Читать книгу The Ancient Regime - Taine Hippolyte - Страница 27

When sovereignty becomes transformed into a sinecure it becomes burdensome without being useful, and on becoming burdensome without being useful it is overthrown.

1301 (return) [ Beugnot, "Mémoires," V. I. p.292.—De Tocqueville, "L'Ancien Régime et la Révolution."]

1302 (return) [ Arthur Young, "Travels in France," II. 456. In France, he says, it is from the eleventh to the thirty-second. "But nothing is known like the enormities committed in England where the tenth is really taken."]

1303 (return) [ Saint-Simon, "Mémoires," ed. Chéruel, vol. I.—Lucas de Montigny, "Mémoires de Mirabeau," I. 53–182.—Marshal Marmont, "Mémoires," I. 9, 11.—Châteaubriand, "Mémoires," I. 17. De Montlosier, "Mémoires," 2 vol. passim.—Mme. de Larochejacquelein, "Souvenirs," passim. Many details concerning the types of the old nobility will be found in these passages. They are truly and forcibly depicted in two novels by Balzac in "Beatrix," (the Baron de Guénic) and in the "Cabinet des Antiques," (the Marquis d' Esgrignon).]

1304 (return) [ A letter of the bailiff of Mirabeau, 1760, published by M. de Loménie in the "Correspondant," V. 49, p.132.]

1305 (return) [ Mme. de Larochejacquelein, ibid. I. 84. "As M. de Marigny had some knowledge of the veterinary art the peasants of the canton came after him when they had sick animals."]

1306 (return) [ Marquis de Mirabeau, "Traité de la Population," p. 57.]

1307 (return) [ De Tocqueville, ibid. p.180. This is proved by the registers of the capitation-tax which was paid at the actual domicile.]

1308 (return) [ Renauldon, ibid.., Preface p. 5.—Anne Plumptre, "A narrative of three years residence in France from 1802 to 1805." II. 357.—Baroness Oberkirk, "Mémoires," II. 389.—"De l'état religieux," by the abbés Bonnefoi and Bernard, 1784, p. 295.—Mme.Vigée-Lébrun, "Souvenirs," p.171.]

1309 (return) [ Archives nationales, D, XIX. portfolios 14, 15, 25. Five bundles of papers are filled with these petitions.]

1310 (return) [ Ibid. D, XIX. portfolio 11. An admirable letter by Joseph of Saintignon, abbé of Domiévre, general of the regular canons of Saint-Sauveur and a resident. He has 23,000 livres income, of which 6,066 livres is a pension from the government, in recompense for his services. His personal expenditure not being over 5,000 livres "he is in a situation to distribute among the poor and the workmen, in the space of eleven years, more than 250,000 livres."]

1311 (return) [ On the conduct and sentiments of lay and ecclesiastical seigniors cf. Léonce de Lavergne, "Les Assemblées provinciales," I vol. Legrand, "L'intendance du Hainaut," I vol. Hippeau, "Le Gouvernement de Normandie," 9 vols.]

1312 (return) [ "The most active sympathy filled their breasts; that which an opulent man most dreaded was to be regarded as insensible." (Lacretelle, vol. V. p. 2.)]

1313 (return) [ Floquet, "Histoire du Parlement de Normandie," vol. VI. p.696. In 1772 twenty-five gentlemen and imprisoned or exiled for having signed a protest against the orders of the court.]

1314 (return) [ De Tocqueville, ibid. pp. 39, 56, 75, 119, 184. He has developed this point with admirable force and insight.]

1315 (return) [ De Tocqueville, ibid. p.376. Complaints of the provincial assembly of Haute-Guyenne. "People complain daily that there is no police in the rural districts. How could there be one? The nobles takes no interest in anything, excepting a few just and benevolent seigniors who take advantage of their influence with vassals to prevent affrays."]

1316 (return) [ Records of the States-General of 1789. Many of the registers of the noblesse consist of the requests by nobles, men and women, of some honorary distinctive mark, for instance a cross or a ribbon which will make them recognizable.]

1317 (return) [ De Boullé, "Mémoires," p.50.—De Toqueville, ibid.. pp. 118, 119.—De Loménie, "Les Mirabeau," p. 132. A letter of the bailiff of Mirabeau, 1760.—De Châteaubriand, Mémoires," I. 14, 15, 29, 76, 80, 125.—Lucas de Montigny, "Mémoires de Mirabeau," I. 160.—Reports of the Société du Berry. "Bourges en 1753 et 1754," according to a diary (in the national archives), written by one of the exiled parliamentarians, p. 273.]

1318 (return) [ "La vie de mon père," by Rétif de la Bretonne, I. 146.]

1319 (return) [ The rule is analogous with the other coutumes (common-law rules), of other places and especially in Paris. (Renauldon, ibid.. p. 134.)]

1320 (return) [ A sort of dower right. TR.]

1321 (return) [ Mme. d'Oberkirk, "Mémoires," I. 395.]

