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The Portuguese, as we have observed before, were the 
first who attempted to colonize Madagascar; and it might 
reasonably be supposed, that a people so devoted to the 
Catholic faith, would have planted the standard of the cross 
immediately ;—but this was not the case. They took priests 
thither, it is true; but their efforts to convert the natives 
were feeble to an unaccountable degree; and the massacre 
of the whole colony, (except five men,) which took place 
about the year 1545, alarmed them so much, that they 
abandoned the idea of settling there, and no further 
attempt was made by them to establish the Catholic faith. 
It was about a century after, that the French fixed their 
colony at Fort Dauphin, at which period no vestige of 
Christianity remained in the island. A short time pre¬ 
vious, a Portuguese vessel, which touched there, had 
carried off the son of a chief, who was taken to Goa, 
where he was instructed in reading and writing, and 
initiated in the mysteries of Catholicism; but after his 
return to Madagascar, he renounced Christianity, and 
again adopted the religion and customs of his forefathers; 
so that, when the French arrived, they found him with 
his lamba and his assagaye, quite ready to receive them. 
The field, therefore, was now open to the French; and 
if there was any glory in converting men from natural 
religion to popish idolatry, they had a fair chance of 
reaping it. 
They found that simple people of a very teachable dis¬ 
position, and resolved to avail themselves of it without 
delay. They appear, indeed, to have been under great 
apprehensions lest the English and Dutch heretics should 
get the start of, or supersede them.* Their first care was 
* Flacourt writes so movingly upon this subject, that one would almost sus¬ 
pect him to have been a monk. He intreats the French government to send 
“ good pastors and workmen, to secure the flocks before the wolves be en¬ 
tered into the fold, and have devoured the sheep.” And in order to assist 
these good pastors in their labours of love, he strongly recommends the “ build- 
