USA > Louisiana > Romance of the history of Louisiana. A series of lectures > Part 8
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14
144
CHARACTER OF LA SALLE.
Authors, who have written on the structure of man, have said that if his features were closely examined, there would be found in them a strange resemblance with some of the animals, of the birds, or of the rep- tiles that people this globe. I remember having seen curious engravings exemplifying this assertion with the most wonderful effect. In a moral sense, the resem- blance is perhaps greater, and the whale, the lion, the eagle, the wolf, the lamb, and other varieties of the brutish creation, may, without much examination, be discovered to exist, physically and spiritually, in the hu- man species. Among the bipeds that are reckoned to belong to the ranks of humanity, none was better calcu- lated than La Salle to personate the toad. His mission was to secrete venom, as the rose exhales perfumes. Na- ture delights in contrarieties. Fat, short, and sleek, with bloated features and oily skin, he was no unfit repre- sentative of that reptile, although certainly to him the traditionary legend of a jewel in the head could not be applied. Puffed up in self-conceit, an eternal smile of contentment was stereotyped on the gross texture of his lips, where it was mixed with an expression of bestial sensuality. His cold grayish eyes had the dull squint of the hog, and as he strutted along, one was almost amazed not to hear an occasional grunt. This thing of the neuter gender, which, to gift with the fac- ulty of speech, seemed to be an injustice done to the
145
CHARACTER OF LA SALLE.
superior intellect of the baboon, did, forsooth, think itself an orator. Whenever this royal commissary had a chance of catching a few of the colonists together, for instance, on all public occasions, he would gradually drop the tone of conversation, and sublimate his colloquial address into a final harangue. Thus, the valves of his brazen throat being open, out ran the muddy water of his brain, bespattering all that stood within reach. Pitched on a high and monotonous key, his prosy voice carried to his hearers, for hours, the same inane, insipid flow of bombastic phrases, falling on the ear with the unvaried and ever-recurring sound of a pack-horse wheel in a flour-mill. A coiner of words, he could have filled with them the vaults of the vastest mint; but if analyzed and reduced to their sterling value, they would not have produced a grain of sense. This man, contemptible as he was, had ac- tually become a public nuisance, on account of the impediments with which he embarrassed the adminis- tration of Louisiana. He was eternally meddling with every thing, under the pretext of correcting abuses, and although he was incapable of producing any thing of his own, that could stand on its legs for a minute, he was incessantly concocting some plan, as ill-begotten as his own misshapen person. He was, in his own delirious opinion, as complete a financier, as skilful a statesman, as great a general, and, above all,
·
-
146
CHARACTER OF LA SALLE.
as profound a legislator, as ever lived; so that this legislative Caliban had even gone so far as to imagine he could frame a code of laws for the colony ; and, because all his preposterous propositions were resisted by Bienville, he had conceived for him the bitterest hatred. To do him justice, it must be said that he was in earnest, when he reproached others with mal- versation and every sort of malfeasances. There are creatures whose accusations it would be wrong to resent. They see themselves reflected in others, and, like yelping curs, pursue with their barkings the sinful image : it would be as idle to expect them to under- stand the workings of a noble heart and of a great mind, as it would be to imagine that a worm could raise itself to the conception of a planet's gravita- tions.
So thought Bienville, and he passed with silent contempt over La Salle's manœuvres. Was he not right ? He who thinks himself your adversary, but who, if you were to turn upon him with the flashes of honest indignation, with the uplifted spear of physical and mental power united, with the threatening aspect of what he does not possess and dreams not of, a soul, convulsed into a storm, would shrink into an atom and flatten himself to the level of your heels, cannot be a real adversary : his enmity is to be regarded as a vain shadow, the phantasm of impotent envy. This is no
147
DISMISSAL OF BIENVILLE FROM OFFICE.
doubt the most dignified course to be pursued, but per- haps not the most prudent ; and Bienville soon dis- covered that, howsoever it may be in theory, there is, in practice, no attack so pitiful as not to require some sort of precautionary defence. Thus on the 13th of July, 1707, the minister dismissed Bienville from office, appointed De Muys in his place, and instructed this new governor to examine into the administration of his predecessor, and into the accusations brought against him, with the authorization of sending him prisoner to France, if they were well founded. A poor chance it was for Bienville, to be judged by the man that pushed him from his stool, and whose con- tinuance in office would probably depend upon the guilt of the accused ! This was but a sorry return for the services of Bienville and for those of his distin- guished family. But thus goes the world !
