The History of Louisiana Part 6

The great difficulties attending the going up the river under sail, particularly at the English Reach, for the reasons mentioned, put me upon devising a very simple and cheap machine, to make vessels go up with ease quite to New-Orleans. s.h.i.+ps are sometimes a month in the pa.s.sage from Balise to the capital; whereas by my method they would not be eight days, even with a contrary wind; and thus s.h.i.+ps would go four times quicker than by towing, or turning it. This machine might be deposited at Balise, and delivered to the vessel, in order to go up the current, and be returned again on its setting sail. It is besides proper to observe, that this machine would be no detriment {49} to the forts, as they would always have it in their power to stop the vessels of enemies, who might happen to use it.

New Orleans, the capital of the colony, is situated to the East, on the banks of the Missisippi, in 30 of North Lat.i.tude. At my first arrival in Louisiana, it existed only in name; for on my landing I understood M. de Biainville, commandant general, was only gone to mark out the spot; whence he returned three days after our arrival at Isle Dauphine.

He pitched upon this spot in preference to many others, more agreeable and commodious; but for that time this was a place proper enough: besides, it is not every man that can see so far as some others. As the princ.i.p.al settlement was then at Mobile, it was proper to have the capital fixed at a place from which there could be an easy communication with this post: and thus a better choice could not have been made, as the town being on the banks of the Missisippi, vessels, tho' of a thousand ton, may lay their sides close to the sh.o.r.e even at low water; or at most, need only lay a small bridge, with two of their yards, in order to load or unload, to roll barrels and bales, &c.

without fatiguing the s.h.i.+p's crew. This town is only a league from St.

John's creek, where pa.s.sengers take water for Mobile, in going to which they pa.s.s Lake St. Louis, and from thence all along the coast; a communication which was necessary at that time.

I should imagine, that if a town was at this day to be built in this province, a rising ground would be pitched upon, to avoid inundations; besides, the bottom should be sufficiently firm, for bearing grand stone edifices.

Such as have been a good way in the country, without seeing stone, or the least pebble, in upwards of a hundred leagues extent, will doubtless say, such a proposition is impossible, as they never observed stone proper for building in the parts they travelled over. I might answer, and tell them, they have eyes, and see not. I narrowly considered the nature of this country, and found quarries in it; and if there were any in the colony I ought to find them, as my condition and profession of architect should have procured me the knowledge of {51} them. After giving the situation of the capital, it is proper I describe the order in which it is built.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Plan of New Orleans, 1720_ (on p. 50)]

The place of arms is in the middle of that part of the town which faces the river; in the middle of the ground of the place of arms stands the parish church, called St. Louis, where the Capuchins officiate, whose house is to the left of the church. To the right stand the prison, or jail, and the guard-house: both sides of the place of arms are taken up by two bodies or rows of barracks. This place stands all open to the river.

All the streets are laid out both in length and breadth by the line, and intersect and cross each other at right angles. The streets divide the town into sixty-six isles; eleven along the river lengthwise, or in front, and six in depth: each of those isles is fifty square toises, and each again divided into twelve emplacements, or compartments, for lodging as many families. The Intendant's house stands behind the barracks on the left; and the magazine, or warehouse-general behind the barracks on the right, on viewing the town from the river side. The Governor's house stands in the middle of that part of the town, from which we go from the place of arms to the habitation of the Jesuits, which is near the town. The house of the Ursulin Nuns is quite at the end of the town, to the right; as is also the hospital of the sick, of which the nuns have the inspection. What I have just described faces the river.

On the banks of the river runs a causey, or mole, as well on the side of the town as on the opposite side, from the English Reach quite to the town, and about ten leagues beyond it; which makes about fifteen or sixteen leagues on each side the river; and which may be travelled in a coach or on horseback, on a bottom as smooth as a table.

The greatest part of the houses is of brick; the rest are of timber and brick.

