CHAPTER II

HITHERTO we hâve spoken of “ the peasants ” in a general fashion, but the point has now been reached when more précision is essential to our arrative. We must, then, describe the composition of his class, and its économie and cultural condition. By hat time we shall be in a position to investigate its ttitude towards the complex of institutions described a the preceding chapter.

In the first place, we must réalisé that it is not strictly ccurate to write of the peasants as of an entirely homo- ;eneous class. Within this section of the French populaion in 1789 were included several distinct social groups vhich differed from one another in various ways, but had . point of contact inasmuch as they were ail more or sss directly concerned with agriculture. What M. leorges Bussière has written of Périgord may be taken .s applying with general accuracy to the whole of rural 'rance at this period. “ The term ‘ peasant,’ ” he emarks, “ embraces the lesser folk who live in contact rith the soil. Only the large towns and cities hâve a ection of inhabitants which takes no part in labour on he land. The village blacksmith and shoemaker, who ,lso cultivate their small holdings, are peasants, and this lass of artisan-cultivators or cultivator-artisans, is very Lumerous. The manufacturer, whether he be miller, veaver, or innkeeper ; the dealer in cattle or agricultural

>roducts, whether his commerce be large or small,

,;elves as “ proprietors,” while the tax-rol1; of the remai A

. ’ clearly distinguish between the f armer, holding

F îd by lease, and the peasant-proprietor. Never- “^ss, it is important to remark, with M. Sée, that the jant’s right of property was not absolute and autonomous.” 1 As we hâve seen in the preceding chapter, the peasant’s freedom of action in regard to his land was often seriously restricted, and he was obliged to share its produce with a social superior. Agrarian feudalism, as it existed in the eighteenth century, may be fairly described as a System of dual ownership ; neither party had complété and sovereign rights over the land. Still, it must be insisted that the actual cultivator had a real and legal right of property in it, and, bearing this in mind, we may pass to the more important question of the distribution of land between the different social classes in 1789.

With one class of proprietors we need not greatly concern ourselves, namely, the small but fortunate class which held land in franc-alleu, that is, unburdened by any feudal servitudes or obligations. Such proprietors existed in 1789, scattered over many parts of French territory, but it seems clear that they were comparatively few in number ; “ allodial property,” says M. Karéiew, “ was exceptional.” 2 This was the case even in districts where the local law presumed the absence of feudal rights over land. Dauphiné, for instance, was a province where the “ written law ” held sway, and where, according to legal theory, the land of non-noble persons could not be subjected to any feudal bond. “ In fact,” says M. Conard, “ the number of peasants who were full proprietors of their lands, that is to say, who paid no other charges than the tithe and the royal taxes, was small,” and he goes on to point out that in the whole of the élection of Vienne the inhabitants of only three communities out of a total of 193, profited by this presumption of freedom 1 Sée, Classes rurales, p. 77. 2 Karéiew, p. 33.

i)f property. In ail the rest, the peasants were wholly Dr in part subjected to the payment of feudal dues.1 In view of these facts, we need not stay to debate the difficult and obscure question of the number M allodial properties that existed at the beginning of the Révolution, but can pass to more important matters.

“ The majority of the peasants are proprietors,” writes M. Sée,2 thus supporting the view of De Tocqueville mentioned above, and most of the detailed studies of this question which hâve been conducted in recent years point to the same conclusion. The late M. Gimel, a pioneer in this department of research, asserted that the number of small proprietors in 1789 was about four millions ; Professor Loutchisky of Kiev, although he indicates various defects in Gimel’s methods of calculation, concludes that the latter’s estimate was too low rather than too high, and that the peasants were by far the most numerous class in a total of five million proprietors of land.3 These are but estimâtes, it is true, ind only a most laborious sériés of researches in the local archives of France could finally settle this controversy. But such evidence as is available appears to support the general correctness of the view of De Tocqueville and his successors. M. Marcel Marion, for example, concludes that the number of small proprietors in the generality of Bordeaux was very great, and speaks of " the general diffusion of landed property among the humbler classes of the community.” 4 The extracts from contemporary official documents given by M. Bridrey in his édition of the Cahiers de doléances for the district of the Cotentin show that in eighty parishes of that région there were 10,320 non-noble proprietors, and the average amount of tax paid by each proves that they

1 Conard, pp. 9-10.

3 Loutchisky, Petite propriété, p. 79.

4 Marion, Bordeaux.

3 Sée, Classes rurales, p. 66.

were small proprietors.1 Without pinning our faith, then, to a particular figure, we may accept tlie opinion originally expressed by Necker, namely, that the number of peasant owners before the Révolution was, relatively speaking, “ immense.” But the case of the Cotentin parishes raises a question of a different order. Alongside the 10,320 small proprietors we find 1290 tenant-farmers, and the amount of tax paid by this second class shows that, on an average, each individual member of it held nearly three times as much land as the members of the first. It is important, then, that we should bring together such information as exists to show the distribution of landed property between the different social groups.

From the statistics as to ownership compiled by Prof essor Loutchisky we can construct the following table : 2

Province or District.

Percentage of Land held by Nobles. Clergy. Peasants.

Artois

Picardy

Burgundy .

ii*6

Limousin .

• iS‘3

Haute-Auvergne

Quercy

Dauphiné .

Les Landes

Béarn

Toulousain

These figures relate, for the most part, as will be seen, to the South and the Centre, parts of the country where Arthur Young noted the prédominance of peasant proprietors ; 3 they tell us little of the North and nothing of the West. Now, these are the areas where there is

1 1 hâve based this calculation on the date given in M. Bridrey’s second volume.

2 Loutchisky, Classes agricoles, pp. 42-3.

8 See under dates 12 June and 12 August 1787 for Quercy and Béarn.

reason to suppose that the amount of land owned by the peasants was smallest ; Loutchisky believes that in Normandy, Poitou, and Brittany it amounted to no more than 20 per cent. The figures given above for the Cotentin support this opinion as regards Normandy,1 2 while the researches of M. Sée confirm it for Brittany. “ The déclarations of the twentieths and the seigneurial documents seem to prove,” he remarks, “ that in Brittany, as in the rest of France, the majority of the peasants are proprietors. In the thirty-eight parishes which I hâve àtudied, we find 7686 peasant-owners as compared with 233 noble and 633 bourgeois proprietors ; that is to say, that of a hundred landowners there would be three nobles, fight bourgeois, and eighty-nine peasants.” * But he *oes on to point out that the holdings of the peasants were generally small ; “in the case of about half the peasant-proprietors (46 per cent) the portion owned by îach is reduced to one or two hectares [the hectare =

2 '47 acres] of land, and there are some whose property consists of a small house, with a garden, a parcel of cultivable land, or a piece of heath attached. . . . One nay affirm that in Upper Brittany the peasant’s property s of quite restricted dimensions, much more so, it would >eem, than in most other régions of France.” In Lower Brittany, conditions were still worse ; most of the cultivators held their land by a peculiarly objectionable orm of leasehold known as domaine congéable. The îumber of owners, and the amount held by each, were îotably smaller than in the upper part of the province.3

The reasons, whether historical or geographical, for :hese marked différences in the distribution of ownership cannot detain us here ; we must pass on to consider )ther points of more immédiate importance. For in-

1 Loutchisky further States that 80 per cent of the agricultural class n Lower Normandy and Perche owned no land. See Classes agricoles, ). 18.

