QUEEN ELIZABETH. Queen Elizabeth ruled England for forty-five years. The English regard her reign as the most glorious in their history. Before it was over they proved themselves more than a match for the Spaniards on the sea. They also began to seek for routes to the East and to attempt settlements in America. Their trade was increasing. The Greek and Roman writers were studied by English scholars at Oxford and Cambridge. Books and poems and plays were written which were to make the English language the rival of the languages of Greece and Rome. This was the time when Shakespeare wrote his first plays. QUESTIONS 1. Why was it easier to sail toward America from Spain or Portugal than from England? 2. What peoples divided the new world between them? Where did they draw the line of division? 3. Why were the kings of France and Spain rivals? Over what countries did King Charles rule? 4. When did religion become a cause of strife? What king was chiefly injured by such struggles? 5. Who were called "reformers?" By what other names were they called? 6. Who were the leaders of the Catholics? of the Protestants? Who were the Huguenots? What was their leader's name? 7. Why did Philip II and his subjects in the Netherlands quarrel? 8. What was strange about the land in which the Dutch lived? Who was the hero of the Dutch? 9. Why were the English and the Spaniards at first friendly? What king of England refused to obey the pope? 10. Why do Englishmen think Queen Elizabeth a great ruler? How did Elizabeth settle the question of religion? EXERCISE Collect pictures of the Dutch, of their canals, dikes, and towns. CHAPTER XIX FIRST FRENCH ATTEMPTS TO SETTLE AMERICA CARTIER. During the reign of Francis I, the French made the first serious attempts to find a westward route to the Far East and to settle the new lands that seemed to lie directly across the pathway. In 1534 Jacques Cartier was sent with two ships in search of a strait beyond the regions controlled by Spain or Portugal which would lead into the Pacific Ocean. Cartier passed around the northern side of Newfoundland and into the broad expanse of water west of it. This he called the Gulf of St. Lawrence. CARTIER AT MONTREAL. Cartier made a second voyage in the following year, exploring the great river which he called the St. Lawrence. He went up the river until the heights of Mount Royal or Montreal, as he called them, appeared on his right hand, and swift rapids in the river blocked his way in front. The name Lachine rapids, or the China rapids, which was afterwards given to these, remains to remind us that Cartier was searching for a passage to China.