Here, "nearly all the inhabitants, not excepting the farmers and landowners, are eating barley bread and drinking water;" there, "many poor creatures have to eat oat bread, and others soaked bran, which has caused the death of several children."-- "Above all," writes the Rouen Parliament, "let help be sent to a perishing people.

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Sire, most of your subjects are unable to pay the price of bread, and what bread is given to those who do buy it "-- Arthur Young,[1104] who was traveling through France at this time, heard of nothing but the high cost of bread and the distress of the people.

At Troyes bread costs four sous a pound--that is to say, eight sous of the present day; and unemployed artisans flock to the relief works, where they can earn only twelve sous a day.