FERDINAND DE SOTO, THE DISCOVERER OF THE MISSISSIPPI.
Ferdinand de Soto, who was with Pizarro in Peru, was born in Spain, and
the first years of his life were spent in a gloomy castle where it was
so quiet, that he often grew lonely and wished that he had some
playfellow besides the birds or his dog or horse. His parents were so
poor that they could not afford to send him to school, and so he grew to
be a big boy before knowing how to read or write; but his family were of
noble blood, the noblest in Spain; and although they could not send him
to school, still they had him taught to ride and fence, as it was
thought disgraceful for a Spanish nobleman not to have these
accomplishments. And so the boy learned to ride daringly, and at the age
of twelve could use his sword as easily as any other Spanish boy of his
age; and in the meantime, in the halls of the dark old castle, he
listened eagerly to the tales he heard of the wonderful land which
Columbus had discovered, and he resolved that when he became a man he
would go himself across the sea and bring back gold and refurnish up the
old castle and make it once more a place fit for noblemen to live in.
When he learned to read he stored his mind with stories of adventure and
romance, and he said that he, too, would go into the world some day and
win honor and fame; and so the days passed; the sun brightened the
castle walls in the daytime and the shadows hung over them at night, and
through sunlight and shadow the boy dreamed on of the years to come when
he would be a knight and a soldier and gain glory and wealth under the
flag of Spain.
[Illustration: DE SOTO.]
One day a very wealthy Spanish nobleman named Don Pedro de Avila rode up
to the castle and asked to see Ferdinand. Ferdinand at this time was an
unusually handsome youth, tall and graceful, and remarkable for his
strength and agility. He excelled all his friends in fencing and riding,
and all those active amusements which the Spanish youth delighted in.
Don Pedro had noticed the handsome boy, and as he had no son of his own
he offered to adopt him and educate him; so Ferdinand left his home and
was sent to a Spanish university, where he spent six years, during which
time he became renowned for his skill in the chivalric entertainments
which were all the time going on in Spain. He took the prizes at all the
tournaments, and was everywhere praised and admired. Don Pedro became
very proud of him and treated him as though he were his own child.
Don Pedro had a daughter, Isabella, who was very beautiful, and her
father wished her to marry some rich nobleman, so that she might have a
high position at the Spanish court; but while her father was away in
Darien, where he had been appointed governor, Isabella fell in love with
Ferdinand de Soto and promised to marry him. When Don Pedro came back
and De Soto asked permission of him to marry his daughter he was very
angry, and from that time he became De Soto's bitterest enemy. He was
going back to Darien again, and thinking it would be a fine thing if De
Soto were to go with him and get killed by the Indians, he offered to
give him a handsome outfit and appoint him captain of a company of
soldiers if he would go. De Soto was very poor, his parents were dead,
and he thought he might win honor and wealth by going with Don Pedro, so
he accepted his offer.
At the time that he left Spain, De Soto was nineteen years of age; he
was away fifteen years, during which time he heard only once or twice
from Isabella; he wrote to her many times and she answered his letters,
but her father always destroyed the letters. During the years that he
was away De Soto did indeed become rich and famous; he had left Spain a
poor boy, and he returned a wealthy and honored man. Without his help
Pizarro would never have been able to conquer Peru, and the fame of the
great soldier De Soto was talked of from one end of Spain to the other.
In the meantime Don Pedro had died, and as soon as De Soto reached
Spain he married Isabella. For two years they lived in Seville in
princely style, but at the end of that time De Soto found that his money
was fast melting away, so he resolved to go on another expedition and
gather more gold. He asked permission of the king to conquer Florida,
where it was believed there was much gold, and offered to fit out the
expedition at his own expense. The king consented, and De Soto began his
preparations.
As soon as it became known that De Soto was raising an army for the
conquest of Florida, all the young noblemen of Spain flocked eagerly
around his standard. He accepted only those who were strong and able to
endure hardship, for he knew that he had a very difficult task before
him. Such an army had never before left Spain; the gallant and daring
soldiers were nearly all wealthy and well-born. They wore costly armor
and all their outfit was of the richest description. Everything was
provided to make the expedition a success. Arms and provisions, chains
for the Indians whom they expected to make slaves, bloodhounds for
hunting runaways, and cards for the young nobles to amuse themselves
with. Twelve priests went with them to convert the natives and keep up
religious services. Ten ships left the harbor of San Lucar, with flags
flying, bugles pealing, and cannon thundering over the water, and thus
De Soto, under sunny skies and with bright hopes, sailed for the
summerland of De Leon.
