ST. AUGUSTINE FOUNDED. A friendly Indian chief readily gave his dwelling to the Spaniards. It was a huge, barn-like structure, made of the entire trunks of trees, and thatched with palmetto leaves. Soldiers quickly dug a ditch around it and threw up a breastwork of earth and small sticks. The colonists who came with Menendez landed and set about the usual work of founding a settlement. Such was the beginning of the Spanish town of St. Augustine, founded in 1565, and the oldest town in the United States. [Illustration: ST. AUGUSTINE, FLORIDA, AS FOUNDED BY MENENDEZ Pagus Hispanorum as given in Montanus and Ogilby] FRENCH SAIL TO ATTACK ST. AUGUSTINE. Both sides prepared for a terrible struggle, the French at Fort Caroline and the Spaniards in their new quarters at St. Augustine. The French struck the first blow. A few of the weaker and the sick soldiers were left at Fort Caroline to stand guard with the women and children. The main body aboard the ships advanced by sea to attack St. Augustine, but a furious tempest scattered and wrecked the French fleet before it arrived. MENENDEZ DESTROYS FORT CAROLINE. Menendez now took advantage of the storm to march overland to Fort Caroline, wading through swamps and fording streams amid a fearful rain and gale. His drenched and hungry followers fell like wild beasts upon the few French left in the fort. About fifty of the women and children were spared to become captives. As many men escaped in the forests around the fort, but the greater part were killed. CAPTURE OF THE SHIPWRECKED FRENCH. The French fleet had been wrecked off the coast of Florida a dozen miles south of St. Augustine. A few days later Menendez discovered some survivors wandering along the coast, half starved, trying to live on the shell-fish they found on the beach, and slowly and painfully working their way back toward Fort Caroline. The Frenchmen begged Menendez to be allowed to remain in the country till ships could be sent to take them off, but he was unwilling to make any terms with them. MURDER OF THE CAPTIVES. The unhappy Frenchmen were taken prisoners, and, a few hours later, put to death. Other shipwrecked refugees were captured a few days later, and these suffered the same fate. Nearly three hundred perished in this cold-blooded manner. It was a merciless deed, and yet such was the character of all warfare at the time. Menendez believed that he was doing his duty. Nor did the king of Spain think Menendez unduly cruel, for when he heard the story of the fate of the Frenchmen of Fort Caroline he sent this message to Menendez: "Say to him that, as to those he has killed, he has done well; and as to those he has saved, they shall be sent to the galleys." [Illustration: NORTH AMERICA AS KNOWN AFTER THE EXPLORATIONS OF DE SOTO CORONADO AND CARTIER] [Illustration: (map)] QUESTIONS