The following months were "calm". This "calm" was, of course, relative to the days of the siege of the Bastille.
The order of the higher neighborhoods in the city of Paris has been largely assured. The newly formed National Guard patrols day and night, making it so that the little moth-eaten thieves don't even dare to mess around in these places. Today, those poor people have largely been purged from the National Guard because they have to spend a lot of their time earning a living instead of getting military training.
But go out of these neighborhoods without looking into the areas where the poor people live. You will immediately see that the restoration of order is only an illusion and that the order here is even more chaotic than it was before the revolution.
According to Aunt Sophie, the streets are full of thieves and robbers today.
"I wouldn't dare walk down the street with a loaf of bread." When Joseph suggested that Aunt Sophie could take a little bread from him to go back to her own children, Aunt Sophie said this.
"Mr. Bonaparte, you are unaware of how chaotic it is out on the block today! Well, a woman like me, walking down the street with a loaf of bread - my God, that's more dangerous than walking in a forest with tigers. Not to mention me, but a big man like you, if you were alone, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't be able to walk more than a hundred paces with a loaf of bread in those places. If it had been Master Lucien, he wouldn't have gotten ten paces before he was shot. If little Louis, ah, then even he himself, would have disappeared without a trace."
"If so, how will you bring home the bread you have bought?" Joseph asked.
"Then, of course, several of the neighbors went shopping together." Aunt Sophie said, "To say that it's all you men who make things happen, what with all the nonsense about the Estate General, and the king, and the assembly, and the revolution. Originally, I thought, the days are already difficult enough, and if we make a mess, it will not be more difficult, who knows ... sir, they all said that they will have Estate General, and everyone will be able to have enough to eat. But there were some bad guys that wouldn't let us have our Estate General. So we all went and hit those bad guys. But the bad guys have been fought, the Estate General have been held, and the bread is getting more and more expensive. When the Estate General was not in session, we could not afford to buy bread; when the Estate General was in session, we still could not afford to buy bread: was not the Estate General then in vain?"
Joseph listened and sighed, "Aunt Sophie, the Estate General itself can't change the bread."
At the same time, he mentally added, 'And it was never what those representatives were thinking about, how to make enough bread for even the lowest class of society.'
This idea does not wrong those representatives. As a matter of fact, most of those delegates are rich, and they don't worry about bread. Some have even compared the wages of the French with those of the British and have proposed that French wages are too high, dragging down the French economy, and that legal means should be used to limit high wages.
"But isn't it true that once the Estate General is held, everyone will have a good day? They can't just cheat like that." Aunt Sophie muttered.
"It's not just you guys, actually." Joseph also sighed and said, "Even I, today, have a harder time than before. Everything has gone up except the paycheck. My days are getting hard."
That's a half-truth, but it's true that if Joseph didn't have some other income and relied solely on his school paycheck, it would be a little tougher for him to make ends meet right now. Even a "high-level technician" (Joseph's self-deprecating term) like Joseph could be in trouble, and naturally, the lives of ordinary people would be even more difficult.
In fact, though, nothing would necessarily have happened if there had been no Estate General and no revolution, even if things had been a little harder for ordinary people. Honestly, in Europe, it's not really that bad for the French, even at the bottom of the French ladder. At least, that's much higher than the British worker, who has an average lifespan of no more than thirty-three years, or the Russian serf, who doesn't even have personal freedom. As for Germany? Heine even put it this way, "One-hundredth part of what we German people have suffered would be enough to start a thousand insurrections in France."
But the point is that the convening of the Estate General gave the underclass a great deal of hope, and all the French, even the underclass French like Aunt Sophie, knew about it and were hopeful about it. And all sorts of propaganda kept blowing this hope up stronger and more beautiful as if all problems could be solved as soon as the Estate General had been held and the King had supported the constitution. It's almost like, "After the Estate General, constitutionalism is everything, with foie gras on the table and chicks to snuggle at night."
In the face of reality, however, this blown-up hope dashed like a soap bubble. The Estate General was held, the National Constituent Assembly was formed, the Bastille was brought down, and yet, not to mention the foie gras, there was no more black bread. The pain that can be brought about by such a discrepancy far exceeds the pain of not having enough to eat, and the hatred that can be brought about by such a discrepancy naturally far exceeds the hatred that can be brought about by not having enough to eat. So the Revolution, instead of breaking out in those countries where the oppression was most severe, broke out first in France.