They stopped at Cuba, where De Soto left his wife to govern the colony
during his absence, and then sailing through the Gulf they entered Tampa
Bay and landed. Here they heard that there was a large Indian town six
miles away, and De Soto decided to march there; but when they reached
the village they found it entirely deserted. Not an Indian was to be
seen. It was quite a large village; the houses were made of timber,
thatched with palm leaves; many of them were large, having many rooms;
they had useful articles of furniture, some of which were very elegantly
carved and ornamented with gold. The dresses of the women were very
beautiful and trimmed with shells and embroidery and richly colored;
there were exquisite shawls and mantillas woven by hand from the bark of
the mulberry tree, and the walls of some of the houses were hung with
tapestry of prepared buckskin, while the floors were covered with
carpets of the same material. The buckskin had been tanned so that it
shone like satin, and was as soft as silk, and it made the rooms look
very luxurious and elegant.
All this was very different from the Indian homes De Soto had seen in
Darien, and he did not doubt that here he should find a kingdom as rich
as Peru. He took possession of the village, and he and his soldiers
lived in the houses. One or two of the Indians came back and were taken
captive, and from them De Soto learned that Ucita, the Indian chief, was
a mortal foe to all Spaniards because he had been so badly treated by
Narvaez, a cruel Spaniard who had been there before De Soto's arrival.
Narvaez had treated Ucita most wickedly. He had caused his mother to be
torn to pieces by bloodhounds; like Don Pedro in Darien, he had hunted
down women and girls with his bloodhounds, and had cut infants in pieces
and thrown them to the dogs, and once, in a fit of anger, he had caused
Ucita's nose to be cut off. Ucita remembered all these things, and when
De Soto sent to him and offered his friendship, the Indian chief
replied:
"I want none of the speeches and promises of the Spaniards. Bring me
their heads, and I will receive them joyfully."
Thus De Soto had to suffer for the crimes of Don Pedro and Narvaez.
While he had been in Darien he had always treated the Indians kindly,
but he knew how cruelly other Spaniards had acted toward them, so he
expected a great deal of trouble here. The Indians thought all Spaniards
were alike, and it was a long time before he could make Ucita believe
that he meant him no harm. He sent him presents again and again, and
whenever an Indian was taken captive by his soldiers De Soto treated him
kindly and sent him back to the tribe with presents. At last Ucita
seemed to be touched by the kindness of De Soto, who then felt he could
continue his march without leaving a powerful enemy behind. Ucita did
not say he would be his friend, but then he showed a more friendly
spirit, and the Spaniards felt he would not attack them. Ucita was a
brave and noble man, generous to his friends and merciful to his
enemies; but the Spaniards had treated him so inhumanly that it is no
wonder he did not at first believe in De Soto's offers of friendship.
In the meantime a Spaniard had been brought into camp who had been taken
prisoner by the Indians when Narvaez was in Florida. This man's name was
Juan Ortiz, and he had been with the Indians ten years, so he knew their
language and habits. When he was first taken prisoner he had been very
cruelly treated and at last was bound to the stake to be burned; as the
flames crept around him he cried aloud with pain and terror, and the
chief's daughter, a very beautiful princess about sixteen years of age,
could not endure the sight of his agony; she threw her arms around her
father's neck and begged with tears that Ortiz might be saved. Ortiz was
about eighteen years of age, tall, and very handsome, and the sight of
his great beauty and the pleadings of the princess Ulelah at last
touched her father's heart. Ortiz was spared, but for some time after
his life was miserable, as the Indians treated him very cruelly; but at
last his lot became easier, and at this time he was treated as a friend
by the tribe. Of course De Soto was very glad to meet Ortiz, as he would
be very useful in dealing with the natives.
Ortiz told De Soto of a very powerful chief who lived about a hundred
miles from Ucita, and offered to lead him there; the Spaniards thought
there might be gold there, and they joyfully set off under the command
of Gallegos, De Soto remaining behind. The Indians they met told them of
a place where there was so much gold that the warriors had shields and
helmets made of it; but very few of the Spaniards believed this; they
thought it was a trick of the Indians to get them away from the country.
In a few days De Soto followed Gallegos with the rest of the army, and
they began to work their way through dense forests and swamps, and
thickets, and through mud and water, losing their way and harassed by
the Indians, in this mad hunt for gold.
One day, while they were travelling along the banks of a river, they saw
a canoe with six Indians in it coming toward them; the Indians landed
and three of them came up to De Soto, and, bowing very low, said to him:
"Do you come for peace or for war?"