La Salle had no cause to triumph over the downfall of Bienville, for he himself was, at the same time, dismissed from office, and was succeeded by Diron d'Artaguelle. Nay, he had the mortification of seeing Bienville retain his power, while he lost his; because De Muys never reached Louisiana, having died in Havana, on his way to the colony of which he had been appointed governor. To increase his vexation, he saw that most of the colonists, even those who had been momentarily opposed to Bienville, became sud-
148
CONDITION OF THE COLONY.
denly alive to his merits, when they were on the eve of losing him, and with spontaneous unanimity, sub- scribed a petition, by which they expressed their satis- faction with Bienville's administration, and supplicated the minister not to deprive them of such a wise and faithful governor. This was sufficiently distressing for La Salle's envious heart ; but his spleen was worked into a paroxysm of rage, when he was informed that his successor, the royal commissary, Diron d'Artaguelle, had made a report to the king, in which he declared, that all the accusations brought against Bienville, were mere slanderous inventions, which rested on no other foundation than the blackest malice. Writhing like a snake, under the unexpected blow, he still attempted to sting, and he wrote to France, " that D'Artaguelle was not deserving of any faith or credit ; that he had come to an understanding with Bienville, and that they were both equally bad and corrupt."
It was by such misunderstandings among the chiefs of the colony, that its progress was checked so long. In 1708, its population did not exceed 279 persons. To that number must be added sixty Canadian vaga- bonds, who led a wandering and licentious life among the Indians. Its principal wealth consisted in 50 cows, 40 calves, 4 bulls, 8 oxen, 1400 hogs, and 2000 hens. This statement shows the feebleness of the colony after an existence of nine years. But the
149
CONDITION OF THE COLONY.
golden eggs had been laid in the land, and although kept torpid and unprofitable for more than a century, by the chilling contact of an imbecile despotism, they, in the progress of time, were hatched by the warm incubation of liberty into the production of that splen- did order of things, which is the wonder of the pre- sent age.
But, at that time, the colony seemed to be gifted with little vitality, and the nursling of Bienville threatened to expire in his hands at every moment. The colonists were little disposed to undertake the laborious task of securing their subsistence by the cul- tivation of the soil, and they expected that the mother country would minister to all their wants. Servile hands would have been necessary, but Indian slavery was not found to be profitable, and Bienville wrote to his government to obtain the authorization of exchang- ing Indians for negroes, with the French West India Islands. " We shall give," said he, " three Indians for two negroes. The Indians, when in the islands, will not be able to run away, the country being unknown to them, and the negroes will not dare to become fugitives in Louisiana, because the Indians would kill them." This demand met with no favorable recep- tion. Bienville was so anxious to favor the develop- ment of the colony, that he was led by it into an un- just and despotic measure, as is proved by the follow-
-
1
-
150
CONDITION OF THE COLONY.
ing extract from one of his despatches. "I have ordered several citizens of La Rochelle to be closely watched, beause they wish to quit the country. They have scraped up something by keeping taverns. There- fore it appears to me to be nothing but justice to force them to remain in the country, on the substance of which they have fattened." This sentiment, how- soever it may disagree with our modern notions of right and wrong, was not repugnant to the ethics of the time.
In spite of the spirited exertions of Bienville, famine re-appeared in the colony, and in January, 1709, the inhabitants were reduced to live on acorns. As usual, under such circumstances, the intestine dissensions, of which such a melancholy description has been already given, became more acrid. The minds of men are not apt to grow conciliating under the double infliction of disappointment and famine, and the attacks upon Bien- ville were renewed with more than usual fierceness. La Salle, although now stripped of the trappings of office, still remained in the colony, to pursue his game, and to force the noble lord of the forest to stand at bay. His as- sociate in persecution, the Curate de la Vente, hallooed with him in zealous imitation, and it is much to be re- gretted that they were joined in the chase by Marigny de Mandeville, a brave and noble-minded officer, lately come to the country, who informed his government
151
CONDITION OF THE COLONY.
