangled their affairs so as to avoid paying, but he would cut through their defenses and force them to honor their debts.* In his later letters, he talked militantly of lawsuits: “Les Bouvet, les André, les Sainton sont des fripons avec lesquels il n'y a rien & faire qu'avec justice.” But he never collected any money, or at least he never sent any to Neuchitel. He did, however, win the STN’s gratitude for helping it against “Ia race tortue et perverse des libraires de Troyes”**—no small success, as far as he was concerned, for it indicated that he ‘was gaining its “confidence.” ‘The confidential tone of Mauvelain’s letters increased throughout the last six months of 1784. He suffered from occasional deafness, he wrote on 9 July. Could he prevail upon Ostervald, in the name of their friendship, to solicit a written “consultation” from Auguste Tissot, the famous doctor of Lausanne? Mauvelain would gladly reimburse Ostervald for Tissots fee; and soon he would send yet another boar’s head with some tongues. The deafness had improved a few weeks later; but, Mauvelain complained, “Mon estomac est délabré et ma machine souffrante."** Familiar remarks about his health, his devotion to Oster- vald, and charcuterie garnished the rest of Mauvelain’s letters—without slacken- ing the growth in his orders for books. Meanwhile, Faivre's smuggling continued to go well. On 22 July, he informed the STN that another batch of crates, which probably included some for Mauvelain, had crossed the border and were en route to customers in the provinces. Mauvelain made an open bid to become a clandestine distributor for the STN: “Je puis beaucoup étendre votre commerce et vous procurer un gros débit, ayant beaucoup de facilités pour faire entrer chez moi beaucoup de ballots, ayant une porte de derriére isolée et commode, des remises fermantes, greniers oi tous vos paquets seront en stireté”** Two weeks later he wrote that a publisher near the STN (presumably the house of Samuel Fauche) had offered to supply him with “tous les livres possibles.” But he had refused because he would only deal with the STN: “Vous pouvez comptez sur moi a la vie et & la mort." On 9 August, he explained that the STN’s competitor might be able to undersell it by charging a flat rate of 3 sols per pound (poids or Robert Darnton de marc) for smuggling and transport. But if the STN reduced its handling charges and made him its agent, he could extend its business enormously. “Conn, fet répandu comme je suis, je puis vous procuret un débit immense, En mienvoyant beaucoup de livres dont je vous compterai & mesure que je les placeral, je vous en ferai vendre en Bourgogne et en Champagne.” The STN should supply him with an inventory of books; he would stock them in his hiding places; and he would market them throughout northeastern France, paying the STN as his sales progressed. Mallet and Mirabecu: An Underground Press ‘This plan was interrupted by the arrival ih Troyes of a man who person- iffed yet another aspect of the underground book trade. Jacques Mallet, type- setter, peddlar, police spy, and publisher, tumed up in Mauvelain’s apartment 1 year after having been released from the Bastille, where he had been im- prisoned for selling prohibited books. By good fortune, the police record of his interrogation has survived (it is printed at the end of this essay). As Mallet confessed almost everything he knew and as he knew almost everything that there was to be known about the book trade out of Neuchatel, his confession is worth studying in detail. It provides some rare glimpses of a clandestine pub- lishing operation and the milieu of operators like Mauvelain. ‘On 20 July 1782, Mallet told the police, he became a partner in Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel, a publishing house which had been established recently in Neuchitel and which specialized in printing prohibited books. At that time, the firm had a contract with Mirabeau for the publication of everything he could send to it from the prison of Pontarlier, where he was awaiting trial for his celebrated abduction and seduction of the marquise de Monnier. Mirabeau's adventures had provided him with plenty of material for books about prisons and sex, and he supplied the Neuchatel publishers with the manuscripts of three works: Des lettres de cachet et des prisons d Etat, Le Libertin de qualité ou ma conversion, and Errotika Biblion.