previous next
[68]

Meantime, news arrived, as the French writers assert,

Chap. II.} 1565.
through the treachery of the court of France, that the Huguenots had made a plantation in Florida, and that Ribault was preparing to set sail with reinforcements. The cry was raised, that the heretics must be extirpated, the enthusiasm of fanaticism was kindled, and Melendez readily obtained all the forces which he required. More than twenty-five hundred persons— soldiers, sailors, priests, Jesuits, married men with their families, laborers, and mechanics, and, with the exception of three hundred soldiers, all at the cost of Melendez—engaged in the invasion. After delays occasioned by a storm, the .expedition set sail; and the trade-
July.
winds soon bore them rapidly across the Atlantic. A tempest scattered the fleet on its passage; it was with only one third part of his forces, that Melendez arrived at the harbor of St. John in Porto Rico. But he es-
Aug 9.
teemed celerity the secret of success; and, refusing to await the arrival of the rest of his squadron, he sailed for Florida. It had ever been his design to explore the coast; to select a favorable site for a fort or a settlement; and, after the construction of fortifications, to attack the French. It was on the day which the cus-
Aug. 28.
toms of Rome have consecrated to the memory of one of the most eloquent sons of Africa, and one of the most venerated of the fathers of the church, that he came in sight of Florida.1 For four days, he sailed along the coast, uncertain where the French were established; on the fifth day, he landed, and gathered
Sept. 2.
from the Indians accounts of the Huguenots. At the same time, he discovered a fine haven and beautiful river; and, remembering the saint, on whose day he came upon the coast, he gave to the harbor and to the

1 Ensayo Cronolog. 68—70.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide Places (automatically extracted)

View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.

Sort places alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Porto Rico (1)

Download Pleiades ancient places geospacial dataset for this text.

hide People (automatically extracted)
Sort people alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a person to search for him/her in this document.
John Ribault (1)
Aug (1)
hide Dates (automatically extracted)
Sort dates alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a date to search for it in this document.
1565 AD (1)
September 2nd (1)
August 28th (1)
July (1)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: