USA > Louisiana > The history of Louisiana : from the earliest period, Volume I > Part 6
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. ly part of the lake of the same name. Prairie des Bois, south south east from Monroe, nine miles distant, is also subject to inundation. Another kind of prairie not so necessary, are those found on the summit of the hills-prairie des Cotes is one of that description. It lies almost due south, rather westerly, from Monroe, distant thirty-six miles in a straight course ; the land there is poor. but, like those mentioned above afford very good pasturage for cattle. The direction of the hills between Washita and Dogdemene is rather from north to south, asfar as bayou Castor; they after-
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wards generally run from east to west. The valleys, which separate them. are evidently the work of the water courses, the directions of which are alwaysfrom about north to south, the hills appearing to follow that course, areat the lowest end but very short, and at a bird's eye view, have the appearance of having been thrown together in that manner by the waves of the sea, which probably, at some remote period, rolled over this whole tract of country.
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The settlements of Opelousas are separated from those of Red river, by a ridge of piny and sterile hills. These are succeeded by extensive prairies, which continue, without any important interruption, as far as the sea. They are almost entirely destitute of trees, except along the water courses: so much so. that when a cluster of trees is accidentally met with, it is called an island. The facility these prairies offer in raising cattle, had induced the original settlers of Opelousas and Attakapas to prefer the pastoral to the agricultural life. Those who followed them, were invited by rich spots of land on the water courses, to the cultivation of indigo and afterwards cotton, be- sides corn, rice and other provisions.
The town, near the parochial church of Opelousas, dedicated to St. Landry, has not the advantage of standing upon navigable water; and this circum- stance has contributed to check its growth. It has a branch of the Louisiana bank.
At a few miles below it, is a convent of nuns, the inmates of which devote themselves to the education of young persons of their sex. This establishment is a new one, and entirely due to the piety of a lady of the neighbourhood.
The upper part of the settlements of Attakapas, which lie between Opelousas and the sea. differ very little from the former. Emigrants from the other
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states. having settled on the land near the sea, have given themselves to the culture of the sugar cane, and meet with great success.
There are two towns in the Attakapas-St. Martins. ville and Franklin, on the river Teche, which rises in the Opelousas. The first, though not con- siderable, has a weekly gazette, and a branch of the state bank, a church and the other public build- ings of the parish. The other is as yet an embryo.
The Spaniards made an abortive attempt to estab- lish a town, called New Iberia, about sixteen miles below St. Martinsville.
The prairies in this part of the state are not natural ones : they owe their origin to the Indian practice of setting fire to dry grass during the fall and winter, in order that the tender herbage, in the spring, may attract game; this destroys young trees and the prai- rie annually gains on the woodland, as long as the practice prevails. When it ceases, the woodland gains on the prairie.
To the west is a collection of houses on Vermilion river, near the public buildings of the parish of La- fayette.
Towards the sea, near the base of the delta formed by bayou Lafourche and the Mississippi, are a num- ber of lakes, the principal of which are Barataria and Salvador. Of the streams that fall into the gulf. west of the mouth of the Mississippi, the most important are Latourche, Achafalaya, Teche, Mentao, Calcasu and Sabine.
All the space between these streams, near the gulf, is interspersed with trembling prairies, lagoons and numerous bayous. There are, however, many spots of high ground ; but the difficulty of access and distance from inhabited tracts have prevented migra- tionto them. L
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The Teche has its source in the prairies, in the upper part of the settlements of Opelousas and. dur- ing the season of high water, flows partially into the Courtableau. As it enters the settlements of Atta- kapas, it receives from the right side bayou Fusilier, which bayou Bourbeux connects with Vermilion river. A little more than twenty miles farther, it passes before the town of St. Martinsville and reaches, fifteen miles after, the spot on which the Spaniards, soon after the cession, made a vain attempt to estab- lish a city to which the name of New Iberia was des- tined ; twenty miles, from the mouth of the Teche, is the town of Franklin.
Above St. Martinsville, cotton is universally culti- vated on the banks of the Teche: below it. are a number of sugar plantations. which succeed remarka- bly well. The low price of cotton has of late induced many of the planters to attempt the culture of the cane, above St. Martinsville, even as high as bayou Bœuf.
