obtained money from the most distant climes. All these savings, the

pounds of speculators and the pence of the poor, were swallowed up

in the Avenue de Villiers. Again he was partner in an ironworks in

Alsace, where in a small provincial town workmen, blackened with

coal dust and soaked with sweat, day and night strained their sinews

and heard their bones crack to satisfy Nana's pleasures. Like a

huge fire she devoured all the fruits of stock-exchange swindling

and the profits of labor. This time she did for Steiner; she