The houses of detention, before insupportable, are now yet more crouded with farmers and shopkeepers suspected of opposing the law.--Many of the former are so ignorant, as not to conceive that any circumstances ought to deprive them of the right to sell the produce of their farms at the highest price they can get, and regard the maximum much in the same light as they would a law to authorize robbing or housebreaking: as for the latter, they are chiefly small dealers, who bought dearer than they have sold, and are now imprisoned for not selling articles which they have not got. An informer by trade, or a personal enemy, lodges an accusation against a particular tradesman for concealing goods, or not selling au maximum; and whether the accusation be true or false, if the accused is not in office, or a Jacobin, he has very little chance of escaping imprisonment.--It is certain, that if the persecution of these classes of people continue, and commerce (already nearly annihilated by the war) be thus shackled, an absolute want of various articles of primary consumption must ensue; but if Paris and the armies can be supplied, the starving the departments will be a mere pleasurable experiment to their humane representatives! March 1, 1794. The freedom of the press is so perfectly well regulated, that it is not surprizing we are indulged with the permission of seeing the public papers: yet this indulgence is often, I assure you, a source of much perplexity to me--our more intimate associates know that I am a native of England, and as often as any debates of our House of Commons are published, they apply to me for explanations which it is not always in my power to give them. I have in vain endeavoured to make them comprehend the nature of an opposition from system, so that when they see any thing advanced by a member exactly the reverse of truth, they are wondering how he can be so ill informed, and never suspect him of saying what he does not believe himself. It must be confessed, however, that our extracts from the English papers often form so complete a contrast with facts, that a foreigner unacquainted with the tactics of professional patriotism, may very naturally read them with some surprize. A noble Peer, for example, (whose wisdom is not to be disputed, since the Abbe Mably calls him the English Socrates,*) asserts that the French troops are the best clothed in Europe; yet letters, of nearly the same date with the Earl's speech, from two Generals and a Deputy at the head of different armies intreat a supply of covering for their denudated legions, and add, that they are obliged to march in wooden shoes!** * It is surely a reflection on the English discernment not to have adopted this happy appellation, in which, however, as well as in many other parts of "the rights of Man and the Citizen," the Abbe seems to have consulted his own zeal, rather than the noble Peer's modesty.