Onthe east of the Teche and between that streamand the Achafalaya, is Prairie Grand Chevreuil occupy- ing the ground beyond the reach of inundation. On the opposite side, and to the east of Vermilion river is the Attakapas prairie: the land of which, especially on the banks of the latter stream, is of good quality and well adapted to the culture of sugar, cotton, in- digo, tobacco and corn.
The Vermilion river has its source in the upper part of the Opelou-as settlements: between it and the Mentao is the Opelousas prairie, which is more . extensive, than the two just mentioned ; being about seventy-five miles in length and twenty five in breadth Its direction is S W. to N. E. It affords an extensive range for cattle.
The Mentao and Calcasu rise near the sandy ridge
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separating the settlements of Red river from those of Opelousas. These streams are nearly parallel to the Vermilion and Sabine. The land on their banks is of less fertility than near the Mississippi. Agricultu- ral establishments are rare, and the few settlers confine their attention to raising cattle.
At the mouth of Sabine river. where the western boundary of the State begins, the country exhibits a wild state of desolation. A line of shell banks extends along the shores of the lake. into which the river ex- pands, at the distance of twenty miles from its mouth; they are covered with trees of a stunted growth. The country around is a morass to the distance of twenty miles above the lake.
The whole coast from the Mississippi to the Sabine, as from the former stream to Pearl river, is low and swampy, and except in a very few places indeed, can only be approached through the water courses.
Ulloa, Lorimer, Dunbar, Sibley, Heustis.
شـ
HISTORY
OF
LOUISIANA.
CHAPTER 1.
Discovery of America .- Charles VIII .- Henry VII .- Ferdinand and Isabella .- Cabot .- Prima vista .- Lewis XII .- Denys .- Aubert .- Gulf of St. Lawrence .- Indians carried to France .- Henry VIII .- Francis I. Ponce de Leon .- Florida .- The Baron de Levy .- Sable Island .- Vasquez de Aillon .- Velasquez .- Ve- ranzany .- Narvaez .- Apalachians. - The peace of Cambray .- Cartier .- River of St. Lawrence .- Her- nandez de Soto .- Chickasaws .- Alabamas .- Mobi- lians .- Choctaws .- The Mississippi .- Red River .- Robertval .- Canada .- Luis de Muscoso .- Los Va- queros .- Edward VI .- Henry II .- Mary .- Philip II. Elizabeth .- Charles IX .- Coligny .- Ribaud .- Caro- line .- Albert .- Barre .- Laudonniere .- Sir John Haw- kins .- Pedro de Menendez .- St. Augustine .- Destruc- tion of the French Colony .- De Gourgues .- Henry III. Sir Humphrey Gilbert .- Sir Walter Raleigh .- Oca- cock .- Virginia .- Sir Richard Grenville .- De la Roche .- Acadie.
CHARLES the eighth, the seventh monarch of the house of Valois, wielded the sceptre of France, and Henry the seventh that of England, in 1492, when Columbus, under the auspices of Ferdinand of '
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Aragon and Isabella of Castile, discovered the west tern hemisphere.
Charles, during a reign of nineteen years, sought military glory, and an extension of territory, in the invasion of Italy. Success, for a while attended his arms, and with the aid of the Pope, he caused himself to be crowned Emperor of Constantinople and King of Naples; but, he was soon driven back, and died in 1496, the fiftieth year of his age, without having ever sought to avail himself of the advantages the discovery of the new world offered. Less am- bitious of warlike fame, Henry made an early effort to share them. He fitted out a small fleet, the com- mand of which he gave to Cabot, a Venetian adven- turer, settled in Bristol, whom he sent on a voyage of discovery. No historical record informs us of the success of this expedition : but in 1496, this naviga- tor sailed in a ship furnished by the crown and four barques, supplied by the merchants of Bristol. He discovered a large island, to which he gave the . name of Prima vista, now known by that of New- foundland and soon after the continent. He sailed southwardly along the coast, as far as the bay of Chesapeake. It is not known that he effected or even attempted a landing, and the occular posses- sion he took of the country is the origin and basis of the claim of the English nation to all the land in North America, from the Atlantic, to the Pacific Ocean.
