Cavelier is known to have made a report to Seignelay; and his rough draft of this was recovered in 1854 by Parkman,[661] who calls it “confused and unsatisfactory in its statements, and all the latter part has been lost,” the fragment closing several weeks before the death of his brother.[662] The character of Beaujeu has certainly been put in a more favorable light by the publication of Margry, and the old belief in his treachery has been somewhat modified.[663] The Spanish account of the fate of the colony is translated from Barcia’s _Ensayo cronologico de la Florida_,[664] in Shea’s _Discovery of the Mississippi_;[665] and Margry[666] adds to our knowledge, as does Buckingham Smith in his _Coleccion_.[667] It remains now to speak of the Collections which have been formed, and the theories regarding these Western explorations which have been maintained, by M. Pierre Margry, who has occupied till within a few years the office of archivist of the Marine and Colonies in Paris, having been for a long period assistant and principal. Margry may be said to have discovered what that department contained in manuscripts relating to the explorations of the Mississippi Valley and River, particularly as regards La Salle’s agency. On more than one occasion he has done good service in helping to enrich the archives of New York[668] and Canada with copies of documents known to him,—so far, apparently, as they did not interfere with his own projects of publication. His position created relations for him with other departments of the French Government, and his eager discernment found an abundance of manuscript treasures even in private hands. These he assiduously gathered, and on a few occasions he published papers[669] which seemed to indicate more than he chose to disclose explicitly; for his fellow-students were not quite satisfied, and longed for the documents which had yielded so much. As the guardian of the public archives, he was by office the agent and servant of the public; but other investigators, it is feared, failed, through obstacles thrown in their way, to profit as they might by what that office contained. There is in the Sparks Collection of Manuscripts in Harvard College Library a volume of copies of such documents as could be found in the Paris Archives which that historian intended to use in another edition of his _Life of La Salle_. While Mr. Sparks was regretting that not a single document or letter in the hand of the great explorer had come down to us, enough to fill a large volume was immured in these Paris Archives. At a later day Mr. Parkman, in turn, failed of access to documents which were of the first importance to him, and he was obliged to make the best use he could of what it was possible to obtain. Environed by these disadvantages Mr. Parkman published, in 1869, his _Discovery of the Great West_. In his Preface, speaking of the obscurity which had enshrouded the whole subject, he referred to the “indefatigable research of M.