financial
matters with the King, and, when the sum required was settled, an order
of assessment was issued, and the barons undertook the collection of the
taxes. The assessment was always fixed higher than was required for the
King's wants, and the barons, having paid the King what was due to him,
retained the surplus, which they divided amongst themselves.

The creation of a public revenue, raised by the contributions of all
classes of society, with a definite sum to be kept in reserve, thus dates
from the reign of Philip Augustus. The annual income of the State at that
time amounted to 36,000 marks, or 72,000 pounds' weight of silver--about
sixteen or seventeen million francs of present currency. The treasury,
which was kept in the great tower of the temple (Fig. 262), was under the
custody of seven bourgeois of Paris, and a king's clerk kept a register of
receipts and disbursements. This treasury must have been well filled at
the death of Philip Augustus, for that monarch's legacies were very
considerable. One of his last wishes deserves to be mentioned: and this
was a formal order, which he gave to Louis VIII., to employ a certain sum,
left him for that purpose, solely and entirely for the defence of the
kingdom.

[Illustration: Fig. 262.--The Tower of the Temple, in Paris.--From an
Engraving of the Topography of Paris, in the Cabinet des Estampes, of the
National Library.]

[Illustration: Gold Coins of the Sixth and Seventh Centuries.

Fig. 263.--Merovee, Son of Chilperic I.

Fig. 264.--Dagobert I.

Fig. 265.--Clotaire III.]

[Illustration: Silver Coins from the Eighth to the Eleventh Centures.

Fig 266.--Pepin the Short.

Fig. 267.--Charlemagne.

Fig. 268.--Henri I.]

[Illustration: Gold and Silver Coins of the Thirteenth Century.

Fig. 269.--Gold Florin of Louis IX.

Fig. 270.--Silver Gros of Tours.--Philip III.]

When Louis IX., in 1242, at Taillebourg and at Saintes, had defeated the
great vassals who had rebelled against him, he hastened to regulate the
taxes by means of a special code which bore the name of the
_Etablissements_. The taxes thus imposed fell upon the whole population,
and even lands belonging to the Church, houses which the nobles did not
themselves occupy, rural properties and leased holdings, were all
subjected to them. There were, however, two different kinds of rates, one
called the _occupation_ rate, and the other the rate of _exploitation_;
and they were both collected a