ee expeditions to that country had already been tried: one undertaken
in 1512, by Juan Ponce de Leon, formerly a companion of Columbus;
another in 1520, by Vasquez de Allyon; and another by Panphilo de
Narvaez. All of these had signally failed, the bones of most of the
leaders and their followers having been left to bleach upon the soil
they had come to conquer.

The unfortunate issue of the former expeditions did not operate as a
check upon the aspiring mind of De Soto, but made him the more anxious
to spring as an actor into the arena which had been the scene of the
discomfiture and death of the hardy chivalry of the kingdom. He sought
an audience of the emperor, and the latter, after hearing De Soto's
proposition that, "he could conquer the country known as Florida at
his own expense," conferred upon him the title of "Governor of Cuba and
Florida."

On the 6th of April, 1538, De Soto sailed from Spain with an armament of
ten vessels and a splendidly equipped army of nine hundred chosen men,
amidst the roar of cannons and the inspiring strains of martial music.

It is not within the province of this work to follow De Soto through all
his terrible trials on the North American continent; the wonderful story
may be found in every well-organized library. It is recorded, however,
that some time during the year 1542, his decimated army, then under the
command of Luis de Moscoso, De Soto having died the previous May, was
camped on the Arkansas River, far upward towards what is now Kansas. It
was this command, too, of the unfortunate but cruel De Soto, that saw
the Rocky Mountains from the east. The chronicler of the disastrous
journey towards the mountains says: "The entire route became a trail of
fire and blood," as they had many a desperate struggle with the savages
of the plains, who "were of gigantic structure, and fought with heavy
strong clubs, with the desperation of demons. Such was their tremendous
strength, that one of these warriors was a match for a Spanish soldier,
though mounted on a horse, armed with a sword and cased in armour!"

Moscoso was searching for Coronado, and he was one of the most humane
of all the officers of De Soto's command, for he evidently bent every
energy to extricate his men from the dreadful environments of their
situation; despairing of reaching the Gulf by the Mississippi, he
struck westward, hoping, as Cabeca de Vaca had done, to arrive in Mexico
overland.

A period of six months