DETROIT
THE QUEEN CITY

"Here, beside the broad, blue river builded, I am Queen City of the Lakes."

By SILAS FARMER

A stream of crystal clearness, wide and swiftly flowing, the waters of silver and blue alive with fins and scales, a course dotted with islands large and small, wild ducks in myriads diving and dining along shores bordered with pond lilies and flags, stretches of yellow sand and bluffs of yellow clay peopled with buffalo, bear and deer, with wide leagues of grassy pastures and pleasing vistas beyond, walnuts, oaks and maples sentinelling the scene, and skies and sunsets of unrivalled azure and gold adding the final touch of beauty—such was Nature's invitation to the first visitors to the Detroit.

The earliest of the French travellers to this region was the Sieur Joliet, who came in 1670, and was followed the same year by the Sulpician priests, Galinée and Dollier. Eight years later La Salle in Le Griffon, the first sail-vessel on the Great Lakes, passed through the "strait of Lake Erie," and July 24, 1701, Cadillac and his company landed at the present site of Detroit to establish a fort and permanent settlement.

The desire to escape from Roman or Protestant oppression which led to the founding of Baltimore and Plymouth had no place in the thought of those who colonized Acadia and the West. True, there had been one or two feeble efforts to found French Protestant colonies in America. The great Coligny sent a Huguenot colony to Florida more than fifty years before the Mayflower arrived at Plymouth Rock. The Spaniards, however, fell upon and hanged these colonists, their placards stating that it was done, "not because they were Frenchmen, but because they were heretics." Under Cardinal Richelieu, all Protestant emigration to America was discouraged for fear the emigrants would unite with the English or make converts of the Indians. The conversion of the Indians to the Romish faith was always specially designated among the objects of French enterprise in America. The charter of the "Hundred Associates" of April 29, 1627, expressly stated that it was granted for the primary purpose of converting to the Catholic faith the Indians, usually designated as "worshippers of Baal." All these motives played their part in the founding of Detroit, but not quite so important a part as the commercial motive.

[CADILLAC SQUARE, SHOWING CITY HALL AND MAJESTIC BUILDING.]

Antoine Laumet de la Mothe Cadillac, the founder and commandant, was no mere adventurer. In courage, in scholarship, in mental grasp and in general acumen he deserves a place with the founders of Baltimore and Philadelphia. The confessedly fictitious description of his personal appearance and the one-sided analysis of his character by Gayarré were founded on incomplete knowledge. As an officer of the French marine, Cadillac fearlessly crossed the Atlantic again and again as though it were but an inland ferry. On the coast of America he explored the harbors and islands of New England and noted at length their peculiarities and advantages. As a soldier and knight of the Order of St. Louis, he penetrated into the wildest of western wilds, served as commandant at Mackinaw, Detroit and Mobile, repeatedly defeated the Indians at these posts, and compelled them to sue for peace. He had the scholar's habit of writing detailed memoirs of the places he established or was commanded to inspect. He wielded a pen as sharp as his sharp sword. The opponents of his plans had need to fear its point. He spared no words. "A traveller cannot afford to stop," he said, "for every dog that barks." And illustrating the fact that many of the French lived so much among the Indians that they became like Indians themselves, he sententiously said, "With wolves one learns to howl."

He denounced frauds boldly. Count Frontenac spoke highly of his "valor, wisdom, experience and good conduct." It was no ordinary man to whom a wife could by word and deed alike bear witness as Cadillac's wife bore witness to her husband. After they had been married for fourteen years, and when the colony was less than two years old, in company with Madame Touty, in an open canoe with Indians and woodsmen for an escort, she made the journey of a thousand miles from Quebec to Detroit in the fall of the year when fierce winds and rough waves and heavy rains might be expected. When one of the Quebec ladies reminded her in advance, "At Detroit you will die of ennui," she replied, "A woman who loves her husband as she should has no stronger attraction than his company wherever he may be; everything else should be indifferent to her."

The American cities that equal us in age and population are few indeed. Two hundred years are behind us, and three hundred thousand people fill our homes. Our people are and ever have been of many types. In the early days coureurs des bois, bluff, hearty, reckless, and Indians, the squaw trudging along bent double under her basket of bead-work, the unburdened brave stalking proudly, noiselessly along, frequented the place. Dutch traders from the Mohawk coasting along the Lakes early brought negro slaves from Albany.[3] In our social life the Gallic spirit remains to soften and harmonize. The dash of gorgeous coloring which the almost continuous existence here of a military post has given, the distinction and grace which the early arrival of some of old Virginia's noblest children has lent, the intellectual vigor which Puritan New England has contributed, and the solidity and conservatism furnished by the presence of the many wealthy landed proprietors have all shared in the making of a social life as rich as it is attractive.