173 UC-NRLF 13fi 020 POPE-DAY EST AMERICA. BY JOHN GILMAEY SHEA. [Read before the United States Catholic Historical Society, January 19, 1888.] THE present Pope has recently had a day a day of Jubi lee, commemorated in all parts of the world. The faithful tes tified their joy at the celebration of his sacerdotal Jubilee, and renewed the protestation of their heartfelt allegiance to the See of Unity, to the one whom Christ has set to govern His kingdom. Princes and rulers of all lands, Mohammedan and heathen, as well as Christian, sent their courteous offerings and congratulations to His Holiness, Pope Leo XIII. The Pope has just had a day, and a glorious day. But is this my topic ? No, I am going back into the past. There was a time when, in New England and other colo nies, the Pope had his day, which was very enthusiastically celebrated. This, as a matter of history, will doubtless be new to most of my hearers, for it is not brought into promi nence in the current histories of the country, and few would trace the only remnant left of the old-time celebration the Fourth-of-July firecracker to its real origin. The celebration of Pope-Day arose in a curious way. After the overthrow of the English commonwealth, and the restoration of Charles II., New England was in a dilemma. M255770 The English Crown was asserting its rights over New Eng land, and State holidays had to be observed. But how were the Puritans to keep Guy Fawkes Day, the 5th of Novem ber ? A few misguided Catholics, driven to desperation by the penal laws, had plotted to blow up King James I. and his Parliament, led on by government detectives, in all probabili ty. But how could the Puritans, who, as a body, drove the son of James from the throne, and sent his head rolling from the executioner s block how could they hold up Guy Fawkes to public execration for an unaccomplished crime, when their own hands were reeking with royal blood ? The case was indeed a puzzling one. But New England shrewdness saw a way out of the difficulty. A clergyman of the Established Church in England, when he found his flock growing listless and indifferent, or, what was w r orse, inclined to criticise him, used to give them what he called "Cheshire Cheese"; he began a series of philippics against the Pope. This always roused them to zeal and friendly feeling. New England, in the same way, resorted to "Cheshire Cheese," and by a happy device pleased Court and people. They would celebrate the 5th of November with all due noise and honor ; but they had the Pope carried around in effigy, instead of Guy Fawkes, amid the noise of firecrackers, and finally committed it to the flames amid loud huzzas. Thus, though they sang " Let s always remember The fifth of November," the day became, on this side of the Atlantic, not Gunpowder Treason, but Pope-Day. The contrast between that annual insult of the last century, and the recent ovation of all loyal hearts, the tributes paid by the rulers of English-speaking lands, is striking enough. " Yiva il Papa-re ! " Boston, being a city of great cultivation and refinement, took the lead in celebrating Pope-Day. An effigy of the Pope was made, and generally one of the Devil ; these were placed on a platform, and carried by the crowd, who kept firing crackers, home-made at fir^t, but when New England enter prise opened intercourse with China, the Chinese firecrackers were imported for use on Pope-Day. On the front of the stage was a huge transparency, wdth in scriptions suited to the temper of the times. Boys below the platform worked strings, causing the figures to face toward the houses and make gestures. At the head of the procession went a man ringing a bell, and baw r ling a song, which ended : " Don t you hear my little bell Go chink, chink, chink ? Please give me a little money, To buy my Pope some drink." Every house on the route of the procession was required to contribute to the expense of the show, under penalty of hav ing the windows broken, or being otherwise damaged. The procession passed through the Common, past the State House, and often ended on Copp s Hill, where the effigies were consumed in a bonfire. Such was Pope Day in Boston, which never dreamed in that day of the Old South Church existing to see Boston ruled by a Catholic mayor, the see of a Catholic archbishop, or its celebrating with loud acclaim an anniversary of a Pope. The newspapers of the day sometimes described these pro cessions on Pope-Day as being carried on "with great decency and decorum " ! But it was not always so. In the course of time, one quarter of Boston thought itself badly treated in the arrangements for the procession. Then North End and South End each had a Pope, and the processions generally met on Union Street, where a fight took place for the possession of all the figures, the North Enders burning them on Copp s Hill if they won the day, while their antagonists, when successful, burned the Pope on the Common. In 1745, the celebration of Pope-Day was especially dis graceful. A paper of the time says : Tuesday last being the Anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot, two Popes were made and carried thro the Streets in the evening, one from the North, the other from the South End of the Town, attended by a vast number of negroes and white servants, armed with clubs, staves and cutlashes, who were very abusive to the Inhabitants, in sulting the Persons and breaking the windows, &c., of such as did not give them money to their satisfaction, and even many of those who had given them liberally; and the two Popes meeting in Corn- hill, their followers were so infatuated as to fall upon each other with the utmost Rage and Fury. Several were sorely wounded and bruised, some left for dead, and rendered incapable of any business for a long time to the great Loss and Damage of their respective Masters. And he prints a letter from a subscriber, condemning the supineness of the authorities. This letter was as follows : I hope you will not suffer the grand fray, not to say bloody, that happen d before your Door last Tuesday evening to pass off without a public rebuke ; and such an one as becomes a person zealous as well for the Peace and Good Order of the State as the Church. What a scandal and Infamy to a Protestant Mob, be it of the rudest and lowest Sailors out of Boston, or even of the very negroes of the Town, to fall upon one another with Clubs and Cutlashes in a Rage and Fury which only Hell could inspire or the Devil broke loose from chains there could represent ! Is this a meet or sufferable show of Protestant zeal against Popery ? Is this to honor the Protestant religion to the few French prisoners of war that are left among us ? Or can our children or servants be safe in the streets at such a time if such Rioters be permitted ? Or in a word, what madness must seize the two mobs, united Brethren, as they would appear against Popery, to fall upon each other, break one another s Bones or dash one another s Brains out ? Why this enormity above all others should be winked at, and the Inhabitants of the Town with their Dwellings left to the mercy of a rude and intoxicated Rabble, the very Dregs of the People, black and white, and why no more has been done to prevent or suppress such Riotous proceedings, which have been long growing upon us, and as long bewailed by all sober Persons, must be humbly left to our betters to say.* But the voice of " decency and decorum " could not stop the celebration of Pope-Day. As politics grew tierce, first the Pretender, then obnoxious English statesmen, were burned in effigy with the Pope. In 1755, " the Devil, the Pope, and the Pretender, at night were carried about the city on a bier, their three effigies hid eously formed, and as humorously contrived, the Devil stand ing close behind the Pope, seemingly paying his compliments to him, with a three-pronged pitchfork in one hand, with which at times he was made to thrust his Holiness on the Back, and a Ian thorn in the other, the young Pretender stand ing before the Pope, waiting his commands." The newspaper which gives these details adds: "In their route through the Streets, they stop t at the French General s Lodgings," this was General Dieskau, then lying wounded and a prisoner in Boston, " where a guard was ordered to prevent mischief by the M^b. The General sent down some silver by the carriers, with which after giving three huzzas, they marched off to a proper place, and set fire to the Devil s tail, burning the three to cinders." f The passage of the Quebec Act, by which Catholics in Can ada and the country northwest of the Ohio were maintained in the exercise of their religion, as it was under French rule, excited a bitter feeling in the Thirteen Colonies. This re vived the Pope-Day celebration, and gave it new zest. We have accounts of the observance of the day in several places in the year 1774 : The last public celebration of " Pope Day," so called in Newbury and Newburyport (Mass.), occurred this year. To prevent any tu mult or disorder taking place during the evening or night, the town of Newburyport voted October 24, 1774, "that no effigies be carried * " Weekly Post-Boy," Nov. 18, 1745. t "Annapolis Gazette," Dec. 4, 1755. 6 about or exhibited on the 5th of November, only in the day-time." Motives of policy afterwards induced the discontinuance of this cus tom which has now become obsolete. This year (1774) the celebra tion went off with a great flourish. In the day-time companies of little boys might be seen in various parts of the town, with their lit tle popes dressed up in the most grotesque and fantastic manner, which they carried about, some on boards and some on little car riages for their own and others amusement. But the great exhibi tion was reserved for the night, in which young men as well as boys participated. They first constructed a huge vehicle, varying at times, from 20 to 40 feet long. 8 or 10 wide, and 5 or 6 high, from the lower to the upper platform, on the front of which they erected a paper lantern, capacious enough to hold in addition to the lights, five or six persons. Behind that as large as life sat the mimic Pope and several other personages, monks, friars and so forth. Last but not least stood an image of what was designed to be a representation of old Nick himself, furnished with a pair of huge horns, holding in his hands a pitchfork and otherwise accoutred, with all the frightful ugliness that their ingenuity could devise. Their next step after they had mounted their ponderous vehicle on four wheels, chosen their officers, captain, first and second lieutenant, purser and so forth, placed a boy under the platform to elevate and move around at proper intervals the movable head of the Pope.* This same year, the two rival factions in Boston united in one celebration of what they called a Union Pope. Even down in the Carolinas the day was observed, feeling being very strong there, as we may see by the fact that South Carolina alone, of all the States, maa e Protestantism the es tablished religion in her first Constitution. A letter from Charleston in November, 1774, says: We had great diversion the 5th instant in seeing the effigies of Lord North, Governor Hutchinson, the Pope and the Devil, which were erected on a moving machine, and after having been paraded about the town all day, they were in the evening burnt on the common with a large bonfire, attended by a numerous crowd of people, t * "History of Newburyport," p. 249. t New York Journal," Dec. 15, 1774. General and enthusiastic as was the celebration of Pope- Day in 1774, it was the last occasion of that crafty means to excite the ignorant and brutal to hatred and violence against Catholics, though it needs no philosopher to see in Pope- Day the genesis of some events in our own time. Pope-Day ended with 1774. The next year the din of arms sounded through the land. Protestant and Catholic alike shouldered their muskets, and marched side by side in the cause of America. Yet in the very eunip of Washington, in the army where Catholic sol diers from Maryland and Pennsylvania were gallantly facing the foe, it was proposed to celebrate Pope-Day. But from the headquarters of the Army of Freedom came the words of George Washington, already strong in the attachment of his fellow-citizens : November 5th. As the Commander-in-Chief has been apprised of a design formed for the observance of that ridiculous and childish custom of burning the effigy of the Pope, he cannot help expressing his surprise that there should be officers and soldiers in this army so void of common sense as not to see the impropriety of such a step at this juncture ; at a time when we are soliciting, and have really ob tained the friendship and alliance of the people of Canada, whom we ought to consider as brethren embarked in the same cause, the de fence of the Liberty of America. At this juncture and under such circumstances, to be insulting their religion, is so monstrous as not to be suffered or excused ; indeed, instead of offering the most re mote insult, it is our duty to address public thanks to these our brethren, as to them we are indebted for every late happy success over the common enemy in Canada.* This was the funeral oration on the celebration of Pope- Day. It was heard of no more. It would be presumption in me to continue, after George Washington has spoken. But I will merely add that the firecrackers of Pope- Day have been transferred to the Fourth of July. * Washington s Works, iii., p. 144. UNITED STATES CATHOLIC HISTORICAL MAGAZINE. Vol. III.) (No. 10. WHY IS CANADA NOT A PART OF THE (JOTTED STATES ? Read before the U. S. Catholic Historical Society, Nov. 25th 1889, by John Gilmary Shea. Six score years ago England ruled supreme over all the northern part of this continent. From Hudson Bay to the Gulf of Mexico no flag but hers fluttered in the breeze. From the region of perpetual snow to the region of Spring in North America, no rule was recognized but George s of England. All, however, was not peace and calm. Discontent pervaded the land. Men clamored for rights which they claimed as the inalienable birthright of British subjects. Delegates at last met from the various colonies. This body assumed the title of Continental Congress, for it proposed to represent not a few colonies only, but the Continent. As the Continental Congress it finally met England in battle and carried on a seven years war. Nothing less than the Continent satisfied the aspirations of the grand and noble minds who planned the union of the colonies into a vast republic. Why then did the close of the war find their plan defeated, the republic dwarfed, confined between the north ern lakes and shut off from the Gulf of Mexico, with Eng land holding Canada as a perpetual menace to her peace and prosperity ? Perhaps Canada was settled by men full of devotion to the house of Hanover, grateful for favors, eager to show her their loyalty. On the contrary, it was a colony where England was hated as a power, alien in blood, alien in 2 United States Catholic No. jo.) language, alien In religion; a power submitted to only after a struggle in which the Canadians, left almost unaided by France, had tested the resources of England to crush them, and after being beaten to the earth had in a last desperate effort, almost regained the day. Canada was writhing under the yoke, her people were too numerous to be torn from their homes by England and scattered far and wide like the unhappy Acadians of Nova Scotia: but if England made concessions, she was only biding her time, to crush them utterly. Canada was ripe for revolt. The Continental Congress and its wise leaders counted surely on the adhesion of the Canadians in their struggle with England, at first simply a struggle for the right to govern and tax themselves, a right as essential to the prosperity of Canada as to that of any other colony. The Continental Congress issued "an address to the inhabitants of the province of Quebec," inviting them to act in concert with the other colonies. " We are too well ac quainted," says this address drawn up by John Dickinson, "we are too well acquainted with the liberality of sen timent distinguishing your nation, to imagine that difference of religion will prejudice you against a hearty amity with us. You know that the transcendant nature of freedom elevates those who unite in her cause above all such low minded infirmities. The Swiss cantons furnish a memorable proof of this truth. Their union is composed of Roman Catholic and Protestant States, living in the utmost concord and peace with one another, and thereby enabled, ever since they brave ly vindicated their freedom to defy and defeat every tyrant that has invaded them." * * See address of Congress to the Oppressed Inhabitants of Canada. Pennsylvania Packet. June 19, 1775. " We perceive the fate of the Catholic Colonies to be linked together." Evidences teem in the papers of the day of the active sympathy of the Canadians. "There is advice from Canada that Governor Carlton having in vain endeavored by fair means to engage the Canadians in the service against the Colonies, he attempted to compel them No. 10.) Historical Magazine. 3 Among the Canadian clergy many were openly in favor of the Colonies. One * was driven out of the province by the British officials, others were kept under strict watch, one a man of high social position, and member of a religi ous order, threw himself into the movement, and when Canadian regiments were raised for the Continental service this priest, the Rev. Mr. Lotbiniere was commissioned by Congress as chaplain, and served during the whole war of the Revolution. f The two Canadian regiments were constantly kept up by recruits, and maintained their organization till the army was disbanded at the peace. Canada evidently was ready to join the cause of American freedom. Jesuit and Recollect and Secular priest favored it ; the Canadians themselves shouldered the musket as the best proof. In the outlying parts of the old French province the same feeling prevailed. The Indians in the province of Maine, who had been converted to Christianity by the French missionaries from Canada, at once sided with the colonies, and their Catholic Chief Orono had a commission from Congress. In the west, the French in Indiana and Illinois, with by force, in which there was an insurrection of 3,000 men to oppose that force. . . . It is said they are determined to observe a strict neutrality." Pennsylvania Packet, Aug. 14, 1775 "A party of regulars went out in afloat, ing battery " (near Ticonderoga,) " to drive off our Canadians about 500 in number, who were at work on the east battery but were repulsed three days successively." Pennsylvania Packet, Oct. 30, 1775. " A party of our troops with the Canadians took possession of Chambly." Letter of Oct. 23d in Pennsylvania Packet, Nov. 13, 177*5, "The Canadians in general, on this side of the St. Lawrence are very friendly to us, almost unanimously so alongthe river Sorel, where they are actually embodied and in arms, altogether to the number of more than 1,000." Pen. Packet, Nov. 20, 1775. * Rev. Peter H. de la Valiniere. See Gen. Haldimand s order expelling him. U. S. Catholic Hist. Mag. III. p. 88. \ Hamersly "Army Register," Washington, 1881, p. 32. "Life and Times of Archbishop Carroll, 1 New York, 1888, p. 144. 4 United States Catholic No. 10.) their priest, Rev. Pierre Gibault, received Clark with open arms and aided him to drive the English out of that part of the country. The flower of the young Frenchmen of the West perished in gallant attempt to drive the English be yond the lakes.