2 Sée, Classes rurales, p. 66.

3 Ibid, p. 68.

stance, was the grip of the peasant on the land strengthening or weakening at the beginning of the Révolution ? Even if we take into full account what has been said as to the “ feudal reaction ” in the previous chapter, the evidence is of a character to permit us to believe that the former process was taking place. For the province of Artois, Professor Loutchisky has established that in the two centuries between 1569 and 1769, the peasants in the neighbourhood of Arras had increased their holdings by 30 per cent, and by 34 per cent in that of Saint-Omer. In the generaüty of Soissons, they had acquired four times as much land as they had sold in the years between 1750 and 1785. The same phenomenon can be observed in the Centre and the South. In the Limousin, between the years 1779 and 1791, the peasants sold 700 arpents of land, but they also bought 4700. Around Toulouse, in the same period, both the nobles and the bourgeoisie sold more land than they bought ; clearly it must hâve been the peasants who acquired the différence. In Touraine, between 1765 and 1789, the number of proprietors increased by 475 ; in thirteen parishes of Berry, between 1761 and 1776, the increase was 162 ; and in twenty-four parishes of Auvergne it amounted to 237 from 1750 to 1780. 1 By incredible économies, made at a cost in human suffering of which it is not good to think, the peasants had gradually, and piecemeal, increased their holdings. The growth in brilliance and luxury of the royal court, though it injured the peasants by increasing taxation, helped them indirectly by impoverishing the noblesse. The Abbé Bernier, in his interesting study of the Norman peasants, recounts a family history which shows us an example of this slow and painful upward climb in the économie scale. In 1688, one Pierre B. leased 78 arpents of land ; in 1766, his descendant, Guillaume B., made the first purchase of

1 Loutchisky, Classes agricoles, pp. 19-23 ; cf. also Propriété paysanne.

and in his family’s record, the vendor, it is interesting o note, being a noble who was imprisoned for debt in i’aris. In 1789, when the States-General met, Guillaume’s on was a man of substance, and the proud possessor of :47 arpents. In just over a century the évolution had >een completed. The B.’s must hâve been a family xceptionally favoured by fortune, but what they .chieved on a comparatively large scale, thousands of thers unquestionably did on a small one.1

This process, by which the lands of the noble class yere gradually being transferred to the rural Third Lstate, had been going on for centuries (M. Hanotaux iescribes it as already far advanced at the beginning of he seventeenth),2 and would unquestionably hâve leveloped both in rapidity and extent had it not been or the barriers erected against its progress by feudalism nd the fiscal System of the state. The retraites and the ods et ventes restricted purchases by rendering possession incertain and forcing up the price of land ; the governaent, perpetually in need of revenues, levied registration axes upon legal deeds which inevitably produced the ame effects. So far did this suicidai policy go that in 771 the use of parchment for deeds of sale was made ompulsory by royal edict, however small might be the um involved ! 3 But even this piece of extravagance .id not end the matter. The plebeian holder of “ noble ” md was subjected to a spécial tax known as franc-fief, idiich was levied every twenty years and at each change f ownership. It amounted, in general, to a year’s evenue, but in Picardy (into which province this tax iad been introduced as lately as 1751) a supplementary harge of 50 per cent was added.4 Franc-fief undoubtedly lad its origin in the desire of the Crown to retain the soil

1 Bemier, p. 303.

a Hanotaux, as previously cited, pp. 408-9.

* Sée, Classes rurales, p. 337.

* Ibid. p. 340 ; Kovalewsky, vol. i. p. 94.

in the hands of the class from which military service was due, that is, of the nobilit}'.1 When the rise of professional armies had deprived the tax of its reason of being, it was retained to meet the demands of that true daughter of the horse-leech — the royal treasury. Its effects in artificially restricting the sale of land are obvious, and were clearly recognised at the time. The nobles of Amiens pointed out in 1789 that it was “ préjudiciai to the lower orders whom it burdened with an unjust tax . . . and to the nobles, whose property indirectly bore the weight of it, since the value of their land was diminished by the restrictions placed upon sales and circulation.”3 ‘‘The franc-fief,” said the Third Estate of Aix-en-Issart, “ pre vents the free circulation of landed properties held by non-noble persons.” 3

Nevertheless, the passage of ‘‘noble” land into non-noble hands went on, as we hâve seen. Many of the great seigneurs owned little or no land in 1789 ; their true property was their right to levy feudal dues. M. Loutchisky cites the case of the Duc de Noailles who, though he drew large revenues from his rights over lands in the Limousin, himself owned only some 600 arpents, scattered over several parishes. The revenue derived from these was not one-tenth of his total income. “ And this,” continues Loutchisky, ‘‘was not a State of things peculiar to the great lordships ; it was absolutely the same in the small. In the tax-roll of the parish of Estenos (in the district of Toulouse), we read that the seigneur depended on the Marquis de Roquépine ‘ who possessed nothing but a fief.’ In the roll of the parish of Goudex we read also ‘ that the seigneur of the place had only a lordship, feudal rights and a mill.’ In the Limousin there was scarcely a parish where seigneurs could not be found entirely without land and possessing nothing but their rents. There were entire parishes

1 Kovalewsky, vol. i. p. 13. a Ibid. vol. i. p. 16.

3 Loriquet, vol. ii. p. 149.

rHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 63

'here the noble proprietors lived on their rents without wning a scrap of land. Such was the case in the parish f Saint-Cirgues-de-Jordanc, in Auvergne. It is said 1 the roll of the parish of Saint-Just, also in Auvergne, aat its seigneur ‘ possessed neither a château nor the :ast portion of land, that he had not even a résidence, nd lived only on his feudal dues.’ We discover the mie state of affairs in Dauphiné. In the parish of roses, the lord subsisted merely on the product of his înts ; at Beauregard, the seigneur lived on his feudal ues and the revenue from a mill. The same observation pplies to Champagne ; in the parish of Celles, for exmple, the lord levied his rents and dues and owned no ther property.” 1

But ail these facts as to the distribution and extension f peasant properties, imposing as they are, must not lind us to the sufferings of the class which held and lied them. They were terribly real. There is a tragic lonotony about the complaints of the village comlunities in 1789 which carries conviction to an attentive îader. “ There is no being more wretched than the easant,” says one such document. “ He is obliged to ve upon a little bread made of millet or black corn, and /en that is often lacking. Then he has nothing but a >up made of sait and water, which the dogs of the rich ould certainly reject.” 2 Harassed by the tax-gatherer, îe tithe-farmer, and the agents of the seigneur ; his crops ivaged by pigeons or ruined by the hunt, the peasant as often left in such a condition of poverty that a bad :ason or a déficient harvest brought him face to face ith death by starvation. The cahier of Oger thus escribes the situation of the vine-growers of Champagne. Although he (the peasant) is a proprietor, on account f the debts almost always contracted and caused by the ûshaps connected with the cultivation of vines, he really as nothing of his own, and belongs to the class of serfs 1 Loutchiiky, Classes agricoles, pp. 45-8, * Fourastié, p. 20.