** Mallet described the production of Des lettres de cachet in glorious detail. Mirabeau doled out the manuscript page by page from his cell, where he also corrected the proof as it was sent to him sheet by sheet. The publishers had no worries about being disturbed by the prison guards (the better sort of eighteenth- century prisons seem to have been great centers of literary production), but they wanted to make sure that the municipal authorities of Neuchatel would not object to the printing of such a radical work; so they also sent the proofs to some leading citizens in the town. Not only did the Neuchatelois approve of the text, they suggested ways to improve it and passed it around as if they enjoyed getting a preview of a book that was bound to create a sensation in Paris. Having agreed to a compromise settlement of his case, Mirabeau himself then arrived in ‘Trade in the Taboo 5 Neuchitel and was feted all over town. But he got a cold reception from his printers. They had paid him 150 louis (3,600 livres) for Des lettre de cachet— an enormous sum for a publishing venture in the eighteenth century—and they wanted to bring down the cost of the other two manuscripts." Mallet and his associates protested at the danger and the expense of publishing such radical and pomographic works, but Mirabeau would not bargain, He insisted on receiving a security deposit of 100 louis (2,400 livres) before he let the manu- scripts out of his hands; and once he had collected the deposit, he refused to ppermit the publishers even to examine the manuscript of the Errotika biblion until they had paid for it in advance. That may not have been an altogether out- rageous demand in a trade where manuscripts were often stolen or copied furtively for pirating, but it was too much for Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel, who broke off negotiations and took the dispute to arbitrators. As a result of the arbitration, the publishers finally got the Errotika biblion and Le Libertin de qualité, but they had to give Mirabeau another 1,000 livres in books, which he ‘was to choose from their stock." They had built up this stock from the inventory of Witel’s earlier book- selling business (it included well-known prohibited works like Les Iauriers ecclésiastiques, La Réduction de Paris, La Vérité rendue sensible a Louis XVI, and L’Espion déoalisé), from commerce with the neighboring houses of Samuel Fauche and the STN, and from trades with other Swiss publishers. Mallet could only recall one of these trades: 50 of his firm's Lettres de cachet for 50 Fastes de Louis XV, one of the best-selling anticourt libels, which was provided by a dealer Basel. But Witel handled the trading. Mallet was the traveling salesman of the firm, and in December 1782 he left on a trip through Switzerland and France, ‘evidently carrying sample volumes and handwritten catalogues of liores philo- sophiques drawn up from the catalogues of Samuel Fauche and the STN as well as from the inventory of his own stock. First, Mallet called on some Swiss pub- lishers and wholesalers of probibited French books, In Lausanne, he sold Lettres de cachet to La Combe, Heubach, Grasset, Des Combes, Pott, and Mourer (even though Mourer was already printing a pirated edition of it). He found no buyers Geneva, But in Lyons, he sold Lettres de cachet, L’Espion décalisé, and other works to several dealers: Jacquenet, Rosset, Grabit, Los Rios, Barret, LeRoy, Bernuset. “Il ne leur a pas été difficile de les faire entre, parce quis sont presque tous de la Chambre syndicale (the local booksellers’ guild),” Mallet explained to the police. Next stop, Paris: Desauges and Hardouin, disreputable dealers who traded heavily in prohibited books, ordered a variety of works from him, but the shipments, which apparently followed the Pontarlier route from Neuchétel, were seized in Besangon. Mallet said that he did not do very well with the other Parisian booksellers, but he sold an allotrient to Poingot, one of the most im- portant clandestine dealers in Versailles, where the greatest entrépots of pro- hibited books were located. On his way back, Mallet failed to do any business ‘with Mailly, an important dealer in Dijon, and sold only a few books to Chamboz of Déle, who preferred to order his forbidden books