Voltaire gives here an admirable description of the condition of the country poor before the Revolution, and emphasises the fact that it was not the iniquitous extorsion of the taxes which so much oppressed them but the cruel and rapacious character of the tax-gatherers. Gabelle, or the tax on salt, to which Voltaire alludes here, compelled each person to buy seven pounds of salt per year at a price which varied in the different provinces and was everywhere iniquitously high. The nobles, clergy, and government officials were exempt from the tax altogether.
Seeds are fruitful once only in ten years.
Even this means of subsistance constantly fails, for the forests are devastated here much more than in the rest of the kingdom. I may remark, in passing, that timber will soon be scarce in France, and that lately wood for firing is being bought in Prussia. As I want to be perfectly frank, I own that we make certain cheeses on some of the Jura mountains in June, July, and August. Our chief means of livelihood is at the end of our fingers. We exist, then, solely through our industry.