matter much with them, one way or another. They felt secure in
their lonely situation, and so went on selling their trinkets,
weapons, domestic implements, blankets and intoxicating liquors to
the Indians, whom they held bound to them with a power never
possessed by any other white dwellers in the wilderness. Father
Beret was probably subordinate to Father Gibault. At all events
the latter appears to have had nominal charge of Vincennes, and it
can scarcely be doubted that he left Father Beret on the Wabash,
while he went to live and labor for a time at Kaskaskia beyond the
plains of Illinois.

It is a curious fact that religion and the power of rum and brandy
worked together successfully for a long time in giving the French
posts almost absolute influence over the wild and savage men by
whom they were always surrounded. The good priests deprecated the
traffic in liquors and tried hard to control it, but soldiers of
fortune and reckless traders were in the majority, their interests
taking precedence of all spiritual demands and carrying everything
along. What could the brave missionaries do but make the very best
of a perilous situation?

In those days wine was drunk by almost everybody, its use at table
and as an article of incidental refreshment and social pleasure
being practically universal; wherefore the steps of reform in the
matter of intemperance were but rudimentary and in all places
beset by well-nigh insurmountable difficulties. In fact the
exigencies of frontier life demanded, perhaps, the very stimulus
which, when over indulged in, caused so much evil. Malaria loaded
the air, and the most efficacious drugs now at command were then
undiscovered or could not be had. Intoxicants were the only