Again the folly of farming out the trade of a whole country to a single individual, which had been tried in Canada with such bad effects, was repeated here in Louisiana. This monopoly was granted (1712) to Anthony Crozat for twenty-five years. Like all speculators, Crozat aimed to make the most in the shortest time, letting the future of the colony take care of itself. He was to control, absolutely, all that came into the colony or went out of it. Agriculture was neglected and trade only encouraged. And all trade was monopolized by Anthony Crozat. This was the penny wise, pound foolish, colonial system of France, adopted with the purpose of putting a little money into the royal treasury at a nominal saving to it of certain sums required for maintaining its authority in the colony. This policy turned the colony into a trading-post, and the people themselves into dependants of Crozat.
When Crozat entered upon his exclusive privileges there were but twenty-eight families in the whole province, of whom not more than half were actual settlers, the rest being either traders, innkeepers or laborers, who had no fixed residence.
The roving traders, or Coureurs de Bois,[3] bartered French goods with the Indians for peltries and slaves, which were sold in the settlements. It was found that tobacco, indigo, cotton and rice could be profitably cultivated, but none except slaves were employed in tilling the soil, which, indeed, is comparatively worthless in the neighborhood where the colonists first located themselves. Consequently only such things as would help to eke out a subsistence—such as corn, vegetables and poultry—were cultivated at all. In a word, the colony literally lived from hand to mouth. Instead of growing stronger and richer, of its own robust growth, it grew, if possible, weaker and poorer by reason of a policy, or system, under which no colony has ever thrived.
Little inducement was held out for the colonist to identify himself with the country, or feel that he and it must grow up together. He was a sojourner in a strange land. He could never hope to get rich by trade, since every thing must pass through the hands of Crozat's agents, at a price fixed by them.
This was by no means the whole weakness of Louisiana in her infancy. Perhaps the primary evil lay in the fact that so far the French neither controlled access to the Mississippi, in the place where they were, or had formed any settled plan for securing that solid foothold on its banks which alone could render them masters of the situation.
Crozat's failure was, in the nature of things, foreordained. His scheme, indeed, proved a stumbling-block to the colony and a loss to himself. In five years (1717) he was glad to surrender his monopoly to the crown.
FRENCH SOLDIERS.
From its ashes sprung the gigantic Mississippi Scheme of John Law,[4] to whom all Louisiana, now including the Illinois country, was granted for a term of years. Compared with this prodigality Crozat's concession was but a plaything. It not only gave Law's Company proprietary rights to the soil, but power was conferred to administer justice, make peace or war with the natives, build forts, levy troops and with consent of the crown to appoint such military governors as it should think fitting. These extraordinary privileges were put in force by a royal edict, dated in September, 1717.