Too frequently with such as these the heart-training in childhood is neglected or forgotten, and they learn to do nothing from love as a duty to God and their fellow-beings. The good priest comes not as a minister of peace and love into the family; but is too frequently held up by the thoughtless parent as a terror, not as a good and loving man, to be loved, honored, and revered, and these are too frequently the raw-head and bloody-bones painted to the childish imagination by those parents who regard the rod as the only reformer of childish errors—who forget the humanities in inspiring the brutalities of parental discipline, as well as the pastoral duties of their vocation. They persuade not into fruit the blossoms of the heart, but crush out the delicate sensibilities from the child's soul by coarse reproofs and brutal bearing toward them. The causes of difference I cannot divine, but I know that the facts exist, and I know the difference extends to the adults of the two races.
The Anglo-American is said to be more enterprising, more energetic and progressive—seeks dangers to overcome them, and subdues the world to his will. The Gallic or French-American is less enterprising, yet sufficiently so for the necessary uses of life. He is more honest and less speculative; more honorable and less litigious; more sincere with less pretension; superior to trickery or low intrigue; more open and less designing; of nobler motives and less hypocrisy; more refined and less presumptuous, and altogether a man of more chivalrous spirit and purer aspirations. The Anglo-American commences to succeed, and will not scruple at the means: he uses any and all within his power, secures success, and this is called enterprise combined with energy. Moral considerations are a slight obstacle. They may cause him to hesitate, but never restrain his action. The maxim is ever present to his mind: it is honorable and respectable to succeed—dishonorable and disreputable to fail; it is only folly to yield a bold enterprise to nice considerations of moral right. If he can avoid the penalties of the civil law, success obviates those of the moral law. Success is the balm for every wrong—the passport to every honor.
"His race may be a line of thieves,
His acts may strike the soul with horror;
Yet infamy no soiling leaves—
The rogue to-day's the prince to-morrow."
This demoralizes: the expedient for the just—that which will do, not that which should do, if success requires, must be resorted to. This idea, like the pestilence which rides the breeze, reaches every heart, and man's actions are governed only by the law—not by a high moral sense of right. Providence, it is supposed, prepares for all exigencies in the operations of nature. If this be true, it may be that the peculiarities of blood, and the consequence to human character, may, in the Anglo-American, be specially designed for his mission on this continent; for assuredly he is the eminently successful man in all enterprises which are essential in subduing the earth, and aiding in the spreading of his race over this continent. Every opposition to his progress fails, and the enemies of this progress fall before him, and success is the result of his every effort. That the French Creoles retain the chivalry and noble principles of their ancestry is certainly true; but that they have failed to preserve the persevering enterprise of their ancestors is equally true.
Emigration from France, to any considerable extent, was stayed after the cessation of Louisiana to the United States, and the French settlements ceased to expand. The country along and north of Red River, on the Upper Mississippi and the Washita, was rapidly filled up with a bold, hardy American population, between whom and the French sparsely peopling the country about Natchitoches on the Red, and Monroe on the Washita River, there was little or no sympathy; and the consequence was that many of those domiciled already in these sections left, and returned to the Lower Mississippi, or went back to France.
There had been, anterior to this cession, two large grants of land made to the Baron de Bastrop and the Baron de Maison Rouge, upon the Washita and Bartholomew, including almost the entire extent of what is now two parishes. These grants were made by the European Government upon condition of settlement within a certain period. The Revolution in France was expelling many of her noblest people, and the Marquis de Breard, with many followers, was one of these: he came, and was the pioneer to these lands. A nucleus formed, and accessions were being made, but the government being transferred and the country becoming Americanized, this tide of immigration was changed from French to American, and the requisite number of settlers to complete the grants was not reached within the stipulated period, and they were, after more than half a century, set aside, and the lands disposed of as public lands by the United States Government. Had the government continued in the hands of France, it is more than probable that the titles to these tracts would never have been contested, even though the requisite number of settlers had not been upon the lands to complete the grants at the specified period; and it is also probable there would have been, in proper time, the required number. But this transfer of dominion was exceedingly distasteful to the French population.
The antagonism of races itself is a great difficulty in the way of amalgamation, even though both may belong to the same great division of the human family; but added to this the difference of language, laws, habits, and religion, it would almost seem impossible. In the instance of Louisiana it has, so far, proved impossible. Although the French have been American subjects for more than sixty years, and there now remain in life very few who witnessed the change, and notwithstanding this population has, so far as the government is concerned, become thoroughly Americanized, still they remain to a very great extent a distinct people. Even in New Orleans they have the French part and the American part of the city, and do not, to any very great degree, extend their union by living among each other. Kind feelings exist between the populations, and the prejudices which have so effectually kept them apart for so long a time are giving way rapidly now, since most of the younger portion of the Creole-French population are educated in the United States, and away from New Orleans; consequently they speak the English language and form American associations, imbibe American ideas, and essay to rival American enterprise. Still there is a distinct difference in appearance. Perhaps the difference in bearing, and in other characteristics, may be attributable to early education, but the first and most radical is surely that of blood.