The Indian town located on the present site of St. Augustine was Seloy, and the same name seems to have been given to both of the rivers which unite to form the harbor. From the narration it would seem probable that the point where Laudonnère landed was upon Anastatia Island, the Indians having come over from the mainland on seeing the French ships in the offing.
Laudonnère having left Fort Charles, entered the river May, and selecting a favorable site, about six leagues distant from the mouth, built a small settlement, which he fortified with palisades and an embankment of earth in the shape of a triangle, and named it Carolus, still doing honor to the king who so little deserved esteem. With a religious fervor characteristic of the age, and probably heightened by their isolation, and proximity to the vast ocean which they had just passed in safety, and solemnly impressed by their surroundings on a vast and unexplored continent, the little band of strangers assembled and dedicated their work and themselves to the glory of God and the advancement of his holy faith.
The site of the Huguenot settlement is now known as St. John’s Bluff, the first point of high land on the south after entering the St. Johns River from the ocean. It is a sightly hill, probably formed by sand dunes at an early period when the shore was far to the west of its present coast line. The bluff rises some forty feet above the river, and is covered with a thick growth of oaks and other hard woods. At the foot of the hill on the east lay the broad marshes stretching for four or five miles toward the sea, and reaching to the narrow ridge of sands and woods adjoining the beach. The channel of the river here approaches the southern bank, and the strong current sweeping in against the mobile sands at each tide has greatly abraded the hill until probably the site of Laudonnère’s fort has become the channel of the river. The site has been fortified several times since. During the rebellion a considerable earthwork was erected there by Florida troops, but the encroachments of the river have already swept away the site.
Laudonnère had found the Indians very friendly, and this peaceable disposition was by him assiduously cultivated. Trinkets and small presents were exchanged for the provisions which they liberally provided, and on several occasions the French lent their aid in making war on the enemies of the friendly tribes about them.
The chief or cacique of the tribe which inhabited the country between the mouth of the St. Johns River and St. Augustine was named Satourioua, or Satouriva, and in his intercourse with the French and Spanish he exhibited a remarkable sagacity and fidelity, as well as a dignity unlooked for in a savage.
Laudonnère describes his first meeting with this chief in these words: “We found the Paracoussy Satourioua under an arbor, accompanied by fourscore Indians at the least, and appareled at that time after the Indian fashion, to wit: with a great hart’s skin, dressed like chamois and painted with devices of strange and divers colors, but of so lively a portraiture and representing antiquity with rules so justly compassed that there is no painter so exquisite that could find fault therewith. The natural disposition of this strange people is so perfect and so well guided that without any aid and favor of arts they are able by the help of nature only, to content the eye of artisans; yet even of those which by their industry are able to aspire unto things most absolute.
“The paracoussy now brought us to his father’s lodging, one of the oldest men that lived upon the earth. Our men regarding his age began to make much of him, using this speech, Ami—ami—that is to say friend, whereat the old sire showed himself very glad. Afterwards they questioned with him concerning the course of his age; whereunto he made answer showing that he was the first living original from whence five generations were descended. M. de Ottigni having seen so strange a thing turned to the man praying him to vouchsafe to answer him to that which he demanded touching his age. Then the old man called a company of Indians, and striking twice upon his thigh, and laying his hand upon two of them, he showed him by signs that these two were his sons; again, smiting upon their thighs, he showed him others not so old who were the children of the first two; which he continued in the same manner until the fifth generation. But this old man had his father alive, more old than himself, and this man, which seemed to be rather a dead carcass than a live body, for his sinews, his veins, his arteries, his bones and other parts appeared so clearly that a man might easily tell them and discern them one from another, and both of them did wear their hair very long, and as white as possible, yet it was told us that they might yet live thirty or forty years more by the course of nature, although the younger of them both was not less than two hundred and fifty years old.”[3]
Laudonnère employed the Indians to assist him in finding gold, and sent various boat expeditions to the head-waters of the St. Johns River. It is reported, though unlikely, that one of his officers penetrated the interior as far as the Mississippi.
Some of his men appear to have been dissatisfied with the position assumed by their leader. They accused him of setting up a regal state, and also of having obtained a knowledge of the location of gold which he concealed from the rest of the company. Through the influence of these disaffected ones a conspiracy was organized to depose Laudonnère. He got rid of several of the disaffected ones, however, by sending them back to France in a vessel which was returned for supplies at this period. Subsequently the discontent increased, and Laudonnère was confined for fifteen days upon one of the vessels in the river, while the mutineers set about equipping two small vessels which he had built for exploration. After rifling the fort of such supplies as they needed, they set sail in these two ships on a piratical expedition. One of these vessels, having been separated by a gale from its consort, captured a Spanish ship, and after various adventures was finally captured and the crew destroyed. The other, after having exhausted its supplies, returned to the colony, and four of the leaders were tried and shot for mutiny.
Hearing that there were white captives among the Indians who resided further south, Laudonnère sent word that he would pay a considerable ransom for their delivery. Soon after there appeared two Spaniards who had been wrecked fifteen years before. They had adopted the costume of the natives—long hair, et preteria nihil. They reported that there had also been saved several women who had married and consented to live among the Indians.