from Samuel Fauche, In 26 Robert Darnton Besangon, he mainly dealt with Lépagnez, the bookseller who oversaw the smuggling operations of Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel, and in Pontarlier he sold a great many Lettres de cachet to Faivre, the smuggler of the STN. In short, Mallet made a clandestine, literary tour de France, and he described every stop of it to the police with full details about the names of the bookdealers and the books they ordered. This information proved to be crucial in the government's decision to maintain and enforce the order of 12 June 1783, despite impassioned protests by the booksellers. During Mallet's embdstillement, the directeur de la librairie received a memorandum from one of his subordinates which argued that the order should not be revoked, because it provided the most effective way of checking the flow of prohibited books. To sustain this argument, the memorandum went into a full discussion of the techniques of book smuggling and noted pointedly, “Il y a maintenant a Ia Bastille un particulier associé avec des libraires de Neuchitel, qui par ses aveux et déclarations con- firme I'usage que Yon fait de tous ces moyens.”** When he arrived back in Neuchatel in the early spring of 1783, Mallet had no idea that touring of this sort would lead him to the Bastille; but soon after he returned, his partners sent him on a fatal mission to Paris. This time he was to ‘check on their supply routes and to handle some financial affairs. While passing through Besangon, he told Lépagnez to take more care with his smuggling, be- cause the publishers planned to send their new edition of the Tableau de Paris through Besangon and all but one of their previous shipments by that route had been confiscated. The successful shipment had contained about 150 Lettres de cachet, 4 to 6 Fastes de Louis XV, 6 Espion anglois, 21 Espion décalisé, and 200 Errotika biblion. After he arrived in Paris, Mallet leamed that the underground traffic was flowing more smoothly than he had expected. In early June he received twelve crates of prohibited books at his secret stockpile near Bourg-la-Reine. He transferred them into small packages and then transported them, a few at a time, into Paris simply by taking them with him on the public coach, which was not searched at the customs barrier, because it served the local traffic between Bourg and the capital. In this way Mallet supplied various Parisian booksellers with 270 copies of a Lausanne edition of Linguet’s Mémoires sur la Bastille, 50 Histoire de Suzon, and an “assortissement” of other prohibited works, including the Lettres de cachet, But he took a false step in early July, and soon he was con- fessing everything to the lieutenant-general of police: “Je supplie trés humble- ment Monseigneur de ne pas me perdre. Tout ce que j'ai fait dans le commerce de Ja libraitie, je n'en connaissais pas les dangers; Cest plutot par ignorance que par intérét ou méchanceté. Tous les livres que j'ai vendus, je ne les ai jamais lus. Je suis extrémement bomé dans ce genre de commerce. Daignez, Monseigneur, avoir ‘quelques égards pour ma petite famille: au nom de Etre Supréme, ne me perdez pas. Je fais serment que je ne ferai jamais plus le commerce de librairie, ni en France ni dans Tétranger. . ... Notre maison est entiérement ruinée et dis- ceréditée par les pertes considérables que nous avons essuyées cette anneé et le retard de faire mes paiements que me cause ma détention.” A year later, Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel was still fighting off bank- Trade in the Taboo cd ruptey, and Mallet, who had extricated himself from the Bastille and no longer had any connection. with the firm, unexpectedly appeared before Mauvelain. “mia été amené depuis ma demiére,” Mauvelain informed the STN, “un homme sortant de la Bastille qui a, mfa-til dit, ume maison de commerce dans votre ville en librairie qui a ou cessé ou manqué absolument. Il assure avoir encore dans votre ville sa maison avec beaucoup de livres quiil voudrait en faire venir, il sait comment. Ces renseignements pourront vous faire reconnattre Je personnage, qui, pour en revenir a Iui, mia fait beaucoup solliciter de lui liver des anecdotes rares manuscrites venant d’un homme en place sur la cour qu'il voulait joindre & ce livre intitulé Entretiens de feu Louis XV