The length of the causeys, I just mentioned, is sufficient to shew, that on these two sides of the Missisippi there are many habitations standing close together; each making a causey to secure his ground from inundations, which fail not to come every year with the spring: and at that time, if any s.h.i.+ps {52} happen to be in the harbour of New Orleans, they speedily set sail; because the prodigious quant.i.ty of dead wood, or trees torn up by the roots, which the river brings down, would lodge before the s.h.i.+p, and break the stoutest cables.

At the end of St. John's Creek, on the banks of the Lake St. Louis, there is a redoubt, and a guard to defend it.

From this creek to the town, a part of its banks is inhabited by planters; in like manner as are the long banks of another creek: the habitations of this last go under the name of Gentilly.

After these habitations, which are upon the Missisippi quite beyond the Cannes Brulees, Burnt Canes, we meet none till we come to the Oumas, a petty nation so called. This settlement is inconsiderable, tho' one of the oldest next to the capital. It lies on the east of the Missisippi.

The Baton Rogue is also on the east side of the Missisippi, and distant twenty-six leagues from New Orleans: it was formerly the grant of M. Artaguette d'Iron: it is there we see the famouse cypress-tree of which a s.h.i.+p-carpenter offered to make two pettyaugres, one of sixteen, the other of fourteen tons. Some one of the first adventurers, who landed in this quarter, happened to say, that tree would make a fine walking-stick, and as cypress is a red wood, it was afterwards called le Baton Rouge. Its height could never be measured, it rises so out of sight.

Two leagues higher up than le Baton Rouge, was the Grant of M. Paris du Vernai. This settlement is called Bayou-Ogoulas, from a nation of that name, which formerly dwelt here. It is on the west side of the Missisippi, and twenty-eight leagues from New Orleans.

At a league on this side of Pointe Coupee, are les Pet.i.ts Ecores, (little Cliffs) where was the grant of the Marquis de Mezieres. At this grant were a director and under-director; but the surgeon found out the secret of remaining sole master. The place is very beautiful, especially behind les Pet.i.ts Ecores, where we go up by a gentle ascent. Near these cliffs, a rivulet falls into the Missisippi, into which a spring discharges its waters, which so attract the buffalos, that they are very often {53} found on its banks. 'Tis a pity this ground was deserted; there was enough of it to make a very considerable grant: a good water-mill might be guilt on the brook I just mentioned.

At forty leagues from New Orleans lies a la Pointe Coupee, so called, because the Missisippi made there an elbow or winding, and formed the figure of a circle, open only about an hundred and odd toises, thro'

which it made itself a shorter way, and where all its water runs at present. This was not the work of nature alone: two travellers, coming down the Missisippi, were forced to stop short at this place, because they observed at a distance the surff, or waves, to be very high, the wind beating against the current, and the river being out, so that they durst not venture to proceed. Just by them pa.s.sed a rivulet, caused by the inundation, which might be a foot deep, by four or five feet broad, more or less. One of the travellers, seeing himself without any thing to do, took his fusil and followed the course of this rivulet, in hopes of killing some game. He had not gone an hundred toises, before he was put into a very great surprize, on perceiving a great opening, as when one is just getting out of a thick forest. He continues to advance, sees a large extent of water, which he takes for a lake; but turning on his left, he espies les Pet.i.ts Ecores, just mentioned, and by experience he knew, he must go ten leagues to get thither: Upon this he knew, these were the waters of the river. He runs to acquaint his companion: this last wants to be sure of it: certain as they are both of it, they resolve, that it was necessary to cut away the roots, which stood in the pa.s.sage, and to level the more elevated places. They attempted at length to pa.s.s their pettyaugre through, by pus.h.i.+ng it before them. They succeeded beyond their expectation; the water which came on, aided them as much by its weight as by its depth, which was increased by the obstacle it met in its way: and they saw themselves in a short time in the Missisippi, ten leagues lower down than they were an hour before; or than they would have been, if they had followed the bed of the river, as they were formerly constrained to do.