of the glebe. A good harvest pays for his labour, the rent with which he is charged, and nothing more ; a bad one deprives him of everything.” 1 The inhabitants of Espère (Quercy), after a careful calculation of their total income and the charges upon it, continue in this fashion. “ Such, Sire, is the déplorable situation of the people of this village, and yet candour does not allow us to deny that many parishes in the province of Quercy are even more wretched than ourselves. We hâve not yet seen our children browse upon grass like those of our neighbours, and our old people, happier than many of those in the district, hâve almost ail survived the rigours of last January ; there is only one whom we hâve had the unhappiness to see die from want of food.” 2 Throughout the country the land was under-cultivated, as the pages of Arthur Young suffi ciently prove, a state of affairs directly due to the peasant’s lack of capital,3 and he lacked capital because the drain upon his produce of taxes, tithes, and dues made accumulation a task of almost insurmountable difficulty. Thus he was caught in a vicious circle : poverty produced under-cultivation and under-cultivation produced poverty. “ The unhappy tenants,” said the Third Estate of Forcalquier, “ do not consider their land as a means of maintaining themselves and their families so much as the cause of , and pretext for, their enslavement to the taxes and vexations of every description. Thence arises the discouragement of the worker, the abandonnant of his land, and the numerous émigrations which depopulate the countryside and overflow the large towns.” 4

If it be urged that the peasants were interested ir

1 Laurent, p. 490.

2 Fourastié, p. ni. There is abundant evidence that the wintei of 1788-9 was particularly disastrous for the peasants. This faci must be borne in mind when considering the events of the following summer.

* Cf. Loutchisky, Classes agricoles, p. 62.

4 Kovalewsky, vol. i. p. 392.

DHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 65

iackening the picture of their condition, we need only îm to the pages of Arthur Young to find their de- :ription entirely confirmed by that level-headed and xmpetent observer. “ Women picking weeds into their Drons for their cows,” he wrote on io June 1787, another sign of poverty I observed during the whole ay from Calais” (he was then in Ouercy). Under the ime date we find another note, equally impressive. Ail the country, girls and women, are without shoes : stockings ; and the ploughmen at their work hâve sither sabots nor feet to their stockings. This is a Dverty that strikes at the root of national prosperity ; large consumption among the poor being of more con- :quence than among the rich. . . . It reminded me of 1e misery of Ireland.” When we remember what the. mdition of the Irish peasantry was in Young’s day, iis last curt remark acquires a terrible significance. is account of conditions in Brittany is to the same îect. “ To Montauban. The poor people seem poor deed ; the children terribly ragged, if possible worse ad than if with no clothes at ail ; as to shoes and ockings they are luxuries. A beautiful girl of six or ven years playing with a stick and smiling under such a rndle of rags as made my heart ache to see her. . . . ne-third of what I hâve seen of this province seems îcultivated, and nearly ail of it in misery.” 1 Conierations of space forbid the further accumulation of stimony on this point, but it may be asserted that ail odern research has tended to confirm the general :curacy of the pictures drawn by the peasants and by oung.

If from économie we turn to cultural conditions, we îd the state of affairs equally unsatisfactory. The ajority of the peasants were illiterate, and their own atements frequently refer to the fact. “ An inhabitant

the countryside,” says the cahier of Vasselay (Berry),

1 5 September 1788,

“ is almost always unable to read or write ” ; “ the peasants, for the most part, can neither read nor write,” says that of Saint- Jean-de-Béré (Brittany).1 It can be shown from the signatures to these documents that there was little exaggeration in such statements.2 At Sarcelles, out of 161 persons who took part in drawing up the cahier, only 56 knew how to sign it ; at Chevannes, 10 signed, 37 put a cross or mark ; at Artigues, 34 signed out of 120 ; and at Launac, out of 83 persons présent only 22 were able to write their names. Out of 939 persons who attended the électoral assemblies of 19 parishes in the bailliage of Bourges, only 225 were able to afhx their signatures to the records of the proceedings.3 In 1795, 42 inhabitants of Saint-Leger-de-Fougères (Nièvre) addressed a pétition to the Convention ; only 9 signatures were afhxed, and the document concludes with the common formula, “ The othér petitioners do not know how to sign.” When we learn that the pétition was a protest against the establishment of primary schools as useless and expensive, the facts acquire a certain humour.4 As for the signatures to the cahiers of 1789; they “ attest,” says M. Champion, “ the insufïiciencj of primary instruction ; many are so roughly formée that it is obvious that those who traced them did nol know how to write.” 6

Poor, ignorant, oppressed, it would seem impossible that the peasants should hâve been capable of résistance to the social and political forces that crushed them te the earth, much less of formulating a programme for the betterment of their lot. Yet they were, after ail, o:

1 Gandilhon, p. 479 ; Sée and Lésort, vol. ii. p. 335.

2 Champion, p. 209 note.

3 These figures are calculated from the documents printed by M Gandilhon.

4 Rambaud (A.), Histoire de la civilisation contemporaine en France p. 170.

6 Champion, p. 210 ; for similax conclusions as tojBrittany, Sée Classes rurales, pp. 494-6.

rHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 67

le same class from which sprung the Bagaudæ of Gallo- ’oman times, the Jacques, Palliers, and White Hoods of le Middle Ages ; the Va-nu-pieds, Gauthiers, and Tards- .visés of the sixteenth century ; the Croquants and ionnets Rouges who shook the social order in Périgord nd Brittany at the end of the seventeenth ; the blood f these tierce ancestors ran in their veins, and if the time îemed (but only seemed) to hâve gone by for open insurîction, they could and did resist oppression by due proîss of law. “ On the eve of '89, the sovereign Council )f Alsace] is constantly occupied in settling disputes etween seigneurs and vassals ” ; at the other extremity f the realm in Angoumois, nearly forty parishes were t law with the Marquis of Ruffec over the feudal nvées.1 It would be easy to fi.ll pages of this book with 1e peasants’ accounts of the suits they had waged with ligueurs or tithe-owners, sometimes on account of an nclosure, sometimes because of an illegally levied due ; nd if the courts of that âge were generally hostile, the :ubbornness born of the secular struggle with unfriendly fature still insisted on a fresh effort. The peasants, len, in spite of ail, possessed the will to resist oppression ; ley were capable, too, of aspirations towards better rings and of formulating a programme for the abolition f the burdens that weighed upon them. It must be our ext task to discover what was the nature of that rogramme.

