This discovery marked the close of the fifteenth century. The next century in the New World was Spain's. The story of her conquests is a tale of heroic endeavor, marred by revolting ferocity. The details, as an old Spanish chronicler said, are "all horrid transactions, nothing pleasant in any of them." Not till twenty years after the discovery did the Spaniards advance to the mainland for settlement; but, once begun, her handfuls of adventurers swooped swiftly north and south. By 1550, she held not only all COLUMBUS AT THE COURT OF FERDINAND AND ISABELLA. From the painting by Brozik in the Metropolitan Museum in New York City. South America (save Portugal's Brazil), but also all Central America, Mexico, the Californias far up the Pacific coast, and the Floridas. The gold from Mexico and Peru helped to give Spain her proud place as the most powerful country in Europe through most of the sixteenth century; and she guarded her American possessions jealously. The Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean were Spanish lakes, and the whole Pacific was a "closed sea.' "closed sea." Frenchman or Englishman, caught upon those waters, was given a grave beneath them. 66 FRANCE IN AMERICA 66 9 Nor was Spain content with even this huge empire on land and sea. She planned grandly to occupy the Mississippi valley and the Appalachian slope in America, and Spain's to seize Holland and England in Europe. But, in failure 1588, she received a fatal check when the gallant English sea dogs" destroyed her " Invincible Armada" in that wonderful nine-days sea fight. That victory did more than merely save England: it marked a turning point in World history. Spain never recovered her old supremacy upon the sea, and so other European peoples were left free to try their fortunes in America. For a time France seemed most likely to succeed Spain as mistress of North America. A quarter of a century went to exploration and failures. Then, in 1608, France in Champlain founded a French colony at Quebec. America Soon, canoe fleets of traders and missionaries were coasting the shores of the Great Lakes and establishing French stations there at points still known by French names. Finally, in 1682, after years of splendid effort, La Salle succeeded in following the Mississippi to the Gulf, setting up a French claim to the entire valley. In later years New France consisted of the colony on the St. Lawrence, in the far north, and the semi-tropical colony of New Orleans, joined to each other, along the interior waterways, by a slight chain of trading posts and military stations - Detroit, Sault Ste. Marie, Vincennes, Kaskaskia, St. Louis, and the like. From the beginning of this colonization, it was plain that France and England were the real rivals for the control of eastern North America. The open struggle France and between them began in 1689, and lasted some England the seventy years in a series of wars, until France rivals for was thrust out of the continent in 1763. America At It is easy to point out certain French advantages. home French statesmen worked steadily to build a French empire in America, while the English government French adignored English colonies. The thought of such an vantages empire, too, inspired French explorers in the wilderness, splendid patriots like Champlain, Ribault, and La Salle. France also sent forth the most zealous of missionaries, like the heroic Marquette, to convert the savages. These two mighty motives, patriotism and missionary zeal, played a greater part in founding New France than in establishing either Spanish or English colonies. Moreover, the French could deal with the natives better than the less sympathetic English could, and their leaders were men of far-reaching views. CHAMPLAIN'S FIGHT WITH THE IROQUOIS, on the shores of Lake Champlain. From Les Voyages du Sieur de Champlain (Paris, 1613), the volume in which this lake is first given Champlain's name. Why, then, did France fail? The Iroquois French The chief external cause was the relentless hatred of the Iroquois. Curiously enough, it was the ability of the French to make friends with the natives, which brought and the upon them this terrible scourge. Champlain came first in touch with Algonkin tribes, and won their friendship. He accompanied these allies on the warpath against the Iroquois, and so made the Iroquois foes to New France. (1) The Iroquois annihilated the Huron Indians, whom French missionaries, after many heroic martyrdoms, had christianized, and upon whom the French had hoped to |