[23:3] _Ibid._, p. 211. [24:1] See O'Gorman, chaps. ix.-xiv., xx. [24:2] Mr. Bancroft, describing the "sad condition" of La Salle's colony at Matagorda after the wreck of his richly laden store-ship, adds that "even now this colony possessed, from the bounty of Louis XIV., more than was contributed by all the English monarchs together for the twelve English colonies on the Atlantic. Its number still exceeded that of the colony of Smith in Virginia, or of those who embarked in the 'Mayflower'" (vol. iii., p. 171). [26:1] Dr. R. F. Littledale, in "Encyclopaedia Britannica," vol. xiii., pp. 649-652. [27:1] Both these charges are solemnly affirmed by the pope in the bull of suppression of the society (Dr. R. F. Littledale, in "Encyclopaedia Britannica," vol. xiii., p. 655). [27:2] Bancroft, vol. iii., p. 320. [27:3] _Ibid._, pp. 128, 129. [27:4] The contrast is vigorously emphasized by Mr. Bancroft: "Such was Louisiana more than a half-century after the first attempt at colonization by La Salle. Its population may have been five thousand whites and half that number of blacks. Louis XIV. had fostered it with pride and liberal expenditures; an opulent merchant, famed for his successful enterprise, assumed its direction; the Company of the Mississippi, aided by boundless but transient credit, had made it the foundation of their hopes; and, again, Fleury and Louis XV. had sought to advance its fortunes. Priests and friars, dispersed through nations from Biloxi to the Dahcotas, propitiated the favor of the savages; but still the valley of the Mississippi was nearly a wilderness. All its patrons--though among them it counted kings and ministers of state--had not accomplished for it in half a century a tithe of the prosperity which within the same period sprang naturally from the benevolence of William Penn to the peaceful settlers on the Delaware" (vol. iii., p. 369). [28:1] "Encyclopaedia Britannica," vol. xiii., p. 654. [28:2] Bishop O'Gorman, pp. 137-142. [29:1] Bancroft, vol. iii., pp. 187, 188. CHAPTER IV. ANTECEDENTS OF PERMANENT CHRISTIAN COLONIZATION--THE DISINTEGRATION OF CHRISTENDOM--CONTROVERSIES--PERSECUTIONS. We have briefly reviewed the history of two magnificent schemes of secular and spiritual empire, which, conceived in the minds of great statesmen and churchmen, sustained by the resources of the mightiest kingdoms of that age, inaugurated by soldiers of admirable prowess, explorers of unsurpassed boldness and persistence, and missionaries whose heroic faith has canonized them in the veneration of Christendom, have nevertheless come to naught.