* Even in the heart of Canada, the Indians, converted by the French priests, were so friendly to the Americans, that Burgoyne, who could use Brant to massacre the settlers of Cherry Valley, Wyoming and Esopus, failed to enlist these Catholic Indians in his work of blood, and in an address of reproach he loaded them with abuse. Why then, if the Continental Congress wished the co operation of Canada, if Canada and her French and Indian population were full of sympathy for the cause, why is it that England was able to secure that province and so gain its discontented people as to make it a stronghold against us, the base of constant operations ? The answer of history must be, that this great blow to American hopes, this disastrous result was due to an anti-Catholic bigotry fostered in New York, of which John Jay was the prime mover and instigator, and which as a dele gate to the Continental Congress he succeeded in foisting into some of the acts of that body. That man stands out in history as the embodiment of narrow and short sighted views, who was willing to sacrifice to their unholy gratifica tion, the best interests of America, To see the man as he really was, we need only open the Journal of the Convention which framed the first Constitution for the State of New York in 1777, and fol low the actions of Jay. There was bigotry in New York. Public policy demanded that in the struggle with England all such feelings should be buried. Real statesmen sought to dispel this feeling, but Jay fostered and stimulated it. He was in full accord with those who ran up a flag in New York with " No Popery" inscribed upon it. He was in full accord with those whose anti-Catholic feeling led them to drive the * In the Expedition of Mottin de la Balme. No. 10.) Historical Magazine. $ Catholic MacDonalds from the Mohawk and force them to place themselves under the flag they hated, the flag of the Hanoverian in full accord with those who sent those stal wart Highlanders within the British lines when they would gladly have avenged Culloden ! In the Constitutional Convention of 1777, Jay appears as the advocate of blind unreasoning bigotry, as Governeur Morris was the champion of toleration, liberality and all that is broad and farseeing in statesmanship. The County of Westchester gave the leaders of the two policies. When the question of naturalization came up, the para graph in the proposed Constitution excited the wrath of Jay. He sprang to his feet at once to offer an amendment re quiring the applicant " to abjure and renounce all allegiance and subjection to all and every foreign king, prince, potentate and State in all matters ecclesiastical and civil." Morris opposed the amendment with all his eloquence and proposed a substitute committing naturalization to the legislature : but Jay had evoked the hostile feeling, and his amendment was carried. In vain did Morris, battling in the cause of human freedom, endeavor to alter the clause, the amended section was carried, and though Livingston ap pealed for a reconsideration, the Constitution was adopted with Jay s amendment, and till the Constitution of theUnited States vested the entire control of naturalization in the Fed eral government, no Catholic immigrant could become a citi zen in the State of New York though he might show wounds received in battle against England, for he could not on oath renounce allegiance to the Pope, as head of the Church. When the clause of the proposed Constitution came up for debate, in which it was declared " that the free toleration of religious profession and worship shall forever hereafter be allowed to all mankind," Jay found it too broad. He intro duced an amendment giving the legislature power at any time to deny toleration to any denomination at its op tion. Debates followed, and a majority seemed loth to con- 6 United States Catholic No. 10.) cede such a power; but Jay dropped the mask and proposed a new amendment showing his real object : " Except the professors of the religion of the Church of Rome, who ought not to hold lands in or be admitted to a participation of the civil rights enjoyed by the members of this State, until such time as the said professors shall appear in the Su preme Court of this State, and there most solemnly swear that they verily believe in their consciences that no pope, priest, or foreign authority on earth hath power to absolve the subjects of this State from their allegiance to the same. And further, that they renounce and believe to be false and wicked, the dangerous and damnable doctrine that the Pope or any other earthly authority hath power to absolve men from their sins, described in and prohibited by the Gospel of Jesus Christ : and particularly that no Pope, priest or foreign authority on earth hath power to absolve them from the obli gation of this oath." We can almost picture him to ourselves in wild frenzy, with bloodshot eyes, foaming at the mouth and gesticulating like a madman, as he read this proposed amendment, the rig marole of stupid ignorance. The amendment found advocates in the body, such anti-Catholic feeling had Jay evoked, and it was lost by a vote of 19 to 10, not two-thirds voting for it. Still tmappeased, Jay moved another amendment; Liv ingston insisted that it was virtually the same as the last; but the house held otherwise, and though modified by an amend ment of Morris, it was passed in a form which gave Jay hope that Catholicity could never gain a foothold in this State. The grand, broad charter of toleration as proposed at first was blotted from the Constitution of New York. When we consider that at this moment men, as Bancroft drily remarks, had outgrown the silly anti-catholic raving about the Quebec Act;* that the United States were using * As soon as the Quebec Act was proposed in Parliament protests against it appeared in the American papers. It was after the Boston Port Bill con- No 10.) Historical Magazine. ? every effort to gain Catholic France as an ally, and that a show of amity to professors of the faith of Rome in the sev eral States would have aided the cause of Independence, we can imagine what bitter hatred of Catholicity seethed in the heart of John Jay, where no consideration of public policy could whisper a counsel of moderation. If his spirit showed itself in this shape in 1777, we can imagine what it was three years earlier. And yet, unfortunately, it was to this man that Congress gave a fatal power by confiding to him the preparation of the " Address to the People of Great Britain," and this at the very time when the wise and judicious Dickinson framed the con ciliatory address to the Canadian people, and Congress sent Commissioners with a Catholic priest to influence Canadian adhesion to the common cause. A man of Jay s temper could not lose the opportunity of introducing his favorite topic. The Quebec Act, by which the Canadian French were left in the enjoyment of their re ligion and their former laws, in Canada, and at the feeble set- side red as the greatest of their wrongs. See Postscript to Philadelphia Packet, Aug. 15, 1774. The following stanza from a song shows the temper of the times, to the tune of " my Kitten, my Kitten : " Then heigh for the penance and pardons, And heigh for the faggots and fires ; And heigh for the Popish church wardens, And heigh for the priests and the friars; And heigh for the rare-e show relics To follow my Canada Bill-e With all the Pope s mountebank tricks ; So prithee, my baby, be still-e Then up with the papists, up, up, And down with the Protestants down-e Here we go backwards and forwards And all for the good of the Crown-e," Philadelphia Packet, Aug. 29, 1774. The Act was given in full in the same paper in the Supplement to No. 150, Sep. 5, 1774 and in the paper itself, the violent Protest of the City of London. United States Catholic No. jo.) tlements of Detroit, Vincennes and Kaskaskia, afforded Jay the means of counteracting the whole beneficent policy of Congress. He was one of thc.se who pretended that the act of justice to the conquered French by which they were al- allowed to enjoy religious freedom, and live at least for a time under their own system of laws, was a subtle scheme of Great Britain to compass the ruin of her old colonies.* The experience of more than a century shows that England acted wisely. But Jay, then a young fanatic of twenty-nine, could see nothing but the triumph of the Catholic religion. As to his authorship of the Address there is no doubt. "The Address to the People of Great Britain," says his biogra phers, " was assigned to Mr. Jay. To secure himself from interruption, he left his lodgings and shut himself up in a room in a tavern, and there composed that celebrated state paper, not less distinguished for its lofty sentiments, than for the glowing language in which they are ex pressed," Unfortunately, we cannot agree with this opinion. The Address is narrow-minded, bigoted, fanatical and short sighted. Congress was at first led away by the silly preju dice aroused by the Quebec Act, and it took some time before it outgrew the feeling. Though Congress did at last, Jay never did. In this address, unfortunately issued in the name of Congress, Catholicity is branded as "a religion fraught with sanguinary and impious tenets." Then developing * Influenced by men like him, Congress in Sept. 1774, said: "The late Act of Parliament for establishing the Roman Catholic religion .... is danger ous in an extreme degree." Philadelphia Packet. Sept. 19, 1774. The paper 3f the 12th, contained a contribution against the Act addressed to the Kinp- But the subject was soon dropped with only an occasional reference to it and in the papers of June 19, 1775, we find an address of Congress to the oppress ed inhabitants of Canada, and that of July 10, gives a bill introduced into the House of Lords by Lord Camden for the repeal of the Quebec Act. No. 10.) Historical Magazine. his idea, Jay adds : " By another act the Dominion of Canada is to be so extended, modelled and governed, as that by being disunited from us, detached from our interests, by civil as well as religious prejudice, by their numbers daily swelling with Catholic emi grants from Europe, and by their devotion to administra tion, so friendly to their religion, they might become for midable to us, and on occasion be fit instruments in the hands of power to reduce the ancient free Protestant col onies to the same state of slavery with themselves " Nor (the address continues) can we suppress our astonish ment that a British parliament should ever consent to establish in that country a religion that has deluged your island in blood, and dispersed impiety, bigotry, persecution, murder and rebellion through every part of the world." " This being a true state of facts, let us beseech you to consider to what end they lead. "Admit that the Ministry by the powers of Britain, and the aid of our Roman Catholic neighbors should be able to carry the point of taxation, and reduce us to a state of perfect humiliation and slavery. Such an enterprise would doubtless make some addition to your national debt," etc. In a few words : nothing would satisfy John Jay but penal laws against the Catholics in Canada, and the estab lishment of English laws there. He wished no part or fellowship with them, and would rather see the Canadians remain under English rule, than have Catholics on our side. Such was not the view of Congress. On the i5th of February, 1776, it was "Resolved that a committee of three two of whom be members of Congress be ap pointed to repair to Canada, there to pursue such instruc tions as shall be given them by that body." Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Chase and Charles Car roll, of Carrollton were chosen, and the last named was de sired by Congress " to prevail on Mr. John Carroll to assist 10 United States Catholic No. 10.) them in such matters as they shall think useful." The Catholic priest responded to the call and accom panied the Commissioners to aid them " to promote or to form a union between- the colonies and the people of Can ada." The instructions to the Commissioners all tended to this. "To convince the Canadians of the uprightness of our intentions towards them, they were to declare that it was the inclination of Congress that the people of Canada should set up such a form of government as would be most likely in their judgment, to promote their happiness. And the commissioners were, in the strongest terms to assure them, that it was our earnest desire to adopt them into our union as a sister colony and to secure the same system of mild and equal laws for them and for ourselves, with only such local differences as might be agreeable to each colony respectively." " They were directed further to declare that that we held sacred the rights of conscience; and should promise to the whole people solemnly, in the name of Congress, the free and undisturbed exercise of their religion; and to the clergy the full, perfect and peaceable possession and enjoyment of all their estates; that the government of everything relative to their creed and clergy should be left entirely in the hands of the good people of that province, and such legislature as they should constitute; provided however, that all other denominations of Chris tians should be equally entitled to hold offices and en- joy civil privileges, and the free exercise of their religion as well as be totally exempt from the payment of any titles or taxes for the support of religion." * Congress had been forced by the bigotry of a few to denounce the Quebec Act in terms which showed more religious hate than sound political wisdom, but good sense * This was asking Canada to give Protestants greater rights than Massa- chusetts or New York gave Catholics in 1800 ; or New Hampshire did in 1876. No. JO.) Historical Magazine. u was gaining the day, and the allusion to the Quebec Act in the Declaration of Independence of 1776 is so obscure that few now understand it, and on the point of religion it is silent. At the time of the appointment of the Commissioners everything indicated the possibility of securing the co-op eration or at least the neutrality of the Canadians. At Montreal, the King s statue was smeared over and decorated with a necklace of potatoes; a leading Canadian gentleman was insulted and struck; and the feelings of the people in favor of Congress was so clearly shown that the British Colonel stationed there threatened to use the powder he had to blow up the city. The parishes around Chambly, openly joined the Am erican cause ; those in the government of Three Rivers, Nicolet, Becancour, Gentilly and St. Pierre refused to send a man in response to the call for militia to fight against the Americans. Carleton s proclamation was disregarded.)- The Caughnawaga Indians sent all their warriors to the Ameri can camp, and the British agent appointed to that tribe con fesses that he could find no one to side with him, except one miscreant who had been expelled from the village for his notorious vices. It might be thought that as the Canadians and colon ists to the South had more than once served in arms against each other, there must have been a feeling of hostility. But it should be remembered that they never took up arms for any quarrel of their own, they had both been forced to expend their blood and their means, be cause France and England chose to go to war, and Ameri ca became the scene of hostility for disputes in which it had no interest, and when it really needed peace. The colonists, whether of French or English origin, j- "This Proclamation so far from compelling the Canadians to take up arms, only produced the greatest aversion and repugnance to his orders." Smith, History of Canada," Quebec, 1815, p. 76. i* United States Catholic No. 10.) whether in Canadian or the old British colonies had com mon interests, and had a common history. They had re claimed the wilderness by their sturdy labor, reared their modest homes, and spread their rich fields of grain, their fisheries, their manufactures crippled only by the policy of the home government. Both trained in the same hard nur sery of frugal industry had been compelled to defend their hard bought property against Indian foes; both saw advan tages in peaceful trade and free intercourse. From the first, Canada had sought to bind herself closely to the English colonies by the bonds of com merce, and amity; she had proposed a plan of neutrality so that, though France and England might in the ambi tious projects of their state-craft, make Europe one vast charnel house, peace should reign amid the settlements in America, and each man pursue his avocations undisturbed by the sound or even the thought of war. Canada asked that Indians should not be employed in war; and not till the streets of her thriving town of Lachine were lighted by the flames of the burning houses, and strewn with the mangled corpses of men, women and children slaugh tered by Indians sent from New York by the bigotry roused by the English Revolution of 1688, did Canada summon to her standard the multitudinous tribes to which her influence reached. Between Canada and the Colonies there was and never had been but one bar, an insensate anti-Catholic feeling. When the Commissioners appointed by Congress to undo the mistakes of the past and form a close union reached Canada, General Arnold was in command of Montreal; Cana dians were flocking to the American standard, and all seemed to promise the speedy union of Canada with the other col onies, but just then Jay s handiwork, the Address of Congress to the people of Great Britain, was translated and scattered among the people of Canada. There instead of flattering words of harmony, toleration and union, they found themselves denounced, their religion No. 10.) Historical Magazine. 13 execrated, the very idea of union with them scouted. A general burst of indignation followed. " O the perfidious double faced Congress ! " cried the people. " Let us bless and obey our benevolent prince, whose humanity is consistent, and extends to all religions; let us abhor all who would seduce us from our loyalty." From that moment the tide of opinion changed. Doubt and suspicion prevailed; the leaders of the Canadians threw their influence in the British scale, and Canada was lost. In vain did the Commissioners labor to efface the impression produced by the spirit which dictated the Address to the People of Great Britain The Canadians as a body could not be induced to send delegates to a Congress which could put forward two doc trines so utterly irreconcileable, one all friendship and brother hood; the other unjust, vindictive, oppressive and malignant. Events soon occurred which made their conviction deeper, that the colonies as a whole were imbued with bitter hatred of Canada and her religion. The fugitive Scots from the Mohawk told their tale; the debates in New York con vention became known. Gradually all or nearly ali Can ada became alienated, indifferent to our cause. Yet never had there been a greater opportunity. As Colonel Barre declared on the floor of Parliament reading from a letter written by a military friend in Canada, the French there would not fight against the Americans. When the British authority summoned them to train as militia, they hid their guns in the woods and came with sticks, declaring that if they must fight, it would be against the English, and not for them. Down to the Battle at the Cedars, the Caughnwagas fought under the Continental flag, at severe loss. Canada was assured to England. It became the basis for operations against this country in the East and West. Burgoyne was sent over with an army : the Canadians, over awed and overpowered, were forced into service ; the hostile Indians in New York and the West were organized against our frontiers, and went forth to destruction led by white men in English pay. From Quebec to Green Bay every post was 14 United States Catholic No. 10.) a fomenter of Indian raids on the homes of the hardy sett lers. A broad belt of fire and blood marks the scene of their inhuman warfare, and all this misery and woe were brought upon the country by the hostility to the Catholic Church, a hostility which deprived us of Canada, and esteemed the welfare of America, as of no account, when weighed against the gratification of religious hatred. When, by the aid of the army and fleet of a Catholic ally, an English army was forced to yield at Yorktown and Great Britain lost all hope of reducing the United States to their old colonial condition, Canada might still have been secured, and would have been, but for John Jay, who was unfortunately one of those appointed by Congress to negotiate with England. Franklin and Adams were fully alive to the necessity of securing Canada, for Americans ever to have a real peace with England. This too, was the feeling in the Con tinental Congress, which wrote to its envoys in August, 1779, "It is of the utmost importance to the peace and commerce of the United States, that Canada and Nova Scotia should be ceded." To secure Canada, Franklin even proposed to indemnify the loyalists for their Josses, but when John Jay joined the others in Paris, he threw his whole weight on the English side. He was opposed to the annexation of Canada, true to his old anti-Catholic in stincts rather than to the welfare of America. He opened correspondence with the English ministry without the knowledge of his fellow negotiators, and he was not only willing to give up Canada to England, but offered her an equal right to the navigation of the Mississippi River, and insisted on making the new republic assume the payment of debts due by persons residing in the colonies to credi tors in England before the war, although he was well aware that the Continental Congress was utterly powerless under the Articles of Confederation to compel the payment of such claims. The very failure of the United States on this No. 10.) Historical Magazine. is point was made by England a pretext, for maintaining a hold on our western country, which cost thousands of lives, checked settlements, and desolated the homes of the brave frontiersmen.