We are fortunate in possessing a source of informaon, quite unique in its character, which is of the utmost nportance for this inquiry, namely, the famous cahiers e doléances (statements of grievances) drawn up by the îhabitants bf the rural communities in 1789. These ocuments hâve already been quoted extensively in this nd the preceding chapter, but a few words of explanation s to their character and importance may be of value ere.

1 Vidal'de'Ja Blache, p. 70 ; Boissonade, p. 450.

The States-General which assembled at Versailles in May 1789 were elected by a complicated System, the full details of which it is not necessary to describe. The électoral units were the administrative divisions known as the bailliages and sénéchaussées, and in these the deputies of the Third Estate — the non-noble and nonecclesiastical portion of the population — were chosen by a System of indirect élection. Each town and rural parish elected delegates in proportion to its population (the number for the villages was two for two hundred householders), and these delegates met in a general assembly where were elected the deputies of the order who were to sit in the States-General. The qualifications demanded of the electors in the primary assemblies were that they should be of French nationality, domiciledin the district, twenty-five years of âge, and hâve their names inscribed on the roll of tax-payers. Under the peculiar fiscal conditions of the time this amounted to little less than manhood suffrage. In some parishes, women took part in the assemblies ; but this was due rather to a misunderstanding of the very complicated électoral régulations than to any théories of sex-equality. These féminine electors seem generally to hâve been widows, and as such would, of course, hâve paid taxes in their own names.1

In addition to the élection of delegates, the primary assemblies were charged with another important duty, that of drawing up a statement of grievances and proposais for reform. These were intended to guide the delegates in their task of compiling a general cahier for the whole bailliage, which would, in turn, serve as a programme and instructions for the deputies who would sit and vote at Versailles. Thousands of these cahiers hâve now been printed and made available for study ; they form oui most precious source of information as to the material

1 At Berry-Marmagne, six women, ail widows, took part in thç électoral assembly. See Gandilhon, p. xiv of Introduction.

condition and social aspirations of the French people m the eve of the Révolution.

These documents naturally vary greatly in interest md character. Sometimes they contain only a few îrief clauses ; sometimes they are fair-sized pamphlets vhich discuss every aspect of political and économie ife ; sometimes the authors expressly State that they ire unequal to the task of suggesting reforms, and are montent 'to leave that to other and more enlightened versons. They give only a description of their melan- ;holy condition, often expressed in really moving terms, ind occasionally illustrated by a sort of balance-sheet )f the parish as a whole. These last, artless as they îsually are, are by no means the least useful from the .tudent’s point of view. Much has been said as to he monotonous character of the cahiers, and certainly he first reading of them does produce such an impression, rhe oppressions under which the French people suffered, he crushing taxes, the cruel administrative System, îad much the same conséquences in ail parts of the :ountry and inevitably produced a similarity in com- >laint. But the careful observer will soon perceive how he cahiers of areas differ, and how each bailliage takes >n an individual character due to varying économie and ocial conditions.

One last question remains before we tum to an xamination of the documents themselves, but that is f such importance that some discussion of it, however aadequate, is essential. Did the cahiers really represent he opinions of the peasants themselves ? Were the iews expressed in them the echoes of other men’s opinions, r were they genuine products of the expérience of those ?ho tilled the soil ?

A good deal of misunderstanding of this matter has een caused by the study of only one portion of these Durees, and that, in some respects, the least valuable. 'oo little attention has been paid to the statements of

the villages, and too much to the final cahiers of the bailliages. The latter were drawn up in towns and in assemblies where the éducation and expérience of affairs of the urban représentatives gave them an influence out of proportion to their numbers. There is ground for hésitation in accepting documents drawn up under such conditions as genuinely représentative of the peasants’ point of view. But even when we turn to the first class of documents, there seems room for doubt. We hâve noted the educational level reached by the peasants, and it is impossible to believe that they could hâve been the authors of many of the statements incorporated in these présentations of their grievances. The inhabitants of Balaze, for example, are made to speak of “ the maxim of natural law, qui commodon et incommodon sentire debet ” ; those of Marcillé-Robert demand the abolition of the Concordat agreed upon by Francis I and Léo X, and the re-establishment of the Pragmatic of Saint Louis and Charles VII ; 1 this Breton request is echoed by the Norman inhabitants of Bricqueville-la-Blouette, who also quote no less than eleven different laws, edicts, and ordinances ! La Lande d’Airon quotes (erroneously) Necker’s Treatise on the Administration of the Finances ; 2 Senneçay “ reminds our country of the marks of distinction conferred on the cultivator in far-off lands,” such as China, where the emperor, “ informed every year of the labourer who has most distinguished himself in his profession, makes him a mandarin of the eighth order,” and goes on to remark that in ancient Persia, “ on the eighth day of the month named Chorremcuz, the kings left their royal state to eat with the peasants (Montesquieu, tome iii. p. 45).” 3 Ail this suggests a degree of legal and literary knowledge that not one French peasant in ten thousand can hâve possessed in

1 Sée and Lésort, vol. i. pp. 161 and 203.

a Bridrey, vol. i. pp. 214 and 391.

* Gandilhon, p. 352.

It is clear, then, that the phraseology of the cahiers is often not that of the peasants themselves. Moreover, they are frequently copied from “ models.” These are sometimes the cahier of a neighbouring parish, sometimes printed specimens circulated throughout the district during the électoral period by interested persons. Wellknown examples of this second class are L’ Instruction donnée par Mgr. le duc d’Orléans à ses représentants aux bailliages, partly written by the Abbé Sieyès ; the Suite de l’avis des Bons Normands, by Thouret, who played a notable part in the National Assembly ; and the anonymous Charges d’un bon citoyen de campagne, which sxercised a considérable influence in Brittany.1 Some parishes contented themselves with reproducing it in their cahiers.

Now these facts, taken together, do suggest, at first fight, that we cannot rely upon the cahiers for an expression of the real views of the peasants. But this criticism permits of several answers. To begin with, those who hâve most carefully studied the documents in question ire most convinced of their représentative character. M. Edme Champion, a pioneer in this line of research, îxclaims that in the cahiers “ we hear the voices of our mcestors ” ! 2 M. Bridrey, who has devoted immense pains to the editing of the statements drawn up by the towns and parishes of the Cotentin, bears witness to their remarkable accuracy as to matters of fact. “ The :ahiers may, with the fullest confidence, be compared with the most official and most detailed sources ; on the facts that they alleged the cahiers spoke the truth. A.s to the figures they produced, whether they concerned royal taxes, feudal dues, or tithes, ail the surest documents . . . show us that they were exact, often to a livre, or a bushel of oats. . . . The picture as a whole is true, frank, and loyal. . . . Nothing, perhaps, can give

1 Bloch, vol. i. p. xi ; Sée and Lesort, vol. i. pp. Ixxvii and Ixxxiii.

* Champion, p. 24.

a more just idea of the économie condition of our rural parishes in Mardi and April 1789 ; nothing can make us réalisé in a more striking fashion the formidable power still retained by the privileged classes than the singular and, in the end, overwhelming impression which arises from the reading, parish by parish, of the long and monotonous litany of their dues and servitudes.” 1 It is obvious that the cahiers could not hâve acquired this character of accuracy if the peasants had not themselves played an active part in their préparation. This point need not be laboured, nor need we multiply testimonies of this kind ; it will be more useful to discuss the question from another standpoint.

