e even did not dare to deny his fault.
He was allowed to demand leave of absence to go home and defend himself.
He was badly received, stripped of all military rank in England and
Holland, and (as well as the officers under him) was not without fear of
his degradation, and was even in danger of his life.

This recital of the events that took place in Spain has led me away from
other matters of earlier date. It is time now that I should return to
them.

VOLUME 8.

CHAPTER LV

Although, as we have just seen, matters were beginning to brighten a
little in Spain, they remained as dull and overcast as ever in France.
The impossibility of obtaining peace, and the exhaustion of the realm,
threw, the King into the most cruel anguish, and Desmarets into the
saddest embarrassment. The paper of all kinds with which trade was
inundated, and which had all more or less lost credit, made a chaos for
which no remedy could be perceived. State-bills, bank-bills, receiver-
general's-bills, title-bills, utensil-bills, were the ruin of private
people, who were forced by the King to take them in payment, and who lost
half, two-thirds, and sometimes more, by the transaction. This
depreciation enriched the money people, at the expense of the public; and
the circulation of money ceased, because there was no longer any money;
because the King no longer paid anybody, but drew his revenues still; and
because all the specie out of his control was locked up in the coffers of
the possessors.

The capitation tax was doubled and trebled, at the will of the Intendants
of the Provinces; merchandise and all kinds of provision were taxed to
the amount of four times their value; new taxes of all kinds and upon all
sorts of things were exacted; all this crushed nobles and roturiers,
lords and clergy, and yet did not bring enough to the King, who drew the
blood of all his subjects, squeezed out their very marrow, without
distinction, and who enriched an army of tax-gatherers and officials of
all kinds, in whose hands the best part of what was collected remained.

Desmarets, in whom the King had been forced to put all his confidence in
finance matters, conceived the idea of establishing, in addition to so
many taxes, that Royal Tithe upon all the property of each community and
of each private person of the realm, that the Marechal de Vauban, on the
one hand, and Boisguilbert on the other, had formerly proposed; but, as I
have already des