of five chiefs, Balboa loaded a ship with all the gold he could get, and sent it to Spain, to win him favor with the King. Then, as he knew that Enciso and his other enemies at court would be very busy, he decided to overwhelm them with the great news of his discovery of a new ocean.
So on the sixth of September, 1513, he set out to cross the Isthmus. Comogre's son had warned him that a thousand men would be needed to fight their way through, but Balboa had faith in his hundred and ninety well-armed Spaniards. They had with them bloodhounds, even more dreaded than themselves by the Indians, a train of native porters, and guides that led them by the best and shortest way. After some easy fighting and hard marching, they reached a hill, from the top of which, the Indians said, "the other ocean" could be seen. Halting his men, Balboa ascended alone, and was the first European to see the Pacific. This was September twenty-third, and it was six days later, on St. Michael's Day, when they reached the nearest part of the Pacific, which is still called, for that reason, the Gulf of San Miguel.
Wading into the great unknown ocean, Balboa took eternal possession, in the name of the King of Spain, of all its waters, and every shore they touched. To-day, Spain does not own an inch of land on that ocean. No one can point out the hill from which Balboa first saw the Pacific, and the Isthmus of Darien is less known to white men than it was four hundred years ago.
After a few of the local chiefs had been beaten in battle, and one, a wicked tyrant named Pacra, had been
