also if the private Sansculotte has not his difficulties, in a
time of dearth! Bread, according to the People's-Friend, may be some
'six sous per pound, a day's wages some fifteen;' and grim winter here.
How the Poor Man continues living, and so seldom starves, by miracle!
Happily, in these days, he can enlist, and have himself shot by the
Austrians, in an unusually satisfactory manner: for the Rights of
Man.--But Commandant Santerre, in this so straitened condition of the
flour-market, and state of Equality and Liberty, proposes, through
the Newspapers, two remedies, or at least palliatives: First, that all
classes of men should live, two days of the week, on potatoes; then
second, that every man should hang his dog. Hereby, as the Commandant
thinks, the saving, which indeed he computes to so many sacks, would
be very considerable. A cheerfuller form of inventive-stupidity than
Commandant Santerre's dwells in no human soul. Inventive-stupidity,
imbedded in health, courage and good-nature: much to be commended. "My
whole strength," he tells the Convention once, "is, day and night, at
the service of my fellow-Citizens: if they find me worthless, they will
dismiss me; I will return and brew beer." (Moniteur in Hist. Parl. xx.
412.)

Or figure what correspondences a poor Roland, Minister of the Interior,
must have, on this of Grains alone! Free-trade in Grain, impossibility
to fix the Prices of Grain; on the other hand, clamour and necessity
to fix them: Political Economy lecturing from the Home Office, with
demonstration clear as Scripture;--ineffectual for the empty National
Stomach. The Mayor of Chartres, like to be eaten himself, cries to the
Convention: the Convention sends honourable Members in Deputation; who
endeavour to feed the multitude by miraculous spiritual methods; but
cannot. The multitude, in spite of all Eloquence, come bellowing round;
will have the Grain-Prices fixed, and at a moderate elevation; or
else--the honourable Deputies hanged on the spot! The honourable
Deputies, reporting this business, admit that, on the edge of horrid
death, they did fix, or affect to fix the Price of Grain: for which,
be it also noted, the Convention, a Convention that will not be trifled
with, sees good to reprimand them. (Hist. Parl. xx. 431-440.)

But as to the origin of these Grain Riots, is it not most probably your
secret Royalists again? Glimpses of Priests were discernible in this of
Chartres,--to the eye of Patr