396 FRENCH AND ENGLISH RIVALRY. [1693-97. 



Whence came the numerical weakness of New 

 France, and the real though latent strength of her 

 rivals ? Because, it is answered, the French were 

 not an emigrating people ; but, at the end of the 

 seventeenth century, this was only half true. The 

 French people were divided into two parts, one 

 eager to emigrate, and the other reluctant. The 

 one consisted of the persecuted Huguenots, the 

 other of the favored Catholics. The government 

 chose to construct its colonies, not of those who 

 wished to go, but of those who wished to stay at 

 home. From the hour when the edict of Nantes 

 was revoked, hundreds of thousands of Frenchmen 

 would have hailed as a boon the permission to 

 transport themselves, their families, and their prop- 

 erty to the New World. The permission was fiercely 

 refused, and the persecuted sect was denied even 

 a refuge in the wilderness. Had it been granted 

 them, the valleys of the west would have swarmed 

 with a laborious and virtuous population, trained 

 in adversity, and possessing the essential qualities 

 of self-government. Another France would have 

 grown beyond the Alleghanies, strong with the 

 same kind of strength that made the future great- 

 ness of the British colonies. British America was 

 an asylum for the oppressed and the suffering of 

 all creeds and nations, and population poured into 

 her by the force of a natural tendency. France, 

 like England, might have been great in two hemi- 

 spheres, if she had placed herself in accord with 

 this tendency, instead of opposing it ; but despot- 

 ism was consistent with itself, and a mighty oppor- 

 tunity was for ever lost. 