"I come for peace," replied De Soto, "and seek only a peaceful passage
through your land. I need food for my people and canoes and rafts to
cross the river, and I beg you to help me."
The Indians said that they themselves were in want of food, as there had
been a terrible sickness the year before, and that many of their tribe
had died and others had gone away for fear of the pestilence, thus
leaving the fields uncultivated. They also said that their chieftain was
a young princess and they had no doubt she would receive them kindly and
do everything for them. Having said this, the chiefs returned to the
other side of the river.
And now the Spaniards, looking across the river, saw that there was a
great stir in the village opposite. First, a very large and
beautifully-decorated canoe appeared upon the banks, followed by several
other canoes also very beautiful; then a gorgeous palanquin, borne by
four men, was seen coming toward the river; the palanquin stopped at the
banks, and from it a graceful girl, very finely dressed, entered the
state canoe. She sat down upon the cushions in the end of the canoe,
over which was stretched a canopy; she was followed by eight female
attendants who entered the canoe after she had sat down. Then the six
men who had just been to see De Soto entered a large canoe which was
rowed by a number of other Indians. The canoe in which the princess sat
was fastened to this one, and then they started, followed by several
other canoes in which were the most noted warriors of the tribe.
The Spaniards were charmed with the beautiful young princess. Her
attendants brought with them a chair of state upon which she took her
seat after bowing to De Soto, and then they began a conversation by
means of the interpreter, Juan Ortiz. The princess said that it was
true the pestilence had left the tribe very poor, but that she would do
everything she could to provide them with food; she offered half of her
house to De Soto, and half the houses in the village to the soldiers,
and said that by the next day there would be rafts and canoes ready to
take the Spaniards across the river.
De Soto was much touched by the kindness of the princess and promised to
be her friend forever. Then the princess rose and placed a large string
of costly pearls around De Soto's neck, and he in return presented her
with a gold ring set with a ruby; and then, with promises of help on the
morrow, the princess and her people returned to the village.
The next day the princess had the rafts made and the Spanish army
crossed the river; while crossing four horses were carried away by the
swift stream and drowned, for which the Spaniards grieved very much, as
these horses had been of great service to them in their journey. When
they arrived at the village they found very pleasant quarters awaiting
them; as there were not houses enough to hold all the soldiers, some
wigwams had been built in a beautiful mulberry grove just outside the
village, and the Spaniards were delighted to stop a while with these
friendly Indians.
The mother of the princess was a widow living some miles down the river,
and De Soto wished to see her, and, if possible, make a friend of her,
so the princess, as soon as she heard this, sent twelve of her
chieftains to invite her mother to visit her; but the queen refused to
come, and said that her daughter had done wrong to receive the
Spaniards. This made De Soto all the more desirous to make the queen his
friend, so he sent thirty of his men to see her, with large presents and
offer of friendship. The princess sent one of her relatives to guide the
party; he was a young man about twenty years old, very handsome, and
with fine manners. He was dressed in a suit of soft deerskin which was
trimmed with embroidery and fringe, and wore a head-dress made of
feathers of various colors; he carried in his hand a beautiful bow,
highly polished, so it shone like silver, and at his shoulder hung a
quiver full of arrows. The Spaniards were delighted with the fine
appearance of their guide, who indeed looked worthy to serve the
charming princess, and the party left the village in high spirits.
The guide led them along the banks of the river, under the shade of fine
old trees; after a walk of some miles they stopped for their noon-day
meal, seating themselves in the shade of a beautiful grove through which
they were passing. The young guide, who had been very pleasant and
talkative all the way, now suddenly became very quiet. He took the
quiver from his shoulder and drew out the arrows one by one; they were
very beautiful arrows, highly polished and feathered at the end; he
passed them to the Spaniards, who admired them very much, and while they
were all busy looking at them, the young Indian drew out a very long,
sharp arrow shaped like a dagger. Finding that no one was looking at
him, he plunged the arrow down his throat, and almost immediately died.
The Spaniards were much shocked and could not imagine why this had
happened, but they afterward found out that the young guide was a great
favorite with the queen, and that knowing she did not want to see the
Spaniards, who, he thought, might perhaps seize her and carry her away,
and not daring to disobey the princess, whom he loved and respected, he
had chosen this way to free himself from his trouble.
The other Indians did not know where the mother was, so the Spaniards
returned without seeing her. De Soto was much disappointed at this, and
tried again to find her place of retreat, but without success. In the
meantime the Spaniards had heard from the Indians that there were great
quantities of white and yellow metal in their country, and they thought
it must be gold and silver; but when the Indians brought it into camp,
they found that the gold was copper and the silver mica, and they were
again disappointed.