Charles the eighth, having left no issue, was suc- ceeded by Louis the twelfth, a distant kinsman; their common ancestor being Charles the seventh, the grandfather of the deceased monarch. Louis con- tinued the war in Italy with the same spirit, and with 'as little,success as his predecessor: and viewed the
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progress of the Spaniards in America with equal un- concern. His subjects, however, extended their in- dustry and their commerce to the new world. In 1501, the Biscayans, the Bretons and the Normans, visited Newfoundland, in quest of fish. Two years after, Denys entered, and made a map of, the Gulf of St. Lawrence; and in 1508, Aubert carried over the first American Indians, who trod the soil of France. The crown of England in the following year, passed, on the death of Henry the seventh, in his fifty second, to his son Henry the eighth.
The southernmost part of the continent of North America, was first discovered by a Spanish adven- turer in 1513. Not impelled by avarice or ambition, but led by credulity and chance, Ponce de Leon, believing that the island of Binimi, in the archipela- go of Bahama, possessed a fountain, the waters of which had the virtue of repairing the ravages of time on the human frame, sailed from the island of Porto Rico, in search of this renovating stream. A violent storm disappointed his hopes, and threw him on the cape, opposite- to the northern side of the island of Cuba. He called the country thus disco- vered Florida, either from its flowery appearance, or from the circumstance of his having discovered it on Palm Sunday, Pasqua de Flores. Erecting a large cross on the beach, he took formal possession in the name of his sovereign, Charles the first of Spain, the grandson of Isabella, the late Queen of Castile. He returned in the following year and landed on the same spot, with a number of his countrymen; but the natives fell on the intruders and killed them all but six, who were grievously wounded. The chief was among the latter. He sailed for the island of Cuba, where he and his five surviving companions died of their wounds.
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[1520
Louis the twelfth died on the first of January 1515, the fifty third year of his age, without issue. His successor was Francis the first; their com- mon ancestor was the Duke of Orleans, a brother of Charles the sixth.
The first attempt of the French to plant a colony in America, was made in the second year of Francis' reign. A few adventurers of that nation, were led by the Baron de Levy to the small island, in the forty fourth degree of northern latitude, now known as Sable Island, part of the province of Nova Scotia. The spot was most unfavourable ; at a great dis- tance from the continent, or any other island; the soil is rocky and sterile. These men were unable to derive their subsistence from it. They suffered much from the cold; manysickened and died. The Baron carried back the survivors to France, leaving some cattle and hogs on the island.
In 1520, Vasquez de Aillon sailed from Hispaniola for the northern continent, with views not quite so - unexceptionable as those of Ponce de Leon. His object was to seize some of the Indians, transport them to Hispaniola and sell them to his countrymen, who could not obtain from Africa a sufficient num- ber of negroes to work the mines. He made land . on the coast of the present state of South Carolina, near the mouth of a river to which he gave the name of Jourdain, after a man on board of one of his ships, who first descried it; it now bears that of Santee. He was received with hospitality: after staying awhile, and supplying himself with provis- ions, he invited a number of the natives to a ban- quet on board of his ship -. made them dance at the sound of his trumpets, plying them with abundant doses of ardent spirits. When exercise and ebriety had lulled their senses. he hoisted his sails and
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brought off his unwary guests. Heaven did not allow him to reap the fruits of his treachery. One of the ships perished in a storm. The sturdy cap- tives in the other, for a long while, refused to take any food; the voyage was long, and disease made a great havoc among the Spaniards and the Indians.
Velasquez made another voyage to Florida in 1552, with two ships: he was quite unsuccessful. He lost one of the ships, and the Indians killed a great part of his people.
Veranzany, a Florentine, employed by Francis the first, appears to have been the first navigator, who visited America at the expense of the crown of France. He reached it in the month of March 1524, a little below Cape Hatteras, near the spot on which sixty years after, the first attempt towards English colonization in America was made, under the auspices and at the cost of Sir Walter Raleigh. He sailed up the coast, as far as the fiftieth degree of northern latitude, entered a few of the rivers, had some little intercourse with the aborigines, by whom he was every where friendly received, and re- turned to France, without any attempt towards a settlement.
He made other voyages, in the two following years, and it is supposed perished in the last.
The misfortunes of Francis, made a prisoner at Pavie, his long captivity in Spain, and his distresses till the peace of Cambray, prevented the execution of the plan he had formed of planting a French co- lony in the new world.
