Page:Historic towns of the southern states (1900).djvu/610

 Lutherans." Some twenty or more escaped with Laudonniere to two vessels at the mouth of the river and thence to France.

All of Ribaut's vessels having been wrecked along the coast between St. Augustine and Canaveral, although most of the people escaped with their lives, they had no means of regaining Fort Caroline or of leaving the coast for any point of refuge. Wrecked and wretched, they moved northward along the coast, and at Matanzas, an inlet twenty miles below St. Augustine, they were met by Menendez, who had returned from Fort Caroline, and was informed of their shipwreck and condition by natives living along the coast. Ribaut asked safe-conduct, but Menendez refused all overtures for terms of surrender, requiring unconditional submission to his will or clemency. The result was that, as fast as the French were brought across the inlet in small parties, he directed that they should all be killed. This sad tragedy is commemorated by the name, still borne by the inlet, Matanzas, the place of slaughter.

The French Huguenots thus disposed of, Menendez proceeded to lay out and build his proposed city. A castle and religious house