" that the colony never would prosper until it had a governor with an honest heart and with an energetic mind;" which meant that Bienville was deficient in both. It was an error committed by Marigny de Man- deville, and into which he was no doubt led by the misrepresentations of La Salle and of the Curate de la Vente.
Bienville had so far remained passive, but was at last stung into angry recriminations, which he retorted on all his adversaries, particularly on the Curate de la Vente, who, said he, " had tried to stir up every body against him by his calumnies, and who, in the mean time, did not blush to keep an open shop, where his mode of trafficking showed that he was a shrewd compound of the Arab and of the Jew."
The scarcity of provisions became such in 1710, that Bienville informed his government that he had scattered the greater part of his men among the Indians, upon whom he had quartered them for food. This measure had been more than once adopted before, and demonstrates that the Indians could hardly have been so hostile as they have been represented ; otherwise, they would have availed themselves of such opportuni- ties to destroy the invaders of their territory. Be it as it may, the colony continued in its lingering condition, gasping for breath in its cradle, until 1712, when, on the 14th of September, the King of France granted to
ung lại
152
ROYAL CHARTER TO ANTHONY CROZAT.
Anthony Crozat the exclusive privilege, for fifteen years, of trading in all that immense territory which, with its undefined limits, France claimed as her own under the name of Louisiana. Among other privileges, were those of sending, once a year, a ship to Africa for ne- groes, and of possessing and working all the mines of precious metals to be discovered in Louisiana, provided that one-fourth of their proceeds should be reserved for the king. He also had the privilege of owning for ever all the lands that he would improve by cultivation, all the buildings he would erect, and all the manufactures that he might establish. Ilis principal obligation, in exchange for such advantages, was to send every year to Louisiana, two ships' loads of colonists, and, after nine years, to assume all the expenses of the adminis- tration of the colony, including those of the garrison and of its officers ; it being understood that, in consid- eration of such a change, he would have the privilege of nominating the officers to be appointed by the king. In the mean time, the annual sum of fifty thousand livres ($10,000) was allowed to Crozat for the king's share of the expenses required by Louisiana. It was further provided that the laws, ordinances, customs, and usages of the Prevostship and Viscounty of Paris should form the legislation of the colony. There was also to be a goverment council, similar to the one established in San Domingo and Martinique.
153
CONDITIONS OF THE CHARTER.
This charter of concessions virtually made Crozat the supreme lord and master of Louisiana. Thus Lou- isiana was dealt with, as if it had been a royal farm, and leased by Louis the XIVth to the highest bidder. It is a mere business transaction, but which colors itself with the hue of romance, when it is remembered that Louisiana was the farm, Louis the XIVth the landlord, and that Anthony Crozat was the farmer.
Anthony Crozat was one of those men who dignify commerce, and recall to memory those princely mer- chants, of whom Genoa, Venice, and Florence boasted of yore. Born a peasant's son, on the estate of one of the great patricians of France, he was, when a boy, remarked for the acuteness of his intellect ; and having the good fortune of being the foster brother of the only son of his feudal lord, he was sent to school by his noble patron, received the first rudiments of education, and at fifteen was placed, as clerk, in a commercial house. There, by the protection of the nobleman, who never ceased to evince the liveliest interest in his fate, and particularly by the natural ascendency of his strong genius, he rose, in the course of twenty years, to be a partner of his old employer, married his daughter, and shortly after that auspicious event, found himself, on the death of his father-in-law, one of the richest mer- chants in Europe. He still continued to be favored by circumstances, and having had the good fortune of
8
-
-
154
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
loaning large sums of money to the government in cases of emergency, he was rewarded for his services by his being ennobled and created Marquis du Chatel.
