which was an Indian village. The men were landed, and it was decided, against the advice of Cabeza de Vaca, to leave the ships and march inland. The unfortunate march began on May 1, 1528, with three hundred men and forty horses.[1] Amidst great difficulties, without provisions, they went northward through marshy woods and morasses, and across broad rivers, at no very great distance from the seashore. Till the 17th of June they found only a single Indian village (on May 16th). Then some Indians met them from whom they learned that they were near the settlement of Apalache, of which they were in search, concerning the wealth of which fabulous reports had found their way to the Spanish Antilles. They suffered a bitter disappointment when, on June 24th, they came in sight of the desired place. Forty Indian huts constituted the whole village. They were now in northern Florida, on the Suwanee River. At Apalache serious hostilities began with the natives, who daily harassed the weary and famishing Spaniards and killed some of their men. After a halt there of twenty-five days, Narvaez decided to go westward.
It is not necessary to go further into the melancholy details of the march of this expedition. Once in the swamps and bayous that extended along the coast of Alabama, and perhaps Louisiana, no escape was to be hoped for. An attempt to build rafts and sail upon them across the gulf to the Mexican coast resulted in the drowning of a part of the men. The rest, cast back upon the shore with-
- ↑ The Bay of Santa Cruz, in the present State of Florida, appears to have been the point where Narvaez landed.
