* When he is writing on the spot, at the moment, and under the
dictate of the facts themselves,

* When it is obvious that his sole object is to preserve or furnish
information,

* When his work instead of a piece of polemics planned for the needs
of a cause, or a passage of eloquence arranged for popular effect is
a legal deposition, a secret report, a confidential dispatch, a
private letter, or a personal memento.

The nearer a document approaches this type, the more it merits
confidence, and supplies superior material. - I have found many of
this kind in the national archives, principally in the manuscript
correspondence of ministers, intendants, sub-delegates, magistrates,
and other functionaries; of military commanders, officers in the
army, and gendarmerie; of royal commissioners, and of the Assembly;
of administrators of departments, districts, and municipalities,
besides persons in private life who address the King, the National
Assembly, or the ministry. Among these are men of every rank,
profession, education, and party. They are distributed by hundreds
and thousands over the whole surface of the territory. They write
apart, without being able to consult each other, and without even
knowing each other. No one is so well placed for collecting and
transmitting accurate information. None of them seek literary
effect, or even imagine that what they write will ever be published.
They draw up their statements at once, under the direct impression
of local events. Testimony of this character, of the highest order,
and at first hand, provides the means by which all other testimony