Meeting of the Estates-General, 1789. 165 
De 
_ The fact that the clergy made their action dependent upon the 
action of the nobility, the prolonged debate in the chamber of 
the latter and the obstinacy of the nobles in holding to every 
point of their rights, seemed about to defeat the king’s attempt 
to force a union of the estates. The apprehension of the court 
must have increased with every moment of delay.'!° The middle 
of the afternoon had come without any sign of the nobility’s 
compliance with the king’s desire. Barentin charges that this 
was the situation of which Necker took advantage to play upon 
the king’s fears until Louis XVI ordered the Comte d’Artois, 
who enjoyed marked popularity among the nobles, to write the 
letter of admonition to the reluctant order. The rdle played 
by Necker is very questionable, but that both the king and the 
Comte d’Artois regarded the latter’s step as highly necessary is 
shown by a letter written by.the Comte d’Artois to Barentin in 
1799, apropos of this very matter. After a lapse of ten years 
he said: “If a feeling, independent of my own opinion, could 
have influenced the determination which I had taken, it could 
only be attributed to the positive knowledge which I had that 
the king considered this measure as an absolute duty on my 
part.””! 
Whether the Comte d’Artois wrote but a single note addressed 
to the Duke of Luxemburg, his intimate friend, or whether he 
sent notes to several of the nobles is not clear from the avail- 
able evidence upon the matter.” All the summaries of its 
These two texts vary so greatly in language and content that they cannot 
have come from a common source. 
10 Boullé, Documents inédits, Revue de la rév., XIV, 29; Dorset, 226; Baren- 
tin, 249. 
11 Barentin, 282-284. 
12 Histoire de la rév., I, 240; Moleville, I, 247; Jefferson, II, 488. The 
first states that the letter came to the Duke of Luxemburg, who would be the 
natural person to receive it. Moleville says: ‘‘ Au milieu de ces débats, on 
vit le marquis de la Queuille, lire avec émotion une lettre qu’on venait lui 
remettre, et s’en entretenir d’un ton trés-animé avec les secrétaires; elle était 
de M. le comte d’Artois ....” Jefferson had heard that ‘‘ there was a 
considerable opposition; when notes written by the Count d’Artois to sundry 
members, and handed about among the rest, decided the matter.’’ The 
majority of the accounts which mention the intervention of the Comte d’Artois 
imply that he wrote just one note. 
279 