So far, Crozat had known but the sunny side of life ; but for every man the hour of trial must strike, sooner or later, on the clock of fate, and the length or intense- ness of the felicity that one has enjoyed, is generally counterbalanced by a proportionate infliction of cala- mity. Happy is he, perhaps, whom adversity meets on the threshold of existence, and accompanies through part of his career. Then, the nerves of youth may resist the shock, and be even improved by the struggle. The mind and body, disciplined by the severe trial through which they have passed, have time to substitute gains for losses in the account book of life. At any rate, when the tribute of tears and sufferings is early paid, the debtor may hope for a clear and bright meri- dian ; and when the sun of his destiny sinks down in the west, he has some right to expect, if some clouds should gather round the setting orb, that it will only be to gladden the sight by the gorgeousness of their colors. But if smiling fortune, after having rocked her favorite in his cradle, gives him her uninterrupted attendance until his manhood is past, she is very apt to desert him on the first cold approach of old age, when he is most in need of her support ; for, the stern decree that man is born to suffer, must be accomplished before the por-
155
DEATH OF HIS WIFE.
tals of another life are open; and then, woe to the gray-headed victim, who, after long days of luxurious ease, finds himself suddenly abandoned, a martyr in the arena of judgment, to the fangs and jaws of the wild beasts of an unfeeling and scoffing world ! Woe to him, if his Christian faith is not bound to his heart by adamantine chains, to subdue physical pain, to arm his soul with divine fortitude, and grace his last moments with sweet dignity and calm resignation !
Crozat was doomed to make this sad experiment. The first shaft aimed at him fell on his wife, whom he lost, ten years after the birth of his only child, a daugh- ter, now the sole hope of his house. Intense was his sorrow, and never to be assuaged, for no common companion his wife had been. Looking up to him with affectionate reverence as one, whom the laws, both divine and human, had appointed as her guide, she had lived rather in him than in herself. She had been absorbed into her husband, and the business of her whole life had been to study and to anticipate his wishes and wants. Endowed with all the graces of her sex, and with a cultivated intellect chastened by modesty, which hardly left any thing to be desired for its perfection, she rendered sweeter the part of minis- tering angel which she had assumed, to bless him in this world. With feminine art, she had incorporated herself with his organization, and gliding into the very
-
156
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
essence of his soul, she had become the originating spring of all his thoughts and sentiments. It was beautiful to see, how, entwining herself round his con- ceptions, his volition and actions, she had made herself a component part of his individuality, so that she really was flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone. Is it to be wondered at, that when she died, he felt that the luminary which lighted up his path had been ex- tinguished, and that a wheel had suddenly stopped within himself? From that fatal event, there never was a day when the recollections of the past did not fill his soul with anguish.
Crozat's only consolation was his daughter. The never ceasing anxiety with which he watched over her, until she grew into womanhood, would beggar all description ; and even then she remained a frail flower, which, to be kept alive, required to be fanned by the gentlest zephyrs, and to be softly watered from that spring which gushes from the deep well of the heart, at the touch of true affection. She was exquisitely beautiful, but there was this peculiarity in her beauty, that although her person presented that voluptuous symmetry, that rich fulness of form, and that delicate roundness of outline which artists admire, yet soul predominated in her so much over matter, that she looked rather like a spirit of the air, than an incarna- tion of mortality. She produced the effect of an
157
HIS DAUGHTER ANDREA.
unnatural apparition : forgetting the fascinations of the flesh, one would gaze at her as something not of this world, and feel for her such love as angels may inspire. She appeared to be clothed in terrestrial substance, merely because it was necessary to that earthly existence which she wore as a garment not intended for her, and which had been put on only by mistake. She was out of place : there was something in her organization, which disqualified her for the companionship of the sons of Eve : she looked as if she had strayed from a holier sphere. Those who knew her were impressed with an undefinable feeling that she was a temporary loan made to earth by heaven, and that the slightest disappointment of the heart in her nether career, would send her instantly to a fitter and more congenial abode. Alas! there are beings invested with such exquisite sensibility that the vile clay which enters into their composition, and which may be intended as a protecting texture, with- out which human life would be intolerable for the spirit within, imbibing too much of the ethereal essence to which it is allied, ceases to be a shield against the ills we are heirs to, in this valley of miseries. It is a mark set upon them! It is a pledge that the wounded soul, writhing under repeated inflictions, will wear out its frail tenement, and soon escape from its ordeal. Such was the threatened fate of Andrea, the daughter
L.
158
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
of Crozat. And he knew it, the poor father! he knew it, and he trembled ! and he lived in perpetual fear : and he would clasp his hands, and in such agonies as the paternal heart only knows, kneeling down, humbling himself in the dust, he would pour out prayers (oh, how eloquent !) that the Almighty, in his infinite mercy, would spare his child !
