Henry M. Baird · 236 of 379

CHAPTER X · Chancellor L'Hospital's speech.

The session opened with brief speeches delivered by Francis and his mother, setting forth the object of this extraordinary convocation, but referring their auditors to the chancellor and to the king's uncles for further explanations. Chancellor L'Hospital was less concise. He entertained the assembly with a lengthy comparison of the political malady to a bodily disease, pronouncing the cure to be easy, if only the cause could be detected. He closed by assigning a somewhat singular reason for summoning but two of the three orders of the state. The presence of the people, he said, was in no wise necessary, inasmuch as the king's sole object was to relieve the third estate. Because, forsooth, the poor people—bowed down to the earth with taxes and burdens, which the noblesse would not touch with one of their fingers—was the party chiefly interested in the results of the present deliberations, it was quite unessential that its complaints or requests should be heard! The Duke of Guise and his brother, the cardinal, next laid before the assembly an account of their administration of the army and finances; and the first day's session ended with the pleasant announcement that the royal revenues annually fell short of the regular expenses by the sum—very considerable for those days—of two and one-half millions of livres.