See _post_, vol. i, p. 82.]

[Footnote 137: Froissart, _Chroniques_, book i, chap. 128.]

[Footnote 138: Jean Juvenal des Ursins in Buchon, _Choix des
Chroniques_, iv.]

[Footnote 139: Rymer, _Foedera_, vol. ix, p. 427.]

Every one thought first of himself. Whoever possessed land owed
himself to his land; his neighbour was his enemy. The burgher thought
only of his town. The peasant changed his master without knowing it.
The three orders were not yet united closely enough to form, in the
modern sense of the word, a state.

Little by little the royal power united the French. This union became
stronger in proportion as royalty grew more powerful. In the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries, that desire to think and act in common,
which creates great nations, became very strong among us--at least in
those families which furnished officers to the Crown--and it even
spread among the lower orders of society. Rabelais introduces Francois
Villon and the King of England into a tale so inflamed with military
bravado that it might have been told over the camp fire in an almost
identical manner by one of Napoleon's grenadiers.[140] In his preface
to the poem we have just quoted, Chapelain writes of the occasions
when "_la patrie_ who is our common mother, has need of all her
children." Already the old poet expresses himself like the author of
the _Marseillaise_.[141]

[Footnote 140: _Pantagruel_, book iv, chap. lxvii.]

[Footnote 141: _La Pucelle_, Preface.]

It cannot be denied that the feeling for _la patrie_ did exist under
the old _regime_. The impulse imparted to this sentiment by the
Revolution was none the less immense. It added to it the idea of
national unity and national territorial integrity. It extended to all
the right of property hitherto reserved to a small number, and thus,
so to speak, divided _la patrie_ among the citizens. While rendering
the peasant capable of possessing, the new _regime_ imposed upon him
the obligations of defending his actual or potential possessions.
Recourse to arms is a necessity alike for whomsoever acquires or
wishes to acquire territory. Hardly had the Frenchman come to enjoy
the rights of a man and of a citizen, hardly had he entered into
possession or thought he might enter into possession of a home and
lands of his own, when the armies of the Coalition arrived "to drive
him back to ancient slavery." Then the patriot became a soldier.
Twenty-three years of warfare, with the i