but the early settlers suffered so many misfortunes, that the country was several times on the point of being abandoned. It began, however, to prosper after the foundation of Quebec, by Champlain (A. D. 1608), and the formation of a new colony at Montreal. The contests of the French with the Iroquois and the Hurons were less perilous thar. those of the New Englanders with the Pequods and Narragansets, but they were less ably conducted, and more injurious to the prosperity of the colony.

At a much later period, the French colonized Louisiana (A. D. 1686), with the hope of securing the fertile countries watered by the Misissip pi. The settlement was more valued by the government than Canada, because it was supposed to contain mines of gold, and for the same reason possession of it was equally coveted by the English and the Spaniards. Having two colonies, one at the northern and one at the southern extremity of the British settlements, the French government prepared to connect them by a chain of forts which would have completely hemmed in the English. A furious war ensued between the two nations in the back woods, which ended in the complete overthrow of the French. Canada and Louisiana were ceded to England by the peace of 1763; but the latter is now joined to the United States, while the former still continues under British government. In the history of the other British American colonies there is nothing of sufficient importance to deserve a place in this summary. The most important of them now form a great republic, which must for the future occupy a conspicuous position in Modern History; and among the best guides to a correct estimate of their future career, is a knowledge of the circumstances attending their foundation.

SECTION V.-Colonization of the West Indies.

We have already mentioned the settlements of the Spaniards in Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, and Cuba, and shall now briefly give a sketch of the colonization of the other principal islands. Barbadoes, one of the earliest English settlements, was totally uninhabited when the English took possession of it (A. D. 1623). Its prosperity first began to attract notice when some of the Dutch, who were expelled from Brazil by the Portuguese, introduced the manufacture of sugar, and the cultivation of the cane, from which that useful article is extracted. Negroes were not imported as slaves until about the year 1630; previously to which time the planters are said to have been frequently guilty of kidnapping the Caribs. The negroes multiplied so fast, that they frequently conspired to massacre all the white inhabitants, and take possession of the island, but their plots were discovered and punished with remorseless severity.

St. Lucia was first settled by the English (A. D. 1637), but the colonists were soon massacred by the Caribs, after which it was seized by the French, who are said to have instigated the revolt of the native tribes. The island frequently changed masters in the wars between France and England, but it now belongs to the latter power. St. Vincent and the Grenadine islands were similarly contested, and now belong to England.

Martinico and Guadaloupe were colonized by the French, in the beginning of the seventeenth century. Their prosperity received very severe checks in the frequent wars between France and England. At the late treaty of peace they were restored to France. The other Caribbee islands are possessed by the Dutch, the Danes, the Swedes, and the English, but the largest share belongs to the English. Antigua is, perhaps, the most flourishing of these islands, but there is nothing remarkable in its history.

Tobago was colonized by the Dutch, conjointly with the Courlanders (A. D. 1632). It was wrested from them by the French, who subsequently ceded it to the English (A. D. 1737).

Trinidad is a large and fertile island on the coast of South America, remarkable for a lake of asphaltum, or mineral pitch. It was early colonized by Spain, but was captured by the English in 1797, and is still retained by them. It is one of the very few of these islands which contains any portion of its ancient population.

The Bahama islands, though discovered by Columbus, were com pletely neglected until they were accidentally visited by an Englishman named Sayle (A. D. 1667), who was driven to seek shelter among them by stress of weather. The account which he gave of their climate and productions, on his return home, induced some spirited adventurers to combine for their colonization. The early settlers suffered very severely from hurricanes and the hostility of the Spaniards, but they surmounted these difficulties, and laid the foundation of communities which are now flourishing and prosperous.

The Bermudas, or Summer islands, were discovered but never colonized by the Spaniards. An Englishman named May was shipwrecked on one of them; he and his companions built a vessel of the native cedar, and returned to Europe, where they published a very exaggerated account of the beauty and fertility of these islands, which gave rise to many poetic fictions. A colony was planted on St. George's island, by the Virginia company, but it narrowly escaped destruction in its infancy from a very singular visitation. Some rats, imported in European vessels, multiplied so prodigiously, that they covered the ground and built nests in the trees. Their devastations were continued during five years, when they suddenly disappeared, but from what cause is uncertain. Since that period the prosperity of these islands has been uninterrupted; and of late years vast works for the purpose of establishing here a naval arsenal have been in progress, and are now near completion.