This little labour of our travellers moved the earth; the roots being cut away in part, proved no longer an obstacle to {54} the course of the water; the slope or descent in this small pa.s.sage was equal to that in the river for the ten leagues of the compa.s.s it took; in fine, nature, though feebly aided, performed the rest. The first time I went up the river, its entire body of water pa.s.sed through this part; and though the channel was only made six years before, the old bed was almost filled with the ooze, which the river had there deposited; and I have seen trees growing there of an astonis.h.i.+ng size, that one might wonder how they should come to be so large in so short a time.

In this spot, which is called la Pointe Coupee, the Cut-point, was the Grant of M. de Meuse, at present one of the most considerable posts of the colony, with a fort, a garrison, and an officer to command there.

The river is on each side lined with inhabitants, who make a great deal of tobacco. There an Inspector resides, who examines and receives it, in order to prevent the merchants being defrauded. The inhabitants of the west side have high lands behind them, which form a very fine country, as I have observed above.

Twenty leagues above this Cut-point, and sixty leagues from New Orleans, we meet with the Red River. In an island formed by that river, stands a French post, with a fort, a garrison, its commandant and officers. The first inhabitants who settled there, were some soldiers of that post, discharged after their time of serving was expired, who set themselves to make tobacco in the island. But the fine sand, carried by the wind upon the leaves of the tobacco, made it of a bad quality, which obliged them to abandon the island and settle on the continent, where they found a good soil, on which they made better tobacco. This post is called the Nachitoches, from a nation of that name, settled in the neighbourhood. At this post M. de St. Denis commanded.

Several inhabitants of Louisiana, allured thither by the hopes of making soon great fortunes, because distant only seven leagues from the Spaniards, imagined the abundant treasures of New Mexico would pour in upon them. But in this they happened to be mistaken; for the Spanish post, called the Adaes less money in it than the poorest village in Europe: the Spaniards being ill clad, ill fed, and always ready to buy {55} goods of the French on credit: which may be said in general of all the Spaniards of New Mexico, amidst all their mines of gold and silver.

This we are well informed of by our merchants, who have dealt with the Spaniards of this post, and found their habitations and way of living to be very mean, and more so than those of the French.

From the confluence of this Red River, in going up the Missisippi, as we have hitherto done, we find, about thirty leagues higher up, the post of the Natchez.

Let not the reader be displeased at my saying often, _nearly_, or _about so many leagues_: we can ascertain nothing justly as to the distances in a country where we travel only by water. Those who go up the Missisippi, having more trouble, and taking more time than those who go down, reckon the route more or less long, according to the time in which they make their voyage; besides, when the water is high, it covers pa.s.ses, which often shorten the way a great deal.

The Natchez are situate in about 32 odd minutes of north lat.i.tude, and 280 of longitude. The fort at this post stands two hundred feet perpendicular above low-water mark. From this fort the point of view extends west of the Missisippi quite to the horizon, that is, on the side opposite to that where the fort stands, though the west side be covered with woods, because the foot of the fort stands much higher than the trees. On the same side with the fort, the country holds at a pretty equal height, and declines only by a gentle and almost imperceptible slope, insensibly losing itself from one eminence to another.

The nation which gave name to this post, inhabited this very place at a league from the landing-place on the Missisippi, and dwelt on the banks of a rivulet, which has only a course of four or five leagues to that river. All travellers who pa.s.sed and stopped here, went to pay a visit to the natives, the Natchez. The distance of the league they went to them is through so fine and good a country, the natives themselves were so obliging and familiar, and the women so amiable, that all travellers failed not to make the greatest encomiums both on the country, and on the native inhabitants.

{56} The just commendations bestowed upon them drew thither inhabitants in such numbers, as to determine the Company to give orders for building a fort there, as well to support the French already settled, and those who should afterwards come thither, as to be a check on that nation. The garrison consisted only of between thirty and forty men, a Captain, a Lieutenant, Under Lieutenant, and two Serjeants.

