XLIV.

1841.

CHAP. Government in the most agreeable way, in the shape of a considerable increase of revenue, without any addition to the public burdens. In a word, judging from external appearances, the Throne of the Barricades was firmly established, not only in the general consent of the most influential classes of the community, but from the substantial benefits it had conferred upon those on whose industry and exertions it was mainly dependent.*

3. Universal

thirst for gain.

This fortunate state of things not only diffused general ease and well-being through a large portion of the community, but it rendered government incomparably easier by giving a tried and less dangerous direction to the general objects of desire in all the more affluent classes of the community. Dazzled by the general appearances of prosperity with which they were surrounded, and by the rapid rise in the value of stock of nearly every description which resulted from it, nearly all those who were possessed of any capital, and not a few who were without it, adventured upon the tempting lottery of shares. Such was the success with which these speculations were at first attended, that great fortunes were in several instances realised in a few days; and numbers, without trouble or apparent risk, acquired an independence for life in a few months. As in the days of Law and the Mississippi Scheme, and more recently in the mania of 1835 and 1836, an insatiable passion for speculation seized upon the nation.

* POPULATION, EXPORTS, IMPORTS, REVENUE, AND SHIPPING OF FRANCE, FROM 1841 to 1847-CONVERTED AT 25 FRANCS TO £1.

XLIV.

1841.

Cabinet ministers, and ladies of fashion, aged generals, CHAP. and youthful aspirants, shopkeepers and soldiers, merchants and manufacturers—the high and the low, the rich and the poor-all rushed forward to the course, and forgot all their former objects of ambition in the intense thirst for present gratification, or the belief of an immediate acquisition of fortune. That a whole nation could not in this Carné, manner rush headlong, and almost blindfolded, into one Inst. Rep. exciting chase, without the most imminent hazard, was en France, indeed certain; but these risks were entirely overlooked Regnault, in the intensity of the passions awakened by it; and every de Louis one, regardless of the future, sought only to convert the 123, 127. present into a source of pleasure or profit to himself.1

1 Hist. des

ii. 228;

Huit Ans

Philippe, i.

ing feelings

working

But there are two ways of viewing every question, and 4. different classes of the State to be affected by every change, Accumulatwhether for the better or worse, in the condition of society. of disconAs much as the rise in railway shares, and the general tent in the prosperity of trade and manufactures, spread wealth and classes. contentment through a large portion of the bourgeois section of the people, did they excite feelings of discontent and envy among a still more numerous class to whom these advantages were unknown. The immense mass of the working classes in the great towns were unable to do more than maintain themselves and their families, legitimate or illegitimate, by the produce of their labour. The peasants in the country, still more numerous, were possessed of such small properties, and these for the most part so heavily burdened with debt, that so far from having anything to spare for speculation, they had the utmost difficulty in providing subsistence in the humblest way for themselves. Such was the weight of the interest of mortgages and public taxes in France, that out of £63,000,000, the annual free produce of the soil, no less than £45,000,000 was absorbed by them, leaving only £18,000,000 to be divided among all the owners. In such a state of society the affluence and growing riches of the bourgeois class, derived chiefly from the expenditure of foreigners

VOL. VII.

2 D

XLIV.

1841.

CHAP. or speculations in railway shares, were a grievance the more, and tended to widen the breach which separated the different classes from each other; for, in their muchenvied rulers the shopkeepers and richer proprietorsthey beheld the class which had reft from them the spoils of a revolution, and fearfully augmented the public burdens, and which was now revelling in affluence and the enjoyments of luxury, while they themselves were pining in the penury of humble life.*

5.

Great mag

nitude of

in the re

venue.

Add to this, that flourishing as was the state of the Exchequer, so far as the income was concerned, it was by the deficits no means in an equally satisfactory state when the balance of receipts and expenditure was taken into consideration. On the contrary, the floating debt and annual deficit, which had gone on constantly increasing ever since 1836, and which all the artifices of supplemental credits and budgets had not been able entirely to conceal, had now swelled to such an amount that they had become a source of serious embarrassment to the Government. The cost of the military preparations of M. Thiers, in contemplation of the war in 1840, and on the fortifications of Paris, had also been immense. This floating debt in 1833 amounted to 255,000,000 francs (£10,000,000), and more. now amounted, in 1841, to 1,000,000,000 francs, or £40,000,000, of which no less than 175,000,000 francs, or £7,000,000, had been incurred since the formation. of the administration of M. Thiers, on 1st March 1840.

