Page:The Cambridge History of American Literature, v4.djvu/179

Early Louisiana 59i the nineteenth century was English the more generally employed. Under French rule the only literature produced consisted of official accounts like the journal of Penicault, or the Mem- oire des nSgociants et habitants de la Louisiane sur I'Svenement du 2g octobre, 1768, by Lafreniere et Caresse, of interest chiefly to historians. Under the Spaniards only a few pieces of any significance were written, and they uninspired, being altogether in the prevailing French mode. Julien Poydras, a wealthy planter, published at New Orleans in 1779 an epic poem on La Prise du Morne du Bdton-Rouge par Monseigneur de Galvez. Berquin Duvallon, a refugee from Santo Domingo, offered in 1 801 a Recueil de Poesies d'un Colon de Saint-Domingue, of which Le Colon Voyageur is the best specimen. It was not until after the War of 18 12 that letters really flourished in French Louisiana. The contentment and pro- sperity that filled the forty years between 1820 and i860 en- couraged the growth of a vigorous and in some respects a native literature, comprising plays, novels, and poems. The first drama written in Louisiana took a native theme. Poucha-Houmma was composed by Le Blanc de Villeneufve at the age of seventy-eight, being based upon an Indian story he had heard fifty years before while in the employ of the govern- ment among the Tchactas (Choctaws) . It is a tragedy in the familiar Alexandrines, and it observes the unities. It was written, says the author, to vindicate the noble character of the Indian. The manner is that of Corneille ; indeed, the play might well be called a Louisiana Cid. The old chief addresses his warriors thus : Augustes descendants- d'un peuple sans pareil, Tr^s illustres enfants des enfants du Soleil. The bept dramatist produced by Louisiana was Placide Canonge, who wrote between 1839 and i860. He was educated in New Orleans, and was a frequent visitor in Paris. He was a director of opera and a journalist of some note; he edited La Lorgnette, V Entr'acte, Courrier, V Impartial, Le Courrier Fran- gais, Le Sud, La Renaissance, L'Epoque, and L'Abeille, the last-named, founded in 1827, being the first French daily news-