* The result was soon seen. England held Canada, and not only that, but from Canada maintained posts at Niag ara, ] )etroit, on the Maumee and on Lake Michigan, which by the treaty of peace were territory of the United States. Her Indian agents gained the Western chiefs and supplied the tribes with arms, while constantly fostering their hos tility to the United States. The defeats of Harmar and St. Clair were due to English arms and English guidance. And if Wayne defeated the Indians on the soil of Indiana, it was under the very guns of a fort which England had planted on our soil. At last John Jay, one of the most prominent among those who caused this terrible and lasting scourge to Am erica was sent to England, and he, in order to induce England to retire within her own Canadian boundaries, signed a treaty which excited universal execration. Thirty-six years passed, and we were again at war with England : Canada had become thoroughly submis sive under the British yoke. Her increasing population gave soldiers and officers to maintain English supremacy, and to aid in repelling the forces we sent to reduce the province. England still exercised an influence over our Western Indians and again incited them to massacre and arson, while Tecum- seh, with a royal commission, fought with his Indian braves beside the British regulars. Deeply, deeply has the country atoned in blood, for the error of 1774. Had the liberal and Christian spirit of a Mor ris and a Livingston been able to counteract the malignant purblindness of Jay, the flag of the United States would have floated for the last century over the Continent. * Bancroft, History of the United States, v. pp. 537, 508, 371, 575. AN ESSAY ON THE BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE kqd OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, IN THE UNITED STATES. NEW YORK, 1890. CATHOLIC BIBLIOGRAPHY. A Preliminary Catalogue of Councils, Synods and Statutes which have obtained force in any part of the United States. COUNCILS. Concilio Provincial celebrado en la muy noble y leal ciu- dad de Mexico, presidiendo el Illmo y Rmo Senor D. Fray Alonso de Montufar en el ano 1555. Mexico Juan P. Lombardo, 1556. Sanctum Provinciale Conciliam Mexici celebratum. Mexico; J, Ruiz, 1622. Sanctum Provinciale Concilium Mexici celebratum, Paris. Concilios Provinciales Primero, y Segundo, celebrados en la muy noble, y muy leal ciudad de Mexico, presidiendo el illmo, y rmo Senor D. Fr. Alonso de Montufar, en los anos de 1555, y 1556. Da los a luz el Illmo Sr. D. Francisco An tonio Lorenzana, Arzobispo de esta santa Metropolitana Iglesia. Folio. 408 pp, Mexico, Hogal, 1769. Concilium Mexicanum Provinciale III. celebratum Mexi ci ano MDLXXXV. Preside D. D Petro Moya, et Contreras, Archipiscopo ejusdem urbis, Confirmatum Romae die xxvij Octobris anno MDLXXXIX. Postea jussu regio editum Mexici ano MDCXXII sumptibus D. D. Joannis Perez de la Serna, Archiepiscopi. Demum typis mandatum cura, et ex- pensis D. D. Francisci Antonii a Lorenzana, Archipraesulis. Folio. 332 pp. Mexico, Hogal. 1770. Statuta ordinata a Sancto Concilio Provinciali Mexicano III. anno Domini MDLXXXV, ex prescript Sacrosancti Con- cilu Triclentini Decreto sess. cap 52 de Reform, verbo Cetera. Revisa a Catholica Majestate, et a Sacrosancta sede Apostoli- ca confirmata anno Domini millesimo quingentesimo octua- gesimo nono. Folio. 145 pp. n. p. n. d. Statuta Ecclesige Mexicanae necnon ordo in choro servan- dus curante Vallisoletanae Ecclesiae capitulo sumptus sup- peditante Illmo. ac Rmo D. M. D. F. Antonio a Sancto Michaele Episcopo Mechoacanensi, Regis a Consilus, etc., etc., denuo in lucem edita. Folio. 143 pp. Mexica, Zuniga, 1797.* PLENARY COUNCILS HELD IN THE UNITED STATES. Concilium Plenarium Totius Americse Septentrionalis Foederatae, Baltimori habitum anno 1852. 8vo pp 72. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1853. Concilii Plenarii Baltimorensis II. en Ecclesia Metropoli- tana Baltimorensi a die vii ad diem xxi. Octobris A. D- MDCCCLXVI habiti et a Sede Apostolica recogniti Acta et Decreta, Preside Illustrissimo et Reverendissimo Martino Joanne Spalding, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi et Delegate Apostolico, 8vo iv 346 xxviii, xxvi pp. J. Murphy & Co., Bait. 1867. Title as above omitting "Acta et." 8vo viii, 274, xx*iii, John Murphy, Baltimore, 1808. Title as above omitting "Acta ef but ending with "secun- dis curis editum. 8vo viii, 274. xxviii pp. John Murphy & Co., Bait., 1868. Decreta Conciliorum Provincialium et Plenarii Baltimo- rensium, pro majori cleri Americani commoditate simul col- lecta. 8vo pp 43. John Murphy & Co., Baltimore, 1853. Acta et Decreta Concilii Plenarii Baltimorensis Tertii A. D. MDCCCLXXXIV. Preside Illmo. ac Revmo. Jacobo Gib- * The preceding were in force in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Cali fornia. bons, Archiepiscopo Bait, et Delegate Apostolico. 8vo cix, 329 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1886. PROVINCIAL COUNCILS. Baltimore Concilium Baltimorense Provinciale Primum, habitum Baltimori anno reparatae Salutis 1829, mense Octobri. 8vo 30 pp. Baltimore, J. D. Toy, 1831. Concilium Baltimorense Provinciale Secundum: Habi tum Baltimori a die 20* a diem usque 27am Octobris A. R. S. 1833, 8vo 18 pp. Baltimore, J. D. Toy, n, d. Concilii Provincialia Baltimori habita ab anno 1829, usque ad annum J840. 8vo 221 pp., Baltimore, John Murphy, 1842. Fascisculus quo recensentur Acta ac Decreta Syno- dorum Provincialium Baltimori habitarum ab anno MD- CCCXXIX usque ad annum MDCCCXL qu^ Sacri Consilii Christiano nomine propagando judicio subjecta, et ab Apos- tolica Sede confirmata sunt. 8vo 162 pp., paper. n. p. n. d. (Rome). Same in Bullarium Pontificium Sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide, Rome, 1841, vol. 5, 80 pp 4to. Acta et Decreta Synodorum Provincialium Baltimori habitarum ab anno MDCCCXXIX usque ad annum MD CCCXL, que Sacri Concilii Christiano nomine propagando judicio subjecta et ab Apostolica Sede confirmata sunt ; Re- feruntur simul Sacri Consilii Decreta et Responsa de rebus in qualibet Synodo pertractatis. Editio Secunda. 8 vo 160 pp. Rome, Propaganda, 1841. Concilium Provinciale Baltimorense V. Habitum, anno 1843. 8vo 30 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy, 1844. Concilium Baltimorense Provinciale VI. Habitum anno 1846. 8vo 36 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy. 1847. 6 Concilium Baltimorense Provincialc VII. Habitum an no 1849. 8vo 33 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1851. Concilium Baltimorense Provinciale VIII., Habitum anno 1855. 8vo 40 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1857. Concilium Baltimorense Provinciale IX, Habitum anno 1858. 8vo 42 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., n. d. Concilii Provincialis Baltimorensis X. in Metropolitana Baltimorensi Ecclesia, Dominica quarta post Pascha, quae festo S. Marci Evangelistae incidit A. R. S. 1869 inchoati, et insequenti Dominica absoluti, Acta et Decreta, Prseside Ill- mo ac Revmo. Martino Joanne Spalding, Archiepiscopo Bal timorensi. 8vo 78 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy, 1870. CINCINNATI. Concilium Cincinnatense Provinciale I. Habitum, anno 1855. 8vo pp 50. Cincinnati, John P. Walsh, n. d. Concilium Cincinnatense Provinciale II. Habitum anno 1858. 8vo pp 32. Cincinnati, J. P. Walsh, n, d. Concilium Cincinnatense Provinciale III. Habitum anno 1861. 8vo pp 4S. Cincinnati and N. Y. Benziger Bros. n. d. Acta et Decreta Quatuor Conciliorum Provincialium Cincinnatensium, 1855 1882 Adjectis pluribus Decretis, Re- scriptis, aliisque Documentis. 8vo pp vii 319. Cincinnati, Benziger Bros.. 1886. MILWAUKEE. Acta et Decreta Concilii Provincialis Mil- waukiensis Primi. A. D. MDCCCLXXXVI. Preside Illmo. ac Revmo. Michaele Heiss, Archiepiscopo Milwaukiensi. 8vo 53 pp. Milwaukee, Hoffman Bros., 1888. NEW ORLEANS.- -Concilium Neo-Aurelianense Provin ciale Primum, Habitum anno 1856. 8vo pp 35. New Orleans, H. Meridier, 1857. Concilium Neo-Aureliancnse Tertium, Habitum mense Januario, A. D. 1873, cui addita sunt in appendice Duae Con- stitutiones Vaticanae Epistola Encyclica Quanta Cura Syl labus et Formula Juramenti pro ordinandis ad subdiacona- tum sub titulo Missionis. 8vo pp 69. New Orleans, Propagateur Catholique, 1875. NEW YORK.- -Concilium Neo-Eboracense Primum. Habi- tum anno MDCCCLIV. 8vo pp 32. New York, E. Dunigan & Bro., 1855, Concilium Neo-Eboracense III. mense Junii anno MD- CCCLXI. celebratum. 8vo pp 37 New York, E. Dunigan & Bro., 18C2. OREGON. Decreta Concilii Provincialis Oregonensis I. Sancti Pauli habiti diebus 28, 29 Februarii et 1 Martii 1848, 8vo pp 7. New York. 1887. Reprinted from the U. S, Catholic Historical Magazine, Vol. I. PHILADELPHIA. Decreta Concilii Provincialis Philadel- phiensis I. anno MDCCCLXXX habiti. 8vo 36 pp. n. p. n. d, SAN FRANCISCO. Concilii Provincialis S. Francisci I. in Ecclesia Metropolitana Sancti Francisci A. D. MDCCCLXXIV. habiti, et a Sede Apostolica recogniti, Acta et Decreta. 8vo pp 91. San Francisco, Thomas & Co., 1875. Concilii Provincialis S. Francisci II. in Ecclesia Metropoli tana Sancti Francisci, A. D. MDCCCLXXXII. habiti, et a Sede Apostolica recogniti, Acta et Decreta. 8vo pp 36, San Francisco, P. J. Thomas, 1883. ST. Louis Concilium Provinciale Secundum. Mense Septembris, A. D. 1858. Sancti Ludovici, Habitum. 8vo pp 1 6. St. Louis, G. Knapp & Co., 1859. DIOCESAN SYNODS AND STATUTES. ALBANY. Dioeceseos Albanensis Statuta quae in Synodo Albanensi II A.D. 1869 lata ac promulgata fuere al Illustrisso. et Reverendisso. Joanne Josepho Conroy, Episcopo Albanensi. 8vo 28 pp. Troy, N. Y., A. W. Scribner & Co., 1869. Synodus Dicecesana Albanensis Tertia quae anteceden- tium etiam complectitur constitutiones, diebus 6 et 7 Febru- arii, A. D. 1884 in Seminario S. Joseph!, Trojae habita ab Illustrissimo et Reverendissimo Francisco McNeirny, Episco- po Albanensi. 8vo 85 pp. New York Catholic Publication Society, 1884. BALTIMORE. [Statuta Synodi anno 1791 celebratae II Quidam ex articulis ecclesiacticae discipline quos 111, DD. Archiepiscopus Baltimorensis et Episcopi Americae Foederatae communi consilio, anno 1810, sanxerunt III Regulae ab Illo. et Revmo. Ambrosio Marshal conditae.l No title page. 8vo pp 34. apparently Baltimore, 1817. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis II. habita ab illustris- simo ac Reverendissimo Jacobo, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi. Anno reparatae Salutio 1831. Mense Novembri. 8vo 10 pp. Baltimore, J. D. Toy, 1831. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis, mense Junio, 1853 habita. 8vo 18 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1853. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis, mense Junio, 1857 habita. 8vo 14 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1857. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis. mense Maii, 1863 habita. 8vo 1 8 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1863. Acta Synodi Dioecesanae Baltimorensis Sextae: una cum constitutionibus ab illustrissimo ac reverendissimo Martino Joanne Spalding, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi latis ac pro- mulgatis; in feria quarta Rogationum, Die 24 Maii, A. D. MDCCCLXV. 8vo 22 pp. Baltimore, Kelly & Piet, 1865. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis Septima; quae ante- cedentium etiam complectitur constitutiones; die III Sep- tembris. A, D. 1 868 in Ecclesia Collegiali S. Marias ad Semi- narium S. Sulpitii, Baltimore habita : ab Illustrissimo ac 9 Reverendissimo Martino Joanne Spalding, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi. 8vo 28 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy, 1868. Synodus Dioecesana Baltimorensis Octava, quae antece- dentium etiam complectitur Constitutiones, die xxvii Augus- to, A. D. 1875 and B. M. V. en Seminario S. Sulpitii Baltimore habita, ab Illustrissimo ac Reverendissimo Jacobo Roosevelt Bayley, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi. i2tno 134 pp. Baltimore, John Murphy & Co., 1876. Synodus I )icecesana Baltimorensis nona quae anteceden- tium etiam complectitur Constitutiones; die xxiv Septembris, A. D. 1880 ad B. V. M in Seminario S. Sulpitii Baltimorae hab- itea ab Eminentissimo ac Reverendissimo Jacobo Cardinale Gibbons, Archiepiscopo Baltimorensi. i2mo 136 pp. Baltimore, Foley Brothers, 1886. BOSTON. Synodus Dicecesana Bostoniensis I habita anno 1842. 8vo 1 1 pp,, no place, no date. (2d ed,) 8vo 11 pp. Boston, P. Uonahoe, n. d. Constitutiones Dioecesanae ab Illmo. ac Revmo. Domino Joanne Josepho Williams, Episcopo Bostoniensi in Synodo Dioecesana Secunda habita Bostoniae, A. D. 1868, latae et pro- mulgatae. 8vo 59 pp. n. p. n. d. BUFFALO. Synodus Dioecesana Buffalensis Secunda, hab ita anno MDCCCXLIX. 8vo. Buffalo, Brunck & Domediou, 1850, Synodus Dicecesana Buffalensis Decima Septima, quae complectitur etiam Statuta lata in Synodis ab A.D. 1847 usque ad 1886, die 13 a August!, A, D. 1871 in Ecclesia Cathedrali Sancti Josephi in Civitate Buffalensi habita, ab Illustrissimo ac Reverendissimo Stephano Vincentio Ryan, D. D., Episco po Buffalensi. 8vo 50 pp. Buffalo, 1871. BURLINGTON. Statuta Dioecesis Burlingtoniensis. Deus providebit. 8vo 11 pp. St. Albans, 1878. 10 CHARLESTON Statutaquce in Synodo Carolopolitana XVI lata et promulgata fuere ab Illmo. ac Revmo. Dominio, Hen- rico P. Northrop, Episcopo Carolopolitano. T2mo 47 pp Charleston : Walker, Evans & Cogswell & Co., n. d. CINCINNATI, Statuta Dioecesana ab Illustrissimo ac Rever- endissimo P. D. Joanne Baptista Purcell, Archiepiscopo Cin- cinnatensi in variis synodis, quse hucusque in Ecclesia sua Cathedrali, vel in Sacello Seminarii, celebratae sunt, lata et promulgata. Una cum Decretis Conciliorum Provincialium et Plenarii Baltimorensium, quibus interfuerunt omnes Statuum Fcederatorum Episcopi, et decretis Conciliorum trium Cincinnatensium, nunc primum in unum collecta et publici juris facta. 8vo t>9, x, 15, 44, 14pp. Cincinnati, 18(55. Synodus Dioecesana Cincinnatensis Secunda, diebus 19, 20, 21 Octobris A. D. 1808, in Ecclesia Metropolitana St. Petri in Vinculis, Cincinnati habita, ab Illmo. ac Revmo. Gulielmo Henrico Elder, Archiepiscopo Cincinnatensi. 8vo 82 pp. n, p. n. d. CLEVELAND. Statuta Dioecesis Clevelandensis lata in Synodo Dioecesana habita, A. D. 1852, et in aliis Synodis A.D. 1854 et A. D. 1857 aucta et emendata. 80 pp. Cleveland, H. Kramer, 1857. DENVER. Synodus Dioecesana Denveriensis Prima juxta norman a Cone. Bait. Ill praestitutam habita in Collegio S. S. Cordis, Highlands, a Reverendissimo Nicolao Chryosostomo Matz, Episcopo Denveriensi die ii Augusti MDCCCLXXXIX 8vo 59 pp. Las Vegas, 1889. DETROIT. [Statuta, Dec. 25, I851J. 8vo 15 pp n. p. n. d. Constitutiones Synodi Dioecesanae Detroitensis Primae, habitae mense Octobri, A.D. 1859. 8vo 44 pp. Detroit, John Slater, 1859. Synodus Dicecesana Detroitensis Secunda, habita mense Septembri A. D. MDCCCLXII. 11 8vo pp 1). Detroit, John Slater, 1802, Acta et Constitutiones Synodi Dioecesanse Detroitensis Sextae, habita in Collegio Assumptionis BMV. Sandwichensi, diebus 20 et 21 mensis Julii A. D. 1885 Praeside Reverendis- simo et Illustrissimo Casparo Henrico Borgess, Episcopo De troitensis, 8vo 17 pp. Detroit, Kilroy & Brennan, 1881. A. M, D. G. Sy nodus Dioecesana Detroitensis Septima; antecedentmm etiam complectitur Constitutiones, die XIX M. Augusti, A. D. 1880 in Collegio Assumptionis B. M. V. Sandwichensi, habita; ab Illustrissimo ac Reverendissimo Casparo Henrico Borgess, Episcopo Detroitensi II. 8vo x, 24, ii pp paper, Marshall, Mich,, 1880. DUBUQUE. Statuta lata et promulgata ab Illmo ac Revmo D. Clementi Smyth, Episcopo Dubuquensi in Synodo Primo Dioecesana, Dubuquii, mense Mali 1871 habita. 8vo 19 pp. Dubuque; Rich & Ryan, 1871. FORT WAYNE. Statuta Dicecesis Wayne Castrensis in Synodo I >icecesana 1874 promulgata ab Illustrissimo ac Rev erendissimo Joseph Dwenger. Hvo 23 pp. Fort Wayne; Sentinel, 1875. GREEN BAY. Constitutiones Dioecesos Sinus Viridis. i2mo 12 pp. Milwaukee, P. V. Deuster, 1869. Decreta edita in Synodo Dioecesana ima celebrata Sinu Viridi a Revmo. ac Illustrissimo D. Domino Francisco Xav- erio Krautbauer, diebus nmo et i2mo Julii A. D. 1870. !2mo 30 pp. Green Bay, Robinson Brothers & Clark, 1877. HARTFORD Decreta Synodi Hartfordensis Primae, mense Octobris, anno MDCCCLIV celebratae. 8vo 20 pp. Providence: B. T. Albro, 1855. Constitutiones Synodi Hartfordensis II, mense Septembri anno MDCCCLXXVIII habite. 8vo 40 pp Hartford : Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co., 1878. Constitutiones Synodi Hartfordiensis IV. ab Illmo. et Revmo Domino Laurentio Stephano McMahon, Episcopo Hartfor- 12 diensi, mensi August! anno MDCCCLXXXVI habitse. 8vo 6 1 pp. Hartford: Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co., 1887. LOUISIANA. Statutes of the Diocese of Louisiana and the Floridas, issued 1 y the Rt.Rev.Luis Penalvery Cardenas, 1795, wit h a translation by John Gilmary Shea [Spanish and English.] 8vo 29 pp. New York, 1887. Reprinted from U. S. Historical Magazine for Oct. 87. LOUISVILLE. Constitutions Dicecesis Ludovicopolitanae, a Re verendissimo ac Illustrissimo Domino Martino Joanne Spalding, Episcopo Ludovicopolitano, in Synodo Dioecesana prima, habita mense Julii 1850 en Ecclesiao St. Josephi, Bard- poli, latse et promulgate. 8vo 20 pp. Louisville: Webb, McGill & Levering, 1850. [2d ed.] 8vo 16 pp. Louisville; Joseph F. Brennan, 1857. Synodus Tertia Dioecesana Ludovicopolitana, habita die 27 Augusti J862, in ecclesia Sancti Joseph Bardensi. Hvo 28 pp. Louisville; Bradley & Gilbert, 1862. Synodus Dicecesana Ludovicopolitana IV. in Ecclesia Cathedrali, die 21 Julii A, R. S. 1874 ab Illustrissimo ac Rev- erendissimo D. Gulielmo McCloskey, Episcopo Ludovicopoli tano, habita. 8vo 24 pp. Louisville; Bradley & Gilbert, 1874. MOBILE. Statuta Synodi Mobiliensis Primse mense No- vembris, anno Domini 1861 celebrata. 16mo 1 6 pp. Montgomery, 1862. NATCHEZ Synodus Dicecesana Natchetensis Prima,habita ab Illmo et Rmo Gulielmo Henrico Elder, Episcopo Natche- tensi, hebdomada secunda post Pascha anno 1858. 8vo 14 pp. New Orleans: Propagateur Catholique, 1858. Synodus Dioecesana Natchetensis mense Januarii 1862, habita. 8vo 12 pp. New Orleans: Propagateur Catholique, 1862. Synodus Dioecesana Natchetensis Quarta, habita diebus i9a, 2oa et 21 a mense Januarii A. D. 1874 a Rev mo . Gulielmo Henrico Elder, I^piscopo Natchetensi, in Monasterio cui no- men " St. Theresa s Retreat " Patrum Congregationis SS. Re- demptoris, apud Chatawa, Mississippi. 16 mo 26 pp. n. p. n, d. NEWARK Statuta Novarcensis Dioeceseos a Reverendis- simo Domino Jacobo Roosevelt Bayley, Novarcensi Episcopo, in Synodo Dioecesana Prima habita mense Augusto, 1856, in Collegio Seton Hall, Madison, N. J., lata et promulgata. 16mo 52 pp. New York: E. Dunigan & Brother, 1857. Statuta Dioecesis Novarcensis quae post Synodum I am A.D. A. D. 1853, et II am A. D. 1868 a Rev rao . Jacobo Roosevelt Bayley, fe. me., celebratas, in Synodo Dioscesana Tertia, die- bus 8 et 9 Maji 1878 habita, tulit et promulgavit Illustr mus et Rev mus Michael Augustinus Corrigan, Episcopus. 16mo 161 pp. New York, Benziger Brothers, 1878. Synodus Dioecesana Novarcensis Quinta, A. D. 1886 cele- brata ab Illustr" 10 et Rev mo Michael Venantio Wigger, Episcopo. 8vo 45 pp. Arlington, N. J., J8S7. NEW ORLEANS Synodus Dicecesana Neo-Aurelianensis Secunda, habita mense Aprili anno 1844. 8vo 22 pp. New Orleans: H. Meridier, 1844. NEW YORK Synodus Dioscesana Neo-Eboracensis Prima, Habita anno 1842. 8vo 22 pp. New York, George Mitchell, 1842. Synodus Dioecesana Neo-Eboracensis Tertia, quas ante- cedentium etiam complectitur Constitutiones, die 29 etdie 30 Septembris, A. D. 1868 in ecclesia Metropolitana S. Patritii, Neo-Eboraci habita ab Illustrissimo et Reverendissimo Joanne McCloskey, Archiepiscopo Neo-Eboracensi. 