Arnaud I de La Porte

Laffilard says that "...recognizing that his son had spirit and drive, his father Jean sent him to Paris, entrusting him to Pierre de Casamajor, a physician from his province, to teach him the ins and outs of government officialdom so as to be able to acquire a favourable position within it.

This was about as high as someone not born into a great noble house could hope rise, and doing so within such a short span of time and at thirty, (even with a powerful patron), is a testament to his talent and drive.

Patron and protégé became family on January 23, 1737, when in Versailles, at the age of twenty-one, Arnaud married Pellerin's daughter Marie-Anne.

As a result, the Ministry reversed its former policy of austerity and released a half-million livres between 1737 and 1741 for agricultural and industrial development in Canada.

Pierre Hazeur de L’Orme, representative of the chapter of Quebec at Paris, informed his brother, Joseph-Thierry Hazeur, at Quebec, of La Porte's mission, adding that everyone in Canada, “important or unimportant,” should pay court to Jean for “he could well one day come to hold a high position.” As Commissaire Enquêteur (Commissioner of the Marine acting as special investigator in Canada) he was empowered to audit all accounts, take depositions from all interested parties, hear complaints and accusations and generally to try to get to the bottom of the scandal, if there was indeed a scandal, for there was already, even before his dispatching, a suspicion that the charges of corruption imputed against Hocquart were in fact fabrications (or at least exaggerations) intended to discredit him, conjured up by his enemy and rival, Governor de Beauharnois.

None of his views on the colonial administration has survived, but the very absence of serious repercussions for Canadian officials following his return to France in 1741 suggests that he was reasonably satisfied.

Hocquart's fine opinion of the La Portes soon changed when it became apparent that Jean was using his recently acquired familiarity with the Canadian economy for private benefit.

Arnaud was a vigorous and involved figure at the central government with regard to New France, however as is evidenced by the rich correspondence between him and the Governors and Intendant who followed Hocquart.

Incompetent administration of the forge, then three successive years of bad harvests and finally the French declaration of war with England in 1744, which led to naval blockades that annihilated trade until 1748 brought it to an end.

This however did not stop Bigot during his dozen-year intendancy, with a small group of wealthy and powerful locals called the “Grande Compagnie”, from making a profit.

Many were the complaints filed against them from the outset, whether from jealous outsiders resentful of being excluded from the “take” or from more legitimate quarters, but the government made not the slightest move to investigate them.

Because the government badly needed a scapegoat, and because the enormous costs of the unsuccessful Seven Years' War, among other things, had brought it dangerously near bankruptcy, it was necessary to find him guilty, which the court duly did, simultaneously repudiating as “tainted” the Crown's over 18 million livres of debt to the colonists, many of whom thus found themselves now not only conquered but ruined as well.

Known to history as the “Affaire du Canada” this scandal, along with the government's listless reaction to the British conquest, went a long way towards permanently souring relations between the conquered colonists and the French back home.

Ferdinand was appointed bishop of Carcassonne by Napoleon and was granted the title of Baron by him, and finally Arnaud-Joseph became a Councillor of State under Louis XVIII.