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but finding the ice impenetrable, he turned to the south and coasted along as far as the entrance of Chesapeake bay. A few years later, about 1508, it is probable that Verrazzano, a Florentine in the French service, made a cruise on the coast of North America; but there is no authentic account of his discoveries, the letter over his signature addressed to Francis I. and long received as genuine being now suspected to be spurious. In 1513 the Spaniard Ponce de Leon discovered Florida, and took formal possession of the country near where St. Augustine now stands; but on attempting afterward to plant a colony, he was repulsed and mortally wounded by the natives. In 1539 took place the famous expedition of the Spaniard De Soto, who landed with several hundred followers in Tampa bay on the west coast of Florida, and fought his way in the course of two years through the region which now forms the states of Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, to the river Mississippi, beyond which he penetrated for about 200 m., and to which he returned to die in 1542. After his death his discouraged followers descended the river in boats, and crossed the gulf to the Spanish settlements in Mexico. For a long period no further attempt was made by the Spaniards to colonize Florida. But in 1562 the French Calvinists, under the direction of Admiral Coligni, endeavored to found there a colony which might become a place of refuge for the persecuted Huguenots. Charles IX. conceded an ample charter, and an expedition under Jean Ribault made a settlement at Port Royal in South Carolina, the name of Carolina being then first given to the country in honor of King Charles. This colony was soon abandoned, and another, composed also of Protestants, was planted on the banks of the St. John's in Florida, which in 1565 was surprised and massacred by the Spaniards, who in the same year founded St. Augustine, the first permanent settlement in the United States.—The discoveries of the Cabots had given the English crown a claim to North America, which, though not prosecuted for nearly a century, was never relinquished, and which in the reign of Elizabeth led to efforts at colonization on a large scale. In 1585 an expedition sent by Sir Walter Raleigh made a settlement on Roanoke island in North Carolina, which failed so utterly that in a few years not a trace of it remained. In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold effected a settlement on the Elizabeth islands in Massachusetts, which was abandoned the same year. James I. in 1606 established two great divisions in the American territory claimed by England: South Virginia, extending from Cape Fear to the Potomac, and North Virginia, from the mouth of the Hudson to Newfoundland. Two companies were formed in England for the colonization of America: the London company, to which was granted South Virginia, and the Plymouth company, to which was granted North Virginia; and it was agreed that the region between the Potomac and the Hudson should be neutral ground on which either company might make settlements. The London company sent out three ships and 105 emigrants, who entered Chesapeake bay, and founded on May 13, 1607, the commonwealth of Virginia by building Jamestown on James river, both names being given in honor of the English king. Capt. Newport commanded the expedition, but the master spirit of the enterprise was the celebrated Capt. John Smith. The natives were conciliated by the marriage of Pocahontas, the daughter of their king or principal chief Powhatan, to an Englishman, and remained friendly for some years. The government of Virginia was at first retained by the king in the hands of councils subject to his appointment or control; but after repeated changes the constitution was at length so framed that a house of burgesses chosen by the people was instituted, which met for the first time July 30, 1619. This was the beginning of representative government in America. In August, 1619, a Dutch man-of-war entered James river, and sold 20 Africans to the planters, thus introducing slavery into the colony; and in 1621 the cultivation of cotton was begun. Capt. John Smith had returned to England in 1609, and in 1614 sailed again for America; and having examined the coast from the Penobscot to Cape Cod, he named the country New England. On his return home he published a map and description of New England, which, together with his personal representations of the advantages of emigration, excited much enthusiasm in England for colonizing America; and a patent was obtained from the king for a new company incorporated as “the council established at Plymouth in the county of Devon for the planting, ruling, ordering, and governing New England in America,” which gave the planters absolute property, with unlimited jurisdiction, the sole powers of legislation, and the appointment of all officers and all forms of government, over the territory, extending in breadth from the 40th to the 48th degree of north latitude, and in length from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The first English settlement within its limits, however, was established without the knowledge of the corporation and without the aid of King James, by the “pilgrim fathers of New England,” a body of Puritans (102 in number) who, led by John Carver, William Brewster, William Bradford, Edward Winslow, and Miles Standish, sailed from England, Sept. 6, 1620, in the Mayflower, a vessel of 180 tons burden. They anchored first at Cape Cod (Nov. 9), and on Dec. 11 (O. S.) an exploring party landed at a harbor in Massachusetts bay, where the Mayflower anchored a few days afterward. Here they began to build a town, which they called Plymouth in memory of the hospitalities received at the last English port from which they had sailed. The government of the colony was strictly republican. The governor was elected