Malo, and brought into Quebec. You sold the whole cargo for eight
hundred thousand francs. The purchasers made a profit of two millions.
You bought back a part for the King at one million, or two hundred
thousand more than the price which you sold the whole. With conduct like
this it is no wonder that the expenses of the colony become
insupportable. The amount of your drafts on the treasury is frightful.
The fortunes of your subordinates throw suspicion on your
administration." And in another letter on the same day: "How could it
happen that the small-pox among the Indians cost the King a million
francs? What does this expense mean? Who is answerable for it? Is it the
officers who command the posts, or is it the storekeepers? You give me
no particulars. What has become of the immense quantity of provisions
sent to Canada last year? I am forced to conclude that the King's stores
are set down as consumed from the moment they arrive, and then sold to
His Majesty at exorbitant prices. Thus the King buys stores in France,
and then buys them again in Canada. I no longer wonder at the immense
fortunes made in the colony."[567] Some months later the Minister
writes: "You pay bills without examination, and then find an error in
your accounts of three million six hundred thousand francs. In the
letters from Canada I see nothing but incessant speculation in
provisions and goods, which are sold to the King for ten times more than
they cost in France.
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