8vo 23 pp. New York, Catholic Publication Society, 1868. Synodus Dioecesana Neo-Eboracensis Quarta, quae ante- cedentium etiam complectitur Constitutiones diebus 8 et 9 Novembris A.D. 1882, in Ecclesia Metropolitana S. Patritii,Neo- Eboraci habita ab Eminentissimo et Reverendissimo Joanne Cardinal! McCloskey, Archiepiscopo Neo-Eboracensis. 8vo 51 pp. New York, Catholic Publication Society, 1882. 14 PHILADELPHIA Acta Synodi Dioecesanae Philadelphiensis Primae, habitae in Ecclesia Cathedral! S. Mariae Philadelphia, anno Domini 1832, mense Maji a Reverendissimo Francisco Patritio Kenrick, Episcopo Arathensi et Coadjutore Episcopi Philadelphiensis. 8vo 1 6 pp, Philadelphia, E. Cummiskey, 1832, Constitutiones Dioecesanae in Synodis Philadelphiensibus, annis 1832 et 1842 latae et promulgatae. 8vo 1 8 pp, Philadelphia, M, Fithian, 1842. Constitutiones Dioecesanse in Synodis Philadelphiensibus, annis 1832, 1842, 1847, 1853 et 1855 latae et promulgatae. 8vo 50 pp. Philadelphia; J, B, Chandler, 1855. Acta Synodi Dicecesanse Philadelphiensis Sextae, habitae a Revmo. Joanne Nepomuceno, Episcopo Philadelphiensi, diebus 28 et 29 Octobris A. D. 1857. 8vo. Philadelphia. PITTSBURGH. Statuta Dioecesis Pittsburgensis, lata in Synodo Dioecesana habita A. D. 1844 et in aliis Synodis A. D. 1846 et A. D. 1854 emendata. 8vo 26 pp. Pittsburgh; George Quigley, 1854. Statuta Dicecesis Pittsburgensis lata in Synodo Dioece sana habita A. D. 1844 cum decretis in aliis Synodis A. 0.1846, 1854, 1858 et 1869 promulgatis. 8vo 43 pp. Pittsburgh: James Porter, 1870. PROVIDENCE. Acta et Decreta Synodi Dioecesanse Pro- videntiensis Tertiae habitae in Ecclesia Cathedrali ab Ill mo et Rev* Matthaeo Harkins, Episcopo Providentiensi die 21 Decembris, 1887. 8vo 64 pp. Woodstock College, 1888. QUEBEC.* Statuts publics dans le premier Synode, tenu k Quebec le 9 Novembre, 1690. * These Synods were in force in Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, etc., before the creation of the See of Baltimore. 15 Avis et Reglements publics dans 1 Assemble tenue k Ville Marie le 10 de Mars, 1694. Statuts publics dans le troisieme Synode tenue a Quebec le 276 Fevrier de 1 anne 1698. Statuts publics dans le quatrieme Synode tenu & Que bec, le 8 Octobre, 1700. A " In Mandements, Lettres Pastorales et Circulaires des Eveques de Que bec," Quebec 1887, i p. 270, 325, 368. RICHMOND. Statuta Synodi Richmondensis primae mense Octobris Anno Domini 1856 celebratae. 8vo 39 pp. Baltimore: John Murphy & Co., 1857. ROCHESTER. Acta & Statuta Synodi Dioecesanae Roffen- sis Primae habitae diebus 13 and 14 Octobris, A. D. 1875. 8vo36 pp. Rochester: Union and Advertiser Co., 1875. SAN FRANCISCO. Synodus Dicecesana Sancti Francisci habita mense Julii 1862. 8vo 1 6 pp. San Francisco : Towne & Bacon, 1862; [2d edition]. 8vo 19 pp. San Francisco: Smyth & Shoaff, 72. SANTIAGO DE CUBA. Constituciones Synodales de la Iglesia de Cuba. Folio. 1682. Constitutiones Synodales de la Iglesia de Cuba. 2d edition. Synodo Dioecesano que de orden de S. M. celebro el Ilus- trisimo Senor Doctor Don Juan Garcia de Palacios, obispo de Cuba en Junio de 1684, Reimpreso por orden del Ilustrisimo Senor Doctor Don Juan Jose Diaz de Espada y Landa, Se- gundo Obispo de la Habana, y anotado conforme a las ulti mas disposiciones eclesiasticas y civiles. Reimpreso. 8vo 229 pp. Habana, Imprenta del Gobierno, 1844.* SANTA FE. Constituciones Eclesiasticas para la Diocesis de Santa F N. M, Publicadas por el Il m Sr. Obispo D. Juan B. Lamy. *The Synod was in force in Florida till 1820. The Florida Constitutions have been published in the U. S. Catholic Hist. Mag. 16 8vo 37 pp. Albuquerque, N.M., Rio Grande Press, 1874. ST. PAUL. Decreta Synodalia Dioeceseos Sti Pauli de Minnesota. 8vo 36, 8 pp. St. Paul, Pioneer Co., 1874. ST. Louis, vStatuta lata et promulgata ab Ill mo , ac Rev mo . D. Petro Ricardo Kenrick, Archiepiscopo S. Ludo- vici, in Synodo Dioecesana mense Augusti. A, D. i85ohabita. 8vo 19 pp. St. Louis: Richard Phillips, 1850. Statuta Dioecesis S. Ludovici, promulgata ab Ill mo . ac R mo . D. D. Joseph Rosati, Congregationis Missionis, Epis- copo S. Ludovici, in Synodo Dioecesana habita in Ecclesia Cathedrali. mense Aprili 1839. 8vo. St. Louis: C. Keemle, 1839. [2ded.] 8vo Rome, 1839. SAULT ST. MARY. Statuta Dicecesis Marianopolitanae in Michigan. 8vo 84 pp. Detroit: John Slater, 1863. SYRACUSE. Synodus Dioecesana Syracusana Prima, die xiv Septembris A.D. 1887 in Ecclesia Sanctae Mariae in Ccelos Assumptse, Syracusis habita ab Illustrissimo ac Reverendis- simo Patritio A. Ludden. Episcopo Syracusano. 8vo 113 pp. New York Catholic Publication Society, 1887. WHEELING. Statuta ab Ill mo . ac Rev mo . Dom. Richardo Vine. Whelan Episcopo Wheelingensi, in Synodo Dioecesana, in Cathedrali, diebus 28 ac 29 Octobris an, 1873, habita, lata et promulgata. 8vo 15 pp. Wheeling: James F. Carroll, 1873. THE FIRST EPIC OF OUR COUNTRY. BY THE POET CONQUISTADOR OF NEW MEXICO, CAPTAIN GASPAR DE YILLAGRA. BY JOHN GIL MARY S H p] A . IT may be a question in the minds of some whether in this essay I purpose to address the literary with a criticism on a poem, or whether it is my intention to depict some portion of our history, a topic, apparently, more germane to the ob jects of this Society. Yet, if I seek to lead the members into the flowery meads of Parnassus, I am only going back to the primitive days. The earliest historical accounts were chanted by poets, not read as dull prose. The book of Job, perhaps the oldest we possess, is a poem : Homer preserves histo ries of events unwritten in prose, the glories of his tribe are sung in the tent of the Arab sheik, as Druids chanted those of the Celt ; and we look to the Edda and the strains of the Minnesinger for many details of event and life that the prim historian ne er consigned to any enduring form of record. In English we have ballads, some of merit, a few graphic in their pictures of events, but amid the mass of rubbish there were but few to be culled by the lover of literature, and none, we may say, to be treasured by the historian. On this side of the Atlantic the Muse of History and the Muse of Poesy were alike niggardly to our pioneers. The attempts at ballad writ ing were even beneath the hymn standard, and that was bad enough. The ballads gathered by Dr. Griswold and others are absurdly curious ; indeed, it was only where ridicule could be brought to bear that any writer of real ability lent him self to the task of embodying some odd episode, as Andre did in his " Cow Chase," and Hopkinson in his " Battle of the Kegs." Our historians do not quote historical ballads in serious his tory. In Spanish literature it is different. There the narra tive poem has always held a recognized position, and works of greater or Jess merit have come down to us, some maintaining to this day their early reputation. A melodious language easily lent itself to poetical numbers ; the long struggle with the Moors called forth all knightly traits and exalted ideas, perhaps often to an extravagant point. The soldier, like Man- rique, solaced his hours of inaction by chanting in verse the deeds of his ancestors or his commander. When the New World opened to the warriors of the peninsula a wide untrod den field for high emprize, strange in all its natural features, its inhabitants, its grandeur, where all was redolent of ro mance, the Spanish knight came with lyre and lance. Nar rative poems were written in many forms, and under every possible circumstance. Some were perpetuated by the press, but an immense number still remain in manuscript, and are known to few but the literary or historic antiquarian. The highest of the poems, the only one recognized as a classic, is the Araucana of Alonso de Ercilla y Zufiiga, the work of an officer who recounted in metre the wars of the Spaniards against the unconquerable Indians of Southern Chili, a theme which inspired also the Arauca Domado of Pedro de Ona printed at Lima in 1596, and the Puren Indomito of Alvarez de Toledo, printed only in our day, but cited as an authority by historians of Chili more than two hundred and fifty years ago. Spain thus brought to the New World her soldier narrative poets, whose rhymed chronicles the historian cannot overlook or despise, though his literary brother may treat them with scant courtesy. Although only our southern frontier was embraced in the Spanish territory, it has its historic poems. I have seen one in print on the overthrow of the French in Florida by Me- nendez, probably sung as a ballad in the streets of Spanish cities ; another of great length, but unpublished as yet, on the capture of Bishop Altarairano by a French pirate, his ransom and the overthrow of the Corsair ; a curious poem of the last century on the seizure of Bishop Morel, at Havana, by Lord Albemarle, and his deportation to Florida. But of all, the most curious and by far the most important is the little vol ume I hold in my hand : " Historia de la Nueva Mexico. Poema Epico del Capitan Gaspar de Yillagra. En Alcala de Henares, por Luis Mar tinez Grade, 1610." " The History of New Mexico. An Epic Poem by Captain Gaspar de Yillagra. Published at Alcala de Henares, by Luis Martinez Grade, 1610." Written and printed before Henry Hudson had made wide ly known our beautiful harbor as it appeared to his eyes ; be fore the self-exiled Separatists in Holland had formed any project of settling in America, this little work stands in the collection of New Mexico books between the .Roman Relation of Montoya, 1603, and the Memorial of Benavides, 1630. It is a poem in 34 cantos, covering, independent of the pre liminary matter, 287 leaves. We cannot claim for it brilliant invention, rich poetical description, or ingenious fancy ; for one of the censors of the work, Master Espinel, while admit ting the correctness of the rhythm, yet, with almost brutal frankness, tells the plain, unvarnished truth on this score. u The History of New Mexico, an heroic poem by Captain Gaspar de Yillaga, contains nothing against faith and morals, it rather exalts and elevates it, to behold such a number of souls brought to Catholic truth, and the crown of Spain, with such immense toil by our Spanish race. The verse is correct (numeroso like Pope i he lisped in numbers, ) and although devoid of inventions and the flowers of poesy (from its being a consecutive and true history), the variety of such new and extraordinary events will please and inspire people of all con ditions some to imitate, others to esteem them, and there fore it is good that it should go into the hands of all. Ma drid, December 9, 1609." But though the censor thus cruelly disappoints us at the outset, the nine odes and sonnets to the author and to the commander of the expedition, including one addressed in their name to the king, show more poetical invention and richness ; even Espinel there pays compliments in verse which he avoids in prose, extolling alike the prowess and the poetry of our Captain. The poem is dedicated to the king, and addresses him throughout ; and his Majesty, in the license, styles it " a work which cost you much labor and care, both from having fought and served us in the discovery, pacification, and settlement of said New Mexico, the history whereof you treat, as well as for reducing it to a veritable history, as you have done." If, then, we cannot claim for Villagra s poem a rank among the classics, it is nevertheless worth study as a poem written here at such an early period on events in which the author took part. It is devoted entirely to an American theme. This would in itself be enough to invest Villagra s poem with interest to any one given to literary research. But as an his torical work it possesses remarkable value. The harmonious prose of some writers like Fronde, for example treats his torical facts with greater poetical license than Villagra allowed himself; and while the muse of Froude prompts him to gar ble documents to ensure poetic effect, our Spanish poet breaks off at times to give us an important document in solid prose. He does not make any sacrifices to the exigency of verse, and apparently suppresses no name, differing in this from the French poet Thomas, who wrote the poem " Jumonville," in which Washington plays the part of arch-fiend. The whole poem turns on his iniquity and its merited retribution ; but as Washington s name defied the poet s ability to introduce it into French verse, it never once occurs in the whole poem. Villagra s poem is all the more important as an historical document, because it is the only one that covers the whole career of Don Juan de Onate from the first project of the conquest of New Mexico down to the revolt of the pueblo of Acoma, and the final reduction and destruction of that city on the beetling crag. It is the only key to the early history of New Mexico. Documents of great value have been printed in Mexico and Spain ; books were printed at an early day con taining important matter relating to that curious cluster of Pueblo Indians before and after the Spanish conquest ; but a student finds himself groping blindly in his endeavor to trace the series of events till he reads the poem of V illagra. Any one who has read the accounts of the conquest of New Mexico, by Onate, either in works especially devoted to that territory, like those of Davis or Prince, or works in which the subject is treated incidentally, must have seen that these writ ers flounder in a most extraordinary manner as to the very date of Ofiate s expedition, and betray complete ignorance as to its earlier stages. They leave you in a delightful mist of uncertainty whether the Spanish commander set out in 1591, or in some year between that and the last year of the century. Yet here was a work in print, not one of highest rarity, writ ten by one of the very conquistadors of New Mexico, an offi cer who served in the expedition and proved himself a gallant man at arms a work in which he gives, with exact particu larity, dates of events, names of officers, priests, and soldiers, names of Indian chiefs and places, till the verse reminds one of the second book of the " Iliad," or passages in Shakespeare s historical plays. It may not be poetry, but we may thank the poet for his poem. Opening with a patriotic tribute to the Spanish monarch, the first canto then proceeds to give an idea of the position of New Mexico in the continent of North America, and of the extent of the province. Next it relates the unanimous, con sistent, and general tradition in Mexico, that two valiant broth ers, issuing from a cave in the northern parts, led the Mexi cans to their present land a story told, too, in their ancient hieroglyphics] paintings. In the next canto the devil, in the form of a frightful hag, meets these early Mexican emigrants on their southward march, and bids them plant their city by a lake, where they see an eagle on a prickly-pear devouring a 6 serpent the emblem of our neighboring republic, now so fa miliar to us. In the third canto lie introduces us to the viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza, and to Cristobal de Ofiate, and his kinsman Juan de Zaldibar, who pushed the Spanish conquests north ward. Then he begins properly the history of the explora tions which led to the occupation of New Mexico, starting with " that zealous, humble provincial of the order of the Seraphic Francis, who is called Fray Mark of Nice." The expedition of Francisco Yasquez de Coronado is next described, from his camp at Compostela, 1,200 miles from Mexico, to the pueblos of Cibola, recounting in stately verse the prowess of some of his officers. The fourth canto is one of moralizing, in which he stigma tizes the infamy of commanders, officers, and soldiers who un dertake new conquests, but lack spirit to carry them out. In the fifth we come to the zealous exploration of the mission aries, Fray Agustin Rodriguez and his companions, escorted bv Francisco Sanchez Chamuscado, and seven other Spaniards whom he names, giving the date of the expedition, 1581 : And in the year, tis certain as the sun, We reckon fifteen hundred eighty-one, The Count whose scutcheon marks Corunna by the sea, Sent forth Agustin, Juan, Francisco, friars three, Devout Religious of the Saint who bore On feet and side and hands in pity-moving gore The stigmas of our suffering Lord portrayed. To ope these heathen lands, with valor they essayed, To guard their steps Francis Sanchez Chamuscado goes, Philip de Escalante, Peter Sanchez de Chaves, and Gallejos, Herrera, Fuensalida, Barrada, and John Sanchez too, Whom all for valiant and stout warriors knew. Much of the land this little corps explored, Then leaving there the priests that God might be adored, Their homeward way without mishap retrace, ( Glad to have journeyed, seen, explored the place. That the names of the soldiers are accurate is attested by the examinations of some of them jet extant. These missionaries reached the pueblo of Puaray, near the present Sandia, and began their Christian work after the sol diers of the escort left them. For a time the prospect seemed most flattering; and one of the priests, attempting to cross the territory of the wild tribes and reach the Spanish settle ments to obtain additional laborers and means, was treacher ously slain. Then another priest, Father Francis Lopez, was killed near Puaray ; and Brother Augustine Rodriguez, left alone with a few young Indians who had accompanied him from Mexico, was likewise butchered. The Franciscans in Mexico were long in harassing doubt as to the fate of their fellow-religious, and, in 1582, a wealthy gentleman, Antonio de Espejo, set out with a force, raised at his own expense, to ascertain the fate of the friars. The people of Puaray fled, and a painted wall depicted only too distinctly the fate of the three brave envoys of Christian civilization. Espejo, disappointed in his hope of rescuing the missionaries, then explored the country of the Pueblo Indians, to which Friar Augustine had given the name of New Mexico, and returned hoping to obtain a royal grant to reduce it. His services were, however, set aside, and the conquest of New Mexico was assigned to Juan de Onate. Espejo s expedition was fully described in a work on China, printed in 1586, but our poet being an adherent of Onate, de scribes it very briefly ; he tells, however, of Father Diego Marquez and his capture by the English ; of the attempt made by Juan Bautista de Lomas in 1589 ; of the expedition under Castanos the next year, with Cristobal de Heredia, which was arrested by the viceroy; next of the attempt made by Cap tain Leiva Bonilla in defiance of the viceroy s order, formally announced to him. His party broke up, and finally submit ted to the authorities. Haying thus touched upon all the previous efforts to reduce New Mexico, our poet, in the sixth canto, begins properly the history of Onate s expedition, which planted the power of Spain on the upper Rio Grande. The king had committed the conquest to Don Juan de Dilate as early as 1588, doubtless from family influence, for he was connected with the houses of Cortes and Montezuma. And it was for this reason that the projects of more ex perienced officers on the frontier were rejected, and their at tempts suppressed. But Cedilla followed Cedula, and it was not till August 24, 1595, that the viceroy of New Spain issued the official authority for the expedition. Onate then called around him several distinguished officers, who were to bring retainers, and share in the perils and glory of the conquest. lie appointed John de Zaldibar maese de campo, and Juan Guerra his lieutenant, Vicente de Zaldibar sargente-major. His officers set up their standards to enroll men for the expedi tion, but amid all the din of preparation there came an order from the Count of Monterey, who had just arrived as viceroy, directing Ofiate to suspend his operations, and not proceed to New Mexico. Jealousy had been at work, and it required time for Ofiate to justify himself in Mexico and in Spain. At last missionaries were assigned to the expedition, Fathers Fray Eodrigo Duran, Fray Diego Marquez, Fr. Balthazar , Fray Cristobal de Salazar, and others. A force of 1,500 men was at last assembled at Nombre de Dios, and a royal officer sent to see that the expedition was properly equip ped and supplied before it set out : but to the dismay of Onate, this officer bore a letter from the Count of Monterey, dated at Mexico, August 12, 1596, inclosing one from the king, dated May 8th, forbidding Onate to enter New Mexico, or if he had entered that province, to continue his expedition. If he or his officers refused to obey, they were cited to appear in sixty days before a tribunal, under penalty of being declared traitors. Fora second time the expedition was thus thwarted, and Onate, after expending 15,000 ducats in preparation, found himself with a considerable force to be maintained at heavy expense or disbanded. 