huntsmen wearing gaiters and hob-nailed shoes, carrying an old rusty
sword under their arms dying with hunger and refusing to work."[18]
Elsewhere we encounter "M. de Pérignan, with his red garments, wig and
ginger face, having dry stone wails built on his domain, and getting
intoxicated with the blacksmith of the place;" related to Cardinal
Fleury, he is made the first Duc de Fleury.-Everything contributes to
this decay, the law, habits and customs, and, above all, the right of
primogeniture. Instituted for the purpose of maintaining undivided
sovereignty and patronage it ruins the nobles since sovereignty and
patronage have no material to work on. "In Brittany," says
Châteaubriand, "the elder sons of the nobles swept away two-thirds of
the property, while the younger sons shared in one-third of the
paternal heritage."[19] Consequently, "the younger sons of younger
sons soon come to the sharing of a pigeon, rabbit, hound and fowling-
piece. The entire fortune of my grandfather did not exceed five
thousand livres income, of which his elder son had two-thirds, three
thousand three hundred livres, leaving one thousand six hundred and
sixty-six livres for the three younger ones, upon which sum the elder
still had a préciput claim."[20] This fortune, which crumbles away and
dies out, they neither know how, nor are they disposed, to restore by
commerce, manufactures or proper administration of it; it would be
derogatory. "High and mighty seigniors of dove-cote, frog-pond and
rabbit-warren," the more substance they lack the more value they set
on the name.-Add to all this winter sojourn in town, the ceremonial
and expenses caused by vanity and social requirements, and the visits
to the governor and the intendant. A man must be either a German or an
Englishman to be able to pass three gloomy, rainy months in a castle
or on a farm, alone, in companionship with peasants, at the risk of
becoming as awkward and as fantastic as they.[21] They accordingly run
in debt, become involved, sell one piece of ground and then another