victors were mingled with the groans of the dying; and when all was over, Menendez, with the consciousness of having done his duty, returned thanks to God, and retired to his head-quarters to send home to his king an account of the triumph of the true faith.
Scenes of bloodshed were now exchanged for the peaceful work of founding a Spanish colony. The site chosen was in N. lat. 29° 51´, W. long. 81° 30´, some miles north of the ill-fated Fort Carolina, and was named St. Augustine, because the Spanish fleet had first come in sight of Florida on the festival day of that saint. The boundaries of the settlement were carefully marked out under the supervision of Menendez himself, and though its foundations were laid in blood, it grew with a rapidity hitherto unequaled, and bid fair to be the first permanent settlement of Europeans in North America. The past was forgotten, and not more unconscious of their coming doom than the poor colonists of Carolina were the Spaniards of St. Augustine, when once more a little fleet appeared upon the coast of Florida, coming, not this time from the South, but from the North; for De Gourgues, with the foresight of a true soldier, had paused to secure the friendship of the Indians of the May before venturing to approach the Spanish camp.
The outposts of the Spaniards were surprised, the sentinels were slain at their posts, and a force of four hundred men sent out by Menendez against the enemy was completely destroyed, those taken prisoners being hanged on the very trees on which some of the Frenchmen of Carolina had suffered the same fate at the hands of the Spaniards. With this retribution, however, De Gourgues—who, it must be remembered, was acting without the authority of his government—appears to have been content. He made no descent upon St. Augustine itself; but having destroyed the forts whose garrisons he had massacred, he bade his Indian allies farewell, and left the country. But his work had been more thorough than he knew himself, for the natives, who had hitherto looked upon the Spaniards as invincible, had seen them fall an easy prey to the French, and the remainder of the career of Menendez was one long struggle against the treacherous schemes of the red men. His efforts at exploration on the North were unsuccessful; the missionaries whom he induced to land on the north-western shores of Florida were led into ambush, and massacred by the natives; and though summary vengeance was exacted for their fate, the enmity of the Indians continued to hamper all the movements of the Spaniards.
To complete the story of early settlements in Florida, we may add that