et de sex ministres quil avait et dont il voudrait faire deux volumes au liew d'un. Il avait aussi des Barjac [i.e., the obscene novel Le Vicomte de Barjac], des Diables dans tun bénitier [another anticourt libel that the government was trying esp hard to suppress] dont je n'ai point voulu. J'ai refusé net ces anecdotes (que je garde pour vous), en disant que je les avais rendues. . . . Je Yai pris pour un espion, Ai-je eu tort? Expliquez-moi tout cela." A. week later, Ostervald of the STN replied with a description of Mallet that made him seem rather less naive and repentant than he did in his confession to the police: “Voici son portrait pour le physique et le morale. 11 se nomme Mallet, est agé environ 35 ans, maigre, cheveux noirs, parlant assez mal, taille tout au plus de 5 pieds. Travaillant & Lyon comme ouvrier compositeur, il fit la connaissance de Ia femme dun paumier ayant quatre enfants avec Iaquelle il partit pour Genéve. L&, ayant été chagriné par la police, i Ta conduite ici, ob elle a trouvé et trouve encore & faire usage de sa beauté. Une circonstance assez plaisante, cest quiaprés un assez long séjour dans notre ville, Mallet voulait bien la restituer moyennant qu’on lui paydt sa pension, Mais le paumier, un homme sage, a laissé ici Ia femelle et a gardé son argent. Elle sest associée aveo d'autres et a eu assez de erédit pour monter une petite imprimerie. Mallet a fait un voyage & Paris et fut mis & Ia Bastille pour voir offert publiquement des ouvrages licentieux. De retour ici, il s'est brouillé avec ses associés et les a quittés. Ils disent hautement que est un coquin. II sest aussi flatté d'étre espion de la police, condition sous laquelle il dit avoir obtenu son élargissement. On dit quil a établi une imprimerie dans votre ville ou aux environs et quil vient dimprimer Le Libertin de qualité, ce live qui fait tant de bruit en France et ief. C'est un fait dont il me serait ts important détre certioré, Tel est, entre nous, le personage. Défiez-vous de Ini et tichez de vous défaire un aussi mauvais voisin.”*? Mauvelain did not need to be prompted to keep his eye on such a dan- {gerous competitor. Soon he reported that Mallet had installed a printing press in 4 country house outside of Troyes and already: was marketing an impressive selection of prohibited books: La Tentation de Saint Antoine, Histoire de Mar- Querite, Anecdotes de Ia vie @Ambroise Borelly, Conversations du Comte de Mirabeau avec le Garde des Sceaur, La Muse libertine, La Cassette verte mau- vaise, Ma conversion (with 6 plates), Essais historiques et critiques, Le Vol plus haut ou Tespion des principaux thédtres de la capitale, Supplément a TEspion dévalisé, Réforme du clergé, Amusements Cun bon Picard, Muses du foyer de 28 Robert Darnton TOpéra, Contes géologiques, La Vérité rendue sensible a Louis XVI. “Si vous voulez un exemplaire de chacun de ses livres,” Mauvelain added suggestively, “Je ‘vous en enverrai un, Vous les imprimerez."*' Ostervald replied that he, too, felt threatened by Mallet’s activities: “Je suis bien aise d'étre maintenant assuré par Tes détails que vous men donnez quill simprime d'aussi bonnes drogues dans le coeur du royaume, et je tirerai bon parti d'une telle découverte. Vous savez que jamais rien de licentieux n’a souillé nos presses; mais comme on en demande souvent, il nous convient de pouvoir au besoin en trouver autour de nous... . Presque tous ces chefs-d'oeuvre dont vous miindiquez les titres sont encore inconnus ici. Mais Phonnéte Mallet ne manquera pas sans doute den assortir ses correspondants en Suisse; et sils en débitent, la France jettera les hauts cris et ‘ontinuera de proscrire toute typographie venant de notre pauvre ville. Voila comment les choses vont dans ce meilleur des mondes."