a long time in consuming him. Already had the fire been lighted, and the victim resigned himself to his terrible fate, when the daughter of Ucita, the chief, throwing herself at her father's feet, begged his life in these words:

"My kind father, why kill this poor stranger? he can do you nor none of us any injury, seeing he is but one and alone. It is better that you should keep him confined, for even in that condition he may some time be of great service to you."

The chief was silent a short time, but finally ordered his release. His wounds were dressed, and he was made tolerably comfortable. Possibly, this incident suggested to Captain John Smith the story he long afterwards wrote of his rescue from death by Pocahontas, the daughter of Powhatan.

At one end of Ucita's village stood a temple; over the door was the figure of a bird carved in wood, and with gilded eyes. As soon as the wounds of Ortiz were healed, he was stationed to guard the entrance of this temple, more especially from the inroads of wild beasts. victims were sacrificed here, wolves were frequent visitors. the penalty for allowing a body to be removed.

As human

Death was

One night he had a terrible scare. A young Indian had been killed,

1

and his body was placed in the temple. Spite of all his efforts, a pack of hungry wolves effected an entrance and seized upon the body. As soon as he recovered from the fright of their first onset, he seized a heavy cudgel, drove them out, and pursued them some distance, dealing one of them a mortal blow.

When morning came, and it was seen that the body was gone, Ortiz was condemned to die; but before executing him Ucita sent a party in pursuit of the wolves, and, if possible, to recover the body. Contrary to all expectations, it was found, and near it the carcass of a huge wolf. The order for Ortiz's execution was revoked, and he was afterwards held in great esteem by the Indians.

Some time afterwards he was again selected for sacrifice, but was a second time saved from a terrible death by the chief's daughter, who aided him to escape to the country of Mocoso, a rival chief, by whom he was well treated, and with whom he remained three years. At the expiration of that time the fleet of De Soto arrived, and Mocoso, out of friendship for Ortiz, sent him to his countrymen, who, as we have seen, supposing him to be what he appeared-an Indian-came near killing him. Ortiz rendered important services to De Soto, as interpreter among the various Indian tribes.

For three years the Spaniards wandered through the country in search of gold, De Soto obstinately refusing to turn back. No gold was discovered; the only wealth of the natives was in their stores of corn; they were poor, but independent, hardy and brave. Everywhere he was met by the most determined hostility on the part of the natives, with whom he had a bloody battle at Mauvilla, or Mobile. For nine hours the Indians fought with desperation, and but for the flames, which consumed Oct. 18, 1540. their light cabins, they would have repulsed the invaders. Thousands of them were slain. Though protected by their armor, many Spaniards were killed or wounded, and all their baggage was burned.

Mauvilla was a strongly - fortified village on the Coosa. It was surrounded by stout palisades, with loop-holes for arrows. Early in the morning the Indian war-cry was raised. De Soto led his men to storm the fort. The entrance was narrow and well defended, and some of his best cavaliers were fatally pierced between the joints of their armor, and numbers of horses were killed. The Spaniards were obliged to withdraw. The Indians then sallied from the gates and rushed upon the foe, charging and retiring over the plain; but the advantage was finally with the Spaniards, and the Indians withdrew to their fort.

In a second assault the gate was broken down, when the assailants

rushed in, and a furious conflict ensued. The Indians thronged the square; lance, club, and missile were wielded from every quarter. Even their young women snatched up the swords of the slaughtered Spaniards and mingled in the fray, being more reckless than the men. The struggle was so fierce and protracted, particularly from the roofs of the houses, that the soldiers set fire to their combustible dwellings, which were soon in flames. At length the Indians gave way and fled, pursued by the cavalry. They would neither give nor take quarter; not a man surrendered. These Indians were of the Creek, Choctaw, and Chickasaw tribes; among the slain was their famous chief, Tuscaloosa, the Black Warrior.

During the first winter De Soto encamped at the deserted Indian town of Chicaza, where for two months his men enjoyed comparative repose. At length the Chickasaws resolved to burn the encampment, which was constructed of inflammable materials.

A dark and windy night having been chosen, the camp was fired in several places, the savages at the same time uttering furious yells and making a desperate attack. A high wind fanned the flames into irresisti ble fury, and for a time the confusion was such as rendered it impossible to resist the impetuosity of the assailants. Discipline and courage, however, regained the ascendancy, and the enemy was repulsed. But the camp was totally destroyed, together with all the arms, accoutrements, and provisions of the army. All that had been saved at the conflagration of Mauvilla was here annihilated. The droves of hogs, which had formed their main dependence for provisions, were burned in their pens. The temper of their swords had been impaired by the action of the fire, and almost every valuable article of equipage consumed.

