a, on pain of confiscation.

The coin in circulation was nearly all Spanish, and in less than two
years the Company, by a series of decrees, made changes of about eighty
per cent in its value. Freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, of
trade, and of action, were alike denied. Hence voluntary immigration was
not to be expected; "but," says the Duc de Saint-Simon, "the government
wished to establish effective settlements in these vast countries, after
the example of the English; and therefore, in order to people them,
vagabonds and beggars, male and female, including many women of the
town, were seized for the purpose both in Paris and throughout
France."[311] Saint-Simon approves these proceedings in themselves, as
tending at once to purge France and people Louisiana, but thinks the
business was managed in a way to cause needless exasperation among the
lower classes.

In 1720 it was ordered by royal edict that no more vagabonds or
criminals should be sent to Louisiana. The edict, it seems, touched only
one sex, for in the next year eighty girls were sent to the colony from
the Parisian House of Correction called the Salpetriere. There had been
a more or less constant demand for wives, as appears by letters still
preserved in the archives of Paris, the following extract from one of
which is remarkable for the freedom with which the writer, a M. de
Chassin, takes it upon him to address a minister of State in a court
where punctilio reigned supreme. "You see, Monseigneur, that nothing is
wanting now to make a solid settlement in Louisiana but a certain piece
of furniture which one often repents having got, and with which I shall
dispense, like the rest, till the Company sends us girls who have at
least some show of virtue. If there happens to be any young woman of
your acquaintance who wants to make the voyage for love of me, I should
be much obliged to her, and would do my best to show her my
gratitude."[312]

The Company, which was invested with sovereign powers, began its work by
sending to Louisiana three companies of soldiers and sixty-nine
colonists. Its wisest act was the removal of the governor, L'Epinay, who
had supplanted La Mothe-Cadillac, and the reappointment of Bienville in
his place. Bienville immediately sought out a spot for establishing a
permanent station on the Mississippi. Fifty men were sent to clear the
ground, and in spite of an inundation which overflowed it for a time,
the feeble foundations o