Lafitte, Jacques, French banker and financier; played a conspicuous part in the Revolution of 1830, and by his influence as a liberal politician with the French people secured the elevation of Louis Philippe to the throne; in the calamities attendant on this Revolution his house became insolvent, but he was found, after paying all demands, to be worth in francs nearly seven millions (1767‒1844).
Definition taken from The Nuttall Encyclopædia, edited by the Reverend James Wood (1907)
La Fayette, Marquis de * Lafontaine, Jean de