First, we may note that if the influence of the circulated models was considérable in some districts, in Brittany, for example, in others they played but an insignifiant part. M. Gandilhon déclarés that, so far as the bailliage of Bourges is concerned, there is scarcely a trace of their influence.2 But even where the models were freely used, we see that, as a general rule, they were not employed in any servile fashion. It is clear from a comparison of the models with parish cahiers that the électoral assemblies considered the former and approved their general purport, but did not hesitate to expand or amend them if they thought fit. The cahier of Saint - Lô, for example, is undoubtedly based on Thouret’s model, but “ is none the less an original production ; twice as long as the Suite de l’avis, it not only has expansions which are its own, but complété clauses which are not in the model. The latter, copied exactly in some places, is followed only with considérable modifications in others, which proves that it has not been blindly adhered to.” 3 An examination of the statements for the district of Rennes shows that the Charges d’un bon citoyen de campagne was used in a similar fashion ; some-

1 Bridrey, vol. i. pp. 71-2. 1 Gandilhon, p. xxxi.

3 Champion, p. 23 note.

rHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 78

imes the amendments are slight, sometimes considérable, ut that they exist at ail is proof that the model was ubjected to criticism and discussion. Clearly, then, if he peasants were willing to utilise these model cahiers, hey did not employ them in a slavish manner, but took hem simply as a foundation on which to work.

There is, moreover, abundant evidence to show that he assemblies did not submit sheepishly to dictation in he matter of their complaints and programmes. The trange syntax and spelling of many of the cahiers prove hat they were the work of men much more accustomed 3 handling a hoe than a pen.1 But even where the easants confided the task of authorship to some one îore instructed than themselves, such as the presiding fficer, a local lawyer or doctor, or the village priest, they ould and did exercise an independent judgment on the ocument proposed for their acceptance. The rural ?orkers in 1789 were men who supported gross oppression dth extraordinary patience, but their bent backs were erceptibly straightening, and they were not a herd of umb cattle who would obey the order of the first corner. Vhen, as sometimes happened, the officer who presided ver the assembly was also an agent of the lord of the lanor and endeavoured to force his own ideas upon the ihabitants, or tried to prevent them from giving free xpression to theirs, the records show us the peasants harply reacting against such treatment and taking steps 0 secure that their true views and demands were incororated in the cahiers. Pierreville, in the Cotentin, rovides us with a good example. There a seigneurial fficer presided over the électoral assembly, and refused d admit the complaints of the people as to local matters. is some of the complaints were directed against feudal buses, his motive can easily be understood. But the easants held firm. “ The said community,” they

1 " The language of the cahiers is another proof of their popular rigin, of their sincerity and originality.” Boissonade, p. zo.

declared, " heard the statement of complaints and grievances drawn up by the principal inhabitants in the manner they considered just and reasonable, and in accordance with the existing condition of distress. But they were neither listened to, nor acted upon, by the said bailiff ; he dictated others himself, by his own authority, and permitted no discussion, however judicious and respectful to his authority it might be. . . . This is the reason the said community has again assembled in the accustomed manner and proceeded to frame a just statement of its grievances.” 1 The inhabitants of Trévérien assembled “ to complain against the seigneurs of our parish ” ; neither the seneschal nor the procurator would présidé, and the meeting had to be adjourned till the following day, when the parishioners met again and complained to some purpose, as a glance at their cahier will show.2 At Bain, the seneschal (subsequently accused of “ keeping as good a table as the seigneur himself ”) presided over a small assembly, almost entirely made up of middle-class persons. The statement framed under these conditions did not meet the views of the rest of the parishioners, as it failed to give enough attention to “ the things which overburden the inhabitants of the aforesaid parish of Bain ” ; they accordingly called a fresh meeting and drew up a second statement more to their liking.3 At Bléruais, the local procurator-fiscal called the primary assembly together in the lord’s château where he “ endeavoured to intimidate the parish and force it to sign a cahier de doléances which began with these words, ‘ The nobles will be pleased to pay taxes like ourselves, and we shall owe them a debt of gratitude.’ After having told him that it was not in the châteaux of noblemen that assemblies of the Third Estate ought to be held, and having attended at the sacristy on several occasions,” the parishioners, in spite of the procurator’s threats, took

1 Bridrey, vol. ii. p. 456. a Seé and Lésort, vol. iii. p. 227.

8 Ibid. vol. ii. p. 263.

rHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 75

ie principal proprietor of the place as their president, nd adopted, with some amendments, the very radical xhier of Saint-Maugan. These additions, it is worth oting, strengthened rather than moderated the fierce xpressions of hatred for the nobles which are marked natures of this latter document.1

The peasants, then, were not mere passive instruments 1 the hands of their social superiors. In Brittany, ideed, they outstripped the middle classes of the towns i the radical nature of their programme. The latter, truggling with the nobles for ascendancy, speedily disovered that if they were to obtain the support of the lirai masses, they must not confine their demands to scal and constitutional questions, but must go forward d attack the feudal System itself. “ It seems,” say IM. Sée and Lésort, “ that it was the peasants who rst agitated the question of the feudal System, and he bourgeoisie was compelled to adopt the greater part f their demands.” 2

But it is time to end this over-long digression. It vould not be difficult to accumulate evidence as to ail he points touched upon in the preceding paragraphs, iut enough has been said to demonstrate the value of he cahiers as a source of the first importance for this nquiry, and we can now proceed to an examination of he contents of the documents themselves, in so far as hey deal with économie feudalism in 1789.

The attitude of the authors of the cahiers towards he agrarian System permits of brief description : it vas one of frank hostility. So universal was this feeling hat when we discover a solitary instance like that of iieurac (Quercy), which defended it, we are compelled o suspect its authenticity. This was probably a case vhere the peasants had been cajoled or overawed. But o solitary an exception may be held to prove the rule. rhe cahiers generally adopt the view that the rights of the

1 Sée and Lésort, vol. iii. p. 407. a Ibid. vol. i. p. xliii.

privileged orders had originated in force or frand, and were actively pernicious in their exercise. “ These rights can only hâve originated in the days when the unliappy vassal was reduced to servitude under the hand of his lord, in the days when he dared not raise his voice and was compelled to submit to the law of the strongest ” ; they are “ servitudes imposed by the seigneurs at the time that they usurped public power and the rights of royal authority ; they are contrary to natural and civil liberty ; they are barbarous relies of feudal anarchy and of conditions too hard for humanity.” They are “ so many wounds through which our life-blood drains miserably away,” and “ owe their origin to the usurpations of the clergy and the nobles in the troublous times when they united to enfeeble the royal power and to oppress the people.” “ The rights over mills and ovens, and the corvées, are odious. It is known that they originated in deceit and fraud, one might even say in force and violence.” “ Their origin dates from the times of slavery, and it would be worthy of an âge of liberty to annihilate them.” “ Most of these rights are the fruit of the law of the strongest. The ignorance and barbarism of the early âges gave them birth.” 1 The peasants are conscious of their true function in society, and contrast it with the treatment meted out to them. ’ ” We are the principal prop of the throne, the true support of the armies. . . . We are the source of riches for others and ourselves remain in poverty. . . i We willingly consent to live in that state of life to 'which Providence has called us, but . . . it is too hard and revolting to support ail that is onerous in the state and to lack bread half our days.” a Starting from such a standpoint many of the cahiers go on to demand the radical destruction of feudalism. “ The

1 Bridrey, vol. ii. p. 596 ; Sée and Lésort, vol. ii. p. 328 ; Sagnac, p. 77 ; Boissonade, p. 2x7; Bligny-Bondurand, vol. i. p. 330; Vernier, vol. i. p. 485.

