“Through the muddied lagoon we clambered, through the mire, the slime, and the muck;
O’er hills and valleys we hastened, through the creeks where our cannon stuck.
We were stung by the fierce mosquitoes, and were mocked by the chattering jay;
But we hewed and hacked a passage through the grass where the moccasin lay.
Fever, and heat, and ague were friends of our ceaseless toil,
And many a brave Castilian was interred ’neath the friendless soil.
We searched for the El Dorado, yet no gilded man found we,
Instead, a bed for our numberless dead, near the sob of the sun-gilded sea.”
Song of De Soto’s Men—1541.