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in number living on the St. John River. They are given up to licentiousness and independence for ten or twelve years they have been here. They are disobedient and seditious and require to be watched." In another paper it is stated of the d'Amours that "although they have vast grants in the finest parts of the country, they have hardly a place to lodge in. They carry on no tillage, keep no cattle, but live in trading with the Indians and debauch among them, making large profits thereby, but injuring the public good." A year later we find Villebon again writing to the minister in the same strain. "I have," says he, "no more reason to be satisfied with the Sieurs d'Amours than I previously had. The one that has come from France has not pleased me more than the other two. Their minds are wholly spoiled by long licentiousness, and the manners they have acquired among the Indians; and they must be watched closely, as I had the honor to state to you last year."

It would not be quite fair to judge of the character of the d' Amours brothers by these statements, although Governor Villebon doubtless made them in good faith. Acadia, at that time, was so full of jealousies and cabals that no man escaped censure, not even Villebon himself. The French government encouraged the forwarding of complaints to France, not only against private parties but against their own officials; and the French archives are full of letters written by all sorts and conditions of men against the governors, the judges, the priests and against each other. The d'Amours were engaged in trading with the Indians and this was enough to raise the ire of the governor, who deemed such conduct an infringement of the monopoly of the company which was supposed to control the trade of Acadia. But as this company did not provide a sufficient amount of goods and sold them at exorbitant