" In the
vicinity of ?tampes, fifteen bandits enter the farmhouses at night
and put the farmer to ransom, threatening him with a conflagration.
In Cambr?sis they pillage the abbeys of Vauchelles, of Verger, and
of Guillemans, the ch?teau of the Marquis de Besselard, the estate
of M. Doisy, two farms, the wagons of wheat passing along the road
to Saint-Quentin, and, besides this, seven farms in Picardy. "The
seat of this revolt is in some villages bordering on Picardy and
Cambr?sis, familiar with smuggling operations and to the license of
that pursuit." The peasants allow themselves to be enticed away by
the bandits. Man slips rapidly down the incline of dishonesty; one
who is half-honest, and takes part in a riot inadvertently or in
spite of himself; repeats the act, allured on by impunity or by
gain. In fact, "it is not dire necessity which impels them;" they
make a speculation of cupidity, a new sort of illicit trade. An old
soldier, saber in hand, a forest-keeper, and "about eight persons
sufficiently lax, put themselves at the head of four or five hundred
men, go off each day to three or four villages.
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