9 Seeing no immediate prospect of reaching New Mexico, Father Rodrigo Duran, the Commissary, as the Superior of the Friars was called, with F. Balthazar, and some others, re turned to Mexico. Ofiate, with his soldiers, settlers, flocks, and herds, remained encamped, daily losing men, and annoy ed by royal officers, who caused him excessive injury by petty persecutions, in which nearly all the live-stock of the array was scattered far and. wide. Onate s representations finally obtained a recall of the order, and he broke up his camp at Noinbre de Dios, and began his march for the Rio de las Conchas, eighty heavy wagons, with other vehicles, and herds of cattle and smaller live-stock, retarding his progress. He threw a bridge over the Conchas, and there the royal Visitor left him, giving merely verbal permission for the expedition. At this time only one clergyman, Father Diego Marquez, re mained with the army as chaplain, and a cabal forced him to leave the camp, perhaps regarding his answers in presence of Queen Elizabeth, as dictated by fear of rack and thumb-screw in the Tower, and unworthy of a religious. A new Commissary, Father Alonso Martinez, with several Franciscan priests, soon after overtook the force. After cele brating Holy Week as became good Christians, the Spaniards encountered some Indians, one of whom traced on the ground with the point of his arrow, the route the expedition should follow to reach the Rio del Norte and the pueblos of New Mexico. The wife of this Indian, becoming anxious over her husband s absence, came to the Spanish camp, and her devoted affection afforded the poet a theme for his thirteenth canto. After crossing a waterless tract, in which their horses nearly perished. Onate s people reached the Rio Grande. It delight ed them with its waters, as well as by the verdure and game found on its banks. While seeking a ford to cross the river, the Spaniards came upon an Indian village, and entered into friendly relations with the people. Within a dim and overarching wood, A graceful church, with one broad nave soon stood, 10 Its verdant walls afford unjostling space To all who with the camp had reached the place. Here in this hallowed and religious shrine A very solemn Mass was offered. With study fine The learned Gustos preached a sermon grave, Then when the Church her final blessing gave, A comedy by Captain Farf an writ to show How holy Church by all New Mexico Was welcomed, suppliant, eager for the light That by baptismal waters all her children might Be cleansed from sin, as on the march till now, The sacred waters had touched many a brow. Our poet thus ungrudgingly records the effort of his fellow- poet Farfan to give solemnity to the day. On Ascension day, April 30, 1598, Onate took possession of New Mexico in an official act, which surpassed the powers of his poetical captain to versify, and Yillagra accordingly gives it in prose. None of our historians have yet copied this document, which occupies twenty-six pages in the fourteenth canto of the poem. This document recites the royal orders of January 26, 1588, July 19, 1589, January 17, 1593, June 21, 1595, and April 2, 1597, constituting Don Juan de Onate governor, captain- general, and adelantado, and cites, as the just ground for the invasion and reduction of New Mexico, "the innocent death of the preachers of the holy gospel, true sons of St. Francis, Friars John of St. Mary, Francis Lopez, and Augustine Ruiz, first discoverers of this land after that great Father Friar Mark of Nice, who all gave their lives and blood as the first- fruits of the holy gospel therein, whose death was innocent and undeserved." This act was drawn up by a notary, and Onate then nailed a cross to a tree, and, kneeling, recited a prayer to ask God to open them a peaceful way into the land for the conversion of the Indians. The first pueblo town was reached in a terrible thunder storm, described in sonorous verse. The natives received the 11 Father Commissary and the General with marks of friend ship. Here, on the eve of St. John s Day, the army rested, admiring the paintings on the walls "of the houses and the painted mantles. A kind of tournament was held to revive the spirits of the troops, and, as the General was seated, look ing on, an Indian came up and said solemnly, " Jueves, Yiernes, Sabado, Domingo,"" Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday." Ofiate waited for a sequel to this strange exordi um, but found that the Indian had exhausted his Spanish vocabulary, except two words more, " Thomas, Christobal Thomas, Christopher," which he pronounced, explaining by signs that they were two days off. At Puarai, the Spaniards beheld still painted on the wall, the deaths of the missionaries, and finally discovered Thomas and Christopher, Mexican Indians, speaking their own lan guage and Spanish, as well as some Kew Mexican dialects, having come into the country with Castaiio. From them Onate acquired a definite knowledge of the country and the people, their many-storied houses, their agricultural products, weaving, fisheries, and customs. A general weeping one day excited the wonder of the Spaniard, and he found that the long drought menaced them with famine, and their gods were deaf to their appeals. Onate, through interpreters, bid them cease, assuring them that he would invoke his Father to take pity on the land, and on them, disobedient children though they were. Rains came, exalting no little the Indian idea of the power of the new-comers. Then Jusepe reached the camp, an Indian who had entered the country with Bonilla s prohibited expedition. This man reported that Eonilla, the commander of the party, had been killed by Umana, whom he had left at the head of the Span iards on the banks of a river six hundred miles distant from Onate s camp, a river of such width and volume that it was a full league across.* * " Que riberas de un rio le dcxava Tan ancho y caudaloso, que tenia 12 The tragic fate of Bonilla, slain by one of his own com mand, apparently on the banks of the Mississippi or Missouri in 1598, strangely preludes and presages that of La Salle near- ly a century afterward. New Mexico did not seem inviting to all. Desertions be gan in Ofiate s force, some soldiers making off with numbers of horses. Our poet was detached in pursuit, and he tells how he recovered the steeds and punished the men. The expedition at last reached a pueblo, the position of which seemed to Oiiate so attractive and so well fitted for a settlement, that he resolved to plant his colony there, the In- dians showing all friendship for the Spaniards. He named the place San Juan de los Caballeros, as our poet expressly states in his sixteenth canto, refuting in advance those who state that the name was given after the revolt of 1680, in consequence of the fidelity of the Indians at that time. *At this place the Religious set to work to erect a church, which, after some months labor, was completed and blessed under the invocation of Saint John the Baptist. Here, evidently, prep arations were made for permanent residence, and to the end of the poem, San Juan appears as the Spanish settlement and headquarters of Dilate, no allusion being made to San Gabriel and Santa Fe, which were subsequently founded. From San Juan, Ofiate sent a force to explore the bison plains, while he visited Zuni, Cibola, and Mohoce, everywhere receiving submission, no spirit of resisting being evinced ex cept at Acoma, where Zutacapan, a man of low degree, against the counsel of the oldest and best chiefs, urged the people of the pueblo to attack the Spaniards; but when Onate arrived before the town, no demonstration of hostility was made. The Una cumplida legua, y quo distaua De nuestro nuevo assiento y estalage Seyscientos largas rnillas bien tendidas." The expression "long well extended miles" would convey the idea that the istance exceeded rather than fell short of six hundred .miles. 13 town submitted like the rest. Ofiate had, apparently, reduced all New Mexico without the use of force. There was, therefore, no room for heroic exploit or thrill ing episode, and the poem rises to exciting interest only in the nineteenth canto, where Villagra tells us how Zutacapan endeavored to entrap him as he passed by Acoma on his way to San Juan. The Indian, finding the Spanish officer too wary, pursued him, and Villagra underwent great hardships, and was reduced to keen famine in his flight from the pur suing braves. At last, to obtain food, he killed his faithful dog, but he touchingly tells us that the dying animal licked his hand with such marks of attachment, that he plodded on, unable to eke out life by its aid. Less cautious than Yillagra, the Maese de Campo Zaldibar and some of his men entered Acoma. They were attacked there by Zutacapan and his adherents. Three cantos are de voted to this episode ; nearly all the Spaniards were killed, Zaldibar falling by the hand of Zutacapan. In the next canto we have Onate submitting to his religious guides the question whether it would be just war to attack and punish Acoma. The reply of the theologians is given at length in prose. Then war was declared " a sangre y fuego " against Acoma. The almost impregnable position of Acoma, and the recent escape of Captain Villagra, showed that the work was to be no child s play. Onate, who could not determine whether this was merely an isolated outbreak or part of a general plan, felt that he must hold most of his force at his camp city of San Juan. To punish Acoma, he detached a force of seventy men under Yincent de Zaldibar, accompanied by the Sergeant- Major, the Comptroller, Commissary, and some brave officers, our poet being one, and active from the first. Every precaution was taken that their armor and weapons should be in the best possible condition to stand the arrows and stones that would rain down upon them, and in his de scription we have a perfect description of the equipment of Onate s men. 14 At last the towering height was discerned, and the Spanish approach was perceived by the men of Acoma. No pilot long becalmed in torrid seas E er saw his sails distended by the breeze, With greater joy than lit each warrior s glance To see the Spanish squadrons firm advance ; Then rose at once from all that rocky height, Looming above us like the throne of night, So fierce a cry, such wild unearthly yell As might be given by the hosts of hell ; In serried line on moves our steady van To where between two peaks a Titan s span In haughty pride sat Acoma the queen, Who never yet a conqueror had seen. Between the peaks had Nature wanton thrown A platform bristling with acutest stone ; Thence Zutacapaii scanned with soldier s eye The hostile force now open to descry, Which formed in ordered line around the place. Amazement at the scanty numbers filled his face. The action with John de Zaldibar had lessened the Indian estimate of Spanish superiority, and Zutacapan assured the people that no such Spanish force as lay in the plain could take Acoma. The walls were thronged with naked warriors and women, hurling defiance and insult at their assailants. The horse was still a mysterious animal to the Indians of New Mexico, and Zaldibar resolved to give them a super stitious dread of its powers. He sent a messenger and an in terpreter to call upon the chiefs of Acoma to descend, and in conference explain their recent hostilities, threatening, if they refused, to ride up and destroy their town. The Acomans answered with derisive shouts; but they gathered in full force to defend the main approach to the town. Foreseeing this, Zaldibar had selected twelve men, whom he concealed from view of the city behind some rocks. This picked band, to which Captain Villagra was assigned, were quietly and stealthily to climb the height and reach the 15 further peak, from which the Indians had temporarily de scended, but which commanded the town. To cover their operations he struck his tents and moved with the rest of his men toward the path leading up to the town. The Indians prepared for the onset, but the keen watch kept on the horses, which Zaldibar kept curveting around, showed that they almost expected to see them come flying through the air. Under cover of this the twelve, without any covering fire or protection, scaled the height, and fleet as racers contending for a prize, gained the commanding height, the key of the position. The towering- peak they gained without delay, Then plunged adown the bristling flinty way ; . Roused by the danger back the warriors sped, To hold the pass or strew it with the dead. But the brave twelve pressed down the narrow path, As each good sword cut wide a bloody swath. Bempol, a chief, first led up four hundred to attack them, but the firearms and swords cut down the naked chiefs and warriors in terrible slaughter. Other Indians came up, leav ing the town almost undefended ; but the twelve held their own, and were steadily gaining in spite of wounds and bruises. Meanwhile favored by this diversion Zaldibar had reached the walls of the pueblo and had penetrated a house. So ended the battle on St. Vincent s day, night descending before the fate of Acoma was decided. The previous night had been spent by the Indians in war-dance and carouse. Now all was still. Before sunrise the Spanish chaplain said mass, and nearly all the little force received communion to prepare for the decisive struggle before them. When the sun rose, those on the height saw that the town was untenanted. The Indians had all drawn off to a cave in the rocks, beyond two chasms, from which they hoped to make a last sudden attack on the Spaniards. 16 Zaldibar s whole force was soon moving on this, and a part crossing the chasms on logs, opened fire into the cave with musketry and two light field-pieces that had been dragged up But the Indians, roused to desperation, forced them back, and they with difficulty reached solid ground, one brave officer, Salado, receiving several mortal wounds. The slaughter of the Indians had been so terrible that Zu- tacapan at last asked to surrender. He was told that the Spaniards would accept their submission, but that the leaders of the revolt would be punished. The chief preferred to die fighting, and the battle went on, many Indians killing each other. Meanwhile the town had been set on fire, and the smoke and flames came rolling up. The few surviving Indians threw down their arms. Acoma was won, and Zaldibar had avenged his brother s death. As the Spaniards moved through the ruined town, they came upon some women mutilating with savage fury the body of one of their own warriors. They were wreaking vengeance on the lifeless corpse of Zutacapan, source of all their woes. Captain Villagra describes the battle at great length and with some spirit, making Zutacapan, Bempol, and other of his adherents utter Homeric speeches, answered by the sage and venerable chief Chumpa, and by the noble Zutancalpo, son of Zutacapan, who steadily opposed his father, but when the bat tle came, fought and died like a hero. This chief the poet in vests with peculiar interest, which is sustained till the scene where we behold his four sisters lamenting over his dead body. Such is the History of the Conquest of New Mexico as told by Captain Yillagra. Such is the theme of the First Epic of our land sung by the poet Conquistador. I DONGAN S CHARTER OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK. Read before the United States Catholic Historical Society by John Gilmary Shea. There is a subject which the Executive Council con sidered too important not to be commemorated by at best a brief mention in a meeting of a Society devoted by its very charter to preserve and make known all that relates to the history of Catholics in this country. The act is that by which on April, 1686, New York was raised to the rank of a city, endowed with property and fran chises. It was the act of a Catholic Governor acting in the name and by authority of a Catholic Lord Proprietor, who after making New York English and the keystone of a great colonial system that was to secure to our tongue the pre ponderance on this continent, had ascended the throne of England, the first and only Catholic to rule there during the last three hundred years. The Dongan Charter" is a theme that we hoped to have treated here by the Irish Catholic Mayor of New York, as some remarks would come appositely from his lips, filling as he does the Chief magistracy of a city chartered two centuries ago by an Irish Catholic Governor, I regret that the topic does not fall to better hands than mine, and as I too can plead ill health, I beg your indulgence. Some years ago, a high city official listening to an im portant debate in the Chamber or argument in Court heard constant reference to the Dongan Charter. At last he leaned over to some other official near him and asked in a whisper ; What is the Dongan Charter ? " His friend s blank visage did not require even the movement of his head to show his ignorance. An appeal to another City worthy resulted in no more satisfactory elucidation of the problem, and the high official resigned himself to the prevailing ignorance. But the allusions to "Dongan s Charter" became too much for human nature. He rushed out of the City Hall, secured a carriage on Broadway and ordered the coachman to drive at once to the New York Historical Society. Alighting, he mounted the stairs, and the staircase of that venerable institution was riot planned with an eye to the comfort of well fed city offiicials and entering the Library asked of the Custodian of books, his great conundrum ; "What is the Dongan Charter.?" The answ r er came promptly: it was the charter making New York a city and giving it extensive rights, granted April 22d, 1686 in the name of James II King of Great Britain and Ireland by Colonel Thomas Dongan, an Irish Catholic Gen tlemen, then Govenor of the province of New York. But where is this great document. ! " was the next question. "The original in several large sheets of parchment with its seals is preserved in the office of the Comptroller." "What down in the Park ? " "Undoubtedly." "And where can I see a copy ? " "More or less correctly in the City Charter, in many col lections of Laws relating to the City and in many of Valentine s Common Council Manuals." After examining a copy he hurried back, and studying it at leisure set up as a pundit in regard to "Dongan s Charter." In the remarks about to be presented, I am far from implying in my audience any such ignorance as to the Don gan Charter, or the Governor who granted it, or of the reign and the times in which he lived. Much less do I pretend to give a full or comprehensive account, for it would require a volume to present real facts and sweep away accumulated dust and cobwebs that have long passed for history. The elevation of New York to the rank of a citv was only one of a series of wisely planned and ably guided acts looking to the future well being and greatness of America. It was important not to the city only and the colony of New York, but to the English empire in America, which the house of Brunswick subsequently received, but lacked states manship and honesty enough to retain. The Guelphs lost and lost dearly what the Stuarts consolidated and secured. This to some may be viewing history from a new standpoint, but it is a correct view. Any one who passes rapidly in mind over the list of English monarchs whose rule extended to this country, will see little interest displayed by any of them in its actual or future prosperity. Elizabeth gave grants, James did the same and wrote a book to injure tobacco, the great staple of Virginia; Charles I made land concessions, but that was all. Cromwell did nothing but involve Maryland and Vir ginia in strife and confusion. Pleasure loving Charles II of his own impulse would have done as little for America as any of his predecessors; but his brother James was a man of different stamp. Eminently a man of action and adminis trative ability, James, Duke of York, applied himself during his exile to acquire military experience and saw service under the best general of his time. After the restoration he was made Lord High Admiral of England, and he set to work to increase the efficiency of the British navy. The rules drawn up by him were so wise, so thorough and so practical that they were maintained till our time, and the Nelsons, the Rodneys