1322 (return) [ De Bouillé, "Mémoires," p. 50. According to him, "all the noble old families, excepting two or three hundred, were ruined. A larger portion of the great titled estates had become the appanage of financiers, merchants and their descendants. The fiefs, for the most part, were in the hands of the bourgeoisie of the towns."—Léonce de Lavergne, "Economie rurale en France," p. 26. "The greatest number vegetated in poverty in small country fiefs often not worth more than 2,000 or 3,000 francs a year."—In the apportionment of the indemnity in 1825, many received less than 1,000 francs. The greater number of indemnities do not exceed 50,000 francs.—"The throne," says Mirabeau, "is surrounded only by ruined nobles."]

1323 (return) [ De Bouillé, "Memoires," p. 50.—Cherin, "Abrégé chronologique des édits" (1788). "Of this innumerable multitude composing the privileged order scarcely a twentieth part of it can really pretend to nobility of an immemorial and ancient date."—4,070 financial, administrative, and judicial offices conferred nobility.—Turgot, "Collection des Economistes," II. 276. "Through the facilities for acquiring nobility by means of money there is no rich man who does not at once become noble."—D'Argenson, "Mémoires," III. 402.]

1324 (return) [ Necker, "De l'Administration des Finances," II. 271. Legrand, "L'Intendance de Hainaut," pp. 104, 118, 152, 412.]

1325 (return) [ Even after the exchange of 1784, the prince retains for himself "all personal impositions as well as subventions on the inhabitants," except a sum of 6,000 livres for roads. Archives Nationales, G, 192, a memorandum of April 14th, 1781, on the state of things in the Clermontois.—Report of the provincial assembly of the Three Bishoprics (1787), p. 380.]

1326 (return) [ The town of St. Amand, alone, contains to day 10,210 inhabitants.]

1327 (return) [ See note 3 at the end of the volume.]

1328 (return) [ De Ferrières, "Mémoires," II. 57: "All had 100,000 some 200, 300, and even 800,000."]

1329 (return) [ De Tocqueville, ibid.. book 2, Chap. 2. p.182.—Letter of the bailiff of Mirabau, August 23, 1770. "This feudal order was merely vigorous, even though they have pronounced it barbarous, because France, which once had the vices of strength, now has only those of feebleness, and because the flock which was formerly devoured by wolves is now eaten up with lice. … Three or four kicks or blows with a stick were not half so injurious to a poor man's family, nor to himself, as being devoured by six rolls of handwriting."—"The nobility," says St. Simon, in his day, "has become another people with no choice left it but to crouch down in mortal and ruinous indolence, which renders it a burden and contemptible, or to go and be killed in warfare; subject to the insults of clerks, secretaries of the state and the secretaries of intendants." Such are the complaints of feudal spirits.—The details which follow are all derived from Saint Simon, Dangeau, de Luynes, d'Argenson and other court historians.]

1330 (return) [ Works of Louis XIV. and his own words.—Mme. Vigée-Lebrun, "Souvenirs," I.71: "I have seen the queen (Marie Antoinette), obliging Madame to dine, then six years of age, with a little peasant girl whom she was taking care of, and insisting that this little one should be served first, saying to her daughter: 'You must do the honors.'" (Madame is the title given to the king's oldest daughter. SR.)]

1331 (return) [ Molière, "Misanthrope." This is the "desert" in which Célimène refuses to be buried with Alceste. See also in "Tartuffe" the picture which Dorine draws of a small town.—Arthur Young," Voyages en France," I. 78.]

1332 (return) [ 'Traité de la Population,' p. 108, (1756).]

1333 (return) [ I have this from old people who witnessed it before 1789.]

1334 (return) [ "Mémoires" de M. de Montlosier," I. p. 161,.]

1335 (return) [ Reports of the Société de Berry, "Bourges en 1753 et 1754," p. 273.]

1336 (return) [ Ibid.. p. 271. One day the cardinal, showing his guests over his palace just completed, led them to the bottom of a corridor where he had placed water closets, at that time a novelty. M. Boutin de la Coulommière, the son of a receiver-general of the finances, made an exclamation at the sight of the ingenious mechanism which it pleased him to see moving, and, turning towards the abbé de Canillac, he says: "That is really admirable, but what seems to me still more admirable is that His Eminence, being above all human weakness, should condescend to make use of it." This anecdote is valuable, as it serves to illustrate the rank and position of a grand-seignior prelate in the provinces.]

1337 (return) [ Arthur Young, V.II. P.230 and the following pages.]

1338 (return) [ Abolition of the tithe, the feudal rights, the permission to kill the game, etc.]

1339 (return) [ De Loménie, "Les Mirabeau," p.134. A letter of the bailiff, September 25, 1760: "I am at Harcourt, where I admire the master's honest, benevolent greatness. You cannot imagine my pleasure on fête days at seeing the people everywhere around the château, and the good little peasant boys and girls looking right in the face of their good landlord and almost pulling his watch off to examine the trinkets on the chain, and all with a fraternal air; without familiarity. The good duke does not make his vassals to go to court; he listens to them and decides for them, humoring them with admirable patience." Lacretelle, "Dix ans d'épreuve," p. 58.]