The princess now told De Soto that about three miles away there was a
village which was once the capital of the kingdom, and that there was a
great sepulchre there, in which all their chieftains and great warriors
were buried, and that immense quantities of pearls had been buried with
them. De Soto, with some of his officers, and some of the Indian chiefs,
visited this place and found it to be a large building three hundred
feet long and over a hundred feet wide, covered with a lofty roof; the
entrance was ornamented with wooden statues, some of them twelve feet
high, and there were many statues and carved ornaments in the inside. By
the side of the coffins were small chests, and in these had been placed
such things as it was thought the dead chieftains would need in the
spirit world. When an Indian died his bow and arrows were always buried
with him, as it was supposed he would need them in the "happy
hunting-grounds," and, besides, many other things, as you already know.
In these chests the Spaniards found more pearls than they had ever
dreamed of. It is said that they carried away from this place fourteen
bushels of pearls, and the princess told them if they would visit other
villages they would find enough pearls to load down all the horses in
the army. The Spaniards were delighted and proposed to De Soto that they
should make a settlement there, but he was determined to go further on
in search of gold.
He had noticed that for some time the Indians had not been so friendly
as they were at first; some of his soldiers had ill-treated the
natives--although he had given strict orders that they should not--and
now he felt sure that the princess meant to escape from the village, and
that her tribe would begin a warfare with his army. So he thought the
safest thing to do would be to compel the princess to go with him when
he marched away. He knew that the Indians would not harm him if she were
with him, as they would be afraid of harming her, too; so he told her it
was necessary for her to go with him. The princess did not like this
plan at all, but she said nothing, and in a few days De Soto began his
march accompanied by the Indian princess, in her beautiful palanquin,
which was attended by a large number of her chieftains, all handsomely
dressed, and wearing their gorgeous head-dresses with their nodding
plumes. For some days they travelled through the forests, when one day,
as they were passing through a very thick wood, the princess suddenly
leaped from her palanquin and disappeared among the trees. She had made
this plan with her warriors, and De Soto never saw or heard of her
again.
It is very sad to think that a friendship which began so happily should
have ended thus, and had De Soto acted differently, the princess would
always have remembered him as a noble man; as it was, she must have been
sorry she ever trusted him at all. Had he told her that he wished to
leave her village, and to part with her and her people as friends, she
would, no doubt, have let him go in peace; but by carrying her off he
made her his enemy forever. His only excuse is that he thought it would
really be safer both for his men and hers to make her go with him.
The Spaniards continued their journey, and in a few days came to a large
Indian village. The young chief received De Soto kindly, as he had
heard he did not come to make war. He took him to his own house and gave
his men pleasant quarters, and they remained there two weeks. The
Indians told them that there were copper and gold farther on, and some
Spaniards went to find it, but were again disappointed. However, there
were pearls in the rivers, and some very beautiful ones were obtained.
Many of these pearls which the Indians had were of little value, as they
had bored holes through them with a red-hot iron so they might string
them for necklaces and bracelets. De Soto was presented with a string of
pearls six feet in length, with every pearl as large as a hazelnut,
which would have been of immense value, had not the beauty of the pearls
been dimmed by the action of fire. The Indians obtained the pearls by
laying the oysters on hot coals, and as the heat opened the shells the
pearls could be taken out. To please De Soto, the chief ordered his men
to do this in his presence, and from some of the largest, ten or twelve
pearls were taken about the size of peas. De Soto left this pleasant
Indian village and again commenced his march, and now came many dark
and sad days. The Indians he met after this were mostly hostile, and
there were many dreadful battles in which De Soto lost men and horses.
They journeyed summer and fall and winter, passed through dense forests
where the horses could scarcely move, and marched over barren tracts of
country where they could get no supplies; they suffered from hunger and
sickness, and many died on the weary march, but De Soto would not turn
back, he was still determined to find gold. At length, when they were
almost worn out with travelling for days through a region more dismal
than any they had passed through, uninhabited, and filled with tangled
forests and swamps, they came to a small village, and here De Soto
discovered, not the gold he sought, but something else which has made
his name immortal. The little village was built on the banks of a river,
and when De Soto went down to its margin he saw that, compared with the
other rivers he had seen, it was like a sea. The river was a mile and a
half wide, and rolled swiftly by, carrying with it trees and logs and
driftwood. For ages this great river had rolled from the lake country
above down to the Gulf, but no white man had ever looked upon it until
now. De Soto, in his search for gold, had discovered the great
Mississippi, the largest river in the United States, and one of the
longest on the globe. The Indians called the river Mesaseba, which
means, in their language, the Father of Waters.