It

* The official statistics of France in 1841 exhibit the following extraordinary state of the landed interest of the country :

Francs.

£

-Stat. de la France, vol. vii. p. 91; and REGNAULT, Histoire de Huit Ans de Louis Philippe, vol. ii. p. 276. The separate landed properties in France at this period were 10,860,000, but it was calculated that they belonged to only 6,000,000 separate proprietors. Supposing this to be the case, and allowing 3 to each family, we have 21,000,000 human beings among whom this £18,720,000 was divided, or less than 20s. a-head to each.

XLIV.

1841.

This deficit was brought to a perfect climax by a loan of CHAP. 531,000,000 francs (£21,400,000), contracted in 1841, to be expended on railways in 1841 and 1842. In a word, the finances of the country were in the most alarming situation; and it was evident to all that Government, pressed by the dread of insurrection among the working classes, was resolved at all hazards to keep them for the Regnault, time in full employment, and for this purpose to encroach Ann. Hist. to any extent, by anticipation, on the credit or resources 248.' of future years.

i. 125, 128;

1841, 237,

discontent

The existence and spread of those feelings of discon- 6. tent among the working classes was the more dangerous Increasing that they had no legitimate mode of expression. Govern- of the workment deemed society safe, and the danger over, because the ing classes. voice of treason or ultra-Republicanism was not heard in the Chamber, and insurrection no longer stalked abroad in the metropolis. So far, however, was this from being the case, that the danger was only the greater and more serious from no sound expressive of it being heard in the legislature, and no visible symptom of it appearing in the streets. As in England, during the twelve years which intervened between the contraction of the currency and the Reform Bill, discontent was daily increasing among the people, because the expression of it could not find vent through their representatives. The cry was not against the Sovereign, but the Chamber; it was not the dethronement of the monarch, but the Reform of the Representation, which was demanded; and this, of course, was not expected from the legislature itself, till absolutely constrained to it by external pressure. Thus, while the schism between the Government and the people was daily becoming greater, neither the debates in the Chamber nor the disorders in the streets gave any symptoms of its approach; and the future of France at this period is to be looked for neither in the proceedings of, Parliament, nor the sentences of the courts of justice, but ii. 238, 243. in the speeches at the Reform Banquets.2

Nothing, accordingly, presents so remarkable a contrast

2 De Carné,

CHAP.
XLIV.

1841.

7.

jects in de

Chamber,

Thiers.

as the debates in the Chambers and the ideas fermenting in the great mass of the people, between 1841 and 1847. If you read the speeches in the Chamber, the objects in Trifling sub- dispute appear, for the most part, of the most trivial and bate in the insignificant description. They were not so much about and serious things as words. Verbal amendments to addresses, or to objects of ministerial bills, which, without involving any real difference of opinion, might afford a touchstone to the parties measuring their strength in the struggle for possession of the ministerial portfolios, were the great objects of contention. Upon them the rival orators, candidates for power, exhausted all their eloquence, and frequently, in support of their respective sides, they appealed to abstract principles, and gave expression to warm and eloquent declamation. But excepting on the few occasions when important questions of foreign policy were brought forward for discussion, the vote was almost always taken on a verbal amendment, involving no material political principle. On all questions of social or internal interest, the Chamber appeared to be substantially unanimous. Protection to native industry, diminution of public expenditure, enlarged provision for popular education, resistance to any further extension of the suffrage, or increase of ecclesiastical influence, were inscribed alike on the banners of the Liberal and the Conservative parties. The only real question between them was, whether M. Guizot or M. Thiers was to have the disposal of the 130,000 offices in the gift of the Executive, and on which side were the 166 placemen in the Chamber of Deputies to sit. And this was to be determined, not by divisions on any great social or political questions, but by such a skilful framing of the royal speech, or the amendment, as might succeed in detaching ten votes from the Right or the Left centre, 1 De Carné, either of which was sufficient to determine the fate of an ii. 280, 321, administration, and with it the disposal of all offices and emoluments. 1

238.

While these were the objects of parliamentary division,