1 Marion, Bordeaux.

eudal System has produced nothing but slaves ; the manches of the tree hâve been eut down but the trunk ,till remains, and the axe must be employed to overhrow it entirely ” ; it is necessary “ to extirpate the ;ery root of the evil. Palliatives do not befit a nation ; ron must be used to destroy abuses the moment they are mown.” 1 The inhabitants of Fontenay-Bossery enumerite a catalogue of rights, and demand that they “ be uppressed as outrageous relies of servitude and feudalsm”; those of Combleux wish for “ the suppression of he ruinous rights ” ; “ feudalism ought not to exist in a ree state,” cry those of Chaon. The community of Æargerie “ demands that the cens, the seigneurial corvées, he monopolies, and other feudal rights injurious to the iberty of persons and properties shall be abolished.” 3 )thers formulate their demands in a similar strain, some 'f them attacking particularly the feudal rights possessed >y ecclesiastical corporations. " There still exist divers iues, called seigneurial or feudal, which ought to disappear rom the sight of every French citizen who is free by right rom ail that savours of servitude.” “ Let the ecclesistical and monastic lordships be suppressed, since they nly inspire pride in those who possess them and distract hem from the service of the altars ; moreover, they are epugnant to the spirit of Jésus Christ, who says that Iis kingdom is not of this world ; they are contrary o the vows of humility and poverty taken by the monks.

. . Abolish ail feudal rights, such as quint and requint, lois t ventes, cens, champarts, and banalités ; they are heavy harges for the country people, and are so many monuîents of feudal servitude, contrary to the constitution of free nation.” “ It will always be futile to invite the easants to make their grievances known if the King o not détermine, with the help of the Nation, to suppress il feudalism throughout the realm. . . . The royal and

1 Sagnac, p. 78.

8 Porée. p. 228 ; Bloch, vol. i. pp. 40 and 372 ; Laurent, p. 431.

local taxes weigh less upon them than this immensity of feudal duties which surrounds them on every hand. . . . The use of lettres de cachet scarcely affects the peasants, but what corne home to them much more nearly are the rights which weigh upon their small properties, and the daily attempts of their seigneurs, especially when they are great and powerfal, to break these up by the establishment of some new charge. . . . The true régénération of France will never be achieved so long as a vestige of servitude is allowed to exist. . . . An exact reform of the civil code will never be executed unless, by the extirpation of feudal slavery, the source of so many suits is dried up.” “ It (the parish) . . . demands the abolition of feudalism, the rights of lods et ventes, censives, mainmorte, etc., ail rights of servitude which are répugnant to the liberty of a free people. To belong to one’s king and country sufhces.” 1

But the demands of the peasants were, for the most part, less radical. Sometimes they contented themselves with asking that the seigneurs should prove their legal right to the dues they claimed. “ As we doubt the legality of a great part of these rents, or at least of the rates at which they are fixed, we supplicate His Majesty to deign to compel the production of the titles, so that we may know the truth as to our exorbitant charges.” “ In case His Majesty does not consider it just to suppress them [the feudal rights], let the seigneur be obliged to justify his title to them at his own expense.” “ His Majesty shall be very humbly entreated to establish a commission before which the lords shall be obliged to produce their titles, so that the said commission, after examining them and the memorials of the inhabitants, may confirm, or extinguish the servitudes demanded.” “ If the king prefer not to be the sole seigneur in the province (which would, however, be the most profitable

1 Bridrey, vol. ii. p. 196 ; Laurent, pp. 445-8 ; Bligny-Bondurand, vol. i. pp. 339-41 ; Vernier, vol. i. p. 636.

iurse for himself and his subjects), ail the nobles who retend to rights over the property of the people shall roduce the primordial proofs of the establishment of lese rights in good and due form. . . . Ail those which rove to be unfounded shall be regarded as abusive and bolished, and there shall be no justification by pre- ;ription from any date whatever, nor by immémorial ossession.” 1 The same cahier, however, goes on to emand that the vassals shall be able to enfranchise lemselves by purchase from the dues which hâve a gai foundation, and this is the point of view generally dopted in the programmes drawn up by the parish leetings. The cahier of Nérondes, in the Bourbonnais, is xceptional in that after demanding “ the suppression of le vestiges of feudalism,” it goes on to exclaim, “ but no urchase ; let there be restored to the nation a liberty rhich has been wrested from it.” 2 Some of the comîunities appear to hâve envisaged a scheme of purchase perated by the government, such as Turgot had planned ; lus the cahier of Touzac says “ that His Majesty shall e entreated to liberate them from the feudal dues which iminish the product of the land, by paying such an idemnity to the seigneurs as he shall think fit.” 3 For le most part, however, individual enfranchisements reie evidently what the peasants had in mind, and to iis end it was necessary to abolish ail solidarity in the îatter of charges. Thus, the cahier of Savignac-deliremont (Dordogne), described by M. Marcel Marion s the most anti-feudal in its district, begins with a îference to the seigneurs as “ leeches,” and then proeeds, “ Render the dues redeemable, destroy ail solidrity, that barbarous custom which destroys the liberty fiat is the natural birthright of Frenchmen, and leave o the seigneur over his vassal only the right of forcing

1 Saint-Léger and Sagnac, vol, i. p. 1x7 ; Porée, p. 228 ; Laurent, . 502 ; Sée and Lésort, vol. jii. p. 402.

? Chassin. * ppyrastié, p. 341.

him to love him, to esteem him, and to respect his good qualities.” A few other typical demands for rédemption may be quoted. “ Let feudalism be destroyed throughout Brittany ; it gives too much power to the lords over their vassals ; and if this etemal truth still stand that a debtor may satisfy his creditor, let the tyrannical and barbarous laws which render the corvées, servitudes, and charges irredeemable be abolished and replaced by a law which permits each vassal to free himself from them.” “ Let each individual be authorised to redeem the feudal rights . . . and let the price of the indemnity they must pay be fixed.” “ The deputies at the States-General will demand that ail feudal rights, save the cens, shall be redeemable at the will of the vassals.” 1

