to within seven hundred miles of its mouth, thus demonstrating that the great river emptied its waters into the Gulf of Mexico and not into the "Vermillion Sea," as the Pacific was then called.

33. La Salle and the Extension of New France.-Ten years later, La Salle pushed down the great river, and took possession in the name of France of that vast territory, one-half of which was later to be surrendered to the English; the other half, to be sold to the republic of the United States in 1803, for fifteen millions of dollars. "La Salle stands in history like a statue cast in iron." At first a Jesuit, he renounced his connection with that society, and, in behalf of France, began his interminable voyages of exploration. He traversed a stretch of country from the Great Lakes on the north to the Ohio River on the south; and from the portage of Chicago to the mouth of the Mississippi. He is said to have traveled twenty thousand miles in the interior of the continent, most of the distance on foot or in an Indian bark canoe. He built the first ship that ever sailed the waters of the lakes above Niagara. He is truly entitled to the distinction, The Discoverer of the Great West. To him, more than any other man, was the mother country indebted for the expansion of New France.

It is sad to relate that after this crowning act of his life, he repaired to France only to be enlisted in an enterprise which led to his death by assassination. Spain patrolled the Gulf of Mexico, by her warships forbidding any nation to enter the ports of the West Indies or of Mexico unless by her permission. La Salle, however, on his way over from France succeeding in deceiving the Spanish at Santo Domingo, planted a French colony on the coast of Texas. This colony did not flourish on account of Indian foes without and wicked plottings within. La Salle had concluded to abandon the colony and lead his followers back to France through the Canadian settlement of Quebec. He, however, was assassinated on the eve of his departure. "Thus died," says

Parkman, "in ignominy and darkness the last embers of the doomed colony of La Salle."

THE DUTCH

34. Holland was also a seafaring nation, and yet she, like Portugal, failed to profit much by discoveries in the New World. On the single voyage of Henry Hudson in 1609 she based her claim. He entered the beautiful river, to which he gave his name, and the Dutch were thus enabled rightfully to claim one of the richest sections of the New World. They made their claim good in 1613, by permanent settlement on the present site of New York City.

THE ENGLISH

35. England. We now come to the nation which was later to have such a vast influence upon the North American

continent. When Henry'

At

VII. of England turned
a deaf ear to the appeal
of Columbus, he lost an
opportunity which in all
probability he did not
cease regretting to the
day of his death.
that time, the English
navigators and sailors
were worthy competitors
with those of Spain and
Portugal, and, after the
discovery of Columbus,
they were imbued with
a desire to penetrate the
sea of darkness and share
in the discoveries of the

mysterious land beyond the Atlantic. While Portugal strove for a southeast passage and Spain for a western, English

and French sailors set their faces toward the northwest. They believed, and rightly, that if there were an open passage, the route by the northwest would be shorter than the routes chosen by either Spain or Portugal. For the first voyage to the New World under the flag of England we are indebted to this belief.

36. The Cabots Establish the Claim of England—1497, 1498. John Cabot and Sebastian his son were Genoese sailors in the employ of England. Under the direction of the king of their adopted country, they made a voyage to the New World, touching at some point on the Labrador coast. They sailed southward for a distance of some three hundred miles and landing at a point not now known, planted a cross and the flag of England, and, after three months, returned to the harbor of Bristol from which they had sailed. Thus to John Cabot and to England is due the first discovery of the North American continent. He had touched Labrador fourteen months before Columbus saw the mainland at the mouth of the Orinoco River. By this early and remarkable voyage of the Cabots England was able to establish her claim to nearly the whole of North America. However, on the death of Henry VII., his successors, out of respect for the papal decree, did nothing to further the claims made good by these early voyagers. Busy with affairs at home, the English allowed three-quarters of a century to elapse before they again appeared in the western world.

37. England under Queen Elizabeth.-Queen Elizabeth was keenly alive to the interests of her people, and under her, England rapidly rose in power. In commerce she dared to compete Iwith all the other countries of the world. She became the antagonist of Spain and the great champion of Protestantism in Europe. She "strengthened her navy, filled her arsenals, and encouraged the building of ships in England.” The spirit of English nationality was developed in her reign. She encouraged adventure and discovery in Africa and Russia,