VIEWS OF LOUISIANA- 
132 
CHAPTER VI. 
HISTORICAL CHARACTER OF THE ANCIENT INHABITANTS-— 
CHANGE OF GOVERNMENT. 
THERE is scarcely any thing more difficult, and consequent¬ 
ly more rare, than correct delineation of character This task 
is usually undertaken by friends or enemies, and the result is 
cither panegyrick or satire.-—Even amongst such as are unbi¬ 
assed, how few the happy copyists, who can paint nature with 
her own colors, so as tp be repognized by every beholder ! 
(Conscious of this difficulty, I entertain hpmble hopes of sue* 
cess? in being able to satisfy the expectation and inquiries of the 
intelligent reader. And, particularly where there are no strike 
ing and prominent features, bqt the traits of an infant colony de¬ 
licately marked. 
A colony will not remain long separated from the parent 
stock, untif it exhibits a peculiar and distinct character. Climate, 
situation, and country, although not exclusively the agents in 
forming this character, must nevertheless, be admitted to have 
great influence. Nqr do the manners of the parent country con¬ 
tinue invariable j other tjines, other men, other circumstances, 
produce the most surprising changes, while the coiony, beyond 
the sphere of their influence, retains its pristine customs and 
manners. The Spaniards of Mexico, are said to bear a stronger 
resemblance to their ancestors of the fifteenth century, than to 
their present brethren of Old Spain:—The French inhabitants of 
the Mississippi, have little resemblance to the gay, and perhaps 
frivolous, Frenchmen of Louis the fifteenth and sixteenth, and 
still less^to those who have felt the racking storm of the revo¬ 
lution. 
To thp country on both sides of the Mississippi, the general 
name, Les Jllinoiop , was giyen. It was inhabited by a powerful 
Indian nation of that name, at present reduced to a handful of 
miserable creatures. After the discovery of the Mississippi, by 
Mons. Joliet and the priest Marquette, from Canada, a num¬ 
ber of Canadian traders, about the year 1680. settled in Kas- 
kaskia, a large Indian town. By degrees, a number of families 
were induced to quit Canada, for a country represented as much 