The Company had there a warehouse for the supply of the inhabitants, who were daily increasing in spite of all the efforts of one of the princ.i.p.al Superiors, who put all imaginable obstacles in the way: and notwithstanding the progress this settlement made, and the encomiums bestowed upon it, and which it deserved, G.o.d in his providence gave it up to the rage of its enemies, in order to take vengeance of the sins committed there; for without mentioning those who escaped the general ma.s.sacre, there perished of them upwards of five hundred.

Forty leagues higher up than the Natchez, is the river Yasou. The Grant of M. le Blanc, Minister, or Secretary at War, was settled there, four leagues from the Missisippi, as you go up this little river. [Footnote: The village of the Indians (Yasous) is a league from this settlement; and on one side of it there is a hill, on which they pretend that the English formerly had a fort; accordingly there are still some traces of it to be seen. _Dumont_, II. 296.] There a fort stands, with a company of men, commanded by a Captain, a Lieutenant, Under-Lieutenant, and two Serjeants. This company, together with the servants, were in the pay of this Minister.

This post was very advantageously situated, as well for the goodness of the air as the quality of the soil, like to that of the Natchez, as for the landing-place, which was very commodious, and for the commerce with the natives, if our people but knew how to gain and preserve their friends.h.i.+p. But the neighbourhood of the Chicasaws, ever fast friends of the English, and ever instigated by them to give us uneasiness, almost cut off any hopes of succeeding. This post was on these accounts threatened with utter ruin, sooner or later; as actually happened in 1722, by means of those wretched Chicasaws; {57} who came in the night and murdered the people in the settlements that were made by two serjeants out of the fort. But a boy who was scalped by them was cured, and escaped with life.

Sixty miles higher up than the Yasouz, and at the distance of two hundred leagues from New Orleans, dwell the Arkansas, to the west of the Missisippi. At the entrance of the river which goes by the name of that nation, there is a small fort, which defends that post, which is the second of the colony in point of time.

It is a great pity so good and fine a country is distant from the sea upwards of two hundred leagues. I cannot omit mentioning, that wheat thrives extremely well here, without our being obliged ever to manure the land; and I am so prepossessed in its favour, that I persuade myself the beauty of the climate has a great influence on the character of the inhabitants, who are at the same time very gentle and very brave. They have ever had an inviolable friends.h.i.+p for the French, uninfluenced thereto either by fear or views of interest; and live with the French near them as brethren rather than as neighbours.

In going from the Arkansas to the Illinois, we meet with the river St.

Francis, thirty leagues more to the north, and on the west side of the Missisippi. There a small fort has been built since my return to France. To the East of the Missisippi, but more to the north, we also meet, at about thirty leagues, the river Margot, near the steep banks of Prud'homme: there a fort was also built, called a.s.sumption, for undertaking an expedition against the Chicasaws, who are nearly in the same lat.i.tude. These two forts, after that expedition, were entirely demolished by the French, because they were thought to be no longer necessary. It is, however, probable enough, that this fort a.s.sumption would have been a check upon the Chicasaws, who are always roving in those parts. Besides, the steep banks of Prud'homme contain iron and pit-coal. On the other hand, the country is very beautiful, and of an excellent quality, abounding with plains and meadows, which favour the excursions of the Chicasaws, and which they will ever continue to make upon us, till we have the address to divert them from their commerce with the English.

{58} We have no other French settlements to mention in Louisiana, but that of the Illinois; in which part of the colony we had the first fort. At present the French settlement here is on the banks of the Missisippi, near one of the villages of the Illinois. [Footnote: They have, or had formerly, other settlements hereabouts, at Kaskaskies, fort Chartres, Tamaroas, and on the river Marameg, on the west side of the Missisippi, where they found those mines that gave rise to the Missisippi scheme in 1719. In 1742, when John Howard, Sallee and others, were sent from Virginia to view those countries, they were made prisoners by the French; who came from a settlement they had on an island in the Missisippi, a little above the Ohio, where they made salt, lead, &c. and went from thence to New Orleans, in a fleet of boats and canoes, guarded by a large armed schooner. _Report of the Government of Virginia_.] That post is commanded by one of the princ.i.p.al officers; and M. de Bois-Briant, who was lieutenant of the king, has commanded at it.

