:

NOTE 1.

ON THE NUMBER OF ECCLESIASTICS AND NOBLES.

These approximate estimates are arrived at in the following manner:

1. The number of nobles in 1789 was unknown. The genealogist Cherin,
in his "Abrege chronologique des Edits, etc." (1789), states that he is
ignorant of the number. Moheau, to whom Lavoisier refers in his
report, 1791, is equally ignorant in this respect. ("Recherches sur la
population de la France," 1778, p. 105); Lavoisier states the number as
83,000, while the Marquis de Bouille ("Memoires," p.50), states 80,000
families; neither of these authorities advancing proofs of their
statements.--I find in the "Catalogue nominatif des gentilhommes en
1789," by Laroque and De Barthelemy, the number of nobles voting,
directly or by proxy, in the elections of 1789, in Provence, Languedoc,
Lyonnais, Forez, Beaujolais, Touraine, Normandy, and Ile-de-France, as
9,167.--According to the census of 1790, given by Arthur Young in his
"Travels in France," the population of these provinces was 7,757,000,
which gives a proportion of 30,000 nobles voting in a population of
26,000,000.--On examining the law and on summing up the lists, we find
that each noble represents somewhat less than a family, inasmuch as the
son of the owner of a fief votes if he is twenty-five years of age; I
think, accordingly, that we are not far out of the way in estimating
the number of noble families at 26,000 or 28,000, which number, at
five individuals to the family, gives 130,000 or 140,000 nobles.--The
territory of France in 1789 being 27,000 square leagues,[6101] and the
population 26,000,000, we may assign one noble family to every square
league of territory and to every 1,000 inhabitants.

2. Concerning the clergy I find in the National Archives, among the
ecclesiastical records, the following enumeration of monks belonging to
28 orders: Grand Augustins 694, Petits-Peres 250, Barnabites 90, English
Benedictines 52, Benedictines of Cluny 298, of Saint-Vanne 612, of
Saint-Maur 1,672, Citeaux 1,806, Recollets 2,238, Premontres 399,
Premontres Reformes 394, Capucins 3,720, Carmes dechausses 555,
Grands-Carmes 853, Hospitaliers de Saint-Jean de Dieu 218, Chartreux
1,144, Cordeliers 2,018, Dominicans 1,172, Feuillants 148, Genovefains
570, Mathurins 310, Minimes 684, Notre-Dame de la Merci 31, Notre-Saveur
203, Tiers-Ordre de St. Francois 365, Saint-Jean des Vignes de
Soissons 31, Theatins 25, abbaye de Saint-Victor 21, Maisons so