leagues, in great part on foot; and traversed more than six hundred
leagues of unknown country, among savages and cannibals, at the cost of a
hundred and fifty thousand crowns. He now proposes to return by way of the
Gulf of Mexico to the countries he has discovered, whence great benefits
may be expected; first, the cause of God may be advanced by the preaching
of the gospel to many Indian tribes; and, secondly, great conquests may be
effected for the glory of the king, by the seizure of provinces rich in
silver mines, and defended only by a few indolent and effeminate
Spaniards. The Sieur de la Salle, pursues the memorial, binds himself to
accomplish this enterprise within one year after his arrival on the spot;
and he asks for this purpose only one vessel and two hundred men, with
their arms, munitions, pay, and maintenance. When Monseigneur shall direct
him, he will give the details of what he proposes. The memorial then
describes the boundless extent, the fertility and resources of the country
watered by the River Colbert, or Mississippi; the necessity of guarding it
against foreigners, who will be eager to seize it now that La Salle's
discovery has made it known; and the ease with which it may be defended by
one or two forts at a proper distance above its mouth, which would form
the key to an interior region eight hundred leagues in extent. "Should
foreigners anticipate us," he adds, "they will complete the ruin of New
France, which they already hem in by their establishments of Virginia,
Pennsylvania, New England, and Hudson's Bay." [Footnote: _Memoire du Sr.
de la Salle, pour rendre compte a Monseigneur de Seignelay de la
decouverte qu'il a faite par l'ordre de sa Majeste_, MS.]

The second memorial is more explicit. The place, it says, which the Sieur
de la Salle proposes to fortify, is on the River Colbert, or Mississippi,
sixty leagues above its mouth, where the land is very fertile, the climate
very mild, and whence we, the French, may control the continent; since,
the river being narrow, we could defend ourselves by means of fire-ships