FERDINAND DE SOTO, undismayed by these failures, undertook anew the conquest of Florida. He set out with 600 choice men, amid the fluttering of banners, the flourish of trumpets, and the gleaming of helmet and lance. For month after month this procession of cavaliers, priests, soldiers, and Indian captives strolled through the wilderness, wherever they thought gold might be found. They traversed what is now Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. In the third year of their wanderings (1541) they emerged upon the bank of the Mississippi. After another year of fruitless explorations, De Soto died. (See Map, Epoch I). At the dead of night his followers sank his body in the river, and the sullen waters buried his hopes and his ambition. "He had crossed a large part of the continent," says Bancroft, "and found nothing so remarkable as his burial-place." De Soto had been the soul of the company. When he died, the other adventurers were anxious only to get home in safety. They constructed boats and descended the river, little over half of this gallant array finally reaching the settlements in Mexico.
MELENDEZ (ma-len-deth), wiser than his predecessors, on landing (1565) forthwith laid the foundations of a colony. In honor of the day, he named it St. Augustine. This is the oldest town in the United States.
[Footnote: Many Spanish remains still exist. Among these is Fort Marion, once San Marco, which was founded in 1565 and finished in 1755. It is built of coquina—a curious stone composed of small shells.]
EXPLORATIONS ON THE PACIFIC.
California, in the sixteenth century, was a general name applied to all the region northwest of Mexico. It is said to have originated in an old Spanish romance very popular in the time of Cortez, in which appeared a character called California, queen of the Amazons. The Mexicans told the Spaniards that most of their gold and precious stones came from a country far to the northwest. Cortez, therefore, immediately turned his attention to that direction, and sent out several expeditions to explore the Californias. All these adventurers returned empty-handed from the very region where, three centuries afterward, the world was startled by the finding of an El Dorado such as would have satisfied the wildest dreams of Cortez and his credulous followers.
CABRILLO (1542) made the first voyage along the Pacific coast, going as far north as the present limits of Oregon.
NEW MEXICO was explored and named by Espejo (es-pay'-ho) who (1582) founded Santa Fe, which is the second oldest town in the United States. This was seventeen years after the settlement of St. Augustine.
EXTENT OF THE SPANISH POSSESSIONS.
Spain, at the close of the sixteenth century, held possession not only of the West Indies, but of Yucatan, Mexico, and Florida.
[Footnote: A writer of that time locates Quebec in Florida, and a map of Henry II. gives that name to all North America.]