4216 ([return])
[ Ibid., II., 357. The statistics of exports in France in 1787 give three hundred and forty-nine millions, and imports three hundred and forty millions (leaving out Lorraine. Alsace, the three Evéchés and the West Indies).-Ibid., 360. In 1786 the importations from the West Indies amounted to one hundred and seventy-four millions, of which St. Domingo furnished one hundred and thirty-one millions; the exports to the West Indies amounted to sixty-four millions, of which St. Domingo had forty-four millions. These exchanges were effected by five hundred and sixty-nine vessels carrying one hundred and sixty-two thousand tons, of which Bordeaux provided two hundred and forty-six vessels, carrying seventy-five thousand tons.—On the ruin of manufactures cf. the reports of préfets in the year X., with details from each department.—Arthur Young (II., 444) states that the Revolution affected manufactures more seriously than any other branch of industry.]
4217 ([return])
[ Reports of préfets. (Orme, year IX.) "The purchasers have speculated on the profits for the time being, and have exhausted their resources. Many of them have destroyed all the plantations, all the enclosures and even the fruit trees."—Felix Rocquam, ibid., 116. (Report by Fourcroy on Brittany.) "The condition of rural structures everywhere demands considerable capital. But no advances, based on any lasting state of things, can be made."—Ibid., 236. (Report of Lacuée on the departments around Paris.) "The doubtful owners of national possessions cultivate badly and let things largely go to ruin.">[
4218 ([return])
[ Reports by préfets, years X. and XI. In general, the effect of the partition of communal possessions was disastrous, especially pasture and mountain grounds.—(Doubs.) "The partition of the communal property has contributed, in all the communes, rather to the complete ruin of the poor than to any amelioration of their fate."—(Lozére.) "The partition of the communal property by the law of June 10, 1792, has proved very injurious to cultivation." These partitions were numerous. (Moselle.) "Out of six hundred and eighty-six communes, one hundred and seven have divided per capitum, five hundred and seventy-nine by families, and one hundred and nineteen have remained intact.">[
4219 ([return])
[ Ibid. (Moselle.) Births largely increase in 1792. "But this is an exceptional year. All kinds of abuses, paper-money, the non-payment of taxes and claims, the partition in the communes, the sale for nothing of national possessions, has spread so much comfort among the people that the poorer classes, who are the most numerous, have had no dread of increasing their families, to which they hope some day to leave their fields and render them happy.">[
4220 ([return])
[ Mallet-Dupan, "Memoires," II., 29. (February 1, 1794.) "The late crop in France was generally good, and, in some provinces, it was above the average... I have seen the statements of two returns made from twenty-seven departments; they declare an excess of fifteen, twenty, thirty and thirty-five thousand bushels of grain. There is no real dearth.">[