* Ostervald was not referring to the general crackdown on the foreign book trade since June 1783 but to special measures against the printing of prohibited books in Neuchatel. The French government had learned that a later edition of Le Libertin de qualité ow ma conversion was being printed in Neuchatel, and it had exerted diplomatic pressure to get the printing stopped. One reason for the flourishing of the publishing industry in this small comer of Switzerland was that Neuchatel had been a Prussian principality since 1707. For printers of lores philosophiques, it would be difficult to find a better sovereign than Frederick 11, ‘who did little to correct the laxness of the municipal executive authority called the Quatre Ministraux. Although the Quatre Ministraux occasionally felt obliged to investigate printing shops, they always arrived too late to find incriminating evidence. In response to a request from the French ambassador at Soleure, they searched the town for Le Libertin de qualité in August 1784 and, as usual, found nothing. But the ambassador had information derived from Mallet’s confession in the Bastille and perhaps also from later reports by Mallet, if indeed he had become a police spy. So the ambassador insisted that the Quatre Ministraux look harder and in particular that they seek out Malle’s wife, who was reported to have had the manuscript of the book in her possession the previous winter. With ‘most of the detective work being furnished from Paris, the Quatre Ministraux at last managed to find the trail of Le Libertin de qualité. “Madame” Mallet told them that indeed she had had the manuscript more than a year ago, while her husband was in Paris, and that she had given it to Fauche fils ainé, Favre et ‘Witel, who had printed it. Favre then admitted to having bought the manuscript from Mirabeau but claimed that Mallet had made off with it and had published it himself. Since Mallet had gone underground in France, the investigators could not question him. Their inquiry dragged on until June 1785, when Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel were found guilty and had their shop closed. Meanwhile, the alfair gave Ostervald a scare, because as he explained to one of his correspondents, “Quoique notre petit pays soit bien indépendant, nous avons les plus grands ménagements & garder vis-A-vis de la France, & cause de nos fabriques, du com- merce, et du voisinage.”* A correspondent in Paris had warned him that Neu- chitel was swarming with spies of the French police, and Ostervald must have Trade in the Taboo 9 known how in 1764 the police had raided three publishers in Bouillon, another small and defenseless principality on the French border, which was a center for the production of prohibited books. The giant across the Jura could, if sufficiently aroused, crush the STN’s trade in France and even hurt the STN in Neuchatel. Tt was at the height of this crisis during the summer and autumn of 1784 that Ostervald learned, to his delight, that Mallet had tured up in Troyes. Per- hhaps Mallet’s secret presses had produced the very works that the French ex- pected to confiscate in Neuchatel or Pontarlier. “Puisque Mallet vous assortit ainsi de mauvais livres,” he wrote to Mauvelain on 19 October, “marquez-moi, je vous prie, sil sen trouve un qui at pour titre le Libertin de qualité en un volume octavo. Fai grand intérét & le savoir.” The point, of course, was to prove to Versailles that it would do better to turn its police onto territory closer to home. Ostervald made his motive perfectly clear in his next letter to Mauvelain: “Laffaire du Libertin de qualité dont je vous parlais dans ma demiére fait toujours beaucoup de bruit. La cour de France continue & se plaindre de ce que Yon différe trop de punir ceux qui ont mis sous presse ce mauvais livre, Cest ce qui me fait désirer de savoir si Mallet en débite autour de vous.” Mauvelain d obligingly, “Le sicur Mallet débite, puisque vous voulez Ie savoir, et inonde le pays du Libertin de qualité. Il a changé le titre en celui de Ma con- version. II y a 6 estampes dans le livre que jai lu. Tout Je monde Ya ici... . 1 cen a des ballots, & ce qu’on mia assuré, gros comme des lits. . .. Vous pouvez tenir le fait si. On mfa offert de me les faire voire. Jai refusé."* That was exactly the information he needed, Ostervald convenait. Les libraires qui, dit-on, ont imprimé n‘ont point été inquiétés jusqu’a présent, et je suppose que notre governement aura répondu au ministére de France en réclamant notre indépendance.”*" After the crisis had passed, the references to Mallet dropped out of the correspondence between the STN and Mauvelain until February 1785, when Mauvelain complained vehemently that the STN had let his confidential informa- tion leak out and that Mallet had learned of all their dealings. “Cela va me compromettre avec un étourdi que je ne connais ni ne veux connaitre. . . . TI sait tous nos secrets. . . . Je suis au désespoir qu’un homme comme moi passe par Ja langue d'un homme de cette espéce."