In a few minutes every thing
that could hear (for I leave understanding the pedantry of a French
newspaper out of the question) were his auditors. A party at quoits in
one field, and a dancing party in another, quitted their amusements, and
listened with undivided attention. I believe in general the farmers are
the people most contented with the revolution, and indeed they have
reason to be so; for at present they refuse to sell their corn unless for
money, while they pay their rent in assignats; and farms being for the
most part on leases, the objections of the landlord to this kind of
payment are of no avail. Great encouragement is likewise held out to
them to purchase national property, which I am informed they do to an
extent that may for some time be injurious to agriculture; for in their
eagerness to acquire land, the deprive themselves of cultivating it.
They do not, like our crusading ancestors, "sell the pasture to buy the
horse," but the horse to buy the pasture; so that we may expect to see in
many places large farms in the hands of those who are obliged to neglect
them.
A great change has happened within the last year, with regard to landed
property--so much has been sold, that many farmers have had the
opportunity of becoming proprietors. The rage of emigration, which the
approach of war, pride, timidity, and vanity are daily increasing, has
occasioned many of the Noblesse to sell their estates, which, with those
of the Crown and the Clergy, form a large mass of property, thrown as it
were into general circulation.
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