Pamphilo de Narvaez, having obtained from Charles the first of Spain, the government of all the countries he could discover from Rio de Palma, to the undefined limits of Florida, sailed from the island of Cuba, with four ships and a barque in ,
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March 1528, with four hundred foot and eighty horse. He landed near the bay del Spiritu Santo, called, in modern times, the bay of Tampa. The Indians cheerfully supplied him with corn and other provisions. He landed a part of his force and took solemn possession of the country, in the name of his imperial master. Noticing, at this ceremony, a cymbal of gold, in the hands of an Indian, his hope of securing a large quantity of this metal was greatly excited. He was told that the Apalachians, a nation not far distant, had much of it. Under the influence of the excitement which the information created, he putthe shipping under the orders of Cabeca de Vacca, with directions to sail along the coast; he landed the rest of his force, and marched up the country the last day of May. On the next, he crossed a river, on the banks of which was a town, where the In- dians supplied him with provisions. He ranged the country for several days, without meeting a human being; at last he overtook a chief preceded by men blowing flutes, and followed by a large party. He gave them to understand. he was going towards the Apalachians; the chief told him these Indians were at war with his nation: Narvaez travelled with him to his village, in which he was hospitably enter- tained. Proceeding. he reached on the 25th the first village of the Apalachians, which consisted of about forty cabins. He took possession of it with- out opposition, and found corn, venison and skins ; but no metal. He sojourned near this village for several days, making occasional excursions into the country; during which, he had frequent skirmishes with the natives, who darted their arrows at his people and hid themselves in the swamps. At last destitute of provisions. seeing nothing but a sterile country and unpassable roads, he determined on
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THE FIRST
marching towards the sea, and reached Aute, an Indian town, not far distant from the spot on which the Spaniards afterwards erected the fort of St. Mark of the Apalaches. The Indians followed on the flanks of their invaders, harrassing them at times by clouds of arrows. Their countrymen at Aute, strongly defended themselves and killed a number of Spaniards. Cabeca de Vacca approached the coast. and Narvaez and his men took shipping; but the greatest part perished through fatigue, hunger, disease and shipwreck. Those who escaped these complicated disasters, reached Rio de Palma. Nar- vaez was not among them; his vessel foundered in a storm and he never was heard of.
Francis, having married his rival's sister, and releas- ed his sons, detained as hostages in Spain, availed himself of the tranquillity that followed the peace of Cambray, to resume his plan of adding a part of America to his dominions.
For this purpose, he directed two barques of sixty tons, with one hundred and fifty men, to be fitted "out at St. Maloes, and gave the command of them to Cartier, who sailed on the 30th of April 1534. He reached Bonavista in the island of Newfound- land in twenty days, crossed the gulf and entered a bay, which from the extreme heat at the time, he called Chaleur bay ; it is a little to the south of the mouth of the river St. Lawrence. Two sailors (the wretched remnant of the crew of a Spanish ship, which had been wrecked there) were wandering on the beach, when Cartier's boat approached. The French inquired what country they were in; one of the Spaniards, who, being pressed by hunger, ima- gined he was asked whether there was any thing to eat, replied, Aca nada; " there is nothing here." The French in the boat, on returning to Cartier,
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told him the Spaniard said the country was called Canada. Cartier visited several parts of the gulf, and took possession of the country for the crown of France.
The king, on the return of Cartier, ordered a new expedition, consisting of three ships; the largest, commanded by Cartier, was of one hundred and twenty tons; they sailed on the 19th of May 1535. On reaching the continent, Cartier was obliged by stress of weather, to put into a port which he called. St. Nicholas. He gave the name of St. Lawrence to the gulf and the river; leaving the two small vessels at the mouth of the stream. he proceeded to an In- dian town called Hochelaga, near the spot on which the city of Montreal now stands. The friendly re- ception the Indians gave him, induced him to send for the vessels he had left, and to build a number of cabins, which he surrounded with a strong palisa- do, that might enable him to resist a sudden attack ; and he made other preparations to winter there. The season proved extremely severe, and the scurvy broke out among his men; he was himself attacked by it. Twenty-five of his people had already per- ished, and two alone escaped the disease, when a specific remedy was pointed out by the Indians, in a decoction of the bark of the Abies Canadensis, (the Canadian fir.) Eight days after it had been resort- ed to, Cartier found all his men perfectly recovered. Some who had been afflicted with another disease, and had been but partially cured, were perfectly ' restored to health by the use of this specific. In the spring, Cartier brought back such of his men as the fell disorder had spared ; but nothing more was done in Francis' reign, towards the settlement of a French colony in America.
