He built Versailles where two hundred years afterwards the Conference following the Great War of 1914-18 met to settle the terms of peace—“a palace such as the world had never seen, glittering with mirrors and gold, paved and lined with precious marbles, decorated with paintings representing the battles and triumphs of the great monarch and looking over an immense park peopled with bronze and marble statues and reflected in vast sheets of water where lovely fountains played.”—DUCLAUX. [11] Colbert had troubles of his own in trying to provide money for the extravagances of his king, Louis XIV. Colbert was the son of a merchant of Rheims, a hard-working, economical minister, a hater of waste and profusion. He was a marvellous administrator; in ten years he doubled the king’s revenues. But his factories and model farms, his canals and his colonies, his fleet, his finance could not bring money in as fast as Louis could spend it. Colbert was at once Chancellor of the Exchequer, Minister of Agriculture, Director of the Board of Trade, Chief Lord of the Admiralty, Home Secretary and Colonial Secretary. It was in this last capacity that he had special connection with New France. [12] As a matter of history the island is called after another Perrot much less distinguished.