I could show, I think, in very few words, why the _taille_ and its accessories pressed much more heavily on the country than on the towns; but the reader would probably think it superfluous. It will be sufficient to point out that the middle classes, gathered together in the towns, could find a thousand means of alleviating the weight of the _taille_, and often indeed of avoiding it altogether, which not one of them could have employed singly had he remained on the estate to which he belonged. Above all, he thereby escaped the obligation of collecting the _taille_, which he dreaded far more than that of paying it, and not without reason; for there never was under the old French Government, or, I believe, under any Government, a worse condition than that of the parochial collector of the _taille_. I shall have occasion to show this hereafter. Yet no one in a village except the nobles could escape this office; and rather than subject himself to it, the rich man of the middle class let his estates and withdrew to the neighbouring town. Turgot coincides with all the secret documents which I have had an opportunity of consulting, when he says, that ‘the collecting of the _taille_ converts all the non-noble landowners of the country into burgesses of the towns.’ Indeed this, to make a passing remark, was one of the chief causes why France was fuller of towns, and especially of small towns, than almost any other country in Europe. Once ensconced within the walls of a town, a wealthy though low-born member of the middle class soon lost the tastes and ideas of rural life; he became totally estranged from the labours and the affairs of those of his own class whom he had left behind. His whole life was now devoted to one single object: he aspired to become a public officer in his adopted town. It is a great mistake to suppose that the passion for place, which fills almost all Frenchmen of our time, more especially those belonging to the middle ranks, has arisen since the Revolution; its birth dates from several centuries back, and it has constantly increased in strength, thanks to the variety of fresh food with which it has been continually supplied.