* Mauvelain found it unnerving to know that his clandestine book business had been discovered by a man who was both ‘2 competitor and reputedly a police spy. But the STN reassured him that it had protected his seereey, and soon he was convinced that Mallet had lied to him about the leak, presumably as a ruse to ellicit some compromising information about the Neuchitel trade. “Je le ferai pincer un de ces jours,” Mauvelain con- cluded, “fai des amis du crédit. Je nven suis point embarrassé, Je vous vengerai de lui et de toutes le faussetés quil débte ici sur votre compte." Whether or not Mauvelain ever succeeded in getting this dangerous neighbor back into prison and whether or not Mallet really was a double agent can never be known, because at this point his name disappears from the archives. In corresponding about Mallet, the STN and Mauvelain clarified their roles in the illegal book trade. Mauvelain emerged as an active distributor of sd. “Yen ai fait usage od il 30 Robert Darnton prohibited books and he showed himself to be well informed about the tricks of the trade. In fact he offered to provide the STN with the latest lores philo- sophiques so that it could produce its own editions of them, and he even offered to supply it with a manuscript libel. The STN refused to print such extreme works, but it admitted that it stocked them and sold them in large numbers. A new note of frankness came into the exchanges of letters, and Ostervald began slipping into the intimate mode of discourse favored by Mauvelain. He expressed sympathy for Mauvelain’s perpetual ailments; and although he failed to get the requested “consultation” out of Tissot, he sent some written advice from a doctor in Geneva. Meanwhile, Mauvelain was in the most active phase of his efforts to force the bookdealers of Troyes to pay their debts to the STN. Having virtually Decome an agent of his Swiss “friends,” Mauvelain was now the only person in ‘Troyes with whom they still did business. His relations with them reached a peak of cordiality in the autumn of 1784. He had captured their confidence. A Smuggling Circuit: Cost and Effectiveness ‘The Mallet episode also affected the flow of books between Neuchtel and ‘Troyes. While applying diplomatic pressure to get the Neuchatel authorities to suppress the production of prohibited books, the French government ordered its customs agents to prevent their distribution by maintaining a special alert along the French-Swiss border near Pontarlier. In August 1784 the agents arrested five porters carrying crates full of Le Libertin de qualité and other prohibited works, which were being smuggled into France for Fauche fils ainé, Favre et Witel. This disaster produced consternation up and down the Pontarlier route, Although he had had no part of it, Faivre immediately warned the STN to suspend all ship- ments, “Depuis ce malheureux moment tous les employés des fermes sont nuit et jour en alerte,” he lamented.” His porters, who could be sent to the galleys if they were caught, would no longer take the slightest risk; and the STN's crates ‘were not even safe in their secret entrepét in the home of Frangois Michaut, Faivre's relay man at Les Verritres, on the Swiss side of the border, “parce quil y a des espions et des coquins aux Verridres, qui vendent les autres." Faivre ‘ordered Michaut to hide the books on top of nearby mountain until the crisis passed and the clandestine route could be rebuilt. The STN notified Mauvelain that the breakdown of the smuggling operation hed caused six of his crates to be stranded near the border, “en attendant que Torage soit un peu calmé. . . . I fen résultera que quelques retards. Notre homme [Faivre, whom they never ‘mentioned by name in their letters to France] sait son métier et est intéressé lui- ‘méme A bien prendre ses mesures." The news upset Mauvelain, because he had made advance sales of some of the books to army officers, who soon would be transferred from Troyes. Others were destined for local customers, who had grown so impatient that they were threatening to cancel their orders. And a third group Jhad been promised to Parisians, who were about to return to the capital after Trade in the Taboo al spending the summer months near Troyes and so would probably refuse to accept the books, “le moment de la vogue étant passé et les trouvant partout & bon marché." A great deal of damage had been done to Mauvelain's market by early October, when at last he received an encouraging letter from the STN: “Notre assureur commence & se rassurer, comme il parait par une lettre regue de hui il y a huit jours. En conséquence, nous garnissons toujours de plus en plus le dépét. L’approche de Yhiver et de ses neiges nous sera favorable.”"