Spread of English-Speaking Peoples 51 



lowed year in and year out; while bear, elk, and 

 deer dwelt in the groves around the borders. 11 



There were perhaps some four thousand inhabi- 

 tants in these French villages, divided almost 

 equally between those in the Illinois and those along 

 the Wabash. 12 



11 Do. Harmar's letter. 



12 State Department MSS., No. 30, p. 453. Memorial of 

 Francois Carbonneaux, agent for the inhabitants of the Illi- 

 nois country. Dec. 8, 1784. "Four hundred families [in the 

 Illinois] exclusive of a like number at Post Vincent" [Vin- 

 cennes]. Americans had then just begun to come in, but 

 this enumeration did not refer to them. The population had 

 decreased during the Revolutionary War ; so that at its out- 

 break there were probably altogether a thousand families. 

 They were very prolific, and four to a family is probably 

 not too great an allowance, even when we consider that in 

 such a community on the frontier there are always plenty 

 of solitary adventurers. Moreover, there were a number of 

 negro slaves. Harmar's letter of Nov. 24, 1787, states the 

 adult males of Kaskaskia and Cahokia at four hundred and 

 forty, not counting those at St. Philip or Prairie du Rocher. 

 This tallies very well with the preceding. But of course the 

 number given can only be considered approximately accu- 

 rate, and a passage in a letter of Lt.-Gov. Hamilton would 

 indicate that it was considerably smaller. 



This letter is to be found in the Haldimand MSS., Series 

 B. Vol. 123, p. 53; it is the "brief account" of his ill-starred 

 expedition against Vincennes. He says: "On taking an ac- 

 count of the Inhabitants at this place [Vincennes], of all 

 ages and sexes, we found their number to amount to 621; 

 of this 217 fit to bear arms on the spot, several being absent 

 hunting Buff aloe for their winter provision." But elsewhere 

 in the same letter he alludes to the adult arms-bearing men 

 as being three hundred in number, and of course the outly- 

 ing farms and small tributary villages are not counted in. 

 This was in December, 1778. Possibly some families had 

 left for the Spanish possessions after the war broke out, 



