MEETING OF FEBRUARY, 1916. The Louisiana Historical Society held its regular meeting on Wednesday evening, February 6, at the Cabildo. All the officers were present. The minutes of the previous meeting were read by Miss King and approved by the Society. Miss King then begged the attention of the Society for a few minutes while she read the report of Mr. William Price, the archivist, as to the work he had accomplished in the card indexing of the historical documents contained in the "black boxes," as they are familiarly designated, confided by the State to the custody of the Society. The report, an able and comprehensive paper, was listened to with the extreme interest that its importance demanded. At its close an informal discussion took place among the officers of the Society, in which the discontinuance of this splendid work for want of funds was deplored, and the hope was expressed by all that the Society would not supinely submit to circumstances in so grave a matter, but make an effort to overcome them and pursue this interrupted task, which seemed almost a sacred one and is, beyond doubt, an imperative duty. Mr. T. P. Thompson registered himself as unequivocally in favor of devoting the funds of the Society to such historical work, rather than expending them on banquets, celebrations and monumental schemes that appealed, it is true, to popular taste, but did not further the object for which the Society was founded. His words were impressive and produced a marked effect on the members. Mr. Dymond proposed that the matter be put into the hands of the Archives Committee, and that the report read by Miss King should be printed in the forthcoming volume of the Society: The proposition was embodied in a resolution which was voted upon and unanimously carried.† Mr. Cusachs in a few happy words presented the essayist of the evening, the Rev. Father O'Brien, as a member of the Order of Jesuits, which had contributed so nobly and heroically to the history of his country, particularly that of Louisiana. Note.-Published in the Annual for 1916. Father O'Brien's paper covered the history of the founding of the Jesuit College in the Parish of St. Landry. It was replete with interesting local details and character color, and will serve as a valued reference to the future students of the early history and educational progress of the State. The Society testified its appreciation by a vote of thanks. Mr. Cusachs then presented to the Society an old silk flag of a Louisiana regiment. It had come into the possession of and was presented to the Society by Mr. Ed. Curtis, the once wellknown auctioneer of this city, who was now living and doing business in San Francisco. The flag was gratefully accepted as a precious relic. Mr. W. O. Hart, an indefatigable collector of historical documents and souvenirs, presented to the Museum, in the name of Mr. H. Duvalle, a quaint reminder of a well-remembered episode in the city's past. This was a printed cotton handkerchief fabricated as a souvenir of the famous Sullivan-Fitzsimmons prize fight, whose prevention in New Orleans almost caused a revolution in judicial and political circles. It was eventually held on the lake shore in Mississippi. Mr. Duvalle also donated an old flag of the Continentl Guards, a more pleasing souvenir of the city's past, which was gratefully accepted by the Society. Mr. Hart read an excerpt from the Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, describing the banquet given in Ghent by the civic notabilities in honor of the termination of the Treaty of Ghent, on February 7, 1716, by the English and American Commission, the treaty that has insured peace between the two great Englishspeaking nations until this day. Mr. Hart brought also for the consideration of the Society a copy of the Times-Picayune reprinting the account of the opening of the St. Charles Hotel in New Orleans sixty-three years ago. As the hour was late, he waived the reading of it. After the election of new members the meeting was adjourned. SKETCH OF THE EXPULSION OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS FROM COLONIAL LOUISIANA Paper read before the Louisiana Historical Society, July 21, 1915 Before coming to the subject of this paper it will be necessary to make a brief survey of the work of the Jesuits in the ancient colony of Louisiana. Some historians take for granted that the Jesuits came to the southern portion of the colony only in 1726. This is far from correct, as it is an incontrovertible fact that in 1700 the Jesuit priest, Father Paul du Rhu, accompanied Iberville on the latter's second voyage to the colony and that this same priest labored first at Biloxi (Ocean Springs), and afterward at Mobile. In 1702 Father Peter Donge, S. J., was sent to Mobile to assist Father du Rhu; and Father Joseph de Limoges, S. J., was at this period doing missionary work among the Houmas Indians, who dwelt on the east bank of the Mississippi about seven leagues above the Red River. At the end of the year 1703 the work of these three Jesuit fathers in lower Louisiana came to an abrupt close. This was brought about by the injudicious desire of the priests of the Seminary of Quebec to have an establishment at the small settlement of Mobile. In order to prevent any friction arising from the presence of two sets of missionaries in the same district, the Jesuit superiors decided to vacate the lower Louisiana field