pelagoes, new regions of gold and pearl, and barbaric empires of dazzling wealth.

3. It is interesting to read the stirring adventures of Cortez, who conquered Mexico, and of Pizarro, who overcame Peru. But as these things do not strictly concern the story of our country, we will give an account of one of the most remarkable of the Spanish adventurers, Hernando de Soto, the discoverer of the Mississippi.

4. De Soto was the companion of Pizarro in the conquest of Peru. He had come to America a needy adventurer, but returned to Spain enriched by his share of the plunder. Not doubting that in the north were cities as rich, and barbarians as confiding, he obtained permission from the Spanish sovereign to conquer Florida.

5. This name, as the Spaniards of that day understood it, included the whole country extending from the Atlantic on the east to New Mexico on the west, and from the Gulf of Mexico and the River of Palms indefinitely northward toward the Polar Sea.

6. The plans of De Soto were hailed with enthusiasm. Nobles and gentlemen contended for the privilege of joining his standard. The

youth of Spain were eager to be permitted to go, and they sold houses and lands to buy the needful equipment.

7. From the crowd of applicants were chosen six hundred and twenty men; and in 1539 the expedition sailed, high in courage, splendid in show, and boundless in expectation. They landed in Tampa Bay, in the present State of Florida, and began their march into the wilder

ness.

8. What a strangely brilliant spectacle the expedition must have presented! How the clangor of trumpets, the neighing of horses, the fluttering of pennons, the glittering of helmet and lance, must have startled the ancient forest! The Spaniards had with them fetters for the Indians whom they meant to take captive, and bloodhounds lest these captives should escape.

9. From the outset it was a toilsome and perilous enterprise; but to the Spaniard of that time danger was a joy. The Indians were warlike and generally hostile. De Soto had battles to fight and heavy losses to bear. For month after month the procession of cavaliers and priests, crossbow-men and Indian captives, wandered on, lured hither and thither by the hope of finding

some great city, the plunder of whose palaces and temples would enrich them all.

10. But they found nothing better than here and there an Indian town composed of a few wretched wigwams. In this way they traversed great portions of Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, suffering terrible hardships, but never reaching el Dorado, - the "land of gold.”

11. At length in the third year of their wanderings the Spaniards came to a magnificent river. European eyes had seen no such river till now. It was the Mississippi! One of their number describes the great stream as almost half a league wide, deep, rapid, and constantly rolling down trees and drift-wood on its current.

12. The Spaniards crossed over at a point above the mouth of the Arkansas. Here they resumed their journeying, for De Soto would not yet admit that he had failed. They advanced westward, but still found no treasures,— nothing indeed but hardships, and an Indian enemy "furious as mad dogs," as one of their officers

wrote.

13. The Spaniards in their disappointment were cruel and pitiless. They amused themselves by inflicting pain upon the prisoners:

they cut off their hands, hunted them with bloodhounds, burned them at the stake. Hoping to awe the Indians, De Soto once claimed to be one of the gods. But the natives were not to be imposed upon; and a wise savage asked him, "How can you pretend to be a god when you can not even get bread to eat?"

14. And now the utter failure of the expedition could no longer be concealed: so De Soto, with his followers, returned to the banks of the Mississippi. Here, soon afterwards, De Soto was attacked by a fever, and died miserably.

15. His soldiers felled a tree, and scooped room within its trunk for the body of the ill-fated adventurer. They could not bury their chief on land, lest the Indians should dishonor his remains. In the silence of midnight the rude coffin was sunk in the Mississippi, and the discoverer of the great river slept beneath its

waters.

16. The Spaniards now resolved to make their way to Cuba. They had tools, and wood was abundant: so they built and launched seven small brigs to float them down the Mississippi. They slew their horses for flesh, they plundered the Indians for bread, they struck the fetters

from their prisoners to secure their scanty supply of iron.

17. Embarking in their frail vessels, the Spaniards descended the Mississippi, running the gauntlet between hostile tribes who fiercely attacked them. After severe loss they reached the Gulf of Mexico, and then made their way to one of the Spanish settlements. Three hundred ragged and disheartened men were all that remained of the brilliant company whose hopes had been so high, and whose good fortune had been so much envied.

HEADS FOR COMPOSITION.

I. EFFECT OF COLUMBUS'S DISCOVERY: the desire excitedthirst for glory and gold — what the Spanish adventurers did whose story is now to be told?

II. DE SOTO: who he was - his hope — obtains permission to conquer "Florida "- what that name then meant.

III. HOW HIS PLANS WERE RECEIVED: the rush to join him number of men chosen-sailing of the expedition — the landing. IV. EXPERIENCES OF THE SPANIARDS: the Indians- what the

Spaniards hoped to find—what they did find.

V. DISCOVERY OF THE MISSISSIPPI: when discovered -the crossing experiences west of the Mississippi — treatment of the Indians.

VI. FATE OF DE SOTO: description of his death and burial. VII. END OF THE EXPEDITION: voyage down the Mississippi -number of survivors.