Many of the cahiers draw distinctions between different categories of rights ; of some they demand the suppression outright, of others the abolition by purchase. Thus a Norman parish calls for the abolition of “ ail monopolies, corvées, and thirteenths, and the amortisation of feudal rents.” a Amont (Vesoul) desires the extinction without indemnity of “ personal ” mainmorte throughout the realm and of “ real ” mainmorte on ecclesiastical estâtes ; the latter, and ail other feudal dues, are to be redeemed at twenty years’ purchase on lay estâtes ; Milieu (Dole) makes a similar demand.3 Saponcourt puts forward an identical request as regards mainmorte, and goes on to demand the reformation and abolition of ail banalités , servitudes, and charges ; the abolition of the tithe, and the stoppage of payments due to the Abbey of Cherlieu on account of a lawsuit concerning woods which the peasants had lost, and the restitution to them of the sums already paid.4

A number of the cahiers content themselves witb attacking particular rights and calling for their abolitior

1 Sée and Lésort, vol. ii. p, 39 5 Gandühon. p. 47 ; Porée, p. 543.

2 Bridrey, vol. iii. p. 117, ? Chassin.

4 Finot, 1881.

rHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 81

• reformation. Their authors felt, no doubt, that it as hopeless to expect more than this limited relief, he monopolies and the hunting rights bulk most largely the statements of this class. Sometimes the peasants mply ask that the pigeons should be shut up at seedme and harvest, and that the hunts should be restrained om injuring the crops. “ Nothing is more urgent than i discover a remedy for these abuses, and the true eans, it would seem, is to suppress these hunting rights, ■ that at least the seigneurs should be forbidden to hunt sewhere than on their own domains.” 1 “ The number

cotes and pigeon-houses is so great that the pigeons ) great wrong to the cultivators. . . . May it please is Majesty, therefore, to order that the said cotes and geon-houses belonging to those who hâve no legal tles for them be pulled down and destroyed for ever ;

the same time, it is désirable that those who hâve a ^ht to them should be obliged to shut up their pigeons iring the harvest, the season when they do the greatest image.” 2

As has been said, the question of enclosures was at is time a burning one, and the cahiers, especially those Brittany, give plentiful evidence of the feeling that id been aroused. “ The pastures in the parish of Cesson ive ail been leased out by the seigneurs ; these le a ses ive brought the inhabitants who hâve no land attached their houses to beggary ; the pastures served to graze eir cattle, now it is impossible for them to keep any.” erguer points out that the inhabitants of northern rittany “ found a resource in the waste lands named mmons, which furnished nourishment and grazing for e cattle. Since a wide extent of these unproductive nds has been leased out by the proprietors of the fiefs which they are situated, the unhappy inhabitants of e neighbourhood, deprived of this resource, are also prived of cattle and of the manure they obtained from 1 Sée and Lésort, vol. iii. p. 187. 2 Bridrey, vol. i. p. 232.

them, and are reduced in conséquence to the most frightful poverty. It is indispensable, then, that these common lands should be restored to their original and natural ownership without division, that is, to the neighbouring populations to whom they belong, and that in future neither the proprietors of fiefs nor any other individuals shall dispose of them for their personal benefit.” The inhabitants of Saint-Martin-du-Tertre complain that “ they formerly possessed common woods which are now enjoyed by the Archbishop of Sens, and that the suits occasioned by damages in these woods ruin a number of the inhabitants every year ; they demand to hâve the ownership of these common woods restored to them.” “ Let the seigneurs no longer dare,” says the cahier oi Dornont, near Paris, " to seize the communal lands and appropriate or sell the lots used by the community. As for the lots that they hâve already taken, let them be restored to their natural condition.” Another demands that “ the clearings, wastes, and common pastures shal' not be invaded without an express and legal title, anc that those enclosed during the last thirty years shall be restored.” “ Our territory,” says that of Ville-d’Avray “ during the last ten years has become so circumscribec that our hands remain idle because of the quantity o: enclosures that hâve been made ; we demand that ne one shall be permitted henceforward to enclose withou' the previous permission of the parish.” 1

Up to the présent, we hâve found the peasants generalh unanimous as to one point : whether their demands an radical or moderate, ail wish to see agrarian feudalisn directly attacked, but when we corne to examine thei attitude towards the feudal courts, this unanimity dis appears. A few typical extracts will illustrate the point Saint- Jean-de-Béré demands “ the suppression of feuda justices and jurisdictions, and that there be establishei

1 Sée and Lésort, vol. ii. pp. 77 and 675 ; Porée, p. 48 ; Karéiev p. 83 ; Kovalewsky, vol. i. p. 154 ; Thénard, p. 18.:

>yal courts whose districts shall extend for five or six agues at the most.” “ The desire of the community >f Lherm] is . . . that ail the seigneurial courts shall e suppressed, and that justices of the peace, who will ecide most disputes at their commencement, shall be >tablished in each community. This article will dislease the procurators and the judges, but, without oubt, it will be approved by ail persons well-intentioned )wards the State." Argenteuil, on the other hand, istructs its deputies to demand " that the juridictions e maintained in the parish ... as they hâve always tisted, seeing that the parish is sufficiently large and îat their removal elsewhere would occasion heavy icpense to the inhabitants. ” 1 This last clause gives us re true reason for the différences of opinion. The feudal Durts were bad and their officers oppressive, but they ere, at any rate, close at hand. Poor and unlettered len dreaded the joumeys, the expenses, and delays which îey believed would resuit from their supersession by the :ate tribunals. The cahiers are filled with complaints 5 to the costliness and dilatory procedure of the latter, Dmplaints which wTere quite justified ; and it is small onder that many, perhaps the majority, of the peasants referred to endure the evil that lay at their own doors ither than to go farther and fare worse. Those of blaires even went to the length of demanding that royal îrisdictions should be replaced by feudal. “ Let the )yal courts in villages and small towns,” they wrote, be converted into seigneurial jurisdictions, so that the Dsts of litigants may not be so heavy as in the past.” a On the subject of the tithes we find a similar absence f agreement, though there is general discontent in regard ) their amount, the method of collection, and the îanner of their application. A characteristic expression f opinion on this last point is to be found in a letter

1 Sée and Lé*ort, vol. ii. p. 328 ; Fourastié, p. 215 ; Porée, p. 554.

* Laurent, p. 239.

