Page:Historic towns of the southern states (1900).djvu/476

 *ican domination made slow impression upon the vieu carré. It has never really altered the type. There was, correctly speaking, no American domination in the vieu carré until the term ceased to be used, when Louisiana was admitted as a State into the Union.

The memorable discussion in Congress over the admission of Louisiana need be recalled here only to introduce the next important event in her history,—the great and glorious victory of the Battle of New Orleans on the 8th of January, 1815. That victory was the vindication of Louisiana's right to Statehood in the Union;—it was New Orleans's dower gift to the Nation's history.

The American quarter, the new town, built by the flatboatmen outside the wall of the old town, is still called the American quarter by the old inhabitants. In architecture and physiognomy, in material prosperity and educational progress, it rightfully and justly represents the American domination. But for art, poetry, romance, sentiment, and inspiration the denizens of the new city flee into the old mother quarter as into a sanctuary, where in the quiet and gloom, it may be, of the past, they find refuge from the glare and incessant pursuit of