n the pose of their inherited superiority.

{25}

CHAPTER III

ECONOMIC CRISIS

Even under such conditions the Bourbon monarchy might have survived
much longer had it not failed badly at one specific point. Napoleon
himself declared that it was in its financial management that the
_ancien regime_ had broken down; and although for a long period
historians chose to accentuate the political and social aspects of the
Revolution, of recent years the economic has been the point of
emphasis. And it was to consider a financial problem that the
States-General were summoned in 1789; while most of the riots that
broke out in Paris that same year were due to scarcity of food.

The editors of the Encyclopaedia had not neglected economic questions,
and had given much employment to a number of writers who ranked as
Economists or as Physiocrats. Among the men most interested in such
questions were Quesnay, the physician of Madame de Pompadour; Turgot,
the ablest minister of {26} Louis XVI, and the Marquis de Mirabeau,
father of a more famous son. They concerned themselves, among other
things, with theories of agriculture largely based on the conditions of
their country. With her large population France could with difficulty
produce sufficient food for her people. The wheat which she did
produce was brought to market under extremely bad conditions of
distribution and of payment. The century witnessed what appeared to be
an endless succession of short crops and consequent famine. Viewing
these conditions as a whole, the economic thinkers concluded that the
foundations of the State must repose on agriculture, and they quickly
voiced a demand that there should be encouragement for the production
of wheat and free circulation.

Towards the end of the reign of Louis XV the effect of these economic
doctrines began to be felt. Several efforts were made to remove the
restrictions on the circulation of wheat. These efforts, however,
proved unavailing until after the meeting of the States-General, and
that largely because of the powerful interests that were concerned in
maintaining the wheat question as it then existed. The conditions were
curious and are of great importance in {27} their relation to the
outbreak of the Revolution.

Wheat had become the great medium of financial speculation. It was an
article that came on the market at a stated period in large quantities,
though in quantities which experience showed wer