Extraordinary devices for raising money are legitimate subjects for our pages. Of these devices, the French Assignats are not the least remarkable. They originated thus--in the year 1789, at the commencement of the great Revolution in France, Talleyrand proposed in the National Assembly a confiscation of all church property to the service of the state. The Abbe Maury opposed this project with great vehemence, but being supported by Mirabeau, it received the sanction of the Assembly by an immense majority on the 2nd of November. The salaries fixed for the priesthood were small, and, moreover, were not sufficiently guaranteed; whence originated much misery to all classes of priests, from the archbishops down to the humble cures; and as monastic institutions were treated in the same way, monks and nuns were suddenly placed in precarious circumstances regarding the means of subsistence. Here, however, an unexpected difficulty sprang up; the National Assembly were willing to sell church property, but buyers were wanting; conscience, prudence, and poverty combined to lessen the number of those willing to purchase; and thus the urgent claims of the treasury could not be satisfied. Applications for loans were not responded to; taxes had been extinguished; voluntary donations had dwindled almost to nothing; and 400,000,000 of livres were necessary for the vast claims of the year 1790. The municipalities of Paris and other cities sought to ameliorate the state of affairs by subscribing for a certain amount of church property, endeavouring to find private purchasers for it, and paying the receipts into the national exchequer. This, however, being but a very partial cure for the enormity of the evils, the National Assembly fell upon the expedient of creating state-paper or bank-notes, to have a forced currency throughout the kingdom. Such was the birth of the memorable assignats. Four hundred millions of this paper were put in circulation; and a decree was passed that church property to that amount should be held answerable for the assignats. Our sketch represents several of the different forms in which the Assignats were issued to the public. [Illustration [++] French Assignats.] EXECUTION OF LOUIS XVI. The judicial murder of Louis XVI. was the climax of the Revolution in France. The Convention voted his death at three o'clock on the morning of the 20th January, 1793, and he was taken to execution in twenty-six hours afterwards. [Illustration [++] Execution of Louis XVI.]