<P> Two new groups gained importance during the Directory . The number of government officials of all levels increased dramatically . The writer Louis - Sébastien Mercier in his Paris pendant la Révolution (1789--1798), ou Le nouveau Paris, published in 1800, wrote: "There is no one who has not complained of the insolence, or the ignorance, of the multitude of government officials employed in the bureaus to sharpen their pens and to obstruct the course of affairs . New has the bureaucracy been carried to a point so so exaggerated, so costly, to exhausting ." </P> <P> Generals and other military officers also grew greatly in importance during the Directory and became a caste independent of the political structure . The Directory had abolished the Jacobin system of political commissioners who supervised and could overrule the military commanders . Generals like Bonaparte in Italy, Hoche in Germany and Pichegru in Alsace directed entire provinces according to their own ideas and wishes, with little interference from Paris . The soldiers of these generals were often more loyal to their generals than to the Directory, as the soldiers of Bonaparte showed during the 1799 coup d'état that ended the Directory . </P> <P> The working class and poor in Paris and other large cities suffered particularly from the high inflation during the first part of the Directory, which brought higher prices for bread, meat, wine, firewood and other basic commodities . In the last two years of the Directory, the problem was the opposite: with the suppression of the assignats, the money became scarce, the economy slowed, and unemployment grew . The Directory distributed scarce food items, such as cooking oil, butter and eggs, to government employees and to members of the Councils . Before the Revolution, taking care of the poor had been the responsibility of the Church . During the Directory, the government, particularly in Paris and other large cities, was forced to take over this role . To feed the Parisians and prevent food riots, the government bought flour in the countryside at market prices with its silver coins, then gave it to the bakeries, which sold it at the traditional market price of four sous a pound, which was virtually nothing . The subsidies were reduced in the last years of the Directory, paying only for bread, but they were an enormous expense for the Directory . At the beginning, the government tried to provide the standard minimum of one pound of bread a day per person, but the shortage of money reduced the daily ration to sixty grams of bread a day . The government also tried giving rice as a substitute for bread, but the poor lacked firewood to cook it . </P> <P> Economic problems led to a large increase in crime under The Directory, particularly in the countryside . Bands of the unemployed became beggars and turned to robbery, and brigands robbed travelers along the highways . Some of the brigands were former royalists turned highwaymen . They were later celebrated in the novel of Alexander Dumas, Les Compagnons de Jéhu ("The Companions of Jehu"). The government did not have the money to hire more police, and the great majority of the army was occupied fighting in Italy, Switzerland and Egypt . The growing insecurity on the roads seriously harmed commerce in France . The problem of brigands and highwaymen was not seriously addressed until after a serious wave of crimes on the roads in the winter of 1797--98 . The Councils passed a law calling for the death penalty for any robbery committed on the main highways or against a public vehicle, such as a coach, even if nothing was taken . If the crime was committed by more than one person, the robbers were tried by a military tribunal rather than a civilian court . The wave of highway robberies was finally stopped by Bonaparte and the Consulate, which employed special tribunals even swifter and more severe than the Directory tribunals . </P>

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