repulsion, alike for the haughty British officer in his scarlet uniform,
and for the reckless backwoodsman clad in tattered homespun or buckskin.
They remained the owners of the villages, the tillers of the soil. At
first few English or American immigrants, save an occasional fur trader,
came to live among them. But their doom was assured; their rule was at
an end forever. For a while they were still to compose the bulk of the
scanty population; but nowhere were they again to sway their own
destinies. In after years they fought for and against both whites and
Indians; they faced each other, ranged beneath the rival banners of
Spain, England, and the insurgent colonists; but they never again fought
for their old flag or for their own sovereignty.

From the overthrow of Pontiac to the outbreak of the Revolution the
settlers in the Illinois and round Vincennes lived in peace under their
old laws and customs, which were continued by the British
commandants.[14] They had been originally governed, in the same way that
Canada was, by the laws of France, adapted, however, to the
circumstances of the new country. Moreover, they had local customs which
were as binding as the laws. After the conquest the British commandants
who came in acted as civil judges also. All public transactions were
recorded in French by notaries public. Orders issued in English were
translated into French so that they might be understood. Criminal cases
were referred to England. Before the conquest the procureur du roi gave
sentence by his own personal decision in civil cases; if the matters
were important it was the custom for each party to name two arbitrators,
and the procureur du roi a fifth; while an appeal might be made to the
council superieur at New Orleans. The British commandant assumed the
place of the procureur du roi, although there were one or two
half-hearted efforts made to introduce the Common Law.