Jamaica was discovered by Columbus, and soon after colonized by the Spaniards, who massacred the greater part of the native inhabitants. As there were no mines in the island, it was neglected by the Spaniards, and was easily wrested from them by a British armament, under the command of Penn and Venables, during the protectorate of Cromwell. The position of Jamaica afforded many facilities for attacking the Spanish settlements, and it was therefore the great rendezvous of the formidable combination of pirates called the bucaniers. This confraternity was composed of adventurers from various nations, and the Spanish ships and colonies were their chief objects of attack. They were not, however, very scrupulous in ascertaining to what nation any

richly-laden vessel belonged; and, to prevent any discovery of their crimes, they generally massacred the crews. Morgan was their most noted leader; he conquered Panama, and several other rich towns belonging to the crown of Spain; and having by his continued successes gained the command of a large force, appears to have meditated the establishment of an independent sovereignty. Subsequently he abandoned his piracies, submitted to the English government, and received the honor of knighthood. The bucaniers being no longer protected in Jamaica, removed to the French settlement in Hispaniola, and long continued to be the terror of the American seas. Jamaica has often been harassed by negro insurrections, but since the mountains have been opened by roads, the insurgents, deprived of any place of shelter, have found themselves unable to make considerable stand.

To the north of the river Amazon, on the eastern coast of South America, lies a vast level tract, known by the general name of Guiana, possessed by the Portuguese, the French, Dutch, and English. The land is exuberantly fertile, but the climate unhealthy. Formerly the Dutch settlements were the most considerable, but the chief of them were captured in 1797 by the English, and are now in their possession. This is the only portion which bears the appearance of regular colonization, the other tracts being either held by the natives, or mainly used by the European rulers as penal settlements.

Hispaniola, or St. Domingo, after having been long an object of contention between the French, Spaniards, and English, is now an independent negro state, and has resumed its old native name of Hayti.

SECTION VI.-The Portuguese in India.

THE colonies we have just described owe their origin to the discoveries of Columbus; we must now direct our attention to those in the opposite division of the globe, which were consequent on the discovery of a passage round the Cape of Good Hope, by Vasco de Gama. The first enterprises of the Portuguese, when a way was opened for them to Hindústan, were limited to securing their commerce; but under the guidance of the illustrious Albuquerque, they procured a grant of ground from one of the native sovereigns, and founded a strong fortress. The Mohammedans, who had hitherto engrossed the entire commerce of India, formed a league to expel the intruders, in which they were encouraged by the Venetians, who purchased Indian spices and other goods from the Arabs, with which they supplied the principal markets of Europe. This enterprise was defeated, and soon after Don Alphonzo Albuquerque laid the foundation of the future supremacy of the Portuguese by reducing Goa, which afterward became the seat of govern ment, and was also erected into an archbishop's see by the pope. This was the first commencement of territorial acquisition by European powers in India, a system strongly deprecated by Vasco de Gama, and which it is impossible to defend on any principles of national justice. Albuquerque defended himself by declaring that it would be impossible for Portugal to command the trade unless it shared in the empire of India, a pretext whose obvious weakness it is not necessary to expose. Albuquerque also subdued the city of Malacca, and the island of Ormuz,

Had

In the Persisn gulf. The efforts of his successors were principally directed to the maintenance of Albuquerque's acquisitions, and to checking the progress of the Turks, who, after the conquest of Egypt, made several attempts to establish themselves on the coast of Malabar. they succeeded, it is probable that the Christians would never have occupied India, for the Mussulmans spread over the peninsula would have mited to support a power equally favorable to their religious prejudices and their temporal interests. In about sixty years the Portuguese had established an empire in the east, whose extent and power were truly wonderful. On one side, their authority extended as far as the utmost limits of the coast of Persia, and over all the islands in the Persian gulf; some of the Arabian princes were their tributaries, others their allies, and through the whole Arabian peninsula none dared to confess themselves their enemies. In the Red sea, they were the only power that commanded respect, and they had considerable influence over the emperor of Abyssinia and the rulers of eastern Africa. They possessed the whole coast of Malabar, from Cape Ramoz to Cape Comorin; they were masters also of the Coromandel coast, the bay of Bengal, the city, fortress, and peninsula of Malacca. The potent islands of Ceylon, Sumatra, and Java, paid them tribute, as did the Moluccas; and they had obtained a settlement in China (Macao), and a free trade with the islands of Japan.

