But it were as well to attempt to hold back the current of the river itself as the current of popular determination that flowed down with it from its great valley. As it came, so, by secret compact, the Spanish flag went--to be replaced not by the old Fleur-de-Lys, but by the Tricolor; the new and glorious banner of liberty, equality, and fraternity. It was easily made at home in a city whose republicanism under the pruning of Spanish rule had only rooted itself the more deeply. [Illustration: CANAL STREET, NEW ORLEANS.] [Illustration: THE CABILDO, OLD COURT BUILDING, JACKSON SQUARE.] For a short space, popular joy rioted in wild rejoicings. But it was only for a moment that the French flag fluttered over the _place d’armes_, a bare three weeks. Then it descended its staff and the American flag rose in its place. In the Casa Real, the seat of the Spanish Cabildo, the ceremony of the cession of Louisiana to the United States took place, the most important event, judged by results, that has taken place in the history of the Republic, enlarging the United States in domain by a territory three and a half times as great as its original size, raising it in political sovereignty to parity with the greatest European powers. The Spanish walls were demolished, but the American domination made slow impression upon the _vieu carré_. It has never really altered the type. There was, correctly speaking, no American domination in the _vieu carré_ until the term ceased to be used, when Louisiana was admitted as a State into the Union. [Illustration: ST. FRIES CATHEDRAL.] The memorable discussion in Congress over the admission of Louisiana need be recalled here only to introduce the next important event in her history,--the great and glorious victory of the Battle of New Orleans on the 8th of January, 1815. That victory was the vindication of Louisiana’s right to Statehood in the Union;--it was New Orleans’s dower gift to the Nation’s history. The American quarter, the new town, built by the flatboatmen outside the wall of the old town, is still called the American quarter by the old inhabitants. In architecture and physiognomy, in material prosperity and educational progress, it rightfully and justly represents the American domination. But for art, poetry, romance, sentiment, and inspiration the denizens of the new city flee into the old mother quarter as into a sanctuary, where in the quiet and gloom, it may be, of the past, they find refuge from the glare and incessant pursuit of activities of the present. It is the quarter that strangers love. Upon any one of the fine days of a New Orleans winter, a score or more of these visitors may be seen, strolling through the aisles of the Cathedral, or the halls of the old Cabildo, or sitting in the sun on the benches of Jackson Square watching the leisurely, picturesque procession of passers-by, as the soft bells of the Cathedral mark the no less leisurely procession of the hours.