Following the engraving in Shea’s Charlevoix, vol. i. [but now, 1893, thought to be Le Jeune].
The historians of Canada give but brief and inaccurate accounts of the early history of Louisiana. Ferland repeats the errors of Charlevoix even to the “fourth voyage of Iberville.” Garneau leaves the Natchez in possession of their fort at the end of the first campaign.[88]
Judge François-Xavier Martin, in the History of Louisiana from the Earliest Period, 2 vols. (New Orleans, 1827-1829), followed closely the authorities accessible to him when he wrote; his work is a complete, and in the main accurate, compendium of the materials at his command. A new edition was published at New Orleans in 1882, entitled: The History of Louisiana from the Earliest Period. With a Memoir of the Author by W. W. Howe. To which is appended, Annals of Louisiana from 1815 to 1861, by J. F. Condon.
Charles Gayarré is the author of two distinct works which must not be confounded. Louisiana, its Colonial History and Romance,[89] is a history of colonial romance rather than a history of the colony. The Histoire de la Louisiane[90] is an essentially different book. It is mainly composed of transcripts from original documents, woven together with a slender thread of narrative. He states in his Preface that he has sought to remove from sight his identity as a writer, and to let the contemporaries tell the story themselves. References to Gayarré in this chapter are exclusively made to the Histoire, which was brought down to 1770. His final work (reprinted in 1885) was in English, and was continued to 1861.[91] In this edition two volumes are given to the French domination, one to the Spanish, and one to the American.[92]
A little volume entitled Recueil d’arrests et autres pièces pour l’établissement de la compagnie d’occident was published in Amsterdam in 1720. It contains many of the important edicts and decrees which relate to the foundation and growth of this remarkable Company.
The presence of Le Page du Pratz in the colony for sixteen years (1718 to 1734) gives to his Histoire de la Louisiane[93] a value which his manifest egotism and whimsical theories cannot entirely obscure. It was an authority in the boundary discussions.[94]