Crozat had sedulously kept up the closest relations with his noble friend and patron, to whom there had also been born but one heir, a son, the sole pillar of a ducal house, connected with all the imperial and royal dynasties of Europe. A short time after his wife's death, Crozat had had the misfortune to follow to the grave the duke, his foster brother; and his daughter Andrea, who was known to lack at home the tender nursing of a mother, had been tendered the splendid hospitality of the dowager duchess, where she had grown up in a sort of sisterly intimacy with the young duke. There she had conceived, unknowingly to herself at first, the most intense passion for her youth- ful companion, which, when it revealed itself to her dismayed heart, was kept carefully locked up in its inmost recesses. Poor maiden! The longum bibere amorem was fatally realized with her, and she could not tear herself from the allurements of the banquet upon which she daily feasted her affections. Unknown her secret, she lived in fancied security, and, for a
159
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
while, enjoyed as pure a happiness as may be attained to-the happiness of dreams !
One day, a rumor arose that a matrimonial alliance was in the way of preparation for that lineal descend- ant of a princely race, for the young duke, who was the concealed idol of her heart. There are emotions which it would be too much for human endurance to hide from a sympathetic eye, much less from parental penetration, and on that day the terrible truth burst upon Crozat, and stunned him with an unexpected blow. It was a hurricane of woes sweeping through his heart: he felt as if he and his child were in a tornado, out of which to save her was impossible. Too well he knew his Andrea, and too well he knew that she would not survive the withering of her hopes, wild as they were! "Time !" exclaimed he, as he paced his room with hurried steps, holding communion with himself, " Time, that worker of great things, must be gained ! But how ?" A sudden thought flashed through his brain ! Thank God, he clutched the remedy ! Was it not currently reported and believed that the betrothed of the duke loved one, of equally noble birth, but whose proffered hand had been rejected by an ambitious father, merely because fortune, with her golden gifts, did not back his pretensions? That was enough ! And Crozat, on that very day, had sought and found the despairing lover. "Sir!" said
160
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
he to the astonished youth, " in the civil wars which desolated France during the minority of Louis the XIVth, and which ruined your family, several millions were extorted from your father by one, who then had the power. Here they are-it is a restitution-ask no name-I am a mere agent and bound to secrecy." The strange tale was taken as true, and in a short time the betrothed of the young duke was led to the hymenial altar by a more successful rival.
Crozat had been a traitor and a liar !- a traitor to his friend and benefactor's son ! But he was a father ! -and he saw his daughter's tomb already wide open and gaping for the expected prey! And was she not to be rescued at any cost ? And was he to stand with folded arms, and to remain passive, while, in his sight, despair slowly chiselled the cold sepulchral marble destined for his child ? No !- he saved her, and did not stop to inquire whether the means he employed were legitimate. Now, he saw her smile again and resume, as it were, that current of life which was fast ebbing away !- and he was happy! And had he not a sufficient excuse to plead at that seat of judgment which every man has within his breast, when the shrill voice of conscience rose against him in accusa- tion, and said, " Thou hast done wrong ! to save thyself, or thine, thou hast been recreant to thy trust-thou hast injured thy neighbor, and acted dishonorably ?"
161
HISTORY OF CROZAT.
Crozat, however, was not the man to lay a flattering unction to his soul. There was in him no false logic of a corrupt mind to argue successfully against the plain voice of truth : his were not the ears of the wicked, deaf to the admonitions of our inward moni- tor. However gently conscience might have spoken her disapprobation, he heard it, and stood self-con- demned.
He went to his patron's widow, to the duchess, and told her all-and prostrating himself at her feet, awaited her sentence. She raised him gently from his humble posture, and self-collected, soaring as it were above human passions, while she riveted upon him the steadfast look of her calm, blue eyes, thus she spoke with Juno-like dignity, and with a sweet, musical voice, but seeming as cold to the afflicted father, in spite of its bland intonations, as the northern wind : " Crozat, this is a strange and a moving tale. You stand forgiven, for you have acted as nature would prompt most men to do, and even if your error had been more grievous, your manly candor and frank con- fession would redeem the guilt. Therefore, let it pass ; let your conscience be relieved from further pangs on this subject. My esteem and friendship stand the same for you as before. What grieves me to the heart, is the deplorable situation of your Andrea, who is mine also, and whom I love like a daughter, although
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.