Many French inhabitants both from Canada and Europe live there at this day; but the Canadians make three-fourths at least. The Jesuits have the Cure there, with a fine habitation and a mill; in digging the foundation of which last, a quarry of orbicular flat stones was found, about two inches in diameter, of the shape of a buffoon's cap, with six sides, whose groove was set with small b.u.t.tons of the size of the head of a minikin or small pin. Some of these stones were bigger, some smaller; between the stones which could not be joined, there was no earth found.

The Canadians, who are numerous in Louisiana, are most of them at the Illinois. This climate, doubtless, agrees better with them, because nearer Canada than any other settlement of the colony. Besides, in coming from Canada, they always pa.s.s through this settlement; which makes them choose to continue here. They bring their wives with them, or marry the French or India women. The ladies even venture to make this long and painful voyage from Canada, in order to end their days in a country which the Canadians look upon as a terrestrial paradise [Footnote: It is this that has made the French undergo so many long and perilous voyages in North-America, upwards of two thousand miles, against currents, cataracts, and boisterous winds on the lakes, in order to get to this settlement of the Illinois, which is nigh to the Forks of the Missisippi, the most important place in all the inland parts of North-America, to which the French will sooner or later remove from Canada; and there erect another Montreal, that will be much more dangerous and prejudicial to us, than ever the other in Canada was.

They will here be in the midst of all their old friends and allies, and much more convenient to carry on a trade with them, to spirit them up against the English, &c. than ever they were at Montreal. To this settlement, where they likewise are not without good hopes of finding mines, the French will for ever be removing, as long as any of them are left in Canada.]

{59}

CHAPTER X.

_The Voyages of the_ French _to the_ Missouris, Canzas, _and_ Padoucas.

_The Settlements they in vain attempted to make in those Countries; with a Description of an extraordinary Phaenomenon._

The Padoucas, who lie west by northwest of the Missouris, happened at that time to be at war with the neighbouring nations, the Canzas, Othouez, Aiaouez, Osages, Missouris, and Panimahas, all in amity with the French. To conciliate a peace between all these nations and the Padoucas, M. de Bourgmont sent to engage them, as being our allies, to accompany him on a journey to the Padoucas, in order to bring about a general pacification, and by that means to facilitate the traffick or truck between them and us, and conclude an alliance with the Padoucas.

For this purpose M. de Bourgmont set out on the 3d of July, 1724, from Fort Orleans, which lies near the Missouris, a nation dwelling on the banks of the river of that name, in order to join that people, and then to proceed to the Canzas, where the general rendezvous of the several nations was appointed.

M. de Bourgmont was accompanied by an hundred Missouris, commanded by their Grand Chief, and eight other Chiefs of war, and by sixty-four Osages, commanded by four Chiefs of war, besides a few Frenchmen. On the sixth he joined the Grand Chief, six other Chiefs of war, and several Warriors of the Canzas, who presented him the Pipe of Peace, {60} and performed the honours customary on such occasions, to the Missouris and Osages.

On the 7th they pa.s.sed through extensive meadows and woods, and arrived on the banks of the river Missouri, over against the village of the Canzas.

On the 8th the French crossed the Missouri in a pettyaugre, the Indians on floats of cane, and the horses were swam over. They landed within a gun-shot of the Canzas, who flocked to receive them with the Pipe; their Grand Chief, in the name of the nation, a.s.suring M. de Bourgmont that all their warriors would accompany him in his journey to the Padoucas, with protestations of friends.h.i.+p and fidelity, confirmed by smoking the Pipe. The same a.s.surances were made him by the other Chiefs, who entertained him in their huts, and [Footnote: It is thus they express their joy and caresses, at the sight of a person they respect.] rubbed him over and his companions.