Note 49 — I ROCHAMBEAU AND THE FRENCH IN AMERICA FROM UNPUBLISHED DOCUMENTS (continued 2)

As early as 1796, when La Rochefoucauld-Liancourt visited it, the city, formerly a prosperous one, had become a borough of 800 inhabitants, two-thirds of which were colored. "The inhabitants," says the traveller, "are without occupation. Some retail spirits or cloth; some are called lawyers, some justices of the peace. Most of them have, at a short distance from the town, a small farm, which they go and visit every morning, but that scarcely fills the mind or time; and the inhabitants of York, who live on very good terms with each other, occupy both better in dining together, drinking punch, playing billiards; to introduce more variety in this monotonous kind of life, they often change the place where they meet.... The name of Marshal de Rochambeau is still held there in great veneration." Voyage dans les Etats-Unis, Paris, "An VII," vol. VI, p. 283.