domination in the country. He was saved, however, in consequence of the cholera, which committed such ravages in the Costa Rican camp, that the enterprise was abandoned on their part.

For the purpose, doubtless, of having an effect on the United States government, the form of an election was gone through with in Nicaragua, at which of course Rivas was chosen president. This furnished an occasion of sending a minister to Washington; but little favorable to Walker resulted from this measure.

A new invasion was now threatened by the people of San Salvador and Guatemala. Walker, to be in preparation for them, removed his quarters from Grenada to Leon. His forces, however, continued small; for, although he was constantly receiving recruits from the United States, yet sickness and desertion as constantly thinned hist ranks. Rivas, foreseeing his own fate from the execution of other leaders, took an opportunity to escape; and Walker, having returned to Grenada, caused himself to be chosen president, on the 12th of July, 1855. Some of the natives now joined Rivas, and, together with the opposition of the other states, Walker's affairs seemed any thing but encouraging. His success in attacks on his enemies was by no means marked, and he finally became hemmed in between the Lake Nicaragua and the Pacific.

In this situation, he awaited the advance of the enemy; but, impatient of their delay, he left Grenada with most of his troops, on the 19th of October, 1856, and attacked Massaya; but he was obliged to return, without effecting his object, in order to repel a party of invaders, who in the meantime had taken possession of the greater part of Grenada. These, on his return, he dislodged from the place.

Walker has been placed in a most critical situation since; his forces have been reduced greatly by desertion, sickness and scarcity of food, and this notwithstanding the occasional addition of new recruits. Victories on his part have been reported of late, but his ultimate destiny remains in suspense.

Our limits forbid a detailed account of the battles which have occurred in Nicaragua, during the Walker campaign. Following the course of events, we can barely allude to the battles of Grenada, November 24th, and December 12th, 1856, which resulted in a severe defeat on the part of the Americans, and the battle of Obraje, January 25th, 1857. This action took place under command of General Henningsen, in which, according to the statement of the latter, the loss of the allies exceeded fourfold that of the Americans. Costa Rican authority gives only half that number. This was followed by the battles of San Jorge, which occurred at that place, severally, on the 29th of January, and the 3d and 12th of February, and also on the 16th of

March, 1857, in which Walker's force again sustained a heavy defeat. In the conflicting statements respecting the results of many of these battles fought in this campaign, the account being exaggerated by interested parties on both sides, it is difficult to get at the truth of the affair. Particularly is this the case with the official account as given by General Henningsen, of the battles of San Jorge, the object being by a highly colored description of the comparative disparity of numbers in the loss of killed and wounded, to turn what was in reality an ignominious defeat into the appearance of a splendid victory. The truth seems to be that Walker was defeated at San Jorge on the 16th of March, and was compelled to return to Rivas with a loss of one hundred and fifty men. March 23d, and April 11th, 1857, occurred the battles of Rivas, in which Walker again sustained an overwhelming defeat, which seems to have been the turning point in his history, and to have led to the events following the downfall of his fortunes, and the final ruin of his cause in Nicaragua.

To add to other causes, sickness and scarcity of food, reducing Walker's force, numerous and frequent desertions have taken place from his camp to the allies, reducing his effective force, notwithstanding the occasional additional recruits, and thus placing him in a critical, not to say, desperate situation.

On the 13th of April, Walker and his troops were shut up in two houses without provisions, and almost without hopes of escape. The allies already regard the war at an end, and have divided among them the unfortunate state in which this long and bloody struggle has been fought. The latest accounts from San Salvador are, that the terms of the partition of Nicaragua, between Costa Rica, Salvador, and Guatemala, have at length been definitely settled.

On the 18th of May, General Walker capitulated to Captain Davis, of the United States sloop of war St. Mary's, with the consent of the Costa Rican commander, General Mora, and on the next day, Walker with sixteen of his officers embarked for Panama. Thus has ended, for the present, the Walker campaign, and with it the cause of filibusterism in Nicaragua.

British America.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

CANADA. Discovery of Canada by Cartier. Second expedition. Discovery of the St. Lawrence. Roberval's expedition. Pontgrave and Champlain. Quebec founded. Discoveries of Champlain. Establishment of the company of New France. Indian wars. Jesuits in Canada. Slow progress of the colony. Ec-· clesiastical government of Canada. Hostilities of the Iroquois. Earthquakes.

CANADA was discovered by Jacques Cartier, of St. Malo, in France. He was entrusted, at the recommendation of Chabot, admiral of France, with a commission of discovery, as the French had begun to catch the general spirit of maritime enterprise. Cartier sailed from St. Malo with two ships, on the 20th of April, 1534. Though these were called ships in the narrations of that day, they were neither above twenty tons burthen, which shows that naval architecture had made but small progress among the French. On the 10th of May, they saw the shores of Newfoundland, near Cape Bonavista, and steering to the south, along the coast, landed at a harbor which Cartier named St. Catherine's. Thence, proceeding westward and northward, he entered the Gulf of St. Lawrence and passed in sight of Bird's Island, which he called Isles Aux Oiseaux, from the multitudes of sea-fowls that covered them. After some days spent in sailing along the western coast of Newfoundland, he crossed the gulf and

entered a wide and deep inlet, which he named Baie de Chaleur, on account of the intense summer heat which the voyagers experienced while exploring its shores. This bay appears to have been already known to the Spaniards, and in very old charts it is termed Bay des Espagnols. After exploring the greater part of the gulf, he returned toward France, on the 15th of August, and arrived at St. Malo in twenty-one days.

During the following year, in consequence of the favorable report he gave of his voyage, he was invested with the command of three ships, of superior size, and well equipped with all sorts of necessaries. On board the largest of these, "La Grande Hermione,” he embarked on the 19th of May, and on the 26th of July he was joined by the other vessels, which had been separated from him during a storm, at an appointed place of rendezvous within the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They then proceeded together on their course up the great river St. Lawrence, so named, according to some, from Cartier having either returned to the gulf on the 10th of August, the festival of St. Laurente, or his having called a cape on the coast of Cape Breton, at the entrance of the gulf, by the name of the Cape St. Laurente, which was afterward given to the gulf and river of Canada. There appears, however, some uncertainty in the account transmitted to us on this subject. He named the island of Anticosti, Assumption, an appellation which it did not long retain. On the first of August, he was driven into a harbor on the north coast, which still retains the name of St. Nicholas, which he gave it. He then proceeded up the river St. Lawrence, until he entered the Saghunny, from which he continued his course, passing the islands, which he named Isle aux Coudres and Isle de Bacchus, now Orleans. He then proceeded in the Hermione until his ship grounded on the shoals of Lake St. Peter, from whence in two boats he explored the river to the island where Montreal now stands, and which was at that time inhabited by a tribe of the Huron nation, who lived in a village called Hochelaga. The river was then designated the Great Hochelaga, and afterward, before it acquired that of St. Lawrence, the River of Canada. Cartier was received by the natives with great kindness and hospitality.

He returned from the village of Hochelaga on the 5th of October, and on the 11th he arrived at a river which still bears his name, but which he named the St. Croix. Here he wintered, and during the inclemency of that season, Cartier and his crew were subjected to a violent attack of scurvy, which the natives taught them to cure by means of a decoction prepared of the bark of the species of fir which yields the Canada balsam of our pharmacopeia. He returned next summer to France; but, notwithstanding the favorable and unexag

gerated account of the countries he explored, four years elapsed before any further attempt was made to prosecute his discoveries.

In January, 1540, François de la Roque, Seigneur de Roberval, received a patent from Francis I., declaring him Seigneur de Norembegue, (the name by which nearly all North America was then designated,) with all the power and authority possessed by the king in this quarter. Early in the summer of 1540, Roberval, with a squadron of five vessels, sailed for America, Jacques Cartier having the supreme naval command. This voyage was successful, and a fort was erected on some part of those coasts, but whether in Cape Breton or in Canada appears quite uncertain. It was, however, injudiciously selected; the spot was much exposed both to the cold and to the incursions of the natives. Cartier was left at this station as commandant; but he was so harassed by the Indians, who were offended at strangers taking unceremonious possession of a hold in their country, and having despaired of the return of M. Roberval, that he embarked with all his people in order to return to France.

On the banks of Newfoundland he met M. de Roberval, with some vessels carrying men, arms and provisions, and returning with him, reassumed the command of the garrison. M. de Roberval then sailed up the St. Lawrence, and landed at Tadousac, at the mouth of the Saghunny. He made also some attempts, of which we have no very authentic accounts, to explore Labrador; but for some time after this period, Newfoundland was not known to be an island. We have no information, on which we can rely, as to what occurred for some years afterward, when we find Cartier embarking again for America, under the viceroy, Roberval, and with the brother of the latter, a personage whose martial reputation was so brilliant, that the chivalrous king, Francis I., always designated him the "Gen d'arme d' Annibal." Fate decreed that this voyage should be sealed by calamity. After leaving France, the slightest information respecting this spirited expedition has never been traced; and for more than sixty years, American colonization and the glory of discovery seem to have been forgotten or disregarded by the French government. The disastrous attempt of the Marquis de la Roche, in 1598, has been described elsewhere; and also, in the history of Nova Scotia, the departure of M. Pontgrave, the associate of M. de Monts, from Acadia, to trade at Tadousac. M. de Charwin had previously made two voyages, in 1600 and 1601, to Tadousac, and returned to France with valuable cargoes of furs. He died soon after.

M. Pontgrave, who was at first an intelligent merchant in a house at St. Malo, and afterward an expert navigator, who made several voyages to Acadia and Canada, succeeded, along with M. Chatte,