and, accordingly, recalled their subjects to France. Three years after the founding of New Orleans (1718), the Jesuit Father, Pierre François X. Charlevoix was sent by royal authority to investigate and report on the general condition, temporal and spiritual, of the Colony of Louisiana. On his return to France and, apparently because of his report, the civil government of Louisiana was cut off from that of Canada, with which it had hitherto been united. The Company of the West, by an ordinance of May 16, 1722 (professedly approved by Bishop St. Vallier of Quebec, under whose spiritual jurisdiction Louisiana was), divided the Colony of Louisiana into three districts. New Orleans and west of the Mississippi went to the Capuchians; the Illinois country, or upper Louisiana, to the Jesuits, and the Mobile district to the Carmelites. Each religious order was given parish rights only within its own district; nor could the priests of one order perform any ecclesiastical functions within the territory allotted to the others without their sanction. The headquarters of the Capuchin territory were to be at New Orleans, those of the Carmelites at Mobile, and the Jesuits at Kaskaskia, where Father Joseph Kereben, S. J., was superior. This arrangement of districts did not last long, for the Carmelites were unable to supply subjects for the Mobile territory, which was accordingly handed over to the Capuchins, while the care of all the Indian missions in Louisiana was given over to the Jesuits. On the 20th of February, 1726, a new agreement, by which that of 1722 was annulled, was made between the Society of Jesus and the Company of the West, and received the King's approbation on the 17th of August of that year. In 1725 Father Kereben, S. J., was succeeded as Superior of the Jesuits of Louisiana Territory by Father Nicolas Ignatius de Beaubois, S. J., who very soon after his appointment to office visited New Orleans and, toward the close of the year 1725, sailed for France. Before leaving for Europe he selected a temporary residence in New Orleans, for he was already made aware that the Company of the West wished the Jesuits to take up a permanent abode in New Orleans. The site of the temporary residence was on the southeast corner of Bienville and Chartres streets and is so marked in a reliable map dated 1728. The new agreement between the Company of the West and the Society of Jesus, to which Father de Beaubois was a party, had many features, of which the following, according to Martin, are the chief. The Company of the West agreed to bring Jesuit priests and lay brothers on the following conditions: Each priest was to receive a salary of 600 livres ($133.35), with an additional 200 livres for each of the first five years, and 450 livres for his outfit. A chapel or church was to be erected at the expense of the Company for the Jesuits at each mission station attended to by them in the colony. Lay brothers were to have their passage paid, receive a bounty of 150 livres ($33.35), but no salary. By another clause it was agreed that the Jesuits on their arrival at New Orleans were to receive a grant of land of 3600 feet frontage on the river and with a depth of 9600 feet; they were, moreover, to enjoy the privilege of purchasing slaves on the same terms as the colonists. The Jesuits on their side bound themselves to keep constantly at least fourteen members of their Order in the colony, namely, a pastor and missionary at Kaskaskia (Illinois); a missionary in the village of the Brochigomas [?]; a chaplain and missionary at the Wabash Fort; a missionary at the Arkansas Post; a chaplain and missionary at Fort St. Peter among the Yazoos (Mississippi); another missionary at the same place, whose duty it would be to penetrate into the country of the Chicasaws so as to convert them to the true faith and promote union and friendship between them and the French; two missionaries were to be sent to the Alibamon Post, one of whom was to devote himself especially to the conversion of the Choctaws. The Superior of the Jesuits in the Colony of Louisiana was to reside in New Orleans, but was not to perform any parish duties there without the sanction of the Capuchin superior, who, with the priests of his Order, alone possessed parish rights there. The Company agreed to furnish the Jesuit superior with a chapel, vestry room, etc., a house and lot for his accommodation, that of a companion priest, and the temporary use of such priests of the Order as might arrive in the colony through the port of New Orleans. Besides the successful arrangement of the contract between. the Western Company and the Society of Jesus, Father de Beaubois' visit to France had two other successful results, namely, that of securing six Jesuit priests as an earnest of more in the near future, and a colony of Ursuline Nuns for the foundation of a Monastery of Ursulines in Louisiana. In the spring of 1727, Father de Beaubois, accompanied by his six fellow priests, was back in New Orleans and, with the spirit of zeal that characterized him, immediately set about establishing the plantation. The grant of land given in the contract with the Western Company was situated on the west bank of the Mississippi about four and a half miles above the town limits (opposite the present Audubon Park) [?]. This situation was undesirable, as it was too remote from the town and would necessitate extra expense in the |