7532. REVOLUTION (French), National debt.—
Calonné stated to * * * [the Assembly of Notables] that the annual
excess of expenses beyond the revenue, when
Louis XVI. came to the throne, was thirtyseven
millions of livres; that four hundred and
forty millions had been borrowed to reestablish
the navy; that the American war had cost
them fourteen hundred and forty millions (two
hundred and fifty-six millions of dollars), and
that the interest of these sums, with other increased
expenses had added forty millions more
to the annual deficit. (But a subsequent and
more candid estimate made it fifty-six millions .)—
Autobiography. Washington ed. i, 70.
Ford ed., i, 97.
(1821)