1340 (return) [ "De l'état religieux," by the abbés de Bonnefoi et Bernard, 1784, I. pp. 287, 291.]

1341 (return) [ See on this subject "La partie de chasse de Henri IV" by Collé. Cf. Berquin, Florian, Marmontel, etc, and likewise the engravings of that day.]

1342 (return) [ Boivin-Champeaux, "Notice historique sue la Révolution dans le département de l'Eure," p. 63, 61.]

1343 (return) [ Archives nationales, Reports of the States-General of 1789, T, XXXIX., p. 111. Letter of the 6th March, 1789, from the curate of St. Pierre de Ponsigny, in Berry. D'Argenson, 6th July, 1756. "The late cardinal de Soubise had three millions in cash and he gave nothing to the poor."]

1344 (return) [ De Tocqueville, ibid.. 405.—Renauldon, ibid.. 628.]

1345 (return) [ The example is set by the king who sells to the farmer-generals, for an annual sum, the management and product of the principal indirect taxes.]

1346 (return) [ Voltaire, "Politique et Législation, La voix du Curé," (in relation to the serfs of St. Claude).—A speech of the Duke d'Aiguillon, August 4th, 1789, in the National Assembly: "The proprietors of fiefs, of seigniorial estates, are rarely guilty of the excesses of which their vassals complain; but their agents are often pitiless."]

1347 (return) [ Beugnot. "Mémoires," V. I. p.136.—Duc de Lévis, "Souvenirs et portraits," p. 156.—"Moniteur," the session of November 22, 1872, M. Bocher says: "According to the statement drawn up by order of the Convention the Duke of Orleans's fortune consisted of 74,000,000 of indebtedness and 140,000,000 of assets." On the 8th January, 1792, he had assigned to his creditors 38,000,000 to obtain his discharge.]

1348 (return) [ King Louis the XVI's brother. (SR.)]

1349 (return) [ In 1785, the Duke de Choiseul In his testament estimated his property at fourteen millions and his debts at ten millions. (Comte de Tilly, "Mémoires," II. 215.)]

1350 (return) [ Renauldon, ibid.. 45, 52, 628.—Duvergier, "Collection des Lois," II. 391; law of August 31;—October 18, 1792.—Statements (cahier) of grievances of a magistrate of the Chatelet on seigniorial courts (1789), p. 29.—Legrand, "l'Intendance du Hainaut," p.119.]

1351 (return) [ Archives Nationales, H, 654 ("Mémoire" by René de Hauteville, advocate to the Parliament, Saint-Brieuc, October 5, 1776.) In Brittany the number of seigniorial courts is immense, the pleaders being obliged to pass through four or five jurisdictions before reaching the Parliament. "Where is justice rendered? In the cabaret, in the tavern, where, amidst drunkards and riff-raff, the judge sells justice to whoever pays the most for it."]

1352 (return) [ Beugnot, "Mémoires," vol. I. p. 35.]

1353 (return) [ Boivin-Champeaux, ibid.. 48.—Renauldon, 26, 416.—Manuscript reports of the States-general (Archives nationales), t. CXXXII. pp. 896 and 901.—Hippeau, "Le Gouvernement de Normandie," VII. 61, 74.—Paris, "La Jeunesse de Robespierre," pp.314–324.—"Essai sur les capitaineries royales et autres," (1789) passim.—De Loménie, "Beaumarchais et son emps," I. 125. Beaumarchais having purchased the office of lieutenant-general of the chase in the bailiwicks of the Louvre warren (twelve to fifteen leagues in circumference. approx. 60 km. SR.) tries delinquents under this title. July 15th, 1766, he sentences Ragondet, a farmer to a fine of one hundred livres together with the demolition of the walls around an enclosure, also of his shed newly built without license, as tending to restrict the pleasures of the king.]

1354 (return) [ Marquis D'Argenson, "Mémoires," ed. Rathery, January 27, 1757. "The sieur de Montmorin, captain of the game-preserves of Fontainebleau, derives from his office enormous sums, and behaves himself like a bandit. The population of more than a hundred villages around no longer sow their land, the fruits and grain being eaten by deer; stags and other game. They keep only a few vines, which they preserve six months of the year by mounting guard day and night with drums, making a general turmoil to frighten off the destructive animals." January 23, 1753.—"M. le Prince de Conti has established a captainry of eleven leagues around Ile-Adam and where everybody is vexed at it." September 23, 1753.—M. le Duc d'Orléans came to Villers-Cotterets, he has revived the captainry; there are more than sixty places for sale on account of these princely annoyances.]

1355 (return) [ The old peasants with whom I once have talked still had a clear memory of these annoyances and damages.—They recounted how, in the country around Clermont, the gamekeepers of Prince de Condé in the springtime took litters of wolves and raised them in the dry moats of the chateau. They were freed in the beginning of the winter, and the wolf hunting team would then hunt them later. But they ate the sheep, and, here and there, a child.]

1356 (return) [ The estates of the king encompassed in forest one million acres, not counting forests in the appanages set aside for his eldest son or for factories or salt works.]

1357 (return) [ De Montlosier, "Mémoires," I. 175.]