"That's why it was the king's greatest blunder to agree to Estate General. The anger of the citizens of Paris was still gathering today, and with a little guidance, a confrontation between all of Paris and the King was inevitable. Oh, having lost the support of Paris, or even gained its hatred, on what other basis can the king wear his crown securely?" At the Palais-Royal, the Count de Mirabeau is talking to the Duke of Orleans, the owner of the place.
The Count de Mirabeau is a marvelous man who spent the first half of his life in scandal or prison.
As a youth, Mirabeau showed the prodigal factor; his father sent him to the army for exercise while he gambled, picked up girls, and even tried to desert. As a result, he ended up in Ile de Ré prison. After his release, he suppressed the Corsican rebellion, during which he was promoted to the rank of captain for meritorious service and returned to Paris.
He was married to Emilie, daughter of the Marquis of Marignane, by arrangement with his father, who aimed to obtain the other's immense wealth through this union. But this pair of couples are not in tune with each other, not to mention that they do not see each other, but also both like to live in luxury, every day squandering and owe a large amount of foreign debt. In order to prevent his son from dishonoring the family name, the old Marquis of Mirabeau imprisoned him and forbade him to dispose of his property by himself. As a result, Mirabeau remained unabated and was imprisoned again in 1774 at the Château d'If. (It's the same prison where Edmond Dantes stayed in The Count of Monte Cristo.)
In 1775, Mirabeau was released from prison. As soon as he was released from prison, however, he seduced a married woman, the young wife of the Marquise de Monnier, and eloped with her to Holland.
This behavior led the old Marquis de Mirabeau to cut off all his financial resources. So, Mirabeau had to start writing for a living. Coming from the upper class, Mirabeau was well aware of all the bullshit going on in the French upper class, so he specialized in writing to expose the corruption of the French upper class and soon became a famous critic of the old French system.
However, the money earned from writing wasn't enough for Mirabeau, a man who consistently spent his money and did what he did best. So, during this time, he was once again imprisoned for a debt dispute. Of course, Mirabeau claimed that this was a persecution by the reactionary French authorities.
Soon enough, though, Mirabeau was released from prison, miraculously paid off his debts, lived a more flamboyant life, and never got in trouble for debt disputes again. In response, Mirabeau claimed that this was because of his various successful investments, which had paid him handsomely. And it says that achieving financial freedom is nothing more than accomplishing a small goal. But a lot of people say that he just found a big money maker and got a lot of money from him. The big money man was the Duke of Orleans, who was bent on discrediting the King.
Because of his continued criticism of the old French system, Mirabeau gained a good reputation among the third estate, who were dissatisfied with reality. When the Estate General convened, Mirabeau became a delegate of the Third Estate. He became one of the leaders of the National Constituent Assembly.
"However, similar to today, the Parisians have been through this many times. And the wheat is growing so well this year that it is widely believed that if there are no sudden natural disasters, by this fall there will be a bumper crop of wheat, one of the few in the last ten years. At that point, the price of food will definitely go down. It is not subject to human will. Once the price of food falls, the discontent of the people of Paris will fall with it, and then the flames of revolution will be extinguished. If we can't catch a break, the old system will continue to perpetuate itself." Duke Orleans frowned.
Mirabeau laughed heartily, and the fat under his broad chin jiggled.
"Don't worry, Your Highness the Duke, how can we support the fall harvest with the current situation? If it had been before, it wouldn't have been impossible for the common people of Paris to put up with it, but that's not the case today. The anger generated by the Estate General and the revolution, which gave them hope and then reality shattered that hope, is not easy to suppress. Besides who else could suppress such anger these days? Besides, the countryside in the provinces is now in turmoil, and the peasants, who are anxious to get rid of their land rents and tithes, can't wait, and there are now rebellions everywhere. To appease them, the National Constituent Assembly is about to pass a new decree. This new decree will surely be blocked with the king, and then we'll raise prices a little by the way, and then direct the people's anger a little toward the king, and the situation will turn out in our favor."