and the Hoods, the men who made England mis tress of the seas, were trained under the system introduced by James, whom venal or careless historians persist in hold ing up to us as a shallow, bigoted man. In France he had learned from the numerous books printed on Canada and Acadia, the extent of the French empire in America, and saw how the indifference of the English government was periling not only the future sway of our continent, but the very existence of the two neglected groups of colonies, Virginia and Maryland at the south, and New England at the north, colonies posssessing no common bond or tie, colonies not homogeneous in government, re ligion or policy. Reviving an old English claim, James solicited from his brother a grant of the territory colonized by the Dutch and that was wrested by them from the Swedes. As head of the navy he sent over the vessels and force necessary to take possession. New Netherland disappeared from the map, and New York, a new English colony became the con necting link between New Engl-and and Maryland, and as his grant included Maine, the British flag floated from the Penobscot to Cape Fear, over a series of colonies in unbroken line. We see his influence too in the grant of the Carolinas to a number of noblemen, completing the occupation of the coast and confronting the French in Acadia at the north, and the Spaniards in Florida at the south. That the credit is due to James and not to any settled policy of English statesmen is evident, from the fact that this plan had no precedent, and that for nearly half a century after the fall of James not a step was taken to extend the limits of the British coast line his genius had secured. To develop the province he had himself acquired James transferred the country between the Hudson and Delaware to others who soon peopled New Jersey. His friend William Penn, interested in that colony, soon became Proprietor of Pennsylvania, as all know, by the aid and support of James. In New York he established English laws, introduced English settlers and developed the resources of the province. There he established liberty of conscience, Bancroft says that "no glimpse of it reached James," and that he was "an advocate of toleration without a sense of the natural right to freedem of conscience," but that James was in the full sunshine instead of getting a mere glimpse is proved by his acts. He established religious freedom in New York and lost his throne for endeavoring to establish toleration in England. Let me quote a more impartial writer, one not biased by hereditary New England hate of James, never forgiven for his endeavor to bring that part of America into harmony with the British constitution. "Determined to give his American province the fran chises its people desired, the Duke of York sought an able colonial governor to take the place of Andros * * * * The man chosen by James was Colonel Thomas Dongan, born in 1634, a younger son of an Irish baronet, Sir John Dongan, and a nephew of Richard Talbot, afterward created Earl and Duke of Tyrconnel in Ireland. Thomas Dongan, of course, gained advancement by his brother s and his uncle s in fluence at the English court. Dongan was quickly promoted to be a colonel in the royal army, and having been assigned to serve with his Irish regiment under Louis was stationed for some time at Nancy. In 1678 he was ordered home from France, to his pecuniary loss; but was rewarded by Charles with a pension and the appointment of Lieutenant Governor of Tangier, in Africa, under Lord Inchiquin, whence he was recalled in 1680. Dongan was a Roman Catholic, enter prising and active; coveting money, yet "a man of integrity, moderation and genteel manners." His experience in France was an important recommendation, because of the delicate relations between New York and Canada, and the necessity of managing them skilfully on the English side. Dongan was accordingly appointed governor of New York." Such is the language of John Romeyn Brodhead, his torian of our State, a scholar and man of thought, with no bias in favor of an Irishman or a Catholic. Several new officers came over with Dongan. "The Rev. Doctor John Gordon was also commissioned to be chap lain of the soldiers in New York. An English Jesuit priest, Thomas Harvey, of London, likewise accompanied Dongan, who embarked for America in the old Parliamentarian frigate * Constant Warwick. With a considerable retinue Dongan arrived at Nantasket, and set out for New York overland, accompanied some ten miles to Dedham, by a troop of Boston militia, besides several other gents of the town." Brodhead "History of the State of New York, ii pp. 37-375- This was in August, 1683. About two weeks after his arrival on this island, Dongan summoned the first assembly of the province of New York. f) When James became proprietor, such a step with a people ignorant of British laws and government, would have been useless. To give the power to the handful of English who came over, would have been to make a petty minority govern the majority. New York had in twenty years years however developed and James who wished the people to be governed impartially now established a form of goverment in which he aimed to give the legislation to the free-holders, securing on their part a loyal dependence on the British crown, wiser in his generation than the Georges in the next century. On the i yth. of October. i684. the seventeen delegates to the first New York Colonial assembly met with the Governor and Council in Fort James, the English fort between the Bowling-green and the bay. The first and grandest of its acts was "The Charter of Liberties and Priviledges," se curing the rights of British subjects and establishing entire freedom of concience and religion to all peaceable persons which profess faith in God by Jesus Christ." Thus is Dongan s name linked with an act and a day memorable in the annals of New York. But this is not his only claim to a place in history. He at once took a firm stand for New York Colony and its rights. While Thomas Dongan was Governor of New York no in fringement on its territoral or other rights, be it from the French in Canada, the over reaching men of New England or the Proprietor of Pennsylvania or the Governors of Maryland and Virginia would be brooked. He was the bold, skilful, polished but determined up holder of the rights of New York. He was a splendid exponent of state rights. Towards the French he presented a firm front. The noble missions of the Jesuits among the Five Nations had, as a Catholic, Dongan s warmest sympathy, but France could not make their pious labors the ground of a territorial claim- The territory of the Iroquois was within the limits of New York, and New York would not recognize any claim to a single foot of land in their occupation. He upheld the line of the great lakes as the natural border, and strove to keep the French from any foothold below that line. Seeing the importance of Detroit, he endeavored to occupy it as a key to the West. If the line of the lakes is now the northern boundary of the United States, we owe it to James II and his able lieutenant Thomas Dongan. Maryland and Virginia had grounds of complaint against the Five Nations. They sought to negotiate with that won derful confederacy. Dongan put his foot down. They are New York Indians. You can negotiate with them only in my presence and by my sanction. Lord Howard of Effingham came from Virginia to make terms with the Indians under the eye of the Catholic Colonel. His negotiation gave for all- time to the Virginians an Iroquois name. The Dutch inter preter wishing to convey to the Mohawks the meaning of Howard, took the nearest Dutch word he could find, one meaning a hanger or short-sword. This to the Indians was big-knife, and they called the Governor of Virginia Assarigoa. Big-Knife ; and that henceforward became the name for Virginians. Dongan s claim over the Five Nations endures to this day. When the Federal Government was formed, it attempted to pour its legion of Indian agents, contract schemers, and plunderers on the Indians in New York State, especially the Five Nations. Governor Clinton took his stand on Dongan s strong position. "The Six Nations are New York Indians. We tolerate no interference from the general goverment," and this attitude has been maintained. Towards New England Dongan was equally firm. In the whole line of Colonial Governors there is not one who can be ranked higher than Colonel Thomas Dongan. Brodhead, indeed, accuses him of love of money, but more money was freely voted to him than future governors could wring by flattery or force. And Dongan freely spent the money in the public service. He left office with arrears of salary due him and large amounts advanced from his purse for public needs. Among the memorable acts of his administartion was that olF granting a Charter to the City of New York in the name of the King. New York had enjoyed a kind of vague existence as a city. It had the name without the substance. It had no powers that courts would be bouud to recognize. To place the rights of the city on a firm basis, Dongan in April, 1686, in the name and certainly not without the sanc tion of King James II, issued a Charter in the name of James as King of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, and also as Supreme Lord and Proprietor of the Colony and Province of New Yord. It recognized New York as an ancient city confirmed all its rights whether by prescription or by any grant, formal or informal, from the States General or himself, or governors acting in their name. Technically a city requires a bishop, but we were not ready just then to begin our line of bishops. In fact we had to wait sometime. All lands granted to the city, the public buildings erec ted, the streets, ferries and all privileges, franchises, rights, royalties, free customs, jurisdictions and immunites exercised by the city were declared to be irrevocably vested in the Mayor, Aldermen and Commonalty of the City of New York. Still more important perhaps was the grant to the City of all waste, vacant, unpatented and unappropriated lands on the island, with all rivers, rivulets, coves, creeks, ponds, waters and water-courses, all land around the city down to low water mark with power to fill in and reclaim New York was to have a Mayor, six aldermen and as many assistants, a town clerk, a chamberlain, a sheriff, a coroner, a clerk of the market, a high constable and a mar- shall. Nicholas Bayard was appointed the first Mayor, and of the six Aldermen two bear English and four Dutch names. The Corporation thus created received power to regu- ulate trade, markets and fairs, to open new streets and ferries, and to pass ordinances for the government of the city. The Mayor with the Recorder or some of the Aldermen was to preside in a Court of Common Pleas, and hold a criminal court for the trial of offenders. Such were the principal topics of this Charter which 9 declares at its close " that such and no other construction shall be made thereof, than that which may tend most to advantage religion, justice and the public good; and to sup press all acts and contrivances to be invented, or put in use contrary thereunto." That New York prospered under the Dongan Charter is seen by the tenacity with which the citizens clung to it. When further powers were sought and a new charter issued under Governor Montgomerie in 1730, care was taken to recite the Dongan Charter at full length and confirm it. That was the corner stone. The able governor Dongan held his office till James in 1688 united the province of New York to New England, and placed all under the administration of Sir Edmund Andros. Then Governor Dongan retired to his own estate, in the colony. He had acquired lands on Staten Island and Long Island; and had brought over two of his kinsmen, apparently intending to make New York his home and establish the Dongan family here. The fall of James II left New York in confusion. A wild German fanatic, Leisler, seized the reins of government in New York. Left by William Ill s in difference and neglect to do his will he launched the New York Indians on the French in Canada, and committed a frightful massacre at Lachine, compelling the French on their side to use Indians in war, as they did with fearful effect on New England and New York for many a day. Dongan had taken no part in favor of the fallen mon arch, but Leisler hunted him like a wolf, and the best governor New York had had was glad at last to escape to Rhode Island, and sail to England from the port of Boston where he had been so honorably received. He reached England to find a foreigner on the throne, his brother the Earl of Limerick in exile, the property of the family confiscated. His own accounts as Governor had never been settled, and New York owed him heavy arrears. He petitioned in vain for the repayment of moneys which he had with public spirit advanced, and for arrears due him. It was not till after long delay that a pittance reached Dongan, 10 . a poor reward for long and able services to create a British Empire in America. When his brother died and the Earldom of Limerick devolved upon him, he sought at least a portion of the im mense estates in Ireland which had been confiscated, but the same niggardly policy prevailed. The great governor of New York, Thomas Dongan, Earl of Limerick, died at last in the obscurity of poverty at London, and was interred in Saint Pancras Churchyard, the chosen place of repose of Catholics of rank. The Charter is still preserved intact in the office of the Comptroller of the city,but may easily be marred or destroyed. It is one of the oldest and most interesting documents re lating to the city and its rights, and yet one gentleman seeking to consult it, found it used as a foot-rest by a clerk. In the hope of being able to show the original Charter to the members of the Society, I applied to the Hon. W. Low, to permit it to be brought here this evening in cus tody of one of the officers of his department, Walter Dongan, a descendent of the great governor, being now one. He re ceived our application with great courtesy, but expressed his regret that he could not allow it to be removed from his office except under a subpoena from a court of justice. We are not prepared just yet to involve ourselves in liti gation, even with a skilful lawyer for our president ; but I question whether the comptroller has any right to the custody of the Dongan Charter. He is not one of the ancient officers created by the charter, while the chamberlain is : but there seems no authority for any financial officer to hold the charters and rolls of the city, to be its "Gustos Rotulorum." When it was issued Dongan s Charter was surely com mitted to the custody of the Mayor, Nicholas Bayard, and the Clerk, John West. It would seem therefore that the clerk is the proper holder of the same and responsible for its safe keeping. SIR JOHN JAMES OF CRISHALL, ESSEX, BART. THE BENEFACTOR OF THE PENNSYLVANIA MISSIONS. BY JOHN GILMARY SHEA. IT is a curious fact that an English gentleman who stands pre-eminent as the founder of a fund for the support of mis sions in this country, and whose benefactions continued for a century, has been comparatively unknown. The fund bore his name, but of him personally, little has been recorded. In the last century the Rev. Patrick Smyth published an absurd story in regard to it, and in our time strange theories have been set up. While writing " The Catholic Church in Colonial Days," researches left me in doubt whether the benefactor of Cath olics in Pennsylvania was Sir John James, of Heston, or his namesake and contemporary of Crishall. Investigations not then completed produce the conviction that he was Sir John James of Crishall, Essex : and it is purposed gathering here such facts in regard to him and the fund as may aid further studies. A family from Holland bearing the name of Haestrecht, from a place of that name in the Low Countries, settled in England about the reign of Henry VIIL, and in time adopted the name of James. John James of this family acquired the manor of Christhallbury, in the County of Essex, and erected Christhall Hall. He was knighted by Charles II. on the 14th of May, 1665. His arms were argent, a chevron sable between three fers de moulin, transverse of the second.* He * Burke gives the arms of the Baronet as : Quarterly, first and fourth argent, two bars crenelle or counter embattled gules ; second and third argent, three fers de moulin barways, sa. left the estate to his nephew, James Cane, of London, who assumed the name of James, and was created a baronet on the 28th of June, 1680. He died on the 19th of May, 1736, and was succeeded by his son, Sir John James, Bart., who was born, apparently, about 1694."* Sir John, by reading the life of Saint Francis Xavier, prob ably in Dryden s elegant translation, began to form a higher idea of the Catholic religion. The Rt. Rev. Bishop Ch&l- loner converted him to the Catholic faith, and Sir John, by a secret trust in his will, as was then the custom, gave four thousand pounds to the Vicar- Apostolic of London, to be held as a fund, directing that of the income, 40 were to be applied toward maintaining " two Priests for London to assist the poor," and the rest for missioners in Pennsylvania. Sir John James of Chrishall, who died Sept. 28, 1741, at the age of 47,f is apparently the convert of Bishop Challoner, and establisher of the fund, who is said to have died Sept. 28, 1742, the discrepancy being of a single figure. Sir John James of Crishall died unmarried, and was buried at Crishall. He left his estate by will to charitable uses, but the next heir, Haestricht James, after a long litigation, had the bequests set aside as contrary to the statute of George II., and obtained the estate.^ As any bequest for Catholic purposes would have been void, it would be necessary to make the bequest to some person ab solutely. In this case it was in all probability made to Rich ard Challoner, and accordingly, as a personal bequest, was legal. The lawsuits would necessarily cause delay. This seems to harmonize with the facts in relation to the fund. * Philip Morant, "The History and Antiquities of the County of Essex," Lon don, 1768, ii., pp. 603, 604. Townsend, "Catalogue of Knightn from 1660 to 1760," London, 1833, p. 38. t " Gentleman s Magazine," London, 1741, p. 554. " Sep. 28. Sir John James, Bart., aged 47." % Burke, "A Genealogical ard Heraldic History of the Extinct and Dormant Baronetcies," etc., London, 1844, p. 280. 3 The first payment of income noted in Bishop Challoner s Lodger was made by the Executors to him from Michaelmas, 1748, and the principal was paid to him in February, 1751. The whole 1,000 was at first invested by the Bishop in East India 3 per cents., but half of it was soon sold out and invested at Paris in the French India Company s stock.* After deducting the fixed amount set apart for the London poor, the residue was forwarded in Colonial times to the Su perior of the Jesuit mission in Maryland, who divided it be tween the missions of St. Mary s at Philadelphia, St. Paul s at Cushenhopen. St. John Nepomucene at Lancaster, and St. John Francis Regis at Conewago. The first allusion to it is in a letter of Father Henry .Neale from Philadelphia in 1716. The amount sent to America was at first 100. In 1765 each of the four Pennsylvania missions received 20 from the income of the fund, and this continued till the beginning of the French Revolution, when the part of the fund invested in French securities decreased so much in value that it was sold and the amount reinvested in English securities, the loss by the operation being about one-third of the Penn sylvania portion. In consequence, the Pennsylvania income, which till 1792 had been 80, became in 1793 only 59.10s.8d.f * Letter of W. A. Canon Johnson. Bishop Challoner s Ledger brings the ac count down to 1780. t Memorandum it) handwriting of Father George Hunter, 1765; Memorandum in handwriting of Bishop Carroll, 1795. Bishop Douglass wrote to Bishop Car roll, Feb. 5, 1793 : " You are doubtless sensible that a great part of our property was vested in the French funds. When things began to be violent in that coun try, it was judged most advisable to sell out as much of that property as could be sold, and place it in some more secure hands. Accordingly, amongst the rest, we sold those actions from which near two-thirds of Sir John James , or what we call the German funds derived their support. But the market price of actions was then reduced so low, the English Funds had increased in value in the same proportion as the French funds were depressed ; and the price of ex change for bills of remittance of money to England was so very considerably against us, that by one way or another the produce of those actions which in the year 1785 and 1786 produced about 70 per annum, being now placed in one of our stocks (4 p. cents.), produce only 48.10.8 p r annum, which, with 51 p. an. in the same hands it was in before, makes 99.10.8, the whole pro- It subsequently declined to 55, and for a long time never exceeded it.