The Mcmoircs de Bailly 15 



government of Paris, the Proces-vcrbal^ of the conferences at 

 Versailles for the verification of credentials, the Courricr de 

 Provence, the Journal de Versailles, the Journal de Paris, the 

 Gazette de Versailles, the Patriote frangais, the Revolutions de 

 Paris, the Chronique de Paris, and the Point du jour. The 

 proccs-verhaux served as the foundation of the narrative, sup- 

 plemented by the newspapers and by Bailly's recollections and 

 observations. The Mcuwircs contain but little, as has been 

 stated, that did not come directly under the observation of Bailly, 

 but, as he did not trust to his memory for his facts, the relation 

 of his Mcnioires to the sources that he used is a question of the 

 first importance. 



The first natural division of the Mcnioires includes a brief in- 

 troduction and an account of the elections in Paris (I, pp. 1-68). 

 The first six pages deal with the events leading to the convoca- 

 tion of the States General. It contains little that is of value in 

 the way of statement of fact and is chiefly interesting from the 

 point of view of what Bailly thought of it all in 1792. With 

 page 7, he reaches the preliminaries of the elections, and intro- 

 duces on that page and page 8 some recollections of personal 

 conversations touching the possibility of his election as a deputy 

 and what the outcome of the estates would be. The account of 

 the district assembly follows on pages 9-13. It was probably 

 composed without any aid to the memory. I infer this from the 

 character of the account, devoid of details difficult to remember, 

 and the fact that he could not remember the names of all the 

 seven commissioners selected to draw up the cahier. He was a 

 member of the commission, but he could not recall the name of 

 the seventh man and left a blank that was never filled in.' It 

 is evident that he did not have the record before him at the time 

 of writing. If the minutes of the meeting of the district — that 



'^/^roci s-verbal des conferences sur la verification des pouvoirs. Paris 

 1789. Bailly cites this work twice, I, pp. 96, 97, and uses it at timas when 

 he does not cite it. 



2"Ces commissaires, au nombre de sept, furent MM. Marmontel, Bigot, 

 Cholet, Moreau freres, . . . et moi, a qui I'oa fit I'honneur de I'admet- 

 tre," I, p. 12. 



345 



