The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1905-07-02

tolerable wages, and sometimes savee
| enough to buy a small patch OF land
! The districts where large farms were leased
/ and where, consequently. hired agricultural
! laborers were numerous, we're not those
which broke ont into anarchy in the first
months after the meeting OF the States
| General
We observe, then, that critical hist orians
among whom Prof. Montague deserves to
rank. do not adopt without reserve those
descriptions Of the appalling misery OF
the French peasants under the oncifn
regime, which have been 40 often copied
from one book into another II il, at the
same time. undisputed that there are solid
reasons for thinking that most OF them
led a very hard, pinched, insecure lfe'
We are reminded that in England the con-
dition Of the petty farmer or Freebooter
is not easy, even under the more genial
circumstances of the present day. In
France hundred and fifty years ago his
technical skill and command Of capital
we're relatively small. and his difficulties
we're far greater. He was subjected to
unfair and excessive taxation, assessed and
collected in such way as to infict the
ut most loss and annoyance. He had to
pay tithes. When he wished to take his
produce to market he met with many him
ORANGES. Although toward the close OF
the dncien regime the highways were often
superb, the crossroads were usually vii
famous. On every road and every river the
peasant might expect to pay toll to some
lord. or corporation, or city, or to the Crown
itself. Often he had to pass one OF the
internal lines of custom houses. In selling
his grain. especially. he was hampered by
edicts of the King and regulations OF the
Pdriements II his own crops failed in
bad season, the same obstacles hindered
food from coming to him and forced him
to pay dear for it or go without 1t. The
truth is that before the extraordinary
improvements in communications due to
steam all countries we're liable to times
of scarcity even of famine. unless, like
England and Holland. they were every
where accessible to water carriage, or, like
Iombardy. were unfailing in productive
ness Consequently the frequent recur-
renee Of dearths in France before the Revo-
luton does not imply so absolute penury
in the mass OF the people as we are now
apt to assume; but it does imply that their
condition was bad, and in country so
fruitful and among people so thrifty,
it does prove how faulty were the fiscal
and agrarian systems.
In fine. il we judge eighteenth century
France by the standard Of to-day French
institutions must be pronounced clumsy,
inooherent and unjust, and a great part of
! ho Ia ar Iva oh n u O
to have been wretchedly poor and half
civilized. Nevertheless Prof. Montague
recognized that France held the first place
among European kingdoms; and II the con.
dition OF the lower classes was better in
sections of England, in the Netherlands,
in few favored parts Of Germany and in
northern Italy, 1t was probably worse in
most OF the German countries. in Naples,
in Spain. and in Ireland. From the close
Of the Seven Years War to the outbreak
Of the Revolution, France was growing in
population, riches and enlightenment. A
reasonable and humane temper had spread
80 widely among administrators and Judges
that the spirit Of government under Louis
XVI. was very different from what 1t had
been under Louis XIV" For that very rea-
son, adds the author OF this retrospect,
-in society where personal freedom was
general, landed property widely diffused
and every class was aspiring to equality
with the class above, evils which elsewhere
or in other times might have been borne
in patience were felt to be intolerable.
The long reign Of slothful and sensual
prince louis XVI had given time for dis
content to accumulate and for criticism
to become embittered, Glass was divided
from class; old institutions and beliefs be-
came objects of soorn; crude theories and
impossible hopes gave new sting to in
justice and oppression, and discerning
strangers could foretell. even while all was
calm. the approach of tremendous catas-
trophe.