nglish followed the same custom. A large quantity of
land was reserved in the neighborhood of each village for the common
use, and a very small quantity for religious purposes. The common was
generally a large patch of enclosed prairie, part of it being
cultivated, and the remainder serving as a pasture for the cattle of the
inhabitants.[16] The portion of the common set aside for agriculture was
divided into strips of one arpent in front by forty in depth, and one or
more allotted to each inhabitant according to his skill and industry as
a cultivator.[17] The arpent, as used by the western French, was a
rather rough measure of surface, less in size than an acre.[18] The
farms held by private ownership likewise ran back in long strips from a
narrow front that usually lay along some stream.[19] Several of them
generally lay parallel to one another, each including something like a
hundred acres, but occasionally much exceeding this amount.

The French inhabitants were in very many cases not of pure blood. The
early settlements had been made by men only, by soldiers, traders, and
trappers, who took Indian wives. They were not trammelled by the queer
pride which makes a man of English stock unwilling to make a red-skinned
woman his wife, though anxious enough to make her his concubine. Their
children were baptized in the little parish churches by the black-robed
priests, and grew up holding the same position in the community as was
held by their fellows both of whose parents were white. But, in addition
to these free citizens, the richer inhabitants owned both red and black
slaves; negroes imported from Africa, or Indians overcome and taken in
battle.[20] There were many freedmen and freedwomen of both colors, and
in consequence much mixture of blood.

They were tillers of the soil, and some followed, in addition, the
trades of blacksmith and carpenter. Very many of them were trappers or
fur traders. Their money was composed of furs and peltries, rated at a
fixed price per pound;[21] none other was used unless expressly so
stated in the contract. Like the French of Europe, their unit of value
was the livre, nearly equivalent to the modern franc. They were not very
industrious, nor very thrifty husbandmen. Their farming implements were
rude, their methods of cultivation simple and primitive, and they
themselves were often lazy and improvident. Near their town they had
great orchards of gnarled apple-trees, planted by their f