volume 1, chapter 8-12 (foot-note, page 458).

ALSO IN W. Irving, _Life and Voyages of Columbus and His Companions, volume 3._

AMERICA: A. D. 1515. Discovery of La Plata by Juan de Solis.

See PARAGUAY: A. D. 1515-1557.

AMERICA: A. D. 1517-1518. The Spaniards find Mexico.

"An hidalgo of Cuba, named Hernandez de Cordova, sailed with three vessels on an expedition to one of the neighbouring Bahama Islands, in quest of Indian slaves (February 8, 1517). He encountered a succession of heavy gales which drove him far out of his course, and at the end of three weeks he found himself on a strange and unknown coast. On landing and asking the name of the country, he was answered by the natives 'Tectelan,' meaning 'I do not understand you,' but which the Spaniards, misinterpreting into the name of the place, easily corrupted into Yucatan. Some writers give a different etymology. ... Bernal Diaz says the word came from the vegetable 'yuca' and 'tale,' the name for a hillock in which it is planted. ... M. Waldeck finds a much more plausible derivation in the Indian word 'Ouyouckatan,' 'listen to what they say.' ... Cordova had landed on the north-eastern end of the peninsula, at Cape Catoche. He was astonished at the size and solid materials of the buildings constructed of stone and lime, so different from the frail tenements of reeds and rushes which formed the habitations of the islanders. He was struck, also, with the higher cultivation of the soil, and with the delicate texture of the cotton garments and gold ornaments of the natives. Everything indicated a civilization far superior to anything he had before witnessed in the New World. He saw the evidence of a different race, moreover, in the warlike spirit of the people. ... Wherever they landed they were met with the most deadly hostility. {62} Cordova himself, in one of his skirmishes with the Indians, received more than a dozen wounds, and one only of his party escaped unhurt. At length, when he had coasted the peninsula as far as Campeachy, he returned to Cuba, which he reached after an absence of several months. ... The reports he had brought back of the country, and, still more, the specimens of curiously wrought gold, convinced Velasquez [governor of Cuba] of the importance of this discovery, and he prepared with all despatch to avail himself of it. He accordingly fitted out a little squadron of four vessels for the newly discovered lands, and placed it under the command of his nephew, Juan de Grijalva, a man on whose probity, prudence, and attachment to himself he knew he could rely. The fleet left the port of St. Jago de Cuba, May 1, 1518. ... Grijalva soon passed over to the continent and coasted the peninsula, touching at the same places as his predecessor. Everywhere he was struck, like him, with the evidences of a higher civilization, especially in the architecture; as he well might be, since this was the region of those extraordinary remains which have become recently the subject of so much speculation. He was astonished, also, at the sight of large stone crosses, evidently objects of worship, which he met with in various places. Reminded by these circumstances of his own country, he gave the peninsula the name New Spain, a name since appropriated to a much wider extent