* Faivre had counted on overcoming his porters’ fears of arrest by increasing their wages and by bribing some of the customs agents. On 14 October 1784, he reported to the STN, “Samedi prochain vos balles entreront. J'ai tant fait et promis ces porteurs que je leur donnerait de quoi boire et quils seront contents, ce {qui les a ranimés & retourner. . . . Je suis au moment de traiter avec un employé des fermes pour nous laisser passer librement la nuit et mindiquer les chemins ci Yon doit passer en streté.” Five days later, the STN tried to pacify Mauvelain with the news that “notre homme” was about to conclude “un arrangement solide” for the smuggling, And on 21 October, Faivre reported that the frst crates had got through successfully and that future shipments would be helped if the STN could provide him with three copies of an erotic novel for his allies among “ces Messieurs de la ferme du roi.” His main difficulty came from his labor foree: “Les porteurs me rangonnent. Us m‘ont augmenté de 6 deniers par livre, et ce quil me faut payer d'un autre e6té [a] ceux qui me donnent la main (ie his bribes], le temps perdu pour les voyages, aprés tout compté, jfen suis pour le mien.”* Five erates arrived in Faivre’sstockrooms on the night of 12 November, and he forwarded them on to Mauvelain soon afterward. Another shipment came through safely on 18 November."* So at last the way was clear for smooth and regular trading, when new diffcultes arose, this time on Mauvelain’s end, ‘As soon as the STN learned that “notre homme de Ja frontiére” had got Mauvelain’s first two crates through the new route, it sent the good news to ‘Troyes: “Voila done enfin les derniers obstacles levés.” It also requested Mauve- Jain to send payment for the shipments he had received before the route had closed—unless he still planned to bring the money with him on a trip to Neuchatel that year.7" Mauvelain had avoided the subject of payment. Whenever he men- tioned it, he said that he would settle his bills during his visit, which he kept postponing, On 11 October 1784 he announced that he could not make the journey at present, owing to the deterioration of his health. Physically, he traced his trouble to “Thumeur fébrile”; morally, to his sensitivity: “Un homme qui a Tame sensible est plus malheureux qu'un autre. La méchanceté des ses semblables, Tattrstent.” But Mauvelain could not remain insensitive to the STN's requests for payment after November, when the new shipments arrived. At this point the tone of his letters suddenly changed. He began to quibble over costs, to complain about the way the crates were shipped, and to haggle like a man who needed pretests for refusing to pay his bills. This was the classic defense of the toughest customers in the illegal trade, as the STN had just mentioned in a letter to Mauvelain about his attempts to collect its debts from the other booksellers of Troyes: “Il est & remarquer que ces bonnes gens ne commencent a faire des 32 Robert Darnton objections que quand on leur demande des espéves.”"* Mauvelain's bickering made theirs seem mild, and it is especially interesting, because it contains a great deal of information about the economics of the underground book trade. Since there has never been any economic analysis of this kind of commerce, it merits a short digression. Smuggling books was a complicated business. The merchandise was bulky, dangerous, and easily damaged, because most publishers like the STN sent their books in the form of unfolded, printed sheets (a sheet of a quarto volume con- taining eight printed pages, an octavo sixteen pages, and so on), which its packers stuffed into crates, using straw and spoilt sheets (maculature) to protect against friction and damp. Mauvelain required that his books be folded and stitched," and they had to be sent in small crates of 50 or 60 pounds, so that Faivre’s porters could carry them, (Faivre complained that the STN tended to make its crates too heavy, and he once divided a large crate into two, “parce qu'un homme ne peut pas porter 110 livres sur son corps.”)