The ruin of this empire arose chiefly from the union of Portugal with Spain (A. D. 1580). Immediately after that event, Philip II. issued an edict, prohibiting the Dutch from trading with Lisbon, and thus compelled them to seek for the spices and wares of India in other quarters. The enterprising republicans were then hardy and necessitous, and had everything to gain and nothing to lose; the Portuguese, on the other hand, were divided in their counsels, depraved in their manners, and detested by their subjects and neighbors. The Dutch first established themselves in some distant islands, whence, being joined by new settlers from home, partly by force of arms and partly by taking advantage of the errors committed by the Portuguese, they finally supplanted them everywhere, and stripped them of their dominions in far less time than they had acquired them.

The most remarkable of the Portuguese settlements was the island of Ormuz. It is nothing more than a salt and barren rock in the Persian gulf, destitute of water, save where rain, which rarely falls, is collected in natural or artificial cavities; but its commodious situation rendered it the most flourishing commercial mart in the eastern seas. Its roadstead was frequented by shipping from all parts of the Indies, from the coasts of Africa, Egypt, and Arabia, while it possessed an extensive caravan trade with the interior of Asia, through the opposite ports of Persia. The wealth, the splendor, and the concourse of traders at Ormuz, during its flourishing condition, gave the world a memorable example of the almost omnipotent power of commerce: in the trading seasons, which lasted from January to March, and from the end of August to the beginning of November, not only was there an unparalleled activity of traffic, but a display of luxury and magnificence which seemed to realize the extravagances of fiction. The salt dust of the streets was con cealed and kept down by neat mats and rich carpets; canvass awnings

were extended from the roofs of the houses to exclude the scorching rays of the sun; the rooms next the street were opened like shops, adorned with Indian cabinets and piles of porcelain, intermixed with odoriferous dwarf trees and shrubs, set in gilded vases, elegantly adorned with figures. Camels laden with water-skins stood at the corner of every street, while the richest wines of Persia, the most costly perfumes and the choicest delicacies of Asia, were poured forth in lavish profusion. The Portuguese, in the insolence of prosperity, provoked the hostility of Shah Abbas, the most powerful of the Persian monarchs, and quarrelled with the English, just as they were beginning to obtain consideration in the east. A league was formed between Shah Abbas and the English; their united forces assailed Ormuz (a. D. 1622); it was taken with little difficulty, and the value of its plunder was estimated at two millions. Thenceforward the trade of Ormuz rapidly declined: its merchants transferred their capital and enterprise to other quarters, the very materials of its splendid edifices were taken away by the Dutch ships as ballast, and it soon relapsed into its original condition of a barren and desolate rock. Scarcely the smallest remains are now left to vindicate the records of history, or to prove that this was once the flourishing capital of extensive commerce, and the principal magazine of the east.

SECTION VII.-The Spaniards in the East Indies.

We have before stated that the object of the first voyage of Columbus was to discover a western passage to the East Indies, and this project was not forgotten by the Spaniards, even after a new world had been opened to their ambition. After the discovery of the passage round the extremity of South America by Magellan, they prepared to occupy some of the Moluccas, but were prevented by the papal division of newlydiscovered countries between them and the Portuguese. But when Portugal was united to Spain, under Philip II., Lopez de Legaspi resolved to form a settlement in a valuable cluster of these islands, which he called the Philippines, in honor of his sovereign. The city of Manilla was speedily built and fortified; scarcely were its defences complete, when it was attacked by the native islanders, instigated by the Chinese, who appear to have been, at some remote period, masters of the country. With some difficulty the insurrection was suppressed; but more formidable rivals soon appeared: the Dutch occupied the most valuable of the Moluccas, and the Spanish court seriously contemplated the abandonment of the Philippine islands. But though these settlements have been frequently attacked both by the Dutch and English, they have been preserved to the crown of Spain, and are now almost the only remnant of the extensive colonial empire once possessed by that monarchy.

SECTION VIII.-The Dutch in the East Indies.

It was the intolerable cruelty of the Spanish government that drove the Dutch to revolt; and the incurable bigotry of Philip II. prevented