the most competent. The talk waxed warm, the air was made lurid by the strong words used-it all became intensely personal, and something was uttered about an early morning meeting, but friends intervened. Years afterward a teacher who had grown old in the community in which he taught in his young years-it was in Southwest Louisianarelated to me with Gallic good humor, that he and the other teacher (his friend) over whom the quarrel arose, had come near causing a duel— une affaire serieuse-because of difference of opinion in regard to their ability as teachers. In time all this changed. Gradually the private schools were closed and were succeeded by the public schools. This change became noticeable in the fifties.

In our day the schools have greatly improved, but there is room for further improvement. Schools lay the foundations of society. They contribute to the building up of communities. There should be true and good work in this direction as well as in others. For work is the panacea for all the ills of society. The reward of work is great; it gives knowledge, strength, peace; it widens the range of reason. The young, the old, the strong, the rich, the poor, all must work, for it makes men like the Almighty whose work never ceases. Efficient work in all places is the goal to which all are invited. New Orleans, November, 1914.

(By P. M. Milner.)

Fort Macomb is situated at the confluence of the River Chef Menteur and Bayou Gentilly, or Sauvage, about 21.8 miles from Canal and Carondelet streets. It is not on government land. In fact, the fort was erected and completed fourteen years before the United States Government took possession of the land to form a Military Reservation.

A brief history of the tract of land known as "Chef Menteur Plantation" is interesting.

By patent dated at New Orleans, Louisiana, March 10,1763, Louis de Kerlerec, Knight of the Royal and Military Order of St. Louis, Captain of the King's vessels, Governor of the Province of Louisiana, and Dennis Nicholas Foucault, acting as ordering commissioner in said colony, considering the petition and by virtue of the powers vested in them by his Majesty, granted unto Sieur Maxent "the land asked by him at the place called Chantilly, starting from the boundary corner of the thirty arpents at said place, which we have granted the 9th instant to the Sieur Dufossat up to the point called Chef Menteur."

In those good old days our ships were of wood, and hence we find in this interesting document the reservation to the King of all necessary timber for the building and repairs of ships. This custom of reserving the timber on public land for ships was followed by our own government, and in the early land titles of this section of the country, we find section reservations of oak forests.

This land passed from the succession of Gilbert de Saint Maxent to Don Luis Declouet, at a public auction December 14, 1796, per process verbal deposited in the archives of the City Council of this city. It was described as "the plantation and land commonly called Chef Menteur."

Don Bartholome Lafon purchased the property from Don Luis Declouet, Lieutenant of Regiment, by Act signed

in the city of New Orleans, the 7th of January, 1801, attested by Antonio Pedro Pedesclaux, Notary Public. This property, known as Claim No. 316, was confirmed to Lafon by the United States Government. (Volume 2, page 325, Public Lands, Surveyor General's office, Louisiana).

After the death of Bartholome Lafon, the property was divided into forty-four lots, according to a plat, and sold, reserving sixty feet for a public road on the side of Bayou Sauvage. In this sale there is a curious reference, as follows:

"There is on the plantation a house built of cypress wood-three cabins, with posts in the ground fenced in and covered with boards."

What a grapic picture of desolation and primitiveness such a recitation, now 150 years later, brings to the mind, and how valuable were these primitive structures.

These forty-four lots were sold to different persons, and I am informed that it took Antoine Michaud, who had acquired part of the property, twenty years to purchase all the various lots, finally getting the entire tract in his name.

Only recently, on the 2nd day of May, 1910, this property was sold to a corporation, formed principally of Chicago capitalists, and known as the New Orleans Drainage Company, for a cash consideration of $400,000. A great reclamation project was unfolded and the property bonded to the extent of $2,500,000. The interest on these bonds was not paid and within the last few months the mortgage was foreclosed, and the property will very shortly change hands again.

The designation of this tract of land as Chef Menteur is also very interesting historically, and apparently little known. Gayarre, in his History of Louisiana, Volume 4, page 351, connects the name Chef Menteur with the famous Choctaw tribe. He says: "What the Choctaws were most conspicuous for was their hatred of falsehoods and their love of truth. Tradition relates that one of their Chiefs became so addicted to the vice of lying that in disgust they drove him away from their territory. In the now Parish

of Orleans, back of Gentilly, there is a tract of land, in the shape of an isthmus projecting itself into Lake Pontchartrain, not far from the Rigolets, and terminating in what is called Pointe-aux-Herbs, or Herb Point. It was there that the exiled Choctaw Chief retired with his family and a few adherents near a Bayou which discharges itself into the Lake. From that circumstance the tract of land received and still retains the appellation of Chef Menteur, or "Lying Chief."

In those old days, this point was considered of sufficient importance to justify the erection of a battery, and we find that Gayarre in his History, Volume 4, page 384, says:

"At the confluence of Bayou Chef Menteur and Bayou Sauvage or Gentilly, General Jackson caused a battery to be erected."

This was evidently just prior to the battle of New Orleans. In the same volume, page 404, he speaks of General Jackson's instructions for the defense of the city: He immediately ordered the battalion of men of color commanded by Major Lacoste, who must not be supposed to be of African descent, but who was an influential planter of Caucasian blood, to take post with the dragoons of Felicians and two pieces of artillery, at the confluence of Bayou Sauvage or Gentilly and Bayou Chef Menteur, in order to cover the road to the city on that side.

On a map made by Major A. Lacarrierre Latour, late Principal Engineer of the 7th Military District, United States Army, showing the seat of War in Louisiana and West Florida and all fortified points, he places a battery at the junction of Gentilly and Chef Menteur. In Latour's Memoirs, page 203, reference is made to General Jackson's order to "continue the construction of the redoubts begun on the river Chef Menteur at the confluence of Bayou Sauvage," and the statement is made that the number of troops encamped on Lafon's plantation had been augmented with Colonel Nelson's regiment of volunteers from the Mississippi territory 450 strong.

And this reference to Lafon's plantation calls to mind the

picturesque, even beautiful old brick chimney, a hundred feet from the public road, a few miles this side of Michaud Station, which still stands erect, unmarked by the ravages of fire and time, a magnificent example of splendid masonry, square at its middle and base and round in its upper part, relic of a once fine sugar house that overlooked beautiful fields of cane-a hundred years ago.

It was not strange, therefore, that our government, when it began to fortify New Orleans, according to the needs of those old lays, thought this point a desirable point for the erection of a Fort.

Fort Macomb doubtless derived its name from Alex Macomb, Major General Chief Engineer United States Army.

We find a reference to it in American State Papers, Volume 3, page 137, in the report of this Engineer for the year ending 30th of September, 1825, as follows:

"At Chef Menteur the progress of the operations has been much obstructed by the unusual quantity of rain which fell during the year; yet the means of the contractors have been so ample and well organized as to have enabled them to overcome every difficulty, and, by the quantity of work executed, to have absorbed nearly the whole appropriation on the 30th of September."

It appears that construction was begun in 1820.

The cost of the work up to September 30, 1825, had been $253,548.94, and it was estimated to complete the work it would cost an additional $117,270.01.

We find in a report of November 18, 1826,American State Papers, Volume 3, page 359, "that the Fort might be completed next year." A report of Major General Edmund P. Gaines on "Fortifications" up to April, 1827, states that the Fort of Chef Menteur is so nearly completed as to be ready to receive its armament complete at the close of the present working season, or, if necessary, within a week from the time of inspection. And by a report of the Engineer found in Volume 4, American State Papers, page 18, dated November 19, 1828, we read: