 THE MEN WHO FOUND AMERICA This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Elijah Fisher. THE MEN WHO FOUND AMERICA by Frederick W. Hutchinson How quickly the years passed, but yesterday they were babies, now he is a great boy clamoring for trousers with vast and serious pockets, and she, dear little girl, is a mother cherishing her dolls with an inchantly of material graces. Could they but stay young, were there but a fountain like the one in the stories to keep them forever safe in a mother's arms? It is sad to think of their ever-leaving babyland. There is no country like unto this beautiful borne of our children. Here are the dim magic forests, the enchanted castles, the deep, hidden, the secret tree-hollers where dwells sparrows and fairies and lost little children. In this land the princess is ever-young and ever-beautiful. The bold, prince-tarming, sleighs always the wicked, watchful dragon, and fierce-org with him his one mavolent eye eats the tender children at his ravenous evening meal. The land is always full, yet always filling. The sun is forever shining, and flowers spring up under the patter of the little feet. Here bad is bad, and good is good, and always the good comes true. For, is there not a fairy godmother to save the child from all the childish in the world? What a land of adventure it is, what daring deeds, what heroic exploits, the little way to crib into which we tuck him routinely. Why, that is no crib at all. It is a great ship with flapping sails unfurled, creaking under the stress of storm and sea, sailing oceans unto lands of which we had never heard. It is also a locomotive, a disearship, an automobile, and a truth, a fort, a palace, a forest, and a wicked robber's cave. Insidiously, the little captain, a grand king, robber, and policeman marches through all this brave realm of valentineous adventure. Only two assume the child must leave this warm barred land, and losing his baby's heritage, either upon the schoolboy's estate. The wicked joins the fairy possesses a wonderful magic animal to talk, and to think, vanish forever before the spelling book and arithmetic. A little learning is too dangerous a thing. Soon, the little pilgrim must make his exploration of life and knowledge. He too must find America. Well, let us not tear from his own charm than he mays, nor blow our icy breath upon the warm creatures of his quickening imagination. Let us rather gently bring our world to him, so that at his eyelids open after his deep child's asleep, he may see the newer country in his lap as on the dawn of the Christmas morn, he finds the gracious gifts of Santa Claus upon the Latin glittering tree. Into the wild romantic life of the nursery I ventured to bring those twelve tales of twelve great men and brave. They are strange stories and should be welcomed as strangers. And they are true, as true as Cinderella, as true as Sinbad, as true as all the golden dreams of childhood. And it is no wonder, for these stories of exploration are first cousins to those your children already know. Aladdin's lamp was not more magically pregnant than the devil's courage of the Spaniards in the fairy land of El Dorado, dickwitting him and Sol, was not more marvelously transformed than the Swainherd, who came to rule a new, affound nation, and Bealu appeared, or even the Great Hunter Wolf, who ate the Red Riding Hood's grandmother, who is not so franticly modernatic as the wicked, wicked man who hid in the barrel. And so I send these stories to the little children in the hope that they may pass from the true fairies to these other true tales without shock or rude awakening. May the old beautiful visions linger and at last fade but gently into the wildly unreal truth of the actual world. May the two with the tale of the nursery and the tale of the great domain beyond the nursery gathering friendship and enmity, so that when at last the little one comes to lose his fund of the baby award, it will pass from him as gently as the fleeting concessionist leaves the drowsy child. To the little children of America, and to the children who have born and reared children, to all who must find America, these little tales of the man who found America and other stories are affectionately dedicated. End of Preface. Chapter 1 of The Men Who Found America. This Libber Box recording is in the public domain, recorded by Elijah Fisher. The Men Who Found America by Frederick W. Hutchinson. Chapter 1. The Man Who Found America. More than 400 years ago, when King Anne and the wise gentle Queen Isabella ruled over Spain, there came one date, the court, where the King and Queen, and all the brave nobles and beautiful ladies, stayed, a poor man named Christopher Columbus. He was poor, but he was very wise. He had a great plan, a plan to get heaps and heaps of shining pearls and red rubies and diamonds and soft lead and yellow silks, and many other wonderful things for Spain and the good King and Queen. Columbus came to tell the King and Queen about his plan, and to ask them to help him. In those days, even the wisest men believed that the earth was flat, like a table. They thought if a ship sailed far, far across the wide ocean, it would fall off the edge of the earth and down, down into a black hole that was so big and deep that it had no bottom. When Columbus was a little boy, he would often lie in the warm, sunny stands by the seashore and listen to the talk of the sailors, who came together and whispered stories of this far off ocean. Once a sailor with long black hair and a big black beard told Christopher how his ships had sails into a sea that was so hot that it sometimes boiled up like water in a tea kettle. Another very big sailor with only one eye said that he had seen a big serpent gliding through the water and ugly black demons who lay in wait for ships and men. Another sailor told of a bird as big as the tallest house. This bird lifted ships in its claws and dropped them down into the ocean with a great splash, and all the poor sailors were drowned. There was an old sailor who said that he had seen a big black hand come up out of the sea and catch the ships and drag them down into the deep ocean. This sailor had a big sharp knife in his belt. Once he whispered to little Christopher that he had sailed and sailed to the edge of the earth and had looked over the edge in the black hole. And he said he was so frightened that his hair, that was as brown as a tree before, got quite white. He told little Christopher that this ocean was so terrible that people called it the Sea of Darkness. After many years little Christopher grew up to be a wise man. He said these stories are foolish. They are not true. He had sailed often on the ocean and he had never seen the great black bird or the big hand that came out of the sea or any of these terrible things. He had read books and he thought all night about the sea and the earth. The earth has no edge, he said at last. The earth is round. One of the books that Columbus read was about a brave sailor named Marco Polo. This Marco Polo had gone far away from his little white house by the sea. He went always towards the rising sun, sometimes walking, sometimes writing on queer-looking camels with humps on their backs. The book told how Marco Polo had found in that far-off country beautiful shining cities with people in them who had never heard of God. This country was called the Indies. Marco Polo had brought home with him big white pearls and soft silks and spices that smelled strange and sweet, and he said the one who could reach the Indies could get these beautiful things. But it took years and years to get there, and there were fierce robbers on the road, so the people were afraid to go. Columbus too wanted to reach this wonderful land, but he knew an easier way than the long journey Marco Polo had taken. Columbus knew the earth was round, like an orange, because he was very wise, and he said, if it is round, then I can sail around it, and it won't fall off the edge of the ocean, because there is no edge, so I will sail around the earth until I reach the Indies. Then it was that Columbus went to the king and queen and told them about his plan. The king and queen were much surprised at the strange stories that Columbus told them, and they called around the mother Wiseman to talk about it. The Wiseman of Spain laughed at Columbus. They said, Columbus says the earth is round. If it is round, how do the people on the other side live? They would stand on their heads. The rain and snow would fall up instead of down, and the sun would never shine there, and it would always be dark. People could not lay ever like that. The Wiseman told the king and queen not to help Columbus, because he was crazy, and the little boys and girls made fun of Columbus and touched their foreheads when he passed them in the streets, because their fathers had told them that Columbus was crazy. So the king and queen told Columbus that they would not help him. This made Columbus very sad, but he knew he was right, and he kept on trying. He followed the king and queen wherever they went. He went with them from Cedides, always asking them for help, but there was a great war in Spain, and the king and queen were too busy about the war to listen to Columbus. At last Columbus said, if the king and queen of Spain will not help me, I will go to