ikeness, shows us a slender figure,
leaning against the mast, booted to the thigh, with slouched hat and
plume, slashed doublet, and short cloak. His thin oval face, with curled
moustache and close-trimmed beard, wears a somewhat pensive look, as if
already shadowed by the destiny that awaited him.

The intervening year since Ribaut's voyage had been a dark year for
France. From the peaceful solitude of the River of May, that voyager
returned to a land reeking with slaughter. But the carnival of bigotry
and hate had found a pause. The Peace of Amboise had been signed. The
fierce monk choked down his venom; the soldier sheathed his sword, the
assassin his dagger; rival chiefs grasped hands, and masked their rancor
under hollow smiles. The king and the queen-mother, helpless amid the
storm of factions which threatened their destruction, smiled now on
Conde, now on Guise,--gave ear to the Cardinal of Lorraine, or listened
in secret to the emissaries of Theodore Beza. Coligny was again strong
at Court. He used his opportunity, and solicited with success the means
of renewing his enterprise of colonization.

Men were mustered for the work. In name, at least, they were all
Huguenots yet now, as before, the staple of the projected colony was
unsound,--soldiers, paid out of the royal treasury, hired artisans and
tradesmen, with a swarm of volunteers from the young Huguenot nobles,
whose restless swords had rusted in their scabbards since the peace. The
foundation-stone was forgotten. There were no tillers of the soil. Such,
indeed, were rare among the Huegonots; for the dull peasants who guided
the plough clung with blind tenacity to the ancient faith. Adventurous
gentlemen, reckless soldiers, discontented tradesmen, all keen for
novelty and heated with dreams of wealth,--these were they who would
build for their country and their religion an empire beyond the sea.

On Thursday, the twenty-second of June, Laudonniere saw the low
coast-line of Florida, and entered the harbor of St. Augustine, which he
named the River of Dolphins, "because that at mine arrival I saw there a
great number of Dolphins which were playing in the mouth thereof." Then
he bore northward, following the coast till, on the twenty-fifth,
he reached the mouth of the St. John's or River of May. The vessels
anchored, the boats were lowered, and he landed with his principal
followers on the south shore, near the present village of Mayport. It
was the very spot