The antagonism of races itself is a great difficulty in the way of amalgamation, even though both may belong to the same great division of the human family; but added to this the difference of language, laws, habits, and religion, it would almost seem impossible.  In the instance of Louisiana it has, so far, proved impossible.  Although the French have been American subjects for more than sixty years, and there now remain in life very few who witnessed the change, and notwithstanding this population has, so far as the government is concerned, become thoroughly Americanized, still they remain to a very great extent a distinct people.  Even in New Orleans they have the French part and the American part of the city, and do not, to any very great degree, extend their union by living among each other.  Kind feelings exist between the populations, and the prejudices which have so effectually kept them apart for so long a time are giving way rapidly now, since most of the younger portion of the Creole-French population are educated in the United States, and away from New Orleans; consequently they speak the English language and form American associations, imbibe American ideas, and essay to rival American enterprise.  Still there is a distinct difference in appearance.  Perhaps the difference in bearing, and in other characteristics, may be attributable to early education, but the first and most radical is surely that of blood.

The settlements upon the Red and Washita Rivers did not augment the French population in the country; it has declined, but more signally upon the latter than the former river.  There remain but few families there of the ancient population, and these are now so completely Americanized as scarcely to be distinguishable.  The descendants of the Marquis de Breard, in one or two families, are there, but all who located on the Bayou Des Arc (and here was the principal settlement), with perhaps one family only, are gone, and the stranger is in their homes.

The French character seems to want that fixity of purpose, that self-denial, and steady perseverance, which is so necessary to those who would colonize and subdue a new and inhospitable country.  The elevated civilization of the French has long accustomed them to the refinements and luxuries of life; it has entered into and become a part of their natures, and they cannot do violence to this in a sufficient degree to encounter the wilderness and all its privations, or to create from this wilderness those luxuries, and be content in their enjoyment for all the hardships endured in procuring them:  they shrink away from these, and prefer the inconveniences and privations of a crowded community with its enjoyments, even in poverty, to the rough and trying troubles which surround and distress the pioneer, who pierces the forest and makes him a home, which, at least, promises all the comforts of wealth and independence to his posterity.  He rather prefers to take care that he enjoys as he desires the present, and leaves posterity to do as they prefer.  Yet there are many instances of great daring and high enterprise in the French Creole:  these are the exceptions, not the rule.