But the discovery of the Illinois river must, undoubtedly, be credited to him. Returning to Canada, from his long wanderings, he found great changes going on in that country. It was no longer simply a missionary field, but was fast assuming the form and character of a colony. A royal Viceroy, or Governor-General, had taken the place of the former Governor and Intendant; and the controlling interests of the Sulpitian order were now largely overshadowed by those of the Jesuits. Both Count Frontenac, the Governor, and the Intendant Talon, were men of similar character and held like views with La Salle. Like him, they entertained plans of wider scope than those of any previous Canadian officials. And when he broached his plan of finding and opening up of the Mississippi, and the rich southern country through which it ran, and of fortifying along its course, and especially at its outlet, against the incursions of the Spanish and English, he enlisted their ready sympathy. Thus, leaving to the Jesuits, with a dislike of whom they all three seemed to have been imbued, the frozen Canadian country; and to the English, that portion of the continent east of the Alleghanies, they proposed to themselves to conquer the remainder of this vast territory for the King of France. The generally accepted French policy of that day, in regard to the acquisition of new territory in North America, was that the discovery of a great river gave to all the territory drained by such river an inchoate (or inceptive) title, which later could be completed by occupation. It was the attempt to carry out this policy which cost (and lost) France the Seven Years War, in which the politics and history of America and Europe became inextricably mixed. And of this policy, Count Frontenac, the Governor, Talon, the Intendant, and La Salle, the explorer, now became the leading exponents in Canada. They were all exceptionally strong men, full of ambitions and untiring energy, and their scheme combined not only military occupation, but the reclamation of the Indian tribes and their concentration around the proposed chain of French forts, together with colonies of French immigrants of an agricultural and industrial character, the extension of the buffalo fur-trade, etc.—in fact a most enchanting _mirage_ of future civilization and Christianity in the vast central area of this continent. In itself, the scheme was too vast to be more than a sketch of future possibilities; and, moreover, it ignored certain needs and facts which were most important to its success. For instance, the French immigration to this country, at that time, was totally inadequate to furnish settlers enough, and with sufficient rapidity to ensure the successful colonization of the new territory. Again, the pacification among themselves, of the numerous and warring Indian tribes which occupied this western continent, and the securing of their peaceful and friendly co-operation with the whites, was a work almost