"Worth two cents on the dollar. 'Dose British traders,' say the habitants, 'dey will not take five huntert to one. Dey will have nought but skins.' This has brought our Virginia paper into disrepute. They will not even take a coin unless it is stamped with the head of a king."
"What have you done?"
"Done? Purchased supplies on my own credit. Several merchants of this country have advanced considerable sums and I have given them drafts on our Virginian agent in New Orleans. They come back, protested for want of funds. Francis Vigo has already loaned me ten thousand dollars in silver piastres."
"But Virginia will pay it,—she is bound to pay it. The service must not suffer." Thus reassured that his course had been right, Colonel Clark continued:
"Four posts must be garrisoned to hold this country,—Kaskaskia, Cahokia, Vincennes, and the Falls of the Ohio,—not one has sufficient defence. Colonel Montgomery's force is not half what I expected. But if I am not deceived in the Kentuckians I shall yet be able to complete my designs on Detroit. I only want sufficient men to make me appear respectable in passing among the savages."
The cautious French settlers were a trial to Clark. Father Gibault tried to persuade them, parting with his own tithes and horses to set an example to his parishioners to make equal sacrifices to the American cause. Altogether, Father Gibault advanced seven thousand eight hundred livres, French money, equal to fifteen hundred and sixty dollars,—his little all.
Governor Todd said, "If the people will not spare willingly, you must press it."
"I cannot press it," answered Clark. "We must keep the inhabitants attached to us by every means in our power. Rather will I sign notes right and left on my own responsibility to procure absolute necessities to hold Illinois, trusting to Virginia to make it right."
Then after a thoughtful pause,—"I cannot think of the consequences of losing possession of the country without resolving to risk every point rather than suffer it."
The bad crops of 1779 and the severity of the winter of 1780 made distress in Illinois. Nevertheless the cheerful habitants sold their harvests to Clark and received in payment his paper on New Orleans.