ereigns, namely, to the King, the clergy and the
seigniors, more than three-quarters of his net income. After 1800, he
pays to the State less than one-quarter, the one sovereign alone who
replaces the other three. We have seen how relief came to the old
taxable subject, to the rural, to the small proprietor, to the man
without any property, who lived on the labor of his own hands; the
lightening of the direct tax restored to him from 14 to 43 free days,
during which, instead of working for the exchequer, he worked for
himself. If married, and the father of two children over 7 years of age,
the alleviation of one direct tax alone, that of the salt-tax, again
restores to him 12 days more, in all from one to two complete months
each year during which he is no longer, as formerly, a man doing
statute-work, but the free proprietor, the absolute master of his time
and of his own hands.--At the same time, through the re-casting of
other taxes and owing to the increasing price of labor, his physical
privations decrease. He is no longer reduced to consuming only the
refuse of his crop, the wheat of poor quality, the damaged rye, the
badly-bolted flour mixed with bran, nor to drink water poured over the
lees of his grapes, nor to sell his pigs before Christmas because the
salt he needs is too dear.[3251] He salts his pork and eats it, and
likewise butcher's meat; he enjoys his boiled beef and broth on
Sunday; he drinks wine; his bread is more nutritious, not so black
and healthier; he no longer lacks it and has no fear of lacking it.
Formerly, he entertained a lugubrious phantom, the fatal image of famine
which haunted him day and night for centuries, an almost periodical
famine under the monarchy, a chronic famine and then severe and
excruciating during the Revolution, a famine which, under the republic,
had in three years destroyed over a million of lives.[3252] The
immemorial specter recedes and vanishes; after two accidental and local
recurrences, in 1812 and 1817, it never again appears in France.[3253]

V. Conscription or Professional soldiers.

Military service.--Under the Ancient Regime.--The militia
and regular troops.--Number of soldiers.--Quality of the
recruits.--Advantages of the institution.--Results of the
new system.--The obligation universal.--Comparison between
the burdens of citizens and subjects.--The Conscription
under Napoleon.--He lightens and then increases its weight.