[142] _Annual Cyclopedia_, 1869, 394. The _Bee_ dismissed it with the following terse comment: “Nous n’assomerons pas nos lecteurs de cette prose peu intéressante. Une analyse succincte suffira pour leur faire connaître ce que dit M. Warmoth.... Après avoir distillé son venin, le gouverneur aborde les affaires sérieuses.” Jan. 5. The _Abeille_ or _Bee_ had English pages at this time, a fact which accounts for both English and French excerpts. The _Crescent_ was no more kindly: “This portion of the message is strictly and narrowly partisan, a tissue of bold, unqualified assertions and of self-evident exaggerations which would be indecent even in a campaign document; a weak but spiteful jumble of accusatory phrases in which there is but a single pretense to an argument, and that so puerile and idiotic in its fallacy as to be simply ridiculous.” Jan. 5. “The Governor applies harsh terms to our people. He attributes to them all the violence which may have existed in the State. Does he really think that he himself and his associates have had nothing to do with this excitement? Have the publications made by Republican papers, speakers, and writers contributed nothing to these troubles?” New Orleans _Commercial Bulletin_, Jan. 7, 1869. [143] Session Laws, 1869, Nos. 23, 27, 31, 33, 34, 41, 64, etc. [144] House Deb., 1869, 196. [145] Session Laws, 1869, No. 60. [146] Case of Minden, House Deb., 29. [147] Session Laws, 1868, No. 87. [148] An excerpt from _St. Mary’s Banner_ of Sept. 15 corroborates the statement which is often made of the planter’s indifference to politics. “Never did planters of this country show such devotion to business, such singleness of purpose to make money, and such utter want of interest in all things save crops, as at the present time.” It is to be regretted that none of the regular parish papers were available, but we are fortunate enough to catch many reflections through the editorial bickering in the columns of the city papers, which give us fairly accurately the position and spirit and consequent influence in molding public thought of each. Members of Congress accommodatingly brought in many excerpts in the course of debate. We scarcely need the files of the Shreveport _Times_, thanks to the assiduity of Morton and the Radicals in quoting it. [149] “Every Southern State, save only Louisiana, is receiving accessions to her population from the tide of European immigration that daily strikes our shores.... The Bureau gives no sign. Then let it be abolished or let us have a change of personnel ... that which individual enterprise has accomplished for other States, this State-maintained institution has lamentably failed to do for us.” _Pic._, Dec. 19, 1870. [150] _Commercial Bulletin_, Feb. 8. [151] Session Laws, 1869, No. 38. [152] House Deb., 1869, 258-9.