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Rh Cruz, carrying two thousand six hundred troops. Landing at the northern end of Santo Domingo, near Cape Frances, they were joined by seven hundred men from the Spanish settlements. The French, apprised of their landing, though greatly inferior in numbers, rashly gave them battle, and were routed with a loss of five hundred men, the almost impenetrable woods alone saving their force from annihilation. Having destroyed several towns, including the city of Guarico, captured a number of vessels, and taken many prisoners, the expedition returned to Vera Cruz in March 1691, avoiding the more powerful French settlements on the east coast of the island. In honor of this success a thanksgiving service was celebrated in the capital, and a full account of the expedition was soon after written and published by the celebrated Mexican author, Cárlos de Sigüenza y Góngora.

In 1695 a combined expedition of Spaniards and English, the latter having now made common cause against a mutual foe, attacked the French settlements of Santo Domingo, destroyed their forts, captured eighty-one pieces of cannon, and laid waste two settlements.

The French were, at this time, the most enterprising foe with whom the Spaniards had to contend, and several years before the events just described had attempted to establish settlements on the mainland, which might serve as a base for future operations. As early as 1684 the Spaniards, by the capture of a vessel off Santo Domingo, had learned of the expedition of La Salle, of which mention will be made in its place, but no attempt to thwart him appears to have been made until two years later, although in 1685 the report reached Mexico that a French colony had been founded on Espíritu Santo Bay. The earlier expeditions sent in search of this colony failed to find any traces of it or of the lost vessels, but in 1687 the