addressed to Necker by one Miliard, a peasant, i December 1788. He attacked the canons of Sair Maurice at Vienne, and continued, " The poor suff< from cold and hunger, while the canons feast and thin of nothing but fattening themselves like pigs that are t be killed at Easter.” 1 The cahiers tell a similar stor "Another pest destructive to our revenues,” says the of Bellefond, “ is the tithe, so scrupulously demanded b its owners ; for if the rumour, whether true or fals< reach an ecclesiastic’s ear that a poor wretch, driven b necessity, has retained a handful of corn or a few grape: immediately he grumbles, thunders, preaches, menace; probes the recesses of conscience, and imposes a penanc as heavy as if the man were guilty of a great crime.” There is hearty sympathy with the poor village priest; and a general wish that they should be relieved of th necessity for charging fees by an increase of salaries, bu at this point agreement ends. Most of the parishes onl seek reforms, whether in the amount of the tithe or th use to which it is put. jj ‘‘ The tithes are a heavy charg imposed upon us by religion that we willingly pay, bu we should pay more willingly still if we saw them use< in a manner which conformed to their institution both divine and human law.” T1 A few demands appea: for the transformation of the tithes into a money pay ment, and a larger number— though a minority of th< whole — demands their abolition outright. Thus Vanne: solicits “ the abolition of ail tithes and champarts leviec upon different objects of agriculture and enterprises ir general.” “ We demand the suppression of the tithe; and the according to Messieurs the curés of the realm an honest and sufhcient pension.” “ Suppress ail the tithes as absolutely contrary to freedom of property and injurious to agriculture ” ; “ let the rector of this parisb be pensioned with the sum of a thousand livres . . . and

1 Karéiew, p. 58. 2 Marion, Bordeaux.

a Marion, Dîme ecclésiastique, p. 196.

DHE PEASANTS AND THEIR PROGRAMME 85

t the tithe be suppressed and abolished.” “ Our final îmand is that the religious communities be deprived of îe tithes they levy in the provinces. . . . This is an mrpation made upon the parish priests who ought to ; the sole proprietors.” “ It is above ail for the absolute îd irrevocable suppression of the tithe that the comunity of Bellegarde would wish to give to its demands iat strength and energy which render truth and reason ore persuasive. The weight of this crushing charge is ie more insupportable to it since it knows the absurdity : the means by which it was established, the conditions hich caused it to be accepted, the use to which its •oduct is put, and the discouragement that it casts upon e soûl of the cultivator.” 1 It is worth noting that eling was much stronger against the tithes in some gions than in others ; this is particularly noticeable in e case of the communities of the sénéchaussée of Nîmes. )ssibly this is to be accounted for by the existence of a rong Huguenot element in the population.

The land-hunger of the peasants found expression m any demands for the abolition of franc-fief, and for the le of crown and monastic lands. The latter, being the operty of corporate bodies, were withheld from the arket, and the déficit in the finances on the one hand, id the general decay of monasticism on the other, ovided ready justification for the demand. “ The jht of franc-fief is a humiliating tax for the Third date ; Nature has not divided properties into noble id plebeian.” “ Lands differ from one another only by ason of the goodness, the mediocrity, or the badness the soil, their culture or lack of culture. The nobility tributed to some . . . is only an idéal thing. His ajesty shall be entreated to suppress the tax of francf ... \t has caused the ruin of a great number of

1 Bloch, vol. i. p. 341 ; Bridrey, vol. ii. p. 106 ; Sée'and Lésort, 1. ii. pp. 9 and 172; Vernier, vol. i. p. 507; Bligny - Bondurand, 1. i. p. 120.

commoners, principally the inhabitants of the rural districts." “ The right of franc-fief ought to be abolished, because in its origin this tax was only imposed on commoners to take the place of the military service due from the fiefs they had bought from seigneurs who were obliged to serve in the army at their own charges. As to-day the lords and nobles are free from this ancient obligation, and, on the contrary, are paid for their services by the nation, the commoners possessing francs-fiefs ought to enjoy the same privilèges, since the cost of the army is not charged upon the fiefs but upon the national revenue.” 1 “ The sale of the royal domains would provide the State with an annual revenue by means of the taxes on transfers that the return of these lands to commerce would engender, and through the contributions of the new proprietors to the public taxes." Other communities specifically request that the crown lands should be sold or leased in parcels small enough to enable the poorer classes of peasants to acquire them. “ We demand that 150 arpents of land be taken from each of the royal farms, and let out in lots of four or five arpents, so as to help the villagers and enable them to live.” “ His Majesty, being the proprietor of almost the whole of the territory of Bue, is entreated to sell the land in small portions to the highest bidder, on good and solvent security, for the purpose of giving more work and wages to the inhabitants of this parish.” “ Let the royal domains be declared aliénable, and, as such, sold, not in large portions but in lots.” 2

Other cahiers, again, denounce the leasing-out of the seigneurial domains in large farms, a practice which was obviously more profitable and less troublesome to their owners, but was held to be injurious to the peasants’ interests. “ Too large farms are bad for various reasons :

1 Bloch, vol. i. p. 181 ; Sée and Lésort, vol. iii. p. 680 ; Boissonade, p. 458.

3 Kovalewsky, vol. i. p. 92 ; Thénard, pp. 61, 171, *çt.

:hey diminish population and augment the indigent dass ; they inevitably produce a shortage of cattle and i lack of manure. For these reasons, forbid the destruc- :ion of small farms and order the break-up of those which ire too large.” “ It is a misfortune, both for private ndividuals and for the State,” say the inhabitants of Boitron, “ that a ri ch man should be allowed to hold ;everal farms ; by that means, he reduces to poverty :en or twelve households which lived well and brought ip numerous families.” To meet these evils, a limit should be set to the size of farms. “ Permit no farmer :o hâve the exploitation of more than 300 mencaudées of .and, his own included,” say s one cahier ; " let a law ae made which forbids ail peasants to occupy and exploit fnore than one farm in the same parish, above ail, if one s sufficient to allow an individual and his family to exist,” says that of Saint-Cyr.1

Some of the peasants, as we hâve said, cast envious îyes upon the estâtes of the monastic orders. “ To meet the déficit the King could sell the lands and rents belonging to the clergy . . . there would resuit a great advantage by bringing ail these lands into the market.” “ To relieve the unhappy, His Majesty ought to take possession af the abbeys and other properties owned by the monks.”

Let the ecclesiastical corporations be ordered to sell their properties so as to bring them into circulation.” Villedebidon, most radical of ail, demands “ that the [ands of the abbeys shall revert to the poor.” 2 But in spite of these proposais, aimed at a generally unpopular section of society, we find in the cahiers no suggestion of an “ agrarian law,” such as haunted the classicallv-fed imagination of the revolutionary legislators ; the nearest approach — and that a very timid one — to anything of the kind is in a cahier from the Hautes-Pyrénées, where

1 Kovalewsky, vol. i. pp. 50, 68, 150 ; Thénard, p. 182.

J Fourastié, p. 346 ; Gandilhon, p. 41 ; Bloch, vol. i. p. 138 ; Dupont, p, 1 10.

there is question “ of the necessity for compelling the seigneurs to sell their estâtes to the people . . . while paying them a fourth of their value beyond the just price at twenty years’ purchase.” 1

We find, then, widespread discontent with the agrarian System among the peasants in the spring of 1789 ; only a minority suggests radical or revolutionary methods of dealing with that System, but it is clear that if favouring circumstances arise, the peasants as a class will not be slow to attack the whole monstrous and superannuated édifice.

1 Loutchisky, Quelques rémarques sur la vente des Biens Nationaux, p. 24.