De Soto did not remain here long, the chief was not friendly, and after
a few days' rest the Spaniards crossed the Mississippi and continued
their march.
Once they passed near an Indian village whose chief came out to meet
them. The chief said, as the Spaniards were more powerful and had better
arms than the Indians, he believed that their God was also better than
the Indian god, and he asked them to pray to their God for rain, as the
fields were parched for want of water. De Soto replied that they were
all sinners, but that he would pray to God, the Father of Mercies, to
show kindness unto them.
So he ordered the carpenter to cut down a large tree, which was
carefully trimmed, and then formed into a gigantic cross; it was so
large that they were two days in completing it, and it took one hundred
men to raise it and plant it in the ground. It was placed upon a bluff
on the western bank of the Mississippi. The morning after the cross was
raised the whole Spanish army, and many of the natives, formed a solemn
religious procession and walked around it. De Soto and the chief walked
side by side, and the natives and soldiers followed after, two by two.
It seemed for the time as if Indian and Spaniard were not only friends,
but brothers. The priests chanted hymns and offered prayers, and then
the whole procession advanced two by two to the cross, knelt before it,
and kissed it. Upon the opposite shore of the Mississippi thousands of
Indians were gathered, who were watching the service with the greatest
interest; at times they seemed to take part in the exercises; when the
priests raised their hands in prayer, they too raised their eyes to
heaven, and lifted up their arms as if asking help, and the murmur of
their voices floated across the waters of the river, and mingled with
the sighing of the wind through the trees, and with the notes of the
Christian hymns, and with the words of the Christian prayers; and the
blue sky above smiled down alike on the haughty Spaniard and on the
simple native, as he kissed the great wonder cross, the symbol of Him to
whom all men are the same, and whose love reaches down to all.
After the prayers the people returned to the village in the same order,
the priests going before and chanting the Te Deum; and Las Casas, the
historian, writing of this, says, "God, in his mercy, willing to show
these heathens that he listeneth to those who call upon him in truth,
sent down, in the middle of the ensuing night, a plenteous rain, to the
great joy of the Indians."
So the rain fell, and the Indian sowed his seed and gathered harvests of
golden grain; and the cross stood there in the shadow of the forest, and
the mighty river rolled on before it, and in the years to come, when the
memory of the Spaniard had almost faded away, it was still to the red
man a sign of the love of the Great Spirit, who had helped them in their
need.
De Soto did not stay long among these friendly Indians, but pressed on
his way. There were again toilsome marches and weary hours of
disappointment, and, at last, the brave heart of the leader grew sad and
hopeless. The climate was unhealthful, and De Soto was taken sick with
fever, and at the same time he was told that the chief of that country
was getting ready for a great battle, in which all the neighboring
tribes would join, and that they meant to kill every Spaniard in the
country.
But De Soto could fight no more battles, for he was dying. One by one
the faithful soldiers knelt by his bed, and weeping, bade him farewell.
He asked them to live as brothers, loving and helping one another, and
urged them to convert the natives to the Christian religion. And so the
brave soldier died, far from home and that sunny Spain which he loved so
well, and the whole army wept for him, for they loved him, and grieved
to think that they should see him no more.
It was thought best not to let the Indians know of De Soto's death, as
they might attack the Spaniards at once if they knew their great leader
was gone. So De Soto was buried at night by torchlight, and no salute
was fired over his grave, nor any dirge chanted by the priests; but the
Indians suspected that he was dead, and even visited the spot where he
was buried; so the soldiers, for fear the natives would remove the body
after they went away, decided to take it up themselves and sink it in
the river. They cut down an evergreen oak, whose wood is almost as heavy
as lead, and hollowing out a place large enough for the body, placed it
in it, and at midnight it was taken out to the middle of the river, into
whose depths it immediately sank. Then the soldiers, in the silence and
darkness, returned to the camp, and De Soto was left alone in the
wilderness, and only the stars and the river knew where he slept.
His soldiers built some boats and sailed down the Mississippi to the
Gulf, and after much hardship reached a Spanish settlement in Mexico.
Few were left of the brilliant company that had left Spain three years
before, and so ended the expedition which had sailed away from home so
gaily. Their search for gold had been like following the
will-o'-the-wisp, which leads on and on, and then vanishes at last,
leaving you alone in the darkness.