some other king and ask. He started to leave Spain. You can all believe that he was very sad, but then a very strange thing happened. On the way he stopped at a covenant to beg some bread and water for his little son. The boy's name was Diego, which is the Spanish name for James. There was a good wise old man at this convent. When he heard the story that Columbus told, he would help him. So the good old man from the covenant went to see a queen Isabella and begged her Columbus. He told her how rich and great Spain would become if Columbus found the indies. But still the queen was afraid that Columbus was not right, and she said that she would not help him. Then Columbus was angry. He started again to leave Spain. This time he almost reached to the end of Spain when he heard someone calling to him. It was a man sent by the queen. Good news, good news, cried the man. Good queen Isabella has promised to help you. She has said, I will give Columbus ships and men, even if I must sell my golden crown and my beautiful rings and chains to get the money. How glad Columbus was. He had waited a long, long time, and now, at last, he could go on his voyage. Queen Isabella gave him three ships and sailors to sail on them, and she told Columbus that if he found the golden indies, she would give him barrels of shining gold and some of the pearls and diamonds and silks that he would find there. Columbus thanked her and kissed her hand, which is the way people do with queens. The king and queen and all the great lords with their shining swords and velvet coats and the pretty ladies came down to say goodbye to Columbus, and he sailed away into the big strange ocean. For many days, Columbus sailed and sailed and sailed. At first, the sailors, with him, were happy and obedient. For Columbus said, I will give you lots of beautiful things when we reach the indies. But as they'd after day into this strange ocean, they grew very, very much afraid. At night, when Columbus could not see them, they got together and whispered to each other stories of the very good black hand that pulled ships down into the sea, and of the great bird that lifted ships high into the air, and then dropped them down into the ocean so that the poor sailors were drowned. Even the soft, gentle wind that blew always from the east frightened them. How can we ever get back to Spain? They cried if the wind blows always from Spain. For in those days, they had no steamers with big engines that can send ships anywhere. They had only ships with sails, which went the way over the wind blow. At last, the sailors begged Columbus to go back. We shall all die in this strange sea, they cried, and we shall never see our lives in little babies. Let us go back. But Columbus would not go back. Every day he told them stories of beautiful country which they would find, and he told them to be brave. But after a while, they would not listen anymore, and when they found that Columbus said would not go back, some of them said, let us throw Columbus into the sea. Then we can go back to Spain, and if anyone asks us, where's Columbus? We will say that he fell into the ocean. Columbus knew what they said, but he was brave and was not afraid. He believed that if he sailed far enough, he would reach the blendies. Then one day they saw something on the far off ocean, and the sailors joyfully shouted, land, land. But when they sailed near, they saw it was only a cloud. Then the sailors were sad again. Every day they all looked out to for land. Queen Isabella had promised a handful of shining gold to the one who first saw land, and Columbus said he would also give a fine velvet coat. How lonely the poor sailors were. Every day they saw nothing but the wide, wide ocean with the rolling waves, and last one day some birds flew over the ships. The sailors shouted joyfully, and they said, if there are birds, there must be land for them to rest on. But although they looked and looked, and sailed quickly after the birds, they could not find land. Then on another day, Columbus fished out the sea, a Hawthorne nabrand, shared with berries on it, and a carved stick. The sailors crowded it around to look at the branch and the stick, and laughed and sang for joy. There must be land for the Hawthorne to grow on, they said, and there must be people who carved the stick. Everyone was glad and happy, and watched eagerly for land. Columbus watched too. One night he stood alone on a ship, looking out over the black ocean. All at once he saw a little light in the darkness. A little he could not be sure it was light, so he called two of his men and asked them whether they could see the light. Yes, yes, they cried. We can see it. It seems to move up and down. Still, they could not be quite sure until about two hours afterwards, when the morning began to grow brighter. One of the other ships fired a gun. This meant that they had seen land. When the sun came up, everyone could see the land. It was a beautiful land, with waving green trees and flowers. But it seemed even more beautiful than it really was to brave Columbus and his poor tired sailors, because they had seen nothing but the wide ocean for so many days. They quickly rode their boats to the shore and landed. Columbus was dressed in shining steel with a beautiful red cloak, and he carried the red and yellow flag of Spain. These captains also carried flags. They all met down on the shore and thanked God for bringing them to this beautiful place. They'd see any of the beautiful cities that Marco Polo had written about, but men came out of the woods and ran up to them on the beach. These men had strayed to black hair and brown skins with bright colored feathers in their hair, and they had hardly any clothes on. Look, look at the people from heaven! They cried when they saw Columbus and his men with their white skins and beautiful clothes on their ships, which looked like great big white birds. These people were Indians, not furious like the Indians we know, but very kind and gentle. Columbus had never seen an Indian before, and the Indians had never seen a white man in all their lives. Columbus and the Indians were very much surprised and looked at each other for a long time. Columbus was very kind to the Indians. He gave them little red caps and pretty glass beads and little tinkling bells. The Indians liked these things very much, and they gave Columbus fresh fruits and beautiful red and green parrots and little bits of gold. This called these people Indians, because he thought this country was part of the Andes that Marco Polo had written about. He did not know that what he had discovered was a wonderful new world, far richer and more beautiful than the Golden Indies. This new world was our own America, the beautiful land where we all live now. After a while, Columbus went back to Spain to tell the king and queen about this land. When Columbus yelled up to the city by the sea, the people in Spain, Enish, cheered and rang bells and fired guns to show their joy. When Columbus came to the throne, the king and queen made him sit down beside them. This was a great honor because was allowed to sit down when a king or queen is in the room. So Columbus sat down and told them how he had sailed across the Sea of Darkness, and at last found this beautiful country. How glad now was the good queen Isabella that she had sent Columbus. She made him a great lord in Spain and gave him gold and jewels, and she capped his little San Diego, always with her, to hold up her long silken train and to carry her fan and tankerchief. Columbus was happy now, but he wanted to see more of this new land, and he sailed across the ocean again three times. Once, while he was away, some Wiccan men told the king and queen lies about Columbus. The king and queen believed what these Wiccan men said, and they ordered their soldiers to beg their chains on Columbus's hands and feet and send him back to Spain. Poor Columbus, how sad he felt. When they came to Spain and Columbus saw Queen Isabella, she soon found that he was a good man, that the stories about him were not true, and she told the soldiers to take the chains off Columbus, and said she was sorry. But Columbus was still sad, because after he found this beautiful country for Spain they had put chains on him, so he always kept the chains, and when he died he asked the people to bury the chains with him. There was another thing that happened that was not fair to Christopher Columbus. When a man finds a new country, it always ought to be named after him, but our country was called Columbia. About seven years after, Columbus found a new country, and an Italian named Emerccio Vespucci sailed across the ocean and wrote a little book about the new land. He did not say one word about Christopher Columbus being their first, so many foolish people thought that Emerccio was the man who founded the new country, and they called it America in honor of America. And this is its name today, and this I think will always be its name. Columbus was old when he died, and he was poor too. Good kind Queen Isabella had died, and the king forgot that Columbus had found a beautiful country for him, and he did not give him any more money. So Columbus was sad and poor. After he was dead, the people knew that the country he had found was not the Indies, but a rich, wonderful country, our own America, and that is why all good Americans love the name of Christopher Columbus because he came and found a cow. End of Chapter 1. Chapter 2 of The Men Who Found America by Frederick W. Hutchinson. This, Liber Vox recording, is in the public domain, recorded by Elijah Fisher. Chapter 2. The White Tyrant of Darien Christopher Columbus was not only a brave man, he was also a very good man. I was, I'd say, the same of all the Spaniards who came after him, but many of these men were cruel and deceitful and wicked. They were not kind to the Indians and they fought and robbed and cheated, and their only thought was to grow rich. Now, one of the most wicked of these Spaniards was Balboa. His full name was Vasco Nunes de Balboa, but I shall call him only Balboa. He was as cruel as a man could be. He liked to see people suffer, and if anyone was in trouble, Balboa would not help him, but would laugh at the poor man's misfortune. He borrowed money and promised to pay it back, but when the time came, he told the people who had lent him the money to get it back the best way they could. He curled with everybody, and everybody said that he was a wicked, wicked man. This Balboa was born in Spain, but like many other Spaniards, he went to America to live. Now, there was in America a great island called Hicep and Neola, where the many Spaniards had houses. Ganyards were very cruel to the kind, gentle Indians. They made slaves of them, and they made them work so hard and so very long that many of the poor Indians died. And all the while, the Spaniards lived without doing any work themselves. They walked about in their fine clothes, and they drank and swore and curled with everyone, and in every as bad as bad could be. And of all these wicked Spaniards, Balboa was the worst. When anything wicked was to be done, Balboa would do it. You see, he was not only wicked, but very brave, and very, very bold. Well, after a while Balboa grew tired of the lazy life in Hispaniola, and he wanted to become rich, and it was harder to get money in Hispaniola than in other America. Besides, nobody in all the island liked Balboa. He was so cruel and cruel some, so unkind to the Indians that the people used to look at him coldly and shake their heads when they passed him in the street. Then to those who had lent money to him began to want it back again, and some men said to Balboa, if you do not pay back the money you owe us, we shall throw you into prison, and there you can stay in the dark with the rats and mice until you die. For in those cruel days, a man who could not pay his debts was thrown into prison. Now you can well believe that the wicked Balboa was only too anxious to get away from the island. But how could he do that? He could not walk away because an island has water on all sides, and he could not go by boat because he had no money, so he thought, and thought, and thought. And at last Balboa hit upon a very clever plan. One day he walked down to the seacoast where a chef was at, and when nobody was watching, he quickly crawled into a great empty wine cast and pulled the lid on top. There he baited and waited, hour after hour, afraid every moment that someone would miss him and look in at the wine casks on the boat. He hurriedly dared breathe, and even the beating of it seemed to him as loud as a great drum. But no one came, and at last the book took up its anchor and sailed away. Then Balboa was very happy, for he knew that he was free from his spaniola, and all the people who hated him, and all the people to whom he owed money. He knew that he would not have to go to prison, but at first he was afraid to come out of the cast because he was afraid of what the captain was when he saw him. He waited a good many hours in the barrel, but at last he gave a shove to the lid, and popped the red face and red beard of Balboa. As he did so, he heard, and all the sailors give a great shout, for you may be sure that they were much surprised to see a man's head come out of a barrel. Now the captain, whose name was Ancisco, was a very disagreeable man, and he was quite angry when he saw Balboa's head out of the barrel. He did not like to carry people on his ship for nothing, and he thought that Balboa had cheated him when he hid himself in a barrel. What is this man? He shouted, and then he swore so many oaths that I am glad you and I were not there, though perhaps we could not have understood because it was all in Spanish. Well, when Balboa told the captain how he had to run away from the island, and how he had no money to pay for the voyage, Ancisco became angrier and angrier. He stamped his foot to shuck his zippers, his eyes got black, and he swore and swore and swore. I will tell you what I will do with you, rather than so loud that the wicked Balboa shook with fear. I shall put you on a desert island without food or water, and you can starve to death, you wicked cheater! Now, I must say that Balboa was a brave man, but at these cruel words he became so frightened. He knew that Ancisco would do as said. In those days people did not think much about killing each other, and Balboa was so cruel himself that he would have treated the captain just as cruelly as the captain was now going to treat him. So Balboa thrust him a sofa on his knees and begged the captain to spare his life. He begged and begged, but the more he begged, the more the captains swore and the angrier he grew. But at last he did feel a little sorry for Balboa, so he said, get up from your knees. This time I will spare your life. Now, you will think perhaps that Balboa was very grateful to the captain for sparing his life, but really he was not, because the captains hanged him over and over again, and swore that he would lay down his life for Ancisco whenever he wished it. But in his real secret heart he hated the captain and only awaited for the chance to do him harm. While the chance came sooner than even then Balboa had thought, one day a great storm came up and a little lost and rocked, and everybody was afraid that the boat would go down. The sailors who were wicked men went down on their knees and tried to pray that their lives might be spared. But they had all forgotten how to say their prayers, and the storm grew worse and worse, and at last the little ship was dashed to pieces on Iraqi coast. The sailors all fell into the sea, but luckily for them the water was not deep and they were able to swim ashore alive. At last the men were all on land again, but not one of them knew the name of the place or the name of the country where they had been wrecked. They looked up and down the coast, but everywhere they found only sand and rocks, and back a little way to woods of the waving palm trees. Now the captain ought always to know where he takes his ship, so each sailor of the sailors asked the captain the name of the country, but the captain had never been in any of that country, and he did not know the name any better than the sailors, so he will believe that they were all very much frightened. Then up spoke the crafty Balboa. He had been very quiet and respectful on the boat, because he was still afraid of the desert island, but here on the land he was as bold as you please. Captain, he said, I know where we are, for I've been here before. This is the country of Darion, and a little way off is an Indian village to which I will take you. Now, when the sailors heard these words of Balboa, they were very glad. They cheered and cheered, and threw out their caps, which were still wet from the seawater. Then they all started off for the Indian village, everybody following a bold Balboa, and if you had looked on at this strange marsh, you would have thought that Balboa was the real captain, and in Cisco was only a sailor. It was not easy to march through this country of Darion, because the Indians were very unfriendly. Before this time, some other Spaniards had come to the country and robbed and killed and tortured the Indians. Perhaps Balboa was one of these very men. Well, anyway, the Indians did not live for the waitmen, who had been so cruel, and so from behind trees they shot arrows and the ship wrecked the sailors. Many sailors were killed and more wounded. Balboa, though very wicked, was a brave and wise general, and he beat off the Indians and got the sailors safely to the little Indian village. At last the time had come for Balboa to make Captain and Cisco sorry for wanting to put him off on a search land. You see, Balboa could never forgive the captain for making him kneel and beg for his life. Besides, he was very proud and wanted all the glory for himself, so Balboa took the sailors aside one by one and whispered it to each of them. Cisco is a poor captain and I am a good one. Make me your captain, I will treat you better than Cisco does. So the sailors all made Balboa their captain. Now at last Balboa had his wish and was a great man in a new country. Here, he could get money and become very rich, but I am sorry to say that he was always very, very cruel. He used to rob the poor Indians and murder them, and when they did not have as much gold as he wanted, he would tie them up by their thumbs until they screamed with pain. He made them hang until they told him where more gold could be found. Sometimes the poor Indians would not know, but just to be rid of the pain they would pretend that the gold was hidden in the forest and they would take Balboa to the place. But if Balboa did not find any gold there and often he did not, it went still worse with the poor Indians. He would burn them alive on a slow fire so that they would suffer great pain. Indeed, he grew so cruel that the Indians called the White Tyrant of Darien. One day, the son of an Indian chief came to where Balboa was living and spoke to the tyrant. You'll always find gold, said he, but I will show you something still better. Come with me a few days to the west and you may see an ocean as great sea you sail when you came from your home. Now, Balboa thought, if I can find this great sea and be the first white man to look at it, then I shall be a famous man. Besides, there may be gold or silver and jewels in the lands beyond the new sea, so of he went, taking good with him the chief's son and some of the Spanish sailors. It was not a long journey, and in a few days they came to a mountain. From the top, he said, you will see the great ocean. Balboa told all his men to stay below, and he went up alone to the top of the mountain, and what the Indian had said came true. There lay the great sea, stretching in all directions as far as the eye could reach. The blue waters were as quiet as a little lake, but Balboa knew that this was a great ocean, and it was a great ocean, the Pacific Ocean, which is the greatest body of water in the world. Balboa, who had run away from Hispaniola, and had hidden himself in a barrel, was the first white man to see it. Then Balboa, wicking and cruel, though he was knelt down on the top of the mountain, and thanked God that he had been first to see this great ocean. And after that, called up his men. Up they rang, each trying to be the first, and when they reached the top, they all looked with wonder at the great peaceful sea, that shone so beautifully in the noonday sun. Then the men piled up great stones until there was a high heap, and Balboa went down the mountain, and carved the name of King Ferdinand upon the bark of the trees. A few days later, Balboa came down the mountain to the sea, which before he had only seen, but not touched. He walked a little way into the ocean, waving his sword in the air, cried out in a loud voice, that all the great sea, and all the islands in it, and all the lands about it, belong to Ferdinand, the King of Spain. Now, if anyone did such a foolish thing to a day, I believe that we would all laugh at him. A great ocean cannot belong to any one man, even if he is a king, or even to any one nation, but to all theness and all the people of the world. But King Ferdinand was very proud, when he heard, of what the bold Balboa had done, and so he made him the ruler of the great ocean he had found. But the wicked Balboa did not go without punishment for his evil deeds. Every day he became more hard and more cool. He did not keep his promise to be kinder than in Cisco, and everybody hated him, even the people who knew that he was brave. So one day the governor of Darien had him sent to prison, and a short time after that, Balboa's head was cut off. I do not know that anybody was sorry. Balboa was a very brave, bold man, and he did find the Pacific Ocean, but the braver a man is, the more gentle and kind and good he should be. So I think Balboa deserved his death, just as he deserved the name the Andean said given him of the White Tyrant of Darien. End of chapter 2. Chapter 3 of The Men Who Found America. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Recorded by Elijah Fisher. Chapter 3. The Beautiful City of the Floating Islands. Columbus had gone on his great journey to find gold, but nowhere did he find it. Other Spaniards came to America, all for gold, like Columbus. But gold does not grow, nor on the dusty roads. It is found in gold mines, deep, deep under the earth, where men work by candlelight, and did and did. Now there was a man named Cortez, who wanted gold, much gold. He wanted to become a very rich man, and go back to staying, and love in a beautiful castle with his servants and horses, and find clothes and jewels of many colors that glistened in the sun. Cortez was a very young man, when he went to America to live. He was only 19, but he was as strong and as brave as he line. There was a Spanish governor in the island where Cortez lived, and the governor did not like Cortez. He threw the young man into prison, and when Cortez escaped, the governor threw him in again. But Cortez was very brave and very clever, and so once more he got away, and ate himself, so that the governor could not find him. Now there had come news from further west, from the land which we now call Mexico, that there was much gold in that land. So the governor of the island said to himself, I will send some soldiers there, and they will take it all away from the Indian, and bring it to me. Then I shall have to be a rich man, and can go back to Spain, move in the castle. From those days, there were castles in Spain, large and gray, and beautiful, with great iron gates, and a ditch of water all around, so that no man could enter except the friends of the owner. You see, the governor of this island wanted to be rich and great, and that is why he sent a little army of Spanish soldiers to the new land of Mexico. Who is the man that will need my army? asked the governor. There will be danger, perhaps the ships will go down in a storm, and all will be drowned, perhaps the food will give out, and the soldiers, and their generals, will die from hunger, or it may be that the Indians will fight them to death with those on arrows. I must have a good general, strong and as brave as a lion. And then he thought of Cortez, the brave, strong young standard, and he made him the general of the little army. So one day the ships sailed away to the new land of Mexico. Cortez chairs the men by telling them stories of the great country they were going to find. We are to set sail and to fight, said he, to fight for our good king, for Spain and for God, the people that live in this land are not believing our God, and we must teach them about him and make them Christian. But even while he spoke, the young Cortez thought of gold, gold, gold, dollars of gold piled up to the sky, tablets and plates and dishes of gold, tablets and chairs of gold, gold, gold, yellow gold that would make the young Spaniard the richest man in all the world. The little ships took up their anchors and sailed west towards the sun setting in the waters. It was a beautiful sea, all green and blue, with the here and there weaves of white coral, and at last, from the distance, they saw the beautiful new land of Mexico. The sun shone bright upon the green trees of the forest, and all the flowers of the field, red and purple, and blue and yellow, glistened in the bright light. The boats came up to the shore. Here, Cortez cried as he stood on the white beach, here I shall find my city, and I shall call it the city of the true cross, an honor of God and the good king of Spain. And to this day, the city bears that name, the city of the true cross. Now, there lived in the new land of Mexico, high up behind the mountains, a nation of Indians called Aztecs. They were very proud and strong and brave, and had conquered many peoples. These Aztecs were not like the Indians, so we end the circus. They had a beautiful city, made of wood and stone, with houses full of gold and silver ornament. And this wonderful city was built upon floating islands. The king of the Aztecs was a very great man. His name was Montezuma, and just had been kinged before him, and his grandfather had been kinged before him. And so, for so many, many years, that no one among the Aztecs, even the oldest, should remember. Now there is a story among the Aztecs, that someday the children of the son would come from the east and drive Montezuma and his Indians away. These children of the son, according to the story, were not red like the Aztecs, but white like Cortez and his Spanish soldiers. So when Montezuma and the white men, who had come and founded the city of the true cross, he called his wise men together. They were very old and very wise, and they bowed deep to Montezuma, because he was king, and they listened to what he said. No, my lords, said Montezuma to the wise men about him. I have strangely to tell you, there have come from the east the children of the son. There are white men with black hair and beard, and their clothes are made of metal, as bright as silver, so that it take bliss in the sun. They ride on big, strong animals that run faster than a man. He seemed like Montezuma had never seen horses, and went on the king. These children have come here in houses that sail on the sea in ships such as the Aztecs. No, not all. I fear that when they see our beautiful city, they will kill our people, and then the Aztec nation will be no more. The king paused, and in the great hall where the wise men had gathered, all was silent, so silent that the breathing of the white men could be heard. Then again the king spoke. My lords, he called out, what you do. A young man, the bravest of all the Aztec princes, rose quietly, and, facing to the king, answered his question. The Aztecs, my lord, he said, have always fought. We must do as our fathers have ever done, fight for our king and our beautiful city of the floating islands. Montezuma was silent, as he listened to the brave words of the young prince, and all the wise men were silent, too. Then a very old man, the oldest and most of all the wise men in the kingdom, rose in his turn, and all the wise men listened as the old man spoke. Not so, my gracious king, not so, he said slowly. We are brave men, but we can't afraid children of the sun. It is true that our soldiers are mini, and the white men are few, but the sun has given to them his fire. They have tubes that are called guns, and when the Indians fight these white children, the tubes speak out fire and noise, which kill the red men. Where are our brothers to the east who have fought the white men? Dead, my lord, dead. We cannot fight against the sun or against his children. He must send to the white men presents rich, pleasant gold and silver, and beg them to go away in their houses that sail the sea, to go away they, and their horses and their guns, and not come up to our beautiful city. And as the old man had said, son of Montezuma dead, he gathered together gray chests of gold and silver, dresses of cloaks of bright green peacock feathers, and heaps and heaps of red rubies, and milky white pearls, and precious jewels that glistened in the sun. Take these to the white men, he said to his servants. Take this gold and all these beautiful gifts to the white men who are children of the sun, and beg them to go away and not come up to our beautiful city. The servants stood as Montezuma had been in them. They did not have horses, but all day and all day they ran and swift as the bird flies, until at last they came to where Cortez and his soldiers waited. Then they fell on their knees and bowed their heads to the ground. Behold of the children of the sun, they said, this gold and silver, and all these rubies, and precious stones, and all these beautiful things, are the priests of our good Montezuma, to the white men who have come from the east, and our king Montezuma begs the white men not to go up to his beautiful city, but to take the gold and silver, and to go away in the wonderful houses that sail on the sea. Now when Cortez saw all the gold and silver that Montezuma had sent, he became very greedy. He wanted still more gold, and he knew that if Montezuma could send him such a beautiful present, there must be great riches in the wonderful city. So he said to the waiting servants, Toe you go, your good king Montezuma, that I thank him for the gold and silver which he has sent, and that I and all my men with me will come to visit him and his city. Then the servants went back with the message. Now it was a long and dangerous journey to a beautiful city of the Aztecs, and Cortez feared that his men might be afraid to go so far from their ships, and so he called them together, I'm going on a long and dangerous journey. He said, those who go with me shall become very rich, but those who are afraid can stay here on the sea coast. And the soldiers answered, your are general Cortez, and we will go too. Then Cortez burned his ships so that none could turn back, and with his little army marched up to the beautiful city where King Montezuma lived. Now when Montezuma heard that the white men were coming to his beautiful city, he did not know what to do. The wise men said, let us fight the jail on of the sun, and others said, let us have peace, let us welcome the white men as gifts to our city. So Montezuma did not know what to do. When Cortez reached the highlands and lived out upon the city, he saw the strangest sight in the world. The city was built on islands that floated on the lake, and there was water all about it, and bridges with gates, and soldiers that stood by the gates to keep the white men out. And Cortez was afraid. You see the bridges were very narrow, and it would have been very easy Aztecs to shoot the Spanish soldiers as they crossed the bridges. So the crafty Cortez said to the Indians, listen my friends, let us come into your beautiful city of the floating islands, but we are tired after our long journey. Let us rest with you for a little, but we are your friends, and we wish to be ours. So the Aztecs left the white men crossed the bridges and entered the gates of their city. Now as soon as Cortez and his soldiers were inside the city, they behaved very badly. They went out on the streets and crawled with the Aztecs. They found a falter with the palace, which the good King Montezuma had given them to live in, and they always thought of ways in which to take from the Aztecs their gold and silver and precious stones. Now Cortez, who was very strong and brave, was also very cruel and deceitful. He made Montezuma to come and see him in his own palace, and when the Aztecs came to see him, Cortez told his soldiers to hold him prisoner. Then the white men went out into the streets and fought the good Indians and killed many of them. The King Montezuma wanted peace, and said that he would give the Indians more gold if they would only go back to their own country. But the Spaniards did not wish to go back, not until they found all the gold and silver and all the lands of the Aztecs. So they fought battles, many battles, and the Spaniards, who were brave but very, very cruel, conquered all that land. Many of the Aztecs were killed, and even the good King Montezuma lost his life. This all came to pass as the white men had foretold, and the city of the floating islands became the white men's city. But it did not go well with Cortez. To be honest, he became very rich, and had beautiful houses and lands and horses, and gold and silver. But he did not keep fit, these are things. He grew poor again, and when he got to be an old man, he was very sad and unhappy. And sometimes, I think, he must have been sorry for his cruelties, and lies, and wickedness. And for all the unkind things he did to the poor Aztecs, when he and his soldiers went up into Mexico and conquered this beautiful city of the floating islands, end of chapter three. Chapter four of The Men Who Found America. The box recording is in the public domain, recorded by Elijah Fisher. The Men Who Found America by Frederick W. Hutchinson. Chapter four, The Swine Hood Who Wanted a Castle. Once upon a time, there lived in a village in Spain a boy who tended pigs. He was a very ragged boy. His clothes were old and torn. He wore a no cap, and he never, in all his life, had won an acre of shoes. His food was even worse than his clothes. He ate nuts and grapes, and still crusts of bread. And sometimes he had cheese. But meat he could not fare more than once a month. But this was because the boy was very, very poor. Now it is not pleasant to tend pigs. They are such dirty animals, and they grunt and grunt and make ugly noises all the time. He is very disagreeable to sit on and have nothing to do but to tie healthy pigs, and see that they do not walk off into the woods and get lost. So the little Spanish boy hated his work and wished that he could get away. The name of this little boy was Francisco Pizarro. I do not wish to pretend that he was a good boy because he was not. He was a bad boy, and he grew up to be a wicked man. But one thing I must say for him, he was surely very brave. And perhaps he became a bad because, as a boy, he did not have a good home, nor any nice boys to play with. Now here where Francisco lived was a beautiful castle. It had big light rooms and long tables, and fine glit chairs, and wonderful pictures, and everything that the heat could desire. Francisco had never seen the inside of this castle. There was a big wall all around, and in this wall a big strong gate that was locked every night. A soldier in a yellow and red coat stood at this gate, and of course he would not let the wrecked little swine herd in. The young Francisco used to watch the old soldier, as he pulled at his mustache and sometimes, when the soldier wasn't looking, the boy pressed his head against the iron bars and looked into the garden. But he could only see a little corner of the castle, but he saw the beautiful trees in the garden, and the soft green grass, and the fountain, which seemed so cool in the hot afternoons. It made Francisco angry to see this beautiful garden, and not be allowed to go into it. He complained to his mother, but she could not do anything because it wasn't her castle, and she was as poor as Francisco. You are only a swine herd, she said to him, and swine herds cannot have castles. To stop thinking of the castle and go back your pegs. But Francisco did not stop thinking of the castle. He had seen in the garden a little boy of his own age, and he saw that the boys' clothes were made of fine soft cloth, and that he had a lovely black feather in his cap. He remembered too that a kind old one man, then a long white beard, had walked with this boy in the garden, and had taught him many things out of a great book. Poor Francisco had never been to school, and he had never had a teacher, like this boy with the fine clothes, but he wanted all the things the boy in the garden had, and he made up his mind that he would get them. I told you before that Francisco was not a good boy, and so he did not ask himself whether it was right for him to want all these things. I do not care, he said almost out loud. I do not care what my mother says, or what the priest says, or anybody. Good or bad, right or wrong, I'm going to get my castle. That will show you the sort of a boy Francisco really was. Now Francisco saw that it was no use to stay in his little village. There he would all be a swine herd. Every day he hated the pigs more and more. He hated them so much that he first dealt them when they squealed. At last, with two other boys, he ran away. I think that Francisco and his two friends were a little afraid at first, that their mothers would stand after them and catch them. So they went away by night, and by the next morning, they were far along the quiet road. Day after day they walked. They used to find chestnuts on the ground and over the high green hedges hung bunches of wild purple grays that anybody might pick. The good country people were all as warm as poor could be, but they all fed the tired boys a bite of bread and a cup of goat's milk. Francisco was very happy. He was glad to be away from the squealing pigs, and he believed that every step he took brought him nearer to the castle he had dreamed of. At last the boys reached Seville. Now Seville was a very large and beautiful city. There were fine houses and glorious palaces, like the castle that Francisco wanted, and women in beautiful dresses, and men rode up and down the crowded streets on the great black houses. It was all late wonderland, and as Francisco looked at everything, the streets, shops, and people, his eyes almost popped out of his head. But in this rich city, Francisco was poorer than ever before in all his life. Here in the great city, nobody cared for the ragged boy, and there were no kind country people to give him bread and goat's milk. Yet after a while, Francisco managed to make a little money, though even then he was still poor. Often he went to bed without suffer, and his castle seemed to be as far away as ever. Of all of the things in the great city of Seville, Francisco liked the soldier's best. They seemed so big and brave in their beautiful uniforms that the boy envied them and wished that he too could be a soldier. This is a good way to get rich, he got himself. It was a good way here in those times. Nowadays, people don't get rich here by killing each other, but in the olden days, to be a soldier was one of the best with money and become great. So Pizarro, who was now quite big and strong, became a soldier. A great war was being fought in Italy, and Pizarro was sent there with others than his soldiers to fight for his king. The young man was very brave, that even then he was a cruel, but the Spaniards did not care about that, so long as he was only brave. So when he came back from the great war in Italy, everybody said Pizarro was a very great, so good soldier. Now, in the meantime Columbus had found America. I told you in another story how the people in Spain were very very glad had over the news, and now everybody wanted to go to the wonderful new lands to make a fortune. Well, you may be sure that Pizarro wanted to go too, but for a long time he could not leave Spain. I cannot tell you why, because I do not know myself. Anyhow, he could not, but at last he got a chance to offend with a band of other Spaniards bent to the new country that Columbus had found. By this time Pizarro was no longer a boy, nor even a young man. He was almost 40 years of age. He had seen many lands and done many things, but he was still poor, and it seemed to him as though the castle that he had dreamed of as a boy was far away as ever. Well, at first America was no better than Spain, Pizarro lived on a rich island, which was then named Spaniola, but which is now called Cuba. There were many other Spaniards on the island, and these were all just as greedy and anxious to get rich as Pizarro. They were a very wicked set of men, all the bad things that a man can do they did, and above all they were cruel to the poor Indians. They used to make the red men a work for them day and night, and if the work was not enough they beat the poor Indians until they died. I think that Pizarro was just as the rest, but in spite of his wickedness he did not get rich. Now after a while, when Pizarro was almost 50 years old, he went to a new country in America, where the Indians were very rich, and where there were very few Spaniards. This was the land of Darien, where Balboa had gone about 10 years before. Here the friendly Indians had much gold and many beautiful jewels. They gave to Pizarro many precious stones and more gold than he had in all his life, so the slime herd became rich at last. But Pizarro was satisfied even with these riches, the more he had the more he wanted. So one day when he heard of some islands in the great ocean to the west where the Indians were very rich, he made up his mind to go to these islands and take the gold from these Indians. His men were very glad to go, they got canoes and paddled out to where the Indians liked. This was a very bold thing to do, because the sea was rough, and many times the canoes turned over and the soldiers were almost drowned. At last they reached the island and Pizarro standing up in his canoe saw the Indians crowding on the beach with their bows and arrows and hen ready to shoot the first Spaniard who landed. Now Pizarro, though a wicked and greedy man, was very brave, so he told his soldiers to fire their guns. As soon as the Indians heard the guns of the Spaniards, they were frightened, and after a little battle they ran away. Then Pizarro and his men landed on the sandy beach. Here they found many pearls which they took, and when there were no more pearls on the island they paddled back to their homes. When Pizarro had sold these pearls, he was very rich indeed. He had now enough money to buy his own. It was really not exactly a castle but a fine big house in Varianne with fields around it and a castle, and a great many Indian servants to do whatever Pizarro wanted. You would think now that Pizarro would be satisfied for he was a hundred times richer than the other little boy who used him to live in a castle in the old old days when Pizarro was only a swine hood. But the greedy Pizarro was never satisfied. After a few years he heard how the brave Cortez had conquered Mako, and he heard that too that Cortez had become even richer than he was. So Pizarro wanted to be as rich as Cortez and looked around for a new nation to conquer. Now at this time they're living in Peru many hundreds of miles to the south a great tribe of Indians called the Incas. They were not savages but wise kind people like the Aztecs of Mexico whom Cortez had conquered. These Incas were very rich. They had wonderful gold and silver mines and they owned so much gold and silver that they could cover walls with them and they also had precious stones. Green emeralds, red derubies, but sapphire is and beautiful, brilliant diamonds that glistened in the sun. I could tell you many things about these curious people and how they prayed to the sun and the moon instead of god of all the wonderful temples and palaces that they built of their fine hard rocks cut through the mountains and their king's messengers who ran along to these roads day and night carrying the news. I could tell you how all the people obeyed the Incas who was king of the country how they all worked for him and how he gave them food and clothing and houses so that no man in all the land was ever hungry or thirsty or cold. Now in Pizarro heard of these Incas he thought to himself I will go up to Peru and fight with these people and take away from them all their gold and silver and jewels and all their cities and palaces. I think it was a wicked plan of Pizarro to want to disturb these good quiet people and it seems to me that the man who had been a poor swine herd should have been satisfied with the money he had and could have left the Incas alone. But Pizarro was very greedy he got together a little band of his soldiers and started to go up. I say up because Peru was high up in the mountains. Pizarro thought that it would be easy to find Peru but things did not go as he had hoped. Nobody could tell him where the great country lay and there were no maps to show him the way. By mistake Pizarro and his little army landed on a lonely desert alone in the Pacific Ocean. There were swans and marshes on this island and there was a little to eat and even the water was not good to drink. The men suffered from mosquitoes and great flies that stung them though they could not sleep. And worse than all there were poisonous snakes that bit the men so that they died. They suffered from hunger and thirst and some feel sick and died. Pizarro sent back his ship for more men and more food and I am sure he was glad after a few weeks the white sails were seen again. The ship brought plenty of food but the governor of Darien who was jealous of Pizarro would not send any more soldiers. Instead he sent word by the ship to Pizarro saying Pizarro you must come back to Darien. Now the men were only too glad to go back. They had suffered enough and they did not want to be bitten or starved anymore. No, not for a hundred curses for us. We will go home they said as our governor says. At first the bold Pizarro said nothing. Then with the point of his word he drew a sharp line in the sand. North of this line he said his home south of this line are Peru and glory and gold and then he stepped across the line meaning that he was going to Peru even if he had to go along. The soldiers all saw that Pizarro was a brave man but none of them wanted to go home. We do not wish to be killed they said to themselves. Alas the pilot of the ship a brave reckless fellow with a long beard named Luis crossed the line. I go he said wherever Pizarro leaves. After that others followed and at last were 13 men across the line who were willing to go with Francisco Pizarro. These brave men I can tell you had a pretty hard time before they reached Peru. They had to cross the sea on a raft which is a very dangerous thing to do but the Indians were kind to them and gave them food to eat and when they got to Peru the Incas were even kinder. Now Pizarro was not only greedy but he was also very deceitful and he made he believe to the Incas that he was their friend but all the time that he was taking their beautiful presence he was learning about the country so that he could come back in a little while with a bigger army and rob and murder them and a few years Pizarro did come back with a big army this time he had 200 men and 30 horses and a great many guns the Incas in all their lives never seen a horse and had never seen people killed with guns so Pizarro knew that they would be very much frightened when they saw his men on horses and saw the guns that filled with bullets and they were afraid whenever Pizarro and his soldiers went the Incas lost their courage when they saw a man on a horse they thought that it was all one animal half man and half horse and so there were that Pizarro came to one city that was quite empty for all the people had to run away and fear of the coolest vaniers who were half men and half horses yet I do not think that Pizarro would have conquered crew if he had fought fair there were so many soldiers among the Incas that they seemed to spring up everywhere but Pizarro was very crafty and he thought out a very clever cruel plot he may believe he was a friend to the Inca who was the great king of all these people and he invited with him on a visit then when the Inca came to visit Pizarro that wicked man had him arrested and cast into prison and all the Indians who were with the Inca were killed or driven away now the Inca was a very brave young man but he did not want to be killed he knew that when he's dead his soldiers would lose their courage after a while he noticed that Pizarro was very greedy for gold so he said to him if you will let me go free Pizarro I will fill up this room with gold and it will be all yours the greedy old Pizarro was very happy over this for he always wanted gold now I do not know why any man should want to a whole very much gold because you cannot eat it or drink it or wear it but Pizarro was greedy as greedy as any old man in all the world and so he promised the Inca to let him go free if he filled up the room with gold he sent for his messengers and day after day the servants of the Inca came carrying great heaps of gold and last after six months the room was almost filled to the ceiling but even then the treacherous Pizarro did not keep his word he made believe the Inca was trying to raise an army against the Spaniards which I think he would have had a right to do if he wanted to for all the country belonged to him and not to the cool Spaniards so instead of letting the brave Inca go home he as he had promised the cruel Pizarro told him he must die and the very same day he had the Inca put to death after that the greedy deceitful Pizarro got more gold and more gold and always more and more and more whenever he went he made the people give him money he really ruled the country although he put to the Indians that he did not and he ruled it very clearly indeed and there and every day he became richer but after all the money he got did not do him any good he was now one of the richest men in all the but nobody loved him and I think that in his secret heart Pizarro was not very happy every day the savagely man became more and more greedy and more wicked and more cool until not only did the Indians fear him and hate him but the Spaniards hated him even more there was a man named Alma Agro who had once been his friend but Pizarro cheated him too and then murdered him well at last one day the son of a ma marco who a young man named Diego went to Pizarro who was in palace with some of his friends he'll kill my father cried Diego now it's your turn the cool Pizarro thought him he was 70 years old fought bravely to the end but he was stabbed over and over again and at last he fell dead at the feet of Diego and thus ended the life of the brave wicked Pizarro the fine herd who wanted a castle he became one of the richest men in all the world in contradiction yet sometimes I think he would have been happier if he had always remained till the end of his days a porous plain herd end of chapter four read by Elijah Fisher chapter five of the men who found America this liverbox recording is in the public domain read by Elijah Fisher the men who found America by Frederick W. Hutchinson chapter five the normal who became a slave during all this time while Cortez was fighting in Mexico and Pizarro was making his plans to go to Peru they're looking Spain a great noble named Cabeza divaca this man was always talking about America he could tell you about their Columbus and his great voyages and about Balboa and Cortez and all the other Spanish who had gone to America whenever any ship came back from that land divaca was always anxious to hear all of the news now as years went on divaca thought that he too would like to go to America he said to himself if Cortez can find gold and riches in that country why cannot odd besides he believed like so many others at that time that somehow or other he could have find a way through America to the Indians the Indians were super very rich and divaca thought it was a country with more cities than the start of heavens he had been told that each of these cities had more people in it than you could count in a year and he also got that all these people had gold and diamonds and rubies and would give them to you for a little class fees if I only can find a way to this place he said to himself I shall be the richest man in the world I shall be as great as the king so because you wish to find gold in America and because you want to dare to find a way to other land which he thought was even richer than America divaca sailed away to the west he was not the captain of the fleet but being a rich lord he was of course very important west of the ship sailed until one great day in spring they landed at bay in Florida now cabaza divaca and the spaniard said with him were not men who had come to Florida this part of the country had been found about 16 years earlier by a rich spaniard named Ponce de Leon and the story of how Ponce de Leon came to find Florida is so interesting that I must tell you about it Ponce de Leon was one of the brave men who had sailed with Columbus a great ocean and afterwards he had been here made a governor of an island called Puerto Rico he was rich and famous and powerful but he was not happy because he was growing old and he wanted to be young in those days the people believed that old men could grow young again just as they believed there are many other things that we know are very foolish one day an indian came to the great Ponce de Leon and said to him if you will go to the islands of the west you will find the magic fountain bathe your hands in the fountain and drink the waters and as soon as you have done so a strange thing will happen your white beard will become black his eyes will grow clear your weak thin legs will go strong and stout again Ponce de Leon loved youth more than he loved money or power or anything else in the world so he made up his mind to sail away on his ship and find the magic fountain i do not know whether he wanted only to get young himself or whether he wanted all the people in the world to be so that no one would ever grow old and no one would ever die it would have been strange i think if Ponce de Leon had found the fountain there would never have been any old people anymore and your grandfather would have been as young as you are well there wasn't a place he sent all the islands of the west that Ponce de Leon did not visit to find the magic fountain every day the old man would put his hands under some little fountain and then watch to see whether he said here it would grow black legs would dig strong again it never happened and for one i do not believe that there ever was such a magic fountain well one Easter morning while sailing around working there for islands where the magic fountain might be hidden by trees Ponce de Leon saw a beautiful new land the most beautiful land he had ever seen there the wonderful green palms that never died and on the ground were flowers of all colors red and yellow and the blue and purple the air soft and warm and high up in the trees the birds sing so sweetly that it almost made the old de Leon weep it is paradise he said here i shall surely find my youth he called the country Florida she is the name it still bears and he looked everywhere for the magic fountain of which he had been told by the Indian but he did not find it as at that time nor did he find it later no he came back again with many men who wished to make homes in Florida the Indians were unfriendly