** The erates left Neuchatel on horse- drawn wagons and made their way up the difficult roads of the Val de Travers to the secret storehouse of Francois Michaut, Faivre's agent in Les Verriézes, the last town on the Swiss side of the border. The porters then back-packed them at night along mountain trails near the French customs station of Frambourg, where Faivre had bribed the agents of the Ferme to slacken their vigilance, and deposited them in Faivre's clandestine warehouse in or near Pontarlier. Faivre then consolidated them into large crates, loaded them onto wagons, and sent them off to Besancon as if they were ordinary domestic shipments (only foreign books had to make the detour to the Parisian booksellers’ guild). In Besancon they were unloaded and stored by a shipping agent called Péchey, a well-known figure in the underground book trade, who worked hand-in-glove with local bookdealers, notably Lépagnez. Péchey paid the waggoner who delivered the crates to him for all the expenses, including the insurance, that they had aceu- mulated since their departure from Neuchatel. When he found a place for them ‘on a wagon bound for Troyes, he added those expenses, his own, and those of the last stage of the journey together in a single bill, which the waggoner had to collect before he could unload the merchandise into Mauvelain’s hidden store- rooms. The waggoner—Claude Carteret of Langres in the case of Mauvelain's largest shipment—would present Mauvelain’s bill of exchange to Péchey on a return trip and would receive payment in eash for his own services. tis thus possible to reconstruct this clandestine circuit in detail, following the books and the accumulation of their expenses as they passed from agent to agent in the network linking Neuchitel and Troyes. Map 1 shows how one shipment progressed along the route, stage by stage and day by day: ‘March-June 1784: Mauvelain sends in his orders in a series of four letters. 26 July’ (approximately): The STN sends off the seven crates numbered BM 107-110, ‘BE 120, and BM 121-2, weighing 40 lies (pod de mac) tn al, 4 October: Faivre reports that all of the crates Rave been stalled at Michaut’s store- hhouse in Les Versires, owing to the critical new conditions at the border. 14 October: Faivre writes that he has reconstructed his smuggling system: the customs agents at Frambourg have been won over, and his porters will resume work soon. Trade in the Taboo 33 Troyes FRANCE " SWITZERLAND 229 Km 11 km Troyes Besangon—_Neuchitel 33° transport 66" insurance 49 #148 transport 12 November: The first five of Mauvelain's erates cross the border. 18 November: The other crates arrive safely in Pontarlier and will be forwarded by Faivre to Péchey in Besangon the next day. Early December: Péchey’s waggoner, Claude Carteret, loads the seven crates on his cart in Besangon and sets off for Troyes. ‘81 December: Mauvelain acknowledges reception of the crates, which arrived at some previous date, probably soon after 19 December. By making wagon drivers double as bill collectors, this system prevented persons from refusing to pay the shipping charges, as they frequently did when it came to paying the manufacturer. But it was slow and expensive. Mauvelain’s books took five months to cover the 210 miles between him and the STN—not an ‘uncommon delay for the smuggling industry, where a single confiscation or the transfer of one corrupt customs agent could back up traffic for weeks. The total cost of the shipment (148 livres 14 sous), came to 15 percent of its wholesale value (1019 livres 11 sous). And worst of all, the system of c.od. payments offered great possibilities for peculation to the middlemen. The consignment note (lettre de voiture) mentioned only two charges: the total cost of the Neuchitel- Besancon leg of the journey (115 livres 14 sous) and the costs between Besangon and Troyes (33 livres). Mauvelain had to pay both. He could understand the latter, because the note informed him that the seven crates weighed 440 pounds in all and that the carrying rate from Besangon to Troyes was 7 livres 10 sous

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