Two years after, Charles the first of Spain gave .
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the government of St. Yago de Cuba to Hernandez de Soto, with permission to prosecute the discovery of, and subjugate, Florida; and on the twefth of May of the following year, he sailed from the Ha- vana with an army of nine hundred foot and three hundred and fifty horse. The fleet was equipped and the naval and land forces raised and supported at Soto's expense. He had amassed considerable wealth in Peru, in the conquest of which he had accompanied Pizarro. The fleet was delayed by contrary winds, and at last reached the bay in which Narvaez had landed eleven years before. Three hundred men, having landed and marched a short distance, were repelled with great loss. Soto now disembarked his horse and foot, and sent back the large vessels. He proceeded northerly, his march being retarded by frequent interruptions from the natives, who hung on his flanks; and he halted at Herriga, the first town he came to, at the distance of six miles from the shore. He spent some days there, to give time to the baggage to come up and afford some rest to his men, and began his march for the country of the Apalachians, which was at the dis- tance of about four hundred miles. The country was divided into small districts, each governed by a cacique : the chief, the district and its principal town, generally bearing the same name. The town was a collection of from fitty to two hundred houses ; surrounded by a strong palisado. Garcilasso de la Vega, in his history of this expedition, has recorded the names of the towns through which Soto passed, from the bay del Spiritu Santo to the Apalachians. They are many, but it is believed the name of none of them corresponds with that of any of the present divisions of the country. Two of the principal dis- LOU. I. 2
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CHAPTER
[1537
tricts, or provinces, were governed by a female cacique. After advancing into the country, Soto's progress ceased to be obstructed. and at several towns he was hospitably received, and obtained abundant supplies of corn and venison. One of the female caciques added to this needed succour, pre- sents of pearls. If we credit Garcilasso, these pre- sents in the quantity and value of the pearls, were immense; they were often as large as hazel nuts and were dealt out by the bushel, except those of the smallest kind, called seed of pearls, which were weighed. But this writer speaks of lions in the forests of Florida, and of a number of caciques, who commanded several thousand of warriors. It is believed those who furnished this Indian author with the memoirs on which he wrote, were less fond of truth than of the marvellous.
Several caciques opposed the passage of the Span- iards through the country, but none could resist, with bows and arrows, an army with musketry and artillery. By courtesy, threats and violence, Soto made his way to the country of the Apalachians. There, after taking some rest. a part of his army was sent in strong detachments to reconnoitre the ground; while the rest proceeding south-westerly, reached Aute, a town, near the sea shore. which Navaez had visited. There, this party divided itself in two de- tachments, one of them marched westerly to Anchusi, another large town, on the spot on which, about a century and a half after, was built the town of Pen- sacola ; while the latter proceeding at first easterly, then southerly, reached the bay in which the army had landed, from which one of the small vessels was sent to Cuba. with an account of Soto's progress, and to obtain supplies.
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The two detachments uniting again at Aute joined the main body at the Apalachians, where Soto had determined on wintering.
The army resumed its march early in the spring; its direction was at first north-westerly; passing through the back parts of the present state of Geor- gia, it marched for some time northerly, then north- westerly through the country of the Cherokees, then a large and warlike nation, crossing the present state of Tennessee and proceeding to that of Kentucky, as high up as the thirty-seventh degree of northern latitude. It marched thence south-westerly to the bay of Mobile. Of the Indians thus visited by Soto, the Tuscaloosas, Mobilians and Alabamians, are the only ones who, at this day retain their names. The Mobilians made a furious resistance, but were at last overpowered. Garrilasso reckons they lost in several skirmishes, a pitched battle and the defence of their principal town, upwards of eleven thousand men, and that more than one thousand women were burnt in a single house. Soto, having subdued the Mobilians, gave one month's rest to his army ; then continued his march to the Chickasaws, among whom he win- tered.
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