* The Rev. Patrick Smyth, an Irish clergyman who had been for a time in the United States, published a pamphlet in Dublin in 1788, in which he gives this queer account of Sir John James fund : About fifty or sixty years ago an English gentleman of the name of James, a Protestant of the Church of England, had an occasion to visit Philadelphia. Charmed with the admirable dis cipline and regularity which was then established in that beauti ful city, he lamented the deplorable state of religion among its inhabitants. As a good Protestant he regretted that the Penn- sylvanians rejected, in effect, the necessity of baptism. His ar dent desire for their conversion did not cool on the extensive bosom of the Atlantic. Upon his arrival in England their sad infatuation engrossed his thoughts and wrung his heart with anguish. He spoke incessantly of his poor mistaken friends. He did more. He chose twelve Protestant clergymen, whom he engaged at a certain salary, to instruct his much esteemed acquaintances in the New World. He entered into articles with them, and tied them down to that strict degree of temperance still observable in the Confederated States. The dishes were specified, and the quantity of wine and other liquors mentioned with the utmost scrupulosity. The preliminary articles being thus ratified, Mr. James, after having sold the greatest part of his property in England, em barked with his apostles for the capital of Quakerism. His breast glowed with ecstasy at the thoughts of his approaching success. That fashionable indifference for all religion which is affected by every deistical coxcomb, was then little known in the world, nor was the abused name of universal benevolence perverted to the worst purposes of infidelity The honest Quakers received their visitors with unaffected tokens of cordiality. They ex pressed their acknowledgments to their old friend for his zeal and duce of Sir John James establishment. And as he ordered that in the first place 40 per annum should be paid to persons for services in London, you see there will remain only 59.10.18 p r an. to be remitted tO3 ou for Pennsylvania." * Campbell, "Life and Times of Archbishop Carroll," "U. S. Cath. Mag.," iv., p. 255. 5 heard his reverend associates enforce the grand object of their mission. But they heard them unmoved. Whether it was owing to the want of perseverance in the ministers, or to a levity of be havior in some of them, they made little or no impression on the meek disciples of Penn. Perhaps, too, the frugality of Mr. James table and the necessary abstemiousness which became irksome to English appetites, contributed to render this extraor dinary project abortive. Be this as it may, the twelve mission aries, like the Israelites of old, sighed for the flesh-pots of Egypt, and in a few months after their first landing re-embarked for Europe, leaving their patron on the banks of the Delaware to vent his disappointment to the waves. In this dejected state of mind he met a German with whom he had formerly some mercantile dealings. He complained to him of the desertion of his missionaries. The blunt German replied that it was not at all surprising if attention were paid to the many in conveniences the gentlemen had to encounter; that English di vines, accustomed, perhaps, to luxury, could but ill brook the scanty provisions afforded at a Quaker s ordinary; that the Ger mans, his countrymen, were rot so much in the habit of faring sumptuously every day; that if the administration of the sacra ment of baptism to the good Quakers was all he sought for, the priests of his own religion (for the German was a Catholic) held it also essential for salvation ; that, moreover, the Jesuits were fitted by their peculiar education to accommodate themselves to the manners of any moral people, and that if they were effect ually encouraged in Pennsylvania, he would pledge himself they should attend to their functions with assiduity and perseverance. Foreign as this purpose may have been to Mr. James original plan, he cheerfully acceded to it. He advanced a small salary to enable four German Jesuits to preach in Pennsylvania, and signed article s binding himself, his heirs, etc., forever to pay the same annually out of his estate in England. I could only learn that this good man shortly after returned to Europe, and that his foundation, through the wise management of the Jesuits in Eng land, is considerably increased.* In the reply which the Very Rev. John Carroll, afterward * Smyth, "The Present State of the Catholic Missions conducted by the Ex- Je&uits in North America," Dublin, 1788. Bishop and Archbishop of Baltimore, prepared to Smyth s virulent pamphlet, he says: The relation of Mr. James foundation is likewise discordant from the fact. From Mr. Smyth s account one would imagine that Mr. James was a Protestant, and lived in America when he solic ited for German Jesuits ; the fact was otherwise. He then was a Catholic in England, and had become a Catholic by meeting ac cidentally with the life of St. Francis Xavier, and afterwards by conversing with the late excellent Dr. Challoner. It is unneces sary to follow him thro all his mistakes on this subject.* That so extraordinary an event as the arrival of an English gentleman with twelve Anglican clergyman on a mission to convert the Quakers, should have escaped the notice of all historical scholars, is impossible. That is a pure romance. That Sir John James entered into any arrangement with the Jesuits in England -or paid salaries, must be slso relegated to the domain of fable. Mr. Foley, in his exhaustive search of the records of the English province, found no note of any relation between Sir John James and the order, and a special examination made for me at Stonyhurst came to a similar result. Converted by Bishop Challoner, Sir John left the fund to him for two objects : the first, absolute ; the second, the Penn sylvania mission, contingent. The fund never at any time passed into the hands of the Jesuits. And of German Jesuits in Pennsylvania prior to 1741 there is no trace. What the exact terms of the trust were in regard to the Pennsylvania mission is not known : but it was, apparently, to the purport that it was to be applied to the mission at Lan caster and others in Pennsylvania; for it has always been re garded as attaching to Lancaster, and when in our time (1886) Lancaster became part of the diocese of Harrisburg, the Sir John James fund inured to the benefit of that diocese. * Carroll s Repty to Smyth. The whole establishment of the fund, therefore, seems to point to some missionary work among the Germans at Lancas ter prior to 1741, the year in which Sir John James died, for the fund was known also as " The German Fund." In 1874 the income of the fund applicable to Pennsylvania had risen again to the old figure of 80 a year. In July, with the approval of Bishop Wood, of Philadelphia, the cap ital was sold in London ; and (together with all unpaid in terest) the proceeds of the sale were paid to Bishop Wood, to be invested by him for the purposes of the founder of the fund. Now the Pennsylvania portion of the Sir John James bequest is in the hands of the Bishop of Harrisburg. COLUMBUS AND THE MEN OF PALOS. BY JOHN GILMARY SHEA. THE little Spanish town of Palos, which receives scanty mention in the pages of the historian, the geographer, or the traveller, owes a temporary lustre to the great voyage of Christopher Columbus, which reveled to Europe a new world. In the history of that illustrious and unfortunate discoverer it assumes a prominence that raises it from obscurity. Palos and its people deserve the credit of having previously opened for the explorer the way to a successful consideration of his project at the Court of Ferdinand and Isabella ; and when Columbus came vested with authority from the Catholic sovereigns, Palos has the additional credit of having afforded him the men and the means, without which it would have been impossible for him to make the experimental voyage. Nay more, there are strong indications that in the expe riences of the men of Palos, he had read more of the mysteries of the great ocean than he had gleaned from the Imago Mundi or from Solinus and the other works over which he had pored ; and that he there added to the store of indications which he had gathered as evidences of a continent within sail ing distance westward. Palos was at that time a busy port, with a long street of Santa Maria la Rabida leading to a rocky pine-clad promon tory crowned with a Franciscan convent, from whose roof and dome a panorama of land and ocean met the eye, stretch ing away northward beyond the frontier of Portugal. The town had its men of means, owners of vessels that plied on the ocean and the Mediterranean, traders in peace, and when the tocsin of war sounded, ready to cope with Moslem or Portuguese or Frenchman. It lived and prospered by the sea, and its inhabitants looked to the ocean for their gain and prosperity. Naturally every thing relating to navigation was a matter of study, and as naturally the convent of Santa Maria la Eabida felt the influence. As such houses were generally in those times, this convent not only afforded religious guidance and comfort to the peo ple, but was at once the hostelry, hospital, and school for the town near it, and we may well suppose that there was always in the community of gray-robed religious, some friar versed in the learning most required by the people of a seaport town, cosmography, astronomy, and navigation. No picture is more vividly impressed on our minds from childhood than that of Christopher Columbus, knocking at the portal of this convent of Santa Maria la Rabida in 1485, to ask shelter for himself and his son Diego. But to those who have studied his life, it is an unsettled question ho\v or why he came to this spot. He had just left the Court of Portugal after his long and fruitless efforts to induce the king to send him out on a voyage of discovery, and after advantage had been taken of his statements, by sending out a surrepti tious expedition. Having determined to lay his plans before the Spanish Court, which was then at Cordova, Columbus was on his way to that city, but the convent of La Eabida was not on his direct route. The port of Palos and the reputation of its pilots and cap tains could not have been unknown to Columbus. Pedro Correa, who had married a sister of his late wife, lived hard by at Huelva ; and if this gentleman was not also known as Muliar, Columbus had another kinsman of that name in this immediate vicinity. He had therefore friends in this part of the peninsula, but he was destined to lind in this modest and secluded convent near Palos, some of the most influential friends he ever had, disinterested men, ready to support his theory as to a voyage westward and to aid him at court to secure its fulfilment. From the convent of La Rabid a you now look down on vineyards and stretches of sand, on the river Tinto and on the Odiel. The little hamlet of Palos, with its few lahorers and vineyard men, is hidden from the sight. The little city of mariners and merchants has vanished. There is no semblance of a seaport, and the thriving city which the monarchy of Spain in the fifteenth century could order to furnish and equip caravels for a long voyage, does not in the nineteenth century possess even a fishing-smack. The ruins of a light house alone suggest that ships once frequented its waters. In the days of Columbus it had all the bustle of a seaport town, and adventurous mariners trod its streets who could re count voyages on all known seas. When the wayfarer at the convent in 1485 began to talk to his friar hosts of his project of sailing westward till he reached Asia, he found more ready listeners than he had met at the Court of Portugal. To the Franciscan friars of La Rabida there was nothing very startling or impracticable in the the ories and projects of Columbus. Two of the religious took especial interest in him. Father Antonio de Marchena was an " astrologer," as a student of astronomy was then styled. To him the theory of Columbus presented no scientific difficul ties ; and as to the practical test, there was a witness in Palos who declared it feasible. Such a voyage out into the ocean had already been at tempted, and clear-headed mariners in Palos believed it could be made successfully. Had not Martin Alonzo Pinzon. the wealthiest ship-owner in the town below, talked in the same strain, and had he not brought from Rome accounts of a Mapa Mundi and of books in the Pontifical Library, that told of land beyond the ocean ? Had not Pedro de Yelasco, a citizen of Palos, discovered the Island of Flores ? Had not Pedro Yasquez de la Frontera, whose roof-tree they could see, sailed westward in the Portuguese service till the ship s course was impeded by vegetable growth, which seemed so impenetrable that the commander lost heart and turned back, though Vas- qnez sturdily maintained that he must soon have reached land, had he but persevered ? The friars, accustomed to hear such accounts, found no difficulty therefore in looking with favor on the plans and projects of their enthusiastic guest, who wished to devote the wealth he might acquire to rescuing the holy land from the hands of the unbeliever. The science of Marchena supported the views of Columbus, and the heart of Father Juan Perez was won by the religious fervor of the Italian navigator. Though living in this retired cloister, he was not unknown at court. Queen Isabella had been hi& penitent, and had confi dence in his judgment. Catching the Crusader enthusiasm with which Columbus exposed Ms projects, the two iriars re solved to use their influence at court in his favor. We can hardly suppose that a question of navigation and the sea was decided in their minds at once; or that it was not canvassed and examined by the aid of the experienced mariners of Palos. They could scarcely have ventured to present the project to the consideration of the court, without being able to declare that it had been considered and deemed feasible by the judgment of the practical seamanship of the port from which they came. It seems almost impossible to believe that the projected voyage of exploration was not submitted to Martin Alonzo Pinzon, the most influential man in the place, to Velasco, one who had already revealed some secrets of the great ocean, and to Pedro Yasquez de la Frontera, who had already attempted what Columbus proposed. The voyage of this navigator un der an Infante of Portugal, inspired perhaps by the very prop ositions of Columbus to that court, has been strangely over looked. Yet the evidence of it exists in the documents of a lawsuit between the heirs of Pinzon and those of Columbus, which were examined by Navarrete, by Irving, and others, but of which a complete analysis lias only recently been given by Captain Duro. The fact of his voyage is mentioned in the testimony of Alonzo Yelez Allid, the Alcalde of Palos, who says lie sailed till embarrassed by the yerbas in the sea, evidently the Sargasso Sea, which is covered for hundreds of miles with a mass of the curious berry-bearing sea-weed, in which peculiar fishes dwell and build their nests. The same statement is made by another citizen of Palos, Fernando V^a- liente, and another witness refers to a conversation between Columbus and Pinzon in the very house of this discoverer of the Sargasso Sea. Las Casas, who generally follows Ferdinand s narrative, mentions both the reasons alleged in his time for the visit of Columbus to Palos ; that given by Ferdinand, that he was on his way to the Spanish Court at Cordova, and turned aside to Palos to leave his son with Correa ; and that maintained by others, that he wished to question the experienced navigators of Palos, and gather what further proofs or indications they had met with of the existence of a continent beyond the At lantic. Las Casas leaves it to his readers to decide, and with the light of the testimony, we cannot believe that Columbus, ever on the alert to seek out evidence of his theory, would refrain from questioning men at this place, especially one who had belonged to a recent Portuguese expedition. Tl:e piety of Father Juan Perez, and the learning of the guardian of the convent, Father Antonio de Marchena, as we know, aided Columbus in his final appeal to the Sovereigns of Cas tile and Aragon. Columbus reached Palos utterly without means, as is gen erally admitted, and we have now evidence not only that he formed an acquaintance with Pinzon before he left the place, but also received sixty ducats of gold from that generous man to enable him to reach Cordova. It seems, therefore, that the good friars and sturdy mariners of Palos gave Columbus hospitality, encouragement, informa tion, and substantial aid. To it he owed the favor he received at court, and the ultimate success, when after the fall of Gra nada, Isabel the Catholic resolved to undertake the proposed discovery. 