It was, however, the foundation of the British colony of New South Wales which most powerfully influenced the fate of New Zealand. Communication rapidly sprang up from the beginning of the nineteenth century onwards between Sydney and New Zealand. In 1814 there arrived a party of English missionaries, under the leadership of the Rev. SAMUEL MARSDEN, which settled in the North Island. In spite of frequent disappointments and rebuffs these missionaries actually succeeded in about twenty-five years in bringing the two islands into something like a condition of peace by composing the quarrels between native tribes, many of whom became converted to Christianity. EDWARD GIBBON WAKEFIELD, who had already carried out several successful colonizing experiments in South Australia, desired to do the same in New Zealand, but was opposed by the missionaries and by the British Government. He eventually succeeded in his purpose, and may almost be called the creator of the New Zealand Dominion, though he would have failed had it not been for the co-operation of that great Governor, Sir George Grey. The British Government hesitated to annex New Zealand, until forced to do so by learning that a French colonial expedition was on its way to take possession of these islands for France. New Zealand was therefore added to the British empire on 11 August, 1840. The French settlers arrived at Akaroa, in the South Island; but, in spite of the British flag having been hoisted only two days before, fifty-seven of them decided to remain, and their descendants at Akaroa now number six hundred. Between 1835 and 1853 the French obtained some small satisfaction for their eighteenth-century explorations by establishing a protectorate over the Tahiti archipelago and annexing the large island of New Caledonia, to which possessions they subsequently added the Marquezas, the Paumotu, and Tubuai archipelagos, and the Loyalty Islands near New Caledonia. It was really French scientific expeditions which definitely discovered the Fiji archipelago, so curiously overlooked by the great British explorers. But when a French expedition, under DUMONT D'URVILLE, examined these islands in 1827 it found them already under British influence; for from time to time convicts had escaped from the Australian penal settlement and had sought refuge in Fiji, where they had become in some cases the advisers of the native chiefs. A better influence, however, came among them in 1835, in the shape of the Wesleyan missionaries, who migrated to the Fiji archipelago from the Tonga or Friendly Islands, where they had met with complete success. [Illustration: Map of Australia and New Zealand]