and they did not want the Spaniards to end so there was a battle between Spaniards and the Indians and De Leon was shot there all had been dipped and poisoned and the wound got worse and worse in a short time Ponce died so it happened that the old man who looked for youth found death instead yet today Florida is a beautiful land where the flowers still grow and the birds still sing and many people go there from all over the country to wait in a wonderful salt water and in the warm sunshine and here they get health and strength though of course they do not get what to Ponce do me on was the look for we ever last perhaps the Spanish noble cabez de vaca thought of the poor Ponce de Leon when so many years after he and his companions landed in Florida what will happen to us he said to himself will we find what we want gold and away to the Indians or will we to die from hunger and sickness or the poisoned arrows of the Indians when the Spanish landed from a bit of ships found that the Indians were quite as undefirming as they had been to Ponce de Leon so the Spanish noble de vaca told the captain whose name was nervous that he thought it would be safer to stay near the ships the Indians told had told their friends that there was gold in the country towards the west near the mountains nervous wanted gold right away so he and his men didn't listen to de vaca but began their weary month inland now this march was much longer and harder and more dangerous than any of the Spangers that thought when they started they were no roads or even paths and they had to cut their way through forests where the trees and bushes grew so thick that you could hardly tell where you were going often they lost their way in swamps their feet sink into the water and they had to ask each other's help so that they would not sink into the swamp and die the sun too was a healing hot and the mosquitoes and insects bit them all day and all night so that often they cried out with pain and could not sleep besides every day the Indians were more and more unfriendly this was the Spaniard's own fault they had burned some Indian sheep some home they had found in a little village little village and all the other Indians hated the Spaniards and got them very wicked they called them white devils now the Indians knew of a good way through the swamps and the forests but they were not tell nears because of the Indian chiefs from the Spaniards had burned so Navars and de vaca and the men who were with them had to fight their way through the great swamps some of the poor fellows that died of sickness and all were hungry and tired so you can well imagine that they were glad to reach at last the little Indian village the Spaniards expected to find gold here but there was hardly any gold in all the village they didn't find a little corn and enough food to keep them from dying but even with this they were a little better off than before the Indians were their enemies and whenever a Spaniard walked away from the village he was sure to be killed with an arrow even when the Spaniards led their horses to water they were shot by the Indians who were hidden behind trees and last these became so bad that the Spaniards had to go back to their boats by the sea it was a hard march they could only get from the Indians by fighting for it and many Spaniards were shot and many others fell sick and died from the bad water and the swamps they had to go on because the Indians would kill any who stayed behind so they marched and marched and marched day after day and day after day losing men all the time until at last they reached the great sea but it wasn't Tampa Bay where they had left their ships many weeks before nor was the coast like any they had seen before there was no life anywhere on all the great water and there no human being on all the miles of hot white sand that stretched as far as the eye could see the soldiers lost their courage we shall never get home they cried in despair we shall die on this terrible sea and some of the great strong bearded men threw themselves on the sinkhands and cried as though their hearts would break well after a while they picked up courage no matter how bad things look a brave man never gives up hope they knew that were hundreds of miles west of Tampa Bay but they remembered that there was some a few Spaniards living near the place where they were so Divaca and the others made up their minds to build boats in which they might sail to the other Spaniards well it is not easy to build ships when you have no sails and no tools and no pitch and no ropes but with the patience you can almost do anything so the Spaniards cut down trees for wood make a rope out of feather hair and their horses tails and nails and their shirts for sails month after month they worked living care on a horse meat and shellfish and a little corn which they took from the Indians as the boats were finished and they sailed away up and down the coast they went always hunting care for the sand here to say who lived nearby and all the time things grew worse and worse with them they were hunger and sick and their frozen to the bone for days the sun beat down on them burning their skin and then cold shock gave them chills and fever and last a great storm came that drove their boats apart and threw them up against the rocks the much divaca soon landed on a little island and the little band of soldiers would surely have died of hunger if the Indians had not been very kind the Indians built large fires for the half-armed men and gave them the hot food and drink and when some other boats appeared make a little specks far away in the distance they threw more wood on the fires so that the smoke would rise in the clouds and guide these ships also to the shore here the tired Indians stayed for many months but most of them did not live for long one after another they died until only divaca and three others were alive these four were all who were left of the bold men who had sailed further a year before but the troubles of brave divaca and his three tired men were not yet over they could not stay long on the island till with the good Indians so one fine morning they said goodbye to their new friends and made their way to the west it was a great wonder to me that they did not to all die for their troubles and dangers were great sometimes the Indians were kind to them and gave them food and a place to sleep but often they were very cruel and one said they kept a divaca and his men and locked up and made them workives you can imagine perhaps how hard it was if a divaca who was a noble and a great man in his own country to have that to be a slave in a little Indian village in Spain there were always people to wait on him and whenever he wanted anything he called and a servant came to ask what he wanted but here in the little Indian village where all the people were half naked he had to work in other fields and dig and cut wood and carry water and do whatever else his master told them yet I wonder did divaca ever think of the fallacies of the Indians who had been made slaves by the standards slavery is always wrong and it was just as wrong that you have Indian slaves and said you have slaves or white slaves or slaves of any kind so this great noble had to work for the Indians but it was not long in a short time the Indians saw the other slave was wiser than they were he could teach the many things and he could cure them when they were sick so they were him and treated him as a chief and after a while they let him and his three men go free now that divaca and his three men were free they started on their journey again they went on day after day week after week month after month and year after year it was six years six long years that they walked on and on over deserts and thick forests crossing deadly swarms and great wide rivers often they had nothing to eat but to nuts and roots and as their clothes had worn out in winter and almost burned them in summer many a time they wanted to lie down and die but being brave men they never quite gave up hope so they kept on then one day through the great forest they caught the sight of the sea and they were so happy that they were tears of joy and here they found that they were among their own were among their own people again for the first time in six years they saw white faces once more for the first time in the six years they heard men speaking their own beautiful language the Spanish language which they love so dearly you can well imagine how glad everybody was to see them the tired but happy cabaza divaca had to tell his story over and over again all the wonderful adventures he had had since he landed in Tampa Bay of the great rivers and swarms he had crossed of the sufferings he had passed through what do you think he was he was far to the west way out upon the Gulf of California near the great pacific ocean cabaza divaca had walked across america it is true that divaca never found the things he came to america to find no for not always did men have their gold and glory like Cortez and his aro but divaca was happy and satisfied when he sailed the way back to his own home in spain he had no gold to take with him but he was happy happy to be with his own people once more happy that he no longer had to be a slave to the indians in america end of chapter five read by Elijah Fisher