174 'The French in Prince Edward Island 
     
    
   
   
    
     find it impossible to maintain themselves, being today 
     
     at the last stage of poverty through the great mor- 
     
     tality among their live stock.” 
     
    

    
     The principal settlement in 1752, as always, was 
     
     Port Saint Pierre with the tributary settlement of 
     
     the Northeast River because of the fishing trade, but 
     
     as had been frequently pointed out these fishermen 
     
     were at the mercy of a ring of merchants in Louis- 
     
     burg who charged exorbitant prices for their sup- 
     
     plies and took the products of the sea at their own 
     
     valuation. The Sieur de La Roque suggests that “if 
     
     the settlers could supply the bread, meat, clothes, 
     
     and linen and the fishermen were obliged to procure 
     
     only their salt, lines and hooks from the aforesaid 
     
     merchants, they would be able to sell their fish at the 
     
     lowest price and reap a substantial profit.” 
     
    

    
     Viewed as a whole the census of Sieur de La Roque 
     
     is the most valuable document of the French period 
     
     in Isle Saint Jean. It reveals both the achievements 
     
     and the aspirations of the French in what might be 
     
     called the era of hope. The virtues and vices of pater- 
     
     nalism stare at one from every page. But his recom- 
     
     mendations like those of his predecessors were neg- 
     
     lected by the corrupt and decrepit Court, and the 
     
     next few years were crowded by events which the 
     
     harassed officials of the little colony were unable to 
     
     control and which finally drove them and their wards 
     
     to the ends of the earth.