6 That Columbus selected Palos as the port where the expe dition was to he fitted out, could have been prompted only by his remembrance of its welcome. But it so happened that the people of Palos were in the position of culprits. For some things done and committed by them, as the royal document says, " in our disservice," they were condemned by the Royal Council to serve their Majesties for twelve months with two caravels, equipped at their own cost and expense, whenever and wherever ordered, under heavy penalties. Columbus had been ordered to sail with three caravels. Palos was thus called upon to furnish two of them. The order was read to the Alcaldes of the place, at a church still standing in Moquer, the Church of St. George, in presence of Columbus and Father Perez; and the magistrates bowed in submission, professing their willingness to obey. But the accomplishment of the royal command was not so easy. The owners of vessels, alarmed at the prospect of a voyage of unknown length and destination, sent their caravels away in every direction to prevent their being seized. The Queen iinally dispatched an officer, Juan de Penasola, to enforce her orders. After meeting protests and delays, Penasola seized the " Pinta," belonging to Gomez Rascon and Cristobal Quintero, of Palos, but it was found impossible to iit her for the intended voyage. One vessel Columbus was to charter and fit out with the means placed at his disposal ; with less difficulty he secured as this vessel, a caravel known as the " Mariagalante," or " Santa Maria," built in Galicia, in Northern Spain, and hence often referred to as " La Gallega," the Galician vessel. But without the other two caravels he could not proceed. At this point Martin Alonzo Piuzon came forward. He had already befriended Columbus ; his influence alone could solve the present difficulties. There was some understanding be tween him and Columbus, by which he not only furnished the third caravel, the "Nina," or " Santa Clara," but equipped the " Pinta," gave his own personal services to the enterprise, and summoned his brothers, kinsmen, and retainers to man the vessels. They promptly rallied around a man who was a ter ror to the Portuguese, of known determination and valor. What the orders of the Court, and the sentence of the Council, and the presence of a royal officer could not effect was achieved almost instantly by the word of Martin Alonzo Pinzon so great was his influence at Palos an influence the family enjoys to some extent even now in those parts. What was the agreement or understanding between Colum bus and Pinzon ? It was not committed to writing, and in the legal proceedings instituted by Pinzon s son, it is not made very clear. Las Casas, recognizing the fact that the fitting out of the expedition depended on securing the co-oper ation of Pinzon, says : " We must undoubtedly believe that he must have promised him something, because no man moves except for his own interest and utility"; and he concludes by declaring that it is very probable and near the truth, accord ing to all that he could ascertain, that Martin Alonzo Pinzon alone, or with his brothers, furnished for the expedition a sum equal to that which Columbus had received from the Queen. Without any distinct bargain he would thus be a partner, and we may well believe that Columbus promised Pinzon, as one witness declares, "half of all interest in the honor and profit," or as another declared he heard, " that he would share with him as with a brother." Columbus fitted out the " Mariagalante," engaging such men as he could find, and his crew was a motley one, made up of men from all parts, not all Spaniards even, for an Englishman and an Irishman figure on the list, with Portuguese and men from various parts of Spain, but not a single man from Palos. They were evidently not a crew on whom much dependence could be placed. But the caravel "Pinta," with Martin Alonzo Pinzon as captain, and his brother Francis as master ; and the caravel u Nina," with Vicente Yanez Pinzon as captain, had crews almost to a man from Palos or the neighboring town of Mo- 8 quer, kinsmen or adherents of the Pinzons, men who had sailed and fought many a time under their command, arid were ready to follow them literally to the ends of the earth. The "Pinta" had, indeed, on board its discontented own ers, who endeavored to cripple her, so that Columbus might be forced to abandon all idea of retaining her in his service, but after he refitted her in the Canary Islands all trace of this feeling disappears. From thcHt time these vessels seem to have been more easily and contentedly handled than the " Mariagalante." Accordingly, when on the 16tn of September they reached the yerbas, or sargasso, the men of Palos, who had heard of its existence, showed no alarm, but on board the vessel of Co lumbus himself the crew showed great discontent, " mi gente andaban muy estimulados." As some say, they became mu tinous, and according to Hernan Perez Mateos, a witness in the lawsuit, Pinzon offered to go with some of his crew and compel submission. The signs of land increased. Birds known never to be far from land were recognized ; pieces of wood and cane cut by human hands were seen floating. As the sun was sinking on the 25th of September Martin Alonzo saw what he took to be land in the southwest, and his cry : Land ! Land ! was followed by his hailing Columbus and claiming the honor. Men climbed the masts of the u Pinta, ? as others did those of the " Nina "; all agreed that it was really land. During the night the vessels ran south west wardly, and in the morning no land was in sight. Columbus and Pinzon had been studying a map, apparently Toscanelli s, and Colum bus, believing the nearest land to be Japan, thought that they had not sailed far enough, and preferred to make the mainland of Asia. Yet there is every reason to suppose that Pinzon actually saw land, and was not deceived, as Columbus maintained, by a bank of cloud. So experienced a seaman would not be likely to make so grave a mistake, and Las Casas, who was 9 too strongly attached to Columbus to be unjust to him, says distinctly : " Till night all continued to affirm that it was really land, and I certainly believe that it was so, because fol lowing the route they had constantly taken, all the islands which the admiral afterwards discovered on his second voyage were then in that direction southwest." Two weeks longer the vessels sailed on, making, however, less than four hundred miles, and then on the llth of Octo ber, Rodrigo Bermudez, of Triana, a sailor on Pinzon s vessel, the "Pinta," which was in advance of the others, discovered land beyond all dispute. Las Casas in his Journal of the first voyage gives this credit fully to Pinzon s sailor ; but the honor and the petty reward were claimed by Columbus, on the ground that at night he had seen a light moving in the darkness. Up to this time the allusions to Pinzon in the diary show no feeling. Columbus indeed nowhere bestows any praise on his subordinates, and we, of course, look for none in regard to the services of Pinzon. But from the discovery of land which secured to Columbus his titles of Admiral of t!ie Indies and Viceroy there is a marked change. A breach had taken place between the admiral and the stout captain of Palos. We have too scanty information to decide whether the fault lay in the arrogance of Columbus in the iirst flush of his new- won honors, or in the jealousy of Pinzon. The latter left us no account or statement of his voyage ; but Columbus, in the diary of this expedition, speaks of the great evil that Pinzon had said and done, and in another place, alluding to him, declares that he " will not suffer the acts of bad men, of little virtue, who presume to do their own will with little respect, against a man who had conferred that honor on them." Pinzon probably felt that his all-important services in fit ting out the expedition entitled him to some consideration at the hands of his commander.* He may have felt, too, that * " Eso merezco yo por haber os puesto en la honra en que estais." Tes timony of Francisco Medel, as to Pinzon s reply to Columbus. 10 his own claim to have first discovered land, arid the still* bet ter established claim of one of his seamen, had been unjustly set aside. Some time after, according to Las Casas, in November, or as others say, in October, he parted company with Columbus, unintentionally as he declared, mutinously as his commander maintained. It was not till the 10th of January, nearly two weeks after the grounding and loss of the " Mariagalante," that he rejoined the admiral, who was continuing his explora tions in the " Nina." They sailed for Europe in company, but in a storm the " Pinta " again parted company with the " Nina," and the caravels reached the peninsula at different points, the " Nina " at Lisbon, the u Pinta " at Bayona in Galicia. Each then proceeded to Palos ; Columbus in the " Nina," com manded by Vicente Yafiez Pinzon, entered that harbor on the 15th of March, and later on the same day the u Pinta " also arrived, her commander broken in health and spirits. The two Palos vessels thus returned in safety, after a voy age of nearly seven months, and their captains and crews long mourned as lost, were all restored to their homes and kindred. Not a single man of Palos w T as left in the fort on the Island of Santo Domingo, the garrison having been made up from the crew of the <% Mariagalante." Pinzon was conveyed from his house to the convent of La Eabida, where he sank rapidly in spite of the care of the friars, and when a messenger came from Queen Isabella to summon him to the court to make his report of the voyage, the staunch old captain of Palos had breathed his last, and his body was already doubtless committed to the earth in the little cemetery of Santa Maria de la Rabida. During his stay at Palos Columbus was for at least a part of the time in the house of Martin Alonzo Pinzon and also at the convent. We can infer from this, at least, that a complete reconciliation took place. The friars, Father Juan Perez and Antonio de Marchena, friends of both, doubtless effected this 11 restoration of friendly feelings between the two men, whom they respected. From this time Pinzon and the men of Palos were con signed to oblivion. No reward, no honor, was paid to the men who had volunteered to carry out the expedition, when the powers at the command of Columbus had failed, and he was utterly without means to effect his project, but was on the point of disastrous defeat. It was not till the Spanish monarchs finding themselves hampered by the powers granted to Columbus, when the dis covery itself was doubtful, and the extent of the New World unknown, thought of the unrewarded services of Pinzon and his brothers. The grant of a coat of arms to their descendants, by the Emperor Charles V., acknowledged rather than paid the debt ; and though the suit in behalf of the heirs of the Pinzons against the heirs of Columbus had the influence of Government, it brought nothing to the ancient family of mariners. A city in the north of Spain, for its gallantry in repel ling the French, was once honored by making every one of its inhabitants a nobleman ; Palos, where so many from the discoverer of the Sargasso Sea had contributed to O the discovery of a new world, which furnished unrewarded two of the vessels and their crews for the expedition of Co lumbus, received no honor ; her commerce was allowed to dwindle away, till the city which gave many of the best pilots, like Aiaminos, the man who threaded the bays and inlets of the American coast, vanished, and the mighty men of the sea are in our day represented by a deserted harbor and a few vine-dressers. The port from which Columbus and the Pinzons sailed is one of the dead cities of Spain. A movement fur tardy reparation has been made by Cap tain Cesareo Fernandez Duro, of the Spanish navy, an active member of the Royal Academy of History of Madrid, to close, careful, and judicious study of unpublished docu- 12 merits, we owe an exhaustive work on the alleged expedition of Governor Pefialosa from New Mexico towards the Missis sippi in 1662, and more recently the first full analysis and extracts of the Pinzon-Colon lawsuit, which had hitherto been so uncritically used in researches as to the voyages of Columbus. THE BEGINNINGS OF TUB CAPUCHIN MISSION IN LOUISIANA. As early as 1717, Bishop Duplessis Mornay, Coadjutor of Quebec and Vicar-General for Louisiana, arranged with the Company of the West, which had control of the province, to send Capuchin missionaries to attend the settlers. No ac count has yet been found of the voyage of the first Fathers or their early labors. The oldest known date is the entry of the Capuchin Father, John Mathieu, in the parish register of Mobile, January 18, 1721, and his assumption of the title of Yicar-Apostolic seems to indicate that he was Superior. In a recent French catalogue, several letters of Capuchin Fathers relating to the Louisiana mission were offered for sale. One was secured by the writer, but the rest were reported sold. A second one, however, was purchased by a New Or leans dealer, and before it passed out of his hands, Dr. G. Devron copied it carefully, and has since published it in the " Comptes Rendus de PAthenee Louisianais," restoring words cut off or worn away. These letters throw new light on the early history of the Church in Louisiana and are here given in English : I. LETTER OF BRUNO DE LANGRES, CAPUCHIN, SUPERIOR OF THE LOUISIANA MISSION. SIR: We are extremely sorry to have left Paris without paying you our respects ; the gentlemen with whom we treated never spoke to us about you. Apparently, sir, it was by our order, and not to withdraw you from your serious occupations. But we have not been less sensible of the fault which we have committed, when we recognized it at Orleans, where Monsieur de Madier informed us that you were the head of the Com pany of the Indies, for whose service we are going to Louis iana, and it is to repair this fault that I do myself the honor to write to you in the name of our Reverend Fathers, mis sionaries, to make our apologies, to assure you of our duty and of our prayers for you to our Lord. We reached Nantes only on the 3d of March, because our boatmen were detained a long time in the public offices. On arriving, we found Mr. Fourtat laid up with gout, but his wife, who is a woman of ability, accustomed to business, has labored so attentively to expedite matters for us, that we have found everything arranged to our wish, according to the statement we have forwarded. If the agents who have charge of the rest are as punctual or as charitable, we shall have reason to be well satisfied. Recollect, if you please, sir, that we have not yet the King s patents for our establishment in Louisiana, arid that we need it in duplicate, one for the Reverend Father Provincial, to be kept in the archives of the province, and the other to serve as our authority in Louisiana. You will also oblige us, sir, if in the orders you give the Governor of that country to receive us, you beg him to supply some little nec essaries which we shall undoubtedly need in those new estab lishments, which are trifles, such as kitchen cranes, bedsteads, paper, tables, chairs, and some other small articles of furniture of that nature, of little consequence, and yet very useful. Excuse me for dwelling so long on such trifles ; the situa tion in which we are placed seems to require it. Our Reverend Fathers, missionaries, present you their hom age, wishing you the blessings of heaven, and I, who am more particularly with a very profound respect, Your very humble and very obedient servant, F. BRUNO DE LANGRES, Capuchin, Superior of the Louisiana Mission. NANTES, March 5, 1722. This would seem to indicate that Father John Mathieu was simply a pioneer, and that Father Bruno de Langres was the first Superior of the Mission and took out several Fathers in 1722. IT. NEW ORLEANS, this 7th September, 1723. (Rec d March 8, 1724.) By the " Galatee." SIR: I flatter myself that you will not find it amiss if I take the liberty of exposing to you the condition in which my compan ions and myself have been-since our arrival in this colony, and if I ask you to continue to honor us with your protection at this time when we feel only too sensibly how much we re quire it. We are here without church and without resi dences, and it does not seem that any exertion is made to erect any, although the orders of Messeigneurs, the Superior Councillors, are formal. Every man thinks only of his own comfort, which he finds means to obtain, while the establish ments are entirely neglected. For six months we have had at New Orleans only a small room, which served us as chapel and kitchen, another to lodge four religious, and a third to store our provisions and other effects. I will not tell you, sir, what inconvenience we suffered during the sickness which attacked us at that time. We have recovered from it only a few days, and we are in a cabin, where I have arranged two- cells, which are not even as large as the ordinary Capuchin cells in France. We have besides this a kitchen where one of our religious sleeps, and another room which serves as a sacristy, where a fourth is lodged. The house which we have converted into a church holds only about - - persons, which is only half a quarter of the inhabitants of New Orleans. It will be difficult for us to remain long in this state, our minis try becoming almost useless for want of a church in which we can assemble the people to instruct them, without which we cannot hope for any fruit of onr mission. Almost all the in habitants live in the most scandalous conditions, and in such a profound ignorance of the truths of our holy religion, that they may be said to be ignorant even of the first elements. No Easter Communion, no attendance at divine service, al though we do all we can to attract them, both in public and private. Those who wish to keep up a show of religion, con tent themselves with a low mass on Sundays and holidays, and carefully avoid any where there is a word of preaching. The example of those who are at the head of the colony en courages this disorder. They ask us for a low mass after the high mass, which they attend, followed by a part of the peo ple who have retained some religious principles, the parochial mass being so neglected that generally scarcely thirty or forty persons are found there. A better example on the part of the authorities could not but produce a good effect. I hope, sir, that you will endeavor to have our provisions increased, it be ing almost impossible for us to maintain ourselves on what is given us in a country where there is no other resource. The ministry gives very little, and even that little can be expected only at New Orleans, where there are a few offerings for masses, some (fees for) parochial functions in copper coin, which is valued so low that during our sickness I sent every where to get a couple of eggs, offering as much as sous apiece, but could not find them. Those who sold them re plied that they could do nothing with our copper, and that if we had white money to give them, they had eggs to sell us. We have bought a few hens, which will be some help to us in future needs. For the rest, we have for our ordinary only a little pork, half a pound of bread, and the third of a chopine of wine, after supplying that for mass. The fatigue we en dure running night and day to visit the sick and carry the sacraments to them, generally in mud knee deep, does not accord with such scanty nourishment. Here at New Orleans we can pay at the rate of France in copper money for a few bottles of wine and some quarters of flour, which out of con- sideration they are willing to grant us, but in the other posts, where our missionaries have no resource but the ration they receive from the Company, it will he absolutely impossible for them to live, unless the Company has the goodness to grant them this allowance gratis. I beg you to consider, sir, that our case is not like that of the missionaries who preceded us. These often had three times as much as we have, and when they were reduced to - - livres allowance yearly, they found also means of subsistence by the traffic they carried on ; they obtained from the storehouses goods which they then sold at threefold and fourfold, which gave them means to visit these same storehouses, where nothing was refused them for copper money, three and four times the amount of goods, which they had obtained for their original sum. "We are not capable of such peddling, which we regard as ruinous to the colony. Hence, it seems to me just that we should be assisted from some other quarter. You will have the goodness, sir, to remember that at Pans you promised us two cows and a bull. If you will kindly give orders that these cattle be delivered to us, we shall be deeply obliged to you, for a little milk with our bit of pork and the rice that we can find here will render our life less hard. I take the liberty, sir, to address you papers in regard to a cask of wine, of which we were deprived by an act of bad faith on the part of the captain and - of the vessel " PAlex- andre," who for five casks which have been delivered to us, put six in the original of their manifest, and to deceive Father Bruno, then Superior, noted on the copy delivered five casks, although in the body of the copy there seem to be due us only three out of the nine which the Company assigned us, and of which we then received only five. I am convinced, sir, that you will have the goodness to see justice done us. Although it is foreign to my ministry to mingle in affairs, I nevertheless think that I shall not overstep the bounds which I draw for myself in this respect by informing you, sir, that it is very necessary that some water-mills should be erected 6 in places adapted for them, or wind-mills where proper streams are wanting. Such mills will dispense with half the French flour sent over, and will prevent the frequent bread famines which now happen, for the common people will be content with rice or Indian corn bread, and many even of those better off will be glad to mix half French flour and half rice or Indian corn meal, which makes very good bread. Bread of this kind is made but by pounding the rice or In dian corn in a mortar, which is very laborious and repulsive work, because it takes a person a whole day to crack enough for one or at most two days. Moreover, the laborer loses a considerable time at this task, when he could be more use fully employed in the Company s establishment, and as the sick cannot be employed, they are left without food or pro visions. Suffer me, sir, in finishing my letter, to recommend to the honor of your protection the Mayor, who will have that of .presenting this to you. He has rendered us an essential ser vice by ceding to us his house, to afford us a little better lodg ing than that we occupied, as well as to afford us a larger and less unbecoming chapel. He obtains no rent, but a free pass age to France, and some repairs that have been made there, the whole not amounting to half the rent the Company had pre viously paid for us. He desires permission to ship some pro visions on a vessel when he returns to this country. I trust you will not refuse him this favor, nor me that of believing myself with all possible respect and gratitude, Sir, Your most humble and obedient servant, F. RAPHAEL DE LUXEMBOURG, Capuchin, Superior of the Mission. THIS BOOK ON THE DA DU " LD2 l-lOOm-7, 40 (69368) YC1.3C673 M255770 THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY