Spaniards in Central America. In 1740, the American colonies were ordered by the British government to contribute each its quota to a grand expedition against the Spanish possessions in the West Indies. Each colony made its contribution promptly, and Pennsylvania, in the place of troops, voted a sum of money.

Fleet of a Hundred Vessels.

The expedition reached Jamaica in January, 1741, but instead of proceeding at once. to attack Havana, which was only three days distant, and the conquest of which would have made England supreme in the West Indies, the fleet was detained for over a month at Jamaica by the dissensions between Wentworth, the incompetent commander of the land forces, and Vernon, the admiral of the fleet. The expedition numbered over one hundred vessels, of which twenty-nine were ships of the line, and was manned with fifteen thousand sailors and twelve thousand troops, and supplied with every requisite for a successful siege. Havana might have been taken, and England have gained a hold upon the southern waters of America which could never have been wrested from her.

Instead of undertaking this important measure, the expedition attacked Carthagena, the strongest fortress in Spanish America. The Spaniards defended it with obstinancy and held the English in check until the besieging force, decimated by the ravages of the climate, was compelled to withdraw. The war continued through the next year, but England gained no advantage in the West Indies which could at all compensate her for her losses in the struggle.

In the autumn of 1739, upon the breaking out of the war, Oglethorpe was ordered to invade Florida, and attack St. Augustine.

He hastened to Charleston and urged upon the authorities of South Carolina, which formed a part of his military command, the necessity of acting with promptness and decision. He was granted supplies and a force of four hundred men, which, added to his own regiment, gave him a force of one thousand white troops. He was also furnished with a body of Indian warriors by the friendly tribes, and with his little army invaded Florida in the spring of 1741, and laid siege to St. Augustine. He found the garrison more numerous and the fortifications stronger than he had been led to believe. The Indians soon became disheartened and began to desert, and the troops from South Carolina, “ enfeebled by the heat, dispirited by sickness and fatigued by fruitless efforts, marched away in large bodies."

Spanish Settlers Protected.

He

The small naval force also became dissatisfied, and Oglethorpe, left with only his own regiment, was obliged to withdraw into Georgia after a siege of five weeks. During this campaign Oglethorpe made a few prisoners, whom he treated with kindness. prevented the Indians from maltreating the Spanish settlers, and, throughout the invasion, "endured more fatigues than any of his soldiers; and in spite of ill-health, he was at the head in every important action."

The invasion of Florida was a misfortune

for Georgia in every way. Not only were some of the inhabitants lost to the colony by death, and the industry of the province greatly interfered with by the calling off of the troops from their ordinary avocations, but a serious misfortune was sustained in the withdrawal of the Moravians from the province. Uncompromisingly opposed to war, they withdrew from Georgia in a body and settled in Pennsylvania, where they founded the towns of Bethlehem and Nazareth.

In the last year of the war, 1742, the Spaniards resolved to avenge the attack upon Florida by driving the English out of Georgia. A strong fleet with a considerable land force was sent from Cuba to St. Augustine, from which it proceeded to the mouth of the St. Mary's. Oglethorpe had constructed a strong work called Fort William, on the southern end of Cumberland Island, for the defence of this river. With no aid With no aid from Carolina, and with less than a thousand men, Oglethorpe was left to defend this position as well as he could. He posted his main force at Frederica, a small village on St. Simon's Island. The Spanish fleet attacked Fort William in June and succeeded in passing it and entering the harbor of St. Simon's. The troops were landed and arrangements were made for a combined attack upon Frederica.

Entrapped and Defeated. Oglethorpe now resolved to anticipate the attack of the enemy by a night assault upon their position, but as his forces were approaching the Spanish camp, under cover of darkness, one of his soldiers, a Frenchman, betrayed the movement by firing his gun, and escaping into the enemy's lines, where he gave the alarm. Oglethorpe, by a happy stratagem, now induced the enemy to withdraw, and drew upon the deserter the punishment he merited. He bribed a Spanish prisoner to carry a letter to the deserter, in which he addressed the Frenchman as a spy of the English, and urged him to use every effort to detain the Spaniards before Frederica for several days longer, until a fleet of six English ships of war, which had sailed from Charleston, could reach and destroy St. Augustine. The letter was delivered by the released prisoner to the Spanish commander, as Oglethorpe had known would be the case, and the deserter was placed in confinement.

Fortunately, at this moment, some vessels from South Carolina, laden with supplies for Oglethorpe, appeared in the offing. These the Spanish commander was confident were the ships on their way to attack St. Augustine. He determined to strike a vigorous blow at Frederica before sailing to the relief of his countrymen in Florida. On his march towards the English position he was ambus caded and defeated, with great loss, at a place since called "Bloody Marsh." The next night he embarked his forces and sailed for St. Augustine to defend it from the attack which had no existence save in the fertile brain of Oglethorpe, whose stratagem was thus entirely successful. On their withdrawal the Spaniards renewed their attempt to capture Fort William, but without success. The firmness and vigor of Oglethorpe had saved Georgia and Carolina from the ruin which the Spaniards, who had no intention of occupying the country, had designed for them.

Oglethorpe Acquitted.

Yet the founder and brave defender of Georgia was not to escape the experience of those who seek with disinterested zeal to serve their fellow-men. The disaffected settlers sent an agent to England to lodge complaints against him with the government. In July, 1743, having made sure of the tranquility and safety of the colony, Oglethorpe sailed for England to meet his accuser, and upon arriving in his native country demanded an investigation of his conduct in the land for which he had sacrificed so much.

The result of the inquiry was the triumphant acquittal of Oglethorpe and the punishment of his accuser for making false charges. Oglethorpe was promoted to the grade of major-general in the English army. He did not return to Georgia again, but he had the satisfaction of knowing that during

his ten years of sacrifice and toil in America he had successfully laid the foundations of a vigorous state and had placed it far beyond the possibility of failure, and that his name was honored and loved by the people for whom he had given his best efforts without any personal reward. He died at the age of ninety years. After the departure of Oglethorpe many improvements were made in the government of Georgia, which was changed from a military rule to a civil a civil establishment. The forms and customs of the English law were introduced and the usual magistrates appointed.

Human Cargoes from Africa. Slavery had been forbidden by the trustees, but the majority of the people were dissatisfied with this prohibition. The Germans and the Scotch were opposed to the introduction of slave labor, but the greater number of the English, many of whom had been reduced to poverty by their idleness and wastefulness, were of the opinion that the agricultural wealth of the colony could not be properly developed by white labor alone. "They were unwilling to labor, but were clamorous for privileges to which they had no right." They declared that the use of strong liquors was rendered absolutely necessary by the climate and demanded the repeal of the laws against their introduction. Negro slaves were hired from the Carolina planters at first for a few years, and finally for a term of one hundred years, which was a practical establishment of slavery in the colony.

Within seven years after Oglethorpe's departure slave-ships from Africa brought their cargoes direct to Savannah and sold them there. The scruples of the Germans were at length overcome. and they were

induced to believe that negroes might be led into the Christian fold by their proper treatment by Christian masters, and that in this way their change of country might result in benefit to them. "If you take slaves in faith," wrote their friends from Germany, "and with the intent of conducting them to Christ, the action will not be a sin, but may prove a benediction." Even the pious Whitefield took this view of the subject and urged the trustees to grant permission to the colonists to hold slaves, as indispensable to the prosperity of Georgia.

The trustees were so strongly urged to this step by all classes of the colony, and so overrun with complaints, that the twenty-one years of their guardianship having expired, they were glad to surrender their trust, which they did in 1752, and Georgia became a royal province. Privileges similar to those granted the other colonies were allowed it. The king appointed the governor and some of the other higher officials, and the assembly discharged the duties, and enjoyed the rights appertaining to similar bodies in the other provinces.

Georgia was always a favored colony. Among the most important privileges bestowed upon it was the right to import and hold negro slaves, which was conferred upon it by Parliament after a careful examination into the matter. After this the colony grew rapidly, and cotton and rice were largely cultivated. In 1752, at the time of the relinquishment of the colony to the crown, Georgia contained a population less than twenty-five hundred whites and about four hundred negroes. In 1775, at the outbreak of the Revolution, the popu lation numbered about seventy-five thousand souls, and its exports were valued at over half a million of dollars.

W

E have already spoken of the explorations of Samuel Champlain in Canada and in the northern part of New York. It is necessary now, in order to obtain a proper comprehension of the period at which we have arrived, to go back to the time of his discoveries and trace the efforts of France to extend her dominion over the great valley of the Mississippi. We have seen Champlain in one of his last expeditions accomjanying a war party of the Hurons and Algonquins against their inveterate enemies, the Iroquois or Five Nations. By his aid the former were enabled to defeat the Iroquois, and that great confederacy thus became the bitter and uncompromising enemies of the French nation. They cherished this hostility to the latest period of the dominion of France in Canada, and no effort of the French governors was ever able to overcome it.

The efforts of Champlain established the settlement of Canada upon a sure basis of success, and after his death settlers came over to Canada from France in considerable numbers. Quebec became an important place, and other settlements were founded. It was apparent from the first that the French colonies must occupy a very different footing

from those of England. The soil and the climate were both unfavorable to agriculture, and the French settlements were of necessity organized chiefly as trading-posts. The trade in furs was immensely valuable, and the French sought to secure the exclusive possession of it. To this end it was indispensable to secure the friendship of the Indians, especially of those tribes inhabiting the country to the north and west of the great lakes.

In 1634, three years before the death of Champlain, Louis XIII. granted a charter to a company of French nobles and merchants, bestowing upon them the entire region embraced in the valley of the St.. Lawrence, then known as New France. Richelieu and Champlain, who were members of this company, were wise enough to understand that their countrymen were not suited to the task of colonization, and that if France was to found an empire in the new world, it must be by civilizing and Chris tianizing the Indians and bringing them under the rule of her king, and not by seeking to people Canada with Frenchmen. From this time it became the policy of France to bring the savages under her sway. The efforts of the settlers in Canada were mainly devoted to trading with the Indians,

cultural state.

Champlain had conceived a sincere desire for the conversion of the savages to Christianity, and had employed several priests of the order of St. Francis as his companions, and these had gained sufficient success among the savages to give ground for the hope that the red men might yet be brought into the fold of Christ. Father Le Caron, one of this order, had penetrated far up the St. Lawrence, had explored the southern coast of Lake Ontario, and had even entered Lake Huron. He brought back tidings of thousands of the sons of the forest living in darkness and superstition, ignorant of the gospel, and dying "in the bondage of their sins." In France a sudden enthusiasm was awakened in behalf of the savages, and at court zeal for the conversion of the Indians became the sure road to distinction. Much of this was the result of genuine disinterested regard for the welfare of the red men, but much also was due to the conviction that by such a course the power of France would be most surely established in Canada.

Work of the Jesuits.

The missions were placed entirely in the hands of the Jesuits, an order well suited to the task demanded of it. It had been established by its founder for the express design of defeating the influences and the work of the Reformation, and its members were chosen with especial regard to their fitness for the duties required of them. They were to meet and refute the arguments by which the Reformers justified their withdrawal from the Roman church, to beat back the advancing wave of Protestantism, and bring all Christendom once more in humble submission to the feet of the Roman pontiff.

The Reformers had made a most successful use of education in winning men from Rome;

against the Protestants. They would no longer command absolute and unquestioning submission to their church; but would educate the people to accept the faith of Rome as the result of study and investigation; and in order that study and investigation should lead to this desired result, the control of these processes should be placed exclusively in the hands of the members of the Jesuit order, who should direct them as they deemed best. Such a task required a band of devoted men, carefully trained for their special work; and such an order the Jesuits became. Surrendering his conscience and will to the direction of his superiors, and sinking his personality in that of his order, the Jesuit became a mere intellectual machine in the hands of his superior.

ence.

A Solemn Oath.

Bound by a most solemn oath to obey without inquiry or hesitation the commands of the Pope, or the superiors of the order, the Jesuit holds himself in readiness to execute instantly, and to the best of his ability, any task imposed upon him. Neither fatigue, danger, hunger nor suffering was to stand in his way of perfect and unhesitating obediNo distance was to be considered an obstacle, and no lack of ordinary facilities of travel was to prevent him from attempting to reach the fields in which he was ordered to labor. The merit of obedience in his eyes atoned for every other short-coming; devotion to the church, the glory of making proselytes, made even suffering pleasure and death a triumph, if met in the discharge of duty.

Such an order was in every way qualified for the work of Christianizing the savages, and America offered the noblest field to which its energies had yet been invited. There, cut off from the ambitious schemes