The conduct of Spain in this matter is hardly censurable, when it is remembered that it occurred in an age of religious intolerance. She was a Catholic power and wanted no Protestant subjects. Her own had left Florida in 1763, as soon as the Spanish flag was lowered. In the articles of capitulation and the treaty of 1783 she had enforced her traditional policy. And to her credit, be it said, that she did not enforce banishment and confiscation after eighteen months had expired under the former; and when that period had elapsed under the latter, she granted an extension of four months. Great Britain, on the other hand, in yielding to Spain’s demands was false to her faith, false to her traditions, and false to that boasted principle of her constitution that her ægis covers every Englishman, in every land. Eighteen months is but a fleeting span to a people, when it is but a respite from confiscation and exile, avoidable only by apostasy. Of the heartaches of the exodus of the Florida-English we have an illustration in the widow of the White House. She had lived out the eighteen months under the capitulation, and the like period under the treaty, when the extension came to her like a respite to the condemned. Those four months embraced the days and nights of her struggle in the toils of temptation, foreshadowed in a previous page. Can she leave that home, consecrated by the graves of her husband and her child; that home where every object, tree, vine, shrub, sea, sky, and the very wild violets at her feet, brought up hallowed associations and sacred memories which made them all parts of her very being? No! The surrender would be at the cost of as many bleeding heart strings. There is, however, an escape in apostasy. She has but to signify her wish to renounce her faith; that faith, however, with which she had consoled a dying husband, and in which she had buried a darling child. Home triumphs. The governor is notified. Time wanes to the day of sacrifice. The bell tolls the sacrificial hour. The priest stands at the altar ready for the offering. But the victim fails the tryst. Faith triumphs. The bonds of temptation are snapped. Turning her back upon home, she goes forth an exile; crowned, we may well believe, with the promise to all the true of every creed who leave “lands” and “houses” for His name’s sake, to swell the mighty host of woman martyrs; time’s woeful harvest of blighted lives and broken hearts; victims of man’s ambitions, his wars, his policies, and his laws. ----- Footnote 38: White’s Recopilacion, Vol. II., p. 298. Footnote 39: White’s Recopilacion, Vol. II., p. 301. Footnote 40: Id. p. 300. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XVI. Boundary Lines—William Panton and Spain—Indian Trade—Indian Ponies and Traders—Business of Panton, Leslie & Co.