Nothing was further from their minds, though they had complete dominion over a territory as large as France, and which contained a population of over one hundred and fifty thousand souls.[312] For arms, they had as chief defence some ‘very long English guns, with rests if they wished to use them, which were not very heavy, and had a tolerable range.’[313] These were the preparations that the Jesuits (who, not in Paraguay alone, but throughout all the American dominions of the Spanish crown, ruled over territories stretching from California to Cape Horn)[314] had made, and they were found alone in the missions of Paraguay, where, by a special permission of the Kings of Spain, arms were allowed for defence against the Portuguese. Bucareli, who seems to have been a timid but honest and upright man, made his first experiment upon the Jesuits of Buenos Ayres, Cordoba, and Santa Fe. The colleges in all these places were suppressed on the same night, and without the least resistance from their occupants. He who suppresses a religious Order, takes a town or country, or, in fact, puts into operation any of the forces of the law or military power, always expects, no matter how exalted be his motives at the start, to recoup himself from the treasure of the conquered. _Væ victis_, together with the vestments of the church, the plainsong, and the saints, came as a pagan heritage to the new faith, and has been held as canon law since Constantine looked at the sky and thought he saw a cross. Great must have been the disgust of the Governor to find the spoil so paltry, and not to have the satisfaction even of saying that the Jesuits had hidden all their gold, as, his own measures having been taken secretly, they had no knowledge of what was in the wind. In the college of Cordoba, esteemed to be a mine of wealth, was found only nine thousand dollars,[315] which sum Ferando Fabro, the commissioner sent by Bucareli to take over the effects of the Jesuits at Cordoba, duly chronicles in his report.