o,
while Marquis de Casa Calvo from the balcony absolved the people in
Place d'Armes below from their allegiance to his master, the King of
Spain.

For the brief term of twenty days Louisiana was again a province of
France. Within that time Laussat bestirred himself to gallicize
the colony, so far as forms could do so. He replaced the cabildo or
hereditary council by a municipal council; he restored the civil code;
he appointed French officers to civil and military posts. And all
this he did in the full consciousness that American commissioners were
already on their way to receive from him in turn the province which his
wayward master had sold. On December 20, 1803, young William Claiborne,
Governor of the Mississippi Territory, and General James Wilkinson, with
a few companies of soldiers, entered and received from Laussat the keys
of the city and the formal surrender of Lower Louisiana. On the Place
d'Armes, promptly at noon, the tricolor was hauled down and the American
Stars and Stripes took its place. Louisiana had been transferred for the
sixth and last time. But what were the metes and bounds of this
province which had been so often bought and sold? What had Laussat been
instructed to take and give? What, in short, was Louisiana?

The elation which Livingston and Monroe felt at acquiring unexpectedly
a vast territory beyond the Mississippi soon gave way to a disquieting
reflection. They had been instructed to offer ten million dollars for
New Orleans and the Floridas: they had pledged fifteen millions for
Louisiana without the Floridas. And they knew that it was precisely West
Florida, with the eastern bank of the Mississippi and the Gulf littoral,
that was most ardently desired by their countrymen of the West. But
might not Louisiana include West Florida? Had Talleyrand not professed
ignorance of the eastern boundary? And had he not intimated that
the Americans would make the most of their bargain? Within a month
Livingston had convinced himself that the United States could rightfully
claim West Florida to the Perdido River, and he soon won over Monroe to
his way of thinking. They then reported to Madison that "on a thorough
examination of the subject" they were persuaded that they had purchased
West Florida as a part of Louisiana.

By what process of reasoning had Livingston and Monroe reached this
satisfying conclusion? Their argument proceeded from carefully chosen
premises. France, it was said, had once h