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French Bishop, Pigneau de Béhaine, is the commanding figure in the drama. He was born in 1741, came out to Cochin-China, built a church at Saigon, and so won the confidence of the King Ngueyen Anh, afterwards better known as Gia Long, that he was actually entrusted with the custody of his son, whom he took to Paris in 1787 and presented at the Court of Louis XVI. France was at the moment over-busy with her internal affairs, being as she was on the eve of the great Revolution, and be- yond a gift of arms and a treaty of alliance, the main pro- visions of which were never fulfilled, nothing tangible re- sulted at the time from Béhaine's mission. Subsequently, however, the existence of this treaty was recalled to mind, and the fact was made a foundation upon which to base France's right to interfere in the affairs of Indo- China.

Béhaine's visit, however, attracted the attention of Frenchmen to this distant corner of the world, and a number of adventurers of that nationality visited Annam. By their aid and that of Bêhaine, King Gia Long suc- ceeded in conquering the whole of the ancient kingdom of Annam, from the Gulf of Siam to the frontiers of China, thus uniting under a single sceptre Cochin-China, Annam and Tongking. His gratitude to the white men who had assisted him in this work led him to show an unwonted measure of tolerance to the preachers of the Christian religion. When Béhaine died in Saigon in 1789 he was ac- corded a state funeral, and the monument erected by his patron over his grave still ranks as one of the most in- teresting historical relics of the place. By 1802 Gia Long