De Soto more than once displayed great coolness and presence of mind. He had, at one time, pitched his camp near Costa, a town in Alabama, and, with a few of his followers, was conversing with the chief, when some of his troopers entered the town and plundered several of the houses. The justly-incensed Indians fell upon them with their clubs. Seeing himself surrounded by the natives, and in great personal danger, the general seized a cudgel and, with his usual presence of mind, commenced beating his own men. The savages, observing this, became pacified in a moment. In the mean time, taking the chief by the hand, he led him, with flattering words, towards his camp, where he was presently surrounded by a guard and held as a hostage. The Spaniards remained under arms all night. Fifteen hundred armed Indians surrounded them, frequently threatening them with attack, and uttering cries of insult and menace. Restraining his troops, De Soto, aided by a prominent Indian, who had followed him

for some time, at length succeeded in restoring peace and in averting what seemed likely to prove a serious affair.

Upon one occasion De Soto tried to overawe the Natchez Indians, who worshipped the sun, by claiming a supernatural birth and demanding tribute.

"You say you are the child of the sun," replied the incredulous chief. "Dry up the river, and I will believe you. If you wish to see me, come to the town where I dwell. If you come in peace I will receive you with special good-will; if in war, I will not shrink one foot back."

The sole achievement of this costly and memorable expedition was the discovery of the Mississippi River at the lowest Chickasaw Bluff. Boats were required to cross, and it took a month to build them. The Spaniards crossed, and extended their tedious journey as far as Kansas. They found the Indians an agricultural people, with fixed

May, 1541.

places of abode, and subsisting chiefly on the product of the fields. They were neither turbulent nor quarrelsome. Their dress was in part mats; in cold weather they wore deerskins, and mantles woven of feathers. Their villages were generally small, but close together. The natives were treated with the utmost cruelty by the Spaniards, who held their lives as of no account. They would cut off their hands on the slightest suspicion, and the guide who was unsuccessful, or who purposely misled them, was thrown to the hounds or condemned to the flames.

Disappointed and dispirited, De Soto's health rapidly declined, and he

was finally carried off by a malignant fever. His body was buried at night in the great river he had discovered. "He had crossed a large part of the continent in search of gold," says the historian Bancroft, "and found nothing so remarkable as his burial-place."

May 21, 1542.

His followers wandered about for months afterwards, but at length abandoned their fruitless expedition and returned to the Mississippi. They then, with extraordinary patience and labor, ingeniously constructed some vessels out of their scanty materials, in which the survivors, three hundred and eleven in number, finally reached Mexico.

Sept. 1543.

1541.

While De Soto was vainly seeking wealth and fame in the American wilderness, Mendoza, the Viceroy of Mexico, organized an expedition under Francis Vasquez Coronado, to search for the "Seven Cities of Cibola," the fame of whose riches was fully credited by the gullible Spaniards. Three hundred men were enlisted for the expedition, who were accompanied by eight hundred Indians.

The tale of the famous seven cities originated in the report of a Spanish missionary, who pretended that he had discovered, north of Sonora, a populous and rich kingdom called Quivera, or the Seven Cities, abounding in gold, the capital of which was called Cibola. Tezon, an Indian, also told the Spanish viceroy, Nuño de Guzman, that his father, who was now dead, had been a trader in ornamental feathers, such as are used in headdresses, to a people in the interior lying north of the Gila River, and that he brought back in exchange large quantities of precious metals. He had accompanied his father, he said, on one of these journeys, and saw seven cities as large as Mexico, built on a regular plan, with high houses, and that there were entire streets of gold and silver smiths. No story seems to have been too absurd for these credulous Spaniards, and this one was still further corroborated by the return of Cabeca de Vaca with three companions from the ill-fated expedition of Narvaez, whose glowing accounts of the countries through which they had passed, inflamed still further the avarice of their countrymen.

Crossing the Gila, Coronado led his men over a desert and through the valley of a small stream, until they arrived before the lofty, natural walls of Cibola (old Zuñi). On the top of these stood the town. The Indians cultivated corn in the valleys below, as they do at this day, wore coarse stuffs for clothing, and manufactured a species of pottery, but possessed neither gold nor mines.

Without waiting to make any inquiries, the Spaniards immediately assaulted the town. The natives rolled down stones from above, one of