HISTORY OF EUROPE. 
An obje& of no less importanee 
to France, in its critical situation 
sespecting foreign powers, was the 
providing means to carry on the war 
with so many potent enemies. Cam- 
bon, the financier, so long celebrated 
for his labours in the department of 
finance, had been dismissed by the 
convention, and succeeded by Jo- 
hannot, a man of established repu- 
tation in that branch of political 
knowledge, In a report which he 
presented on the sixth of May to the 
convention, upon the situation of the 
national finances, he proposed two 
regulations to be observed, with 
inviolable fidelity: the one was a 
striG and punctual’ payment of the 
interest due on the national debt ; 
the other was the establishment of 
a sinking fund, to pay off the prin- 
cipal. Allowing the war to conti- 
nue two years longer, still, he con- 
tended, money enough would re- 
main, after defraying all other ex- 
pences, to answer the purposes of 
such afund. Acéording tohis state- 
ments, the property of the nation, 
in lands and forests, estates of the 
emigrants, royal palaces, and do- 
mains, together with the produce 
of the same nature in Belgium, were 
valued altogether at a sum equal to 
more than 110,000/. sterling per 
annum. This, he asserted; was 
an amount amply suffictent for 
the expences of the war, cn a 
supposition of its lasting a much 
Jonger space than probable, and for 
a complete liquidation of the whole 
debt. After entering into various 
éaleulations, to prove the justness of 
his ideas, he concluded by asserting, 
that, after defraying all charges, 
there would remain, clear and un- 
appropriated, according to the ac- 
¢ounts and valyations referred to, 
{87 
no less assum than seven thousand 
millions of livres. 
This. enumeration of ‘the re. 
sources remaining to France, af. 
forded great satisfaction to the pub- 
lic; but'the deeper class of specula. 
tors could not refrain from Fee 
their doubts of the solidity of the 
multifarious obje&ts on which his 
calculations were founded. Ad. 
_mitting theiy exaCtness, still the un. 
certainty of those amounts, which 
were to arise from assets existing 
only inexpectation, was alone a de- 
fect, that reduced his system toa 
mere possibility. But this, in-pecu- 
niary matters, was no foundation 
to build upon ; especially ina coun- 
try, the government of which was 
liable to $0 many vicissitudes, and 
the finances of which could not, of 
course, be considered in a situation 
of stability. 
The late commotions had left an 
impression on the public mind, so 
inimical to the jacobins, that the 
convention, no Jess desirous of de- 
pressing that turbulent party, and 
punishing the chief \agents in its 
enormities, resolved, in compliance 
with the reiterated desire of the 
mzjority, to bring to justice, con- 
formably to their promise, the exe- 
crated instruments of Roberspierre’s 
cruelties, the president and judges 
of the revolutionary tribunal. ;The 
multiplicity of crimes they, were ac- 
cused of, required some time to be 
arranged: they were accused of 
having prostituted the administra- 
tion of justice, in the most seanda- 
lous and insolent. manuer, to serve 
the purposes of oppression and ctu- 
elty ; and of having made out lists of 
persons to be sentenced to death, 
under juridical forms, merely, to 
gratify private enmity. Contrarily 
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