Peace was of short duration in the reign of Louis XIV., and often so precarious that it did not permit of disarmament.  At the very period when the able minister was trying to make the people feel the importance of the diminution in the talliages, he wrote to the king, “I entreat your Majesty to read these few lines attentively.  I confess to your Majesty that the last time you were graciously pleased to speak to me about the state of the finances, my respect, the boundless desire I have always had to please you and serve you to your satisfaction, without making any difficulty or causing any hitch, and still more your natural eloquence which succeeds in bringing conviction of whatever you please, deprived me of courage to insist and dwell somewhat upon the condition of your finances, for the which I see no other remedy but increase of receipts and decrease of expenses; wherefore, though this is no concern at all of mine, I merely entreat your Majesty to permit me to say that in war as well as in peace you have never consulted your finances for the purpose of determining your expenditure, which is a thing so extraordinary that assuredly there is no example thereof.  For the past twenty years during which I have had the honor of serving your Majesty, though the receipts have greatly increased, you would find that the expenses have much exceeded the receipts, which might perhaps induce you to moderate and retrench such as are excessive.  I am aware, Sir, that the figure I present herein is not an agreeable one; but in your Majesty’s service there are different functions; some entail nothing but agreeables whereof the expenses are the foundation; that with which your Majesty honors me entails this misfortune, that it can with difficulty produce anything agreeable, since the proposals for expenses have no limit; but one must console one’s self by constantly laboring to do one’s best.”

Louis XIV. did not “moderate or retrench his expenses.”

Colbert labored to increase the receipts; the new imposts excited insurrections in Angoumois, in Guyenne, in Brittany.  Bordeaux rose in 1695 with shouts of “Hurrah! for the king without gabel.”  Marshal d’Albret ventured into the streets in the district of St. Michel; he was accosted by one of the ringleaders.  “Well, my friend,” said the marshal, “with whom is thy business?  Dost wish to speak to me?” “Yes,” replied the townsman, “I am deputed by the people of St. Michel to tell you that they are good servants of the king, but that they do not mean to have any gabel, or marks on pewter or tobacco, or stamped papers, or yreffe d’arbitrage (arbitration-clerk’s fee).”  It was not until a year afterwards that the taxes could be established in Gascony; troops had to be sent to Rennes to impose the stamp-tax upon the Bretons.  “Soldiers are more likely to be wanted in Lower Brittany than in any other spot,” said a letter to Colbert from the lieutenant general, M. de Lavardin; “it is a rough and wild country,