cultivated, the mesquite-tree furnished bread. The dress was of skins or cotton mantles. They possessed nothing which could gratify avarice, the promised torquoises were valueless blue stones.

Unwilling to give up the hope of discovering an opulent country, on the 23d of April, 1541, Coronado, with the false Indian as the pilot of his detachment, began a march to the northeast. Crossing the track of Cabeza de Vaca in the valley of the Canadian river, they came in nine days upon plains which seemed to have no end, and where countless prairie dogs peered on them from their burrows. Many pools of water were found impregnated with salt and bitter to the taste.

The wanderings of the General, extending over three hundred leagues or about one thousand miles, brought him among the Omerhas, hunters of the bison, which gave them food and clothing, strings to their bows and coverings to their lodges. They had dogs to carry their tents when they moved, they knew no wealth but the product of the chase, and they migrated with the wild herds.

The Spaniards came once upon a prairie, that was broken by neither rock or hills, nor trees nor shrubs, nor anything which could arrest the eye as it followed the sea of grass to the horizon. In the hollow ravines there were trees, which could be seen only by approaching the steep bank; the path for descending to the water was marked by the tracks of the bison.

The General, sending back most of his men, with a chosen band journeyed on for forty-two days longer, having no food but the meat of buffaloes and no fuel but their chips. At last he reached the province, which apparently from some confusion of names, he was led to call Omivira and which lay in forty degrees north latitude, unless he may have erred one or two degrees in his observations. It was well watered by brooks and rivers, which flowed to what the Spaniards called the Espiritu Santo; the soil was of the best, a strong black mould, and bore plums like those of Spain, nuts, grapes, and excellent mulberries.

The inhabitants were savage, having no culture but of maize, no lodges but of straw or of bison skins, no clothing but buffalo robes. Here on a bank of a great tributary of the Mississippi, a cross was raised with this incription: "Thus far came the General, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado."

Won by the manners of these Indians, two of the Franciscan missionaries begged to remain. One of these, Father John de Padille, a native of Andalusia, had once borne arms in the guise of a soldier, and now in the cause of Christ showed no less intrepidity, and determined to begin a mission at the large town of Omivira. The other, a lay brother, John of the Cross, whom men in other days had called Louis de Escalonna, with equal determination resolved to begin his labors in the neighborhood. Coronado, yielding to their zeal, granted their request, and as he had brought live stock in order to settle in the country, a portion was allotted to each missionary, and some Mexican Indians remained as guides and assistants.

Here Padillo for some time labored assiduously, but as it would seem, almost in vain. Hearing of a tribe more docile in character he set out for their town, but when on the road he was suddenly surrounded by a considerable force of roving Indians. Conscious of danger, he urged his companions to fly, and kneeling down prepared to die. In a few moments he fell, pierced by a shower of arrows, and thus sealed his mission with his blood.

Of Brother John of the Cross and his mission no tidings were ever obtained, and he too in all probability fell a victim to the violence of the natives.

How heroic their sacrifice, who, to regenerate and elevate a fallen and debased race, left themselves entirely at the mercy of the savages, renouncing the comfort, security and honors of civilization for the wants and dangers of a mission life!

CHAPTER V.

SPANISH MISSIONARIES CONTINUED.

In January, 1570, the following letter, written by Pope Pius V, was received at the headquarters of the Spanish government in America:

"To our Beloved Son and Noble Lord, Pedro Melendez de Avites, Viceroy in the Province of Florida in the Parts of India:

BELOVED SON AND NOBLE SIR:

Health, grace and the blessing of our Lord be with you, Amen.

We rejoice greatly to hear, that our dear and beloved son in Christ, Phillip, Catholic King, has named and appointed you Governor of Florida, creating you adelantado thereof; for we have had such an account of your person, and so full and satisfactory report of your virtue and nobility, that we believe without hesitation, that you will not only faithfully, diligently and carefully perform the orders and instructions given you by so Catholic a king, but we trust also that you by your discretion and habit will do all to effect the increase of your holy Catholic faith and gain more souls to God. We are well aware, as you know, that it is necessary to govern these Indians with good sense and discretion, that those who are weak in their faith from being newly converted, be confirmed and strengthened, and idolaters be converted and receive the faith of Christ, that the former may praise God, knowing the benefit of his Divine mercy, and the latter, still infidels, may by the example and model of those now out of blindness, be brought to a knowledge of the truth, but nothing is more important in the conversion of these Indians, and idolaters, than to endeavor by all means to prevent scandal being given by the vices and immoralities of such as go to those Western parts. This is the key of

this holy work, in which is included the whole essence of your charge.

You see, noble sir, without our alluding to it, how great an opportunity is offered you in furthering and aiding this cause, from which result: 1. Serving the Almighty; 2. Increasing the name of your king, who will be esteemed by men, loved and rewarded by God.

Giving you then our paternal and apostolical blessing, we beg and charge you to give full faith and credit to our brother, the Archbishop of Rossano, who in our name will explain our desire more at length.

Given at Rome with the Fisherman's ring, on the 18th day of August, in the year of our Redemption 1569, the third of our pontificate. Ensago Cronologico, ann 1569.

PIUS V, POPE.

This letter infused new life in all missionary enterprises. And though the account given by Coronado of the country, which he had traversed, was very unfavorable, the zeal of the missionaries urged them to further explorations. The Indian Missions of Mexico were steadily advancing to the north.

In 1580, there dwelt in the valley of St. Bartholomew a pious lay brother named Augustine Rodriguez, who had grown old amid austerities and toils in the Franciscan missions. Hearing from Indians who visited the mission, that populous countries unvisited by Spaniards, lay to the north, he burned with the desire to announce the Gospel of Christ to them. His zeal induced him to apply to his provincial for leave to go and learn their language. The Viceroy of Mexico approved the mission, and the good brother was not allowed to depart alone. A regular mission was projected. Father Francisco Lopez of Seville, was named Superior, the learned and scientific Father John de Santa Maria, with Brother Rodriguez were selected to accompany the expedition, and they all set out in the year 1581 with ten soldiers and six

Mexican Indians and advanced to the country of the Tehuas, apparently the Tignez of Coronado. At this point they were compelled to halt, for the soldiers seeing seven hundred weary miles behind them refused to proceed. The missionaries, after a vain appeal to their honor, pride, patriotism and religion, allowed them to depart and began to examine the tribe among whom they were. This New Mexican tribe lived then, as in Padilla's time, in their peculiar houses and, unlike the wild Indians of the plains beyond, dressed in cotton mantles.

The missionaries were so pleased with the manners of the people, that they resolved to begin a mission among them, and the success of their first effort so exalted their hope, that they sent Father John de Santa Maria back to Mexico to bring auxiliaries. Fearless and reliant on his skill, the missionary set out alone with his compass to strike for the nearest settlement, but while asleep by the wayside, on the third day after his departure, he was surprised and killed by a party of wandering Indians. The others meanwhile proceeded with their missionary labors, instructing the people, till at last, in an attack on the town, Father Lopez fell beneath the shafts of the assailants, and Brother Rodriguez, the projector of the mission, was left to conduct it alone.

The people were not indifferent to his teaching, but vice had charms too powerful to submit to the doctrine of the Cross. Rodriguez inveighed with all the fire of an apostle against the awful sins to which they were addicted, till weary at last of his reproaches, they silenced the unwelcome monitor in death.

Meanwhile the returning soldiers had excited the anxiety of the Franciscans, and at their instance, Don Antonio de Espejo, a rich, brave and pious man, set out in 1582 with Father Bernadine Beltran, but arrived only to learn the death of all.

Some time after two other Franciscans, who accompanied an expedition under Castano, were put to death at Puaray, but no details remain.