Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 9.djvu/420

 L0UX8XAIUL 379 lOUIUAlU

wwe the seeds from which was to grow Louisiana, and the Indians had to be subdued. It was only then

the province which was to give to the American Union that the work of civilization coidd be begun, and the

thirteen states and one territory and to exert a great admirable culture of the French extended to the

influence on the civilisation of the United States. In Mississippi Valley. The ele^nce and refinement of

Fefaruaiy, 1600, Iberville and his young brother Bien- manners of Pans in the 'eighteenth century were

ville saw the beautiful coast of the Gulf of Mexico, found in New Orleans from the very foundation of the

where are now Biloxi and Ocean Spring, and after city, and the women of Louisiana are mentioned by

having found the mouth of the Mississippi on 2 March, the early chroniclers with great praise for their beauty

1009, and explored the " hidden" river, they built and charm. They owed, to a great extent, their

Fort liaureDas and laid the foundation of the French mental and moral training to the instruction and

oc^ony on the Gulf Coast, on the Ocean Springs side education which they received at the convent oi the

of the Bay of Biloxi. Iberville ordered a fort to be Ursidine nims. The sons of wealthy colonists were

built fifty-four miles from the mouth of the Mississippi, sent to France to be educated or were taught at pri-

This was the first settlement in the present State of vate schools at home, such as the one kept in 1727

Louisiana, and was abandoned in 1705. On 4 May, by Father C^ile, a Capuchin monk. As girls could

1600, Iberville sailed for France on board the Badine, not be sent to Europe to obtain an education, a schoc^

with the Count de Surg^res who commanded the for them was absolutely necessanr in New Orleans,

Miarin. Sauvole, a young French officer, had been and Bienville, at the suggestion ot the Jesuit Father

given command of the fort at Biloxi. and Bienville de Beaubois, asked that six Ursuline nuns be sent

bad been appointed lieutenant (second in command), from France to attend to the hospital and to open a

Sauvole, who may be considered the first Governor of school for girls. The nuns arriveu in July, 1727, and

Irfniisiana, died on 22 Aug., 1701, and Jean-Baptiste were received with great kindness by Governor P^rier,

Le Moyne de Bienville succeeded him in the command his wife, and the people of the town. In her letters

of the colony. Iberville ordered Bienville to remove to her father Sbter Madeleine Hachard gives an

the seat of the colon3r from Biloxi and form an estab- interesting: account of New Orleans in 1727, speaks of

liahment aa Mobile Kiver. This was done in January, the magnificent dresses of the ladies, and sayis that a

1702, when Fort Louis de la Mobile was constructed song was publicly sung in which it was said that the

at a pmnt eighteen leagues from the sea. In 1711 city had as much ''appearance" as Paris, and she

the settlement was moved to the site which is now adds quaintlv: "Indeed it is very beautiful, but be-

oeeufided by the city of Mobile. In 1704 the devoted sides that I have not enough eloquence to be able to

friend <rf La Salle, Henry de Tonty, died at Mobile, persuade ^'ou of the beauty which the song mentions,

and on July, 1706, Iberville, the founder of Louisi- I find a difference between this city and that of Paris.

ana« died at Havana of yellow fever. It might persuade people who had never seen the

Tiie founders of Louisiana had made the mistake of capital of France, but 1 have seen it, and the song oeglectixig the banks of the Mississippi, when the fort will not persuade me of the contrary of what I believe. on tile river was abandoned in 1705, and, although It is true that it is increasing every day, and later may there were Old Biloxi and Mobile, the settlement coiud become as beautiful and as large as the principal not proq>er as long as it was limited in its site to the towns of France, if there still come workmen, ana it laxKl on the gulf. The colony might not have been become peopled according to its size." Sister Made- permanent, had not Bienville in February, 1718. Icine was prophetic, as Father Charlevoix had be^i twelve years after the death of Iberville, founded in his letter quoted above (in 1722). In 1734 the New Orieans, so admirably situated between the UrsuUnes occui)ied the convent, built for them by the deep and broad Mississippi and beautiful Lake Pont- Government, which is still stanciing on Chartres street. chartrain. In 1722 the seat of the colony was trans- They remained there until 1824, when they moved to ferred from Xew Biloxi, which had l)een founded in another building do;^^ the river. Their services as 1710, to New Orleans, and the future of Louisiana was educators of the girls of Louisiana in colonial times assured. It was then directed by the Western Com- were invaluable.

pany, had received for a time the aid of the bank of The Province of Louisiana had been divided on 16

John Law, and from 1712 to 1717 had been conceded May, 1722, into three spiritual jurisdictions. The

to another banker, Crozat, who had agreed to develop first, comprising all the countiy from the mouth of the

the resources of the colony but had failed in his enter- Mississippi to the Wabash, ancf west of the Mississippi,

prise. On 10 January, 1722, Father Charlevoix, in a was allotted to the Capuchins, whose superior was to

letter dated from New Orleans, says: "This wild and be vicar-gencral of the*Bi:3hop of Quebec and was to

desert place, which the weeds and trees still cover reside in Xew Orleans. The second extended north

almost entirely, will be one day, and perhaps that from the Wabash and belonged to the Jesuits, whose

day is not distant, an opulent city and the metropolis superior, residing in the Illinois country, was also to be

of a rich and great colony." The distinguished his- vicar-general of the Bishop of Quebec in that depart-

torian baaed this hope "on the situation of this town ment. The third comprised all the country east of

thirty-three leagues from the sea, and on the bank the Mississippi from the sea to the Wabash, and was

of a navigable river, which one can ascend to this given to the Carmelites, whose superior was also

plaoe in twenty-four hours; on the fertility of its vicar-general and resided usually at Mobile. The

soU, on the mildness and goodness of its climate, at a Capuchins took possession of their district in 1722.

latitude of thirty degrees north; on the industiy of The Jesuits had already been in theirs a long time,

its inhabitants; on the proximity of Mexico, where The jurisdiction of the Carmelites was added to that of

one can go in two weeks by sea; on that of Havana, the Capuchins on 19 December, 1722, and the former

which is still closer, of the most beautiful islands of returned to France. In December, 1723, the juris-

America and of the English colonics." diction of the Capuchins was restricted to the country

It was no easy matter to establish a successful on both sides of the river from Natchez south to the

colony in the New World, and the French under sea, as the Capuchins were not very numerous. It

Iberville and BienviUe, and the descendants of these was, however, decided in 1725 that no monks or

men, were just as energetic as the Englishmen who priests could attend to churches or missions within

settled Virginia and Massachusetts. There were on the jurisdiction of the Capuchins without the consent

the banks of the Mississippi primeval forests to be cut of the latter. A little later the spiritual care of all the

down,^ in order to cultivate profitably the fertile land savages in the province was given to the Jesuits, and

deposited by the Jgeat river in its rapid course to- their superior was allowed to reside in New Orleans,

^mds the gulf. The turbulent waters of the river provided he performed no ecclesiastical functions

were to be held in their bed l>y strong embankments, ^-ithout the consent of the Capuchins. Several Jesuits