enterprising and accomplished fellow-townsman," and all that. But old M.
D'Hemecourt's name is cut in marble, and his citizenship is in "a city
whose maker and builder is God."

Only yesterday I dined with the Shaughnessys--fine old couple and
handsome. Their children sat about them and entertained me most
pleasantly. But there isn't one can tell a tale as their father
can--'twas he told me this one, though here and there my enthusiasm may
have taken liberties. He knows the history of every old house in the
French Quarter; or, if he happens not to know a true one, he can make
one up as he goes along.




BELLES DEMOISELLES PLANTATION.


The original grantee was Count----, assume the name to be De Charleu;
the old Creoles never forgive a public mention. He was the French king's
commissary. One day, called to France to explain the lucky accident of
the commissariat having burned down with his account-books inside, he
left his wife, a Choctaw Comptesse, behind.

Arrived at court, his excuses were accepted, and that tract granted him
where afterwards stood Belles Demoiselles Plantation. A man cannot
remember every thing! In a fit of forgetfulness he married a French
gentlewoman, rich and beautiful, and "brought her out." However, "All's
well that ends well;" a famine had been in the colony, and the Choctaw
Comptesse had starved, leaving nought but a half-caste orphan family