country swarm, with a view
to their election to the States-General, have been racing after the
members of the Third-Estate, under the pretext of standing by them and
of giving them information. . . They have striven to make them believe
that, in the States-General, they alone would be masters and regulate
all the affairs of the kingdom; that the Third-Estate, in selecting its
deputies among men of the robe, would secure the might and the right
to take the lead, to abolish nobility and to cancel all its rights
and privileges; that nobility would no longer be hereditary; that all
citizens, in deserving it, would be entitled to claim it; that, if
the people elected them, they would have accorded to the Third-Estate
whatever it desired, because the curates, belonging to the Third-Estate,
having agreed to separate from the higher clergy and unite with them,
the nobles and the clergy, united together, would have but one vote
against two of the Third-Estate. . . . If the third--Estate had chosen
sensible townspeople or merchants they would have combined without
difficulty with the other two orders. But the assemblies of the
bailiwicks and other districts were stuffed with men of the robe who
had absorbed all opinions and striven to take precedence of the others,
each, in his own behalf, intriguing and conspiring to be appointed a
deputy."

"In Touraine," writes the intendant,[5421] "most of the votes have been
bespoken or begged for. Trusty agents, at the moment of voting, placed
filled-in ballots in the hands of the voters, and put in their way, on
reaching the taverns, every document and suggestion calculated to excite
their imaginations and determine their choice for the gentry of the
bar."

"In the senechausee of Lectoure, a number of parishes have not been
designated or notified to send their reports or deputies to the district
assembly. In those which were notified the lawyers, attorneys and
notaries of the small neighboring towns have made up the list of
grievances themselves without summoning the community. . . Exact copies
of this single rough draft were made and sold at a high price to the
councils of each country parish".--

This is an alarming symptom, one marking out in advance the road the
Revolution is to take: The man of the people is indoctrinated by the
advocate, the pikeman allowing himself to be led by the spokesman.[5422]

The effect of their combination is apparent the first year. In
Franche-Comte[54