Nadar Elevating Photography to Art

The Chevalier des Adrets is the lover of a woman of the world. He is amiable and fervent, he pretends to be passionate and devoted... one day, an alleged bailiff and an alleged bill of exchange fall like a clap of thunder into the midst of the most tender effusion of feeling... "Oh! My God!! The Baron de Wormspire, a so-called friend, has had the impudence to have me thrown into prison... He's ruined my good fortune, separated me from what I love! Oh! Friends!! What are friends?... There's no such thing as a friend!!!..." The poor woman, poor dupe, casts off her jewels, gives him everything she can, borrows, ruins herself, only to discover too late that her knight is only a knight of industry, a right Robert Macaire.

Un Guichet de théatre.

Doctor Robert Macaire's clinic. - There you are gentlemen, the surgery I performed was a full success, while everybody considered it to be impossible. - But doctor, the patient is dead! - So what... ..she would have died sooner or later anyway.

Croquade Divers

Robert Macaire bookseller. Ladies and gentlemen, would there be anyone in this pleasant place who'd like to make himself a nice little income, without difficulty and without working?... If there is someone he should stock my primers... You don't have to be a bookseller to be a specialist in this trade, you don't even have to know how to read, quite the contrary!... You only have to pay me a deposit... The bigger the better, as the saying goes.

The Grand Stairway of the Palais de Justice

A visit to the Library. - Listen woman... they have told us not to disturb the people sitting here, because they are working. - What do you mean working... they are just feigning to be working... in reality they aren't moving at all! --- Visitors from the province who insist on overlooking Paris from the top of the July Column, convinced that the revolution of 1830 was only made in order to have a pretext to build an observatory on the Place de la Bastille.

The Grand Stairway of the Palais de Justice

Robert Macaire, Professor of Industry. Here's an example. Buy a new process, it doesn't matter which, or whether it's good or bad, buy it for 600F, 500F, 25F, for as little as possible. Create 500'000F worth of shares, as many as possible. Make out monster advertisements, monster posters, monster promises. Make the capital, pocket it, put the key under the door, file your bankruptcy papers, that's to say the company's papers... that's the end of that little game. You then go on to another.

The Grand Stairway of the Palais de Justice

The Passport. The foreigner who visits China is subject to an indispensable formality. He receives a scrap of paper on which he writes the age he wishes to reveal, the profession that he is said to perform and the place that he wishes to give as his birthplace. All this is followed by a description which is so indistinct that it applies to everybody. After which, by means of two Francs, the Chinese Government is deemed to guarantee him aid and assistance for one year