brutal.

A family of ci-devant nobles of my acquaintance, once possessing a
revenue of one hundred and fifty thousand livres--subsist now on fifteen
hundred livres--per year; and this sum must support six individuals--the
father and mother, with four children! It does so, indeed, by an
arrangement of only one poor meal in the day; a dinner four times, and a
supper three times, in the week. They endure their distress with
tolerable cheerfulness, though in the same street, where they occupy the
garrets of a house, resides, in an elegant hotel, a man who was once
their groom, but who is now a tribune, and has within these last twelve
years, as a conventional deputy, amassed, in his mission to Brabant and
Flanders, twelve millions of livres. He has kindly let my friend
understand that his youngest daughter might be received as a chambermaid
to his wife, being informed that she has a good education. All the four
daughters are good musicians, good drawers, and very able with their
needles. By their talents they supported their parents and themselves
during their emigration in Germany; but here these are of but little use
or advantage. Those upstarts who want instruction or works of this sort
apply to the first, most renowned, and fashionable masters or mistresses;
while others, and those the greatest number, cannot afford even to pay
the inferior ones and the most cheap. This family is one of the many
that regret having returned from their emigration. But, you may ask, why
do they not go back again to Germany? First, it would expose them to
suspicion, and, perhaps, to ruin, were they to demand passes; and if this
danger or difficulty were removed, they have no money for such a long
journey.

But this sort of penury and wretchedness is also common with the families
of the former wealthy merchants and tradesmen. Paper money, a maximum,
and requisitions, have reduced those that did not share in the crimes and
pillage of the Revolution, as much as the proscribed nobility. And,
contradictory as it may seem, the number of persons employed in
commercial speculations has more than tripled since we experienced a
general stagnation of trade, the consequence of war, of want of capital,
protection, encouragement, and confidence; but one of the magazines of
1789 contained more goods and merchandize than twenty modern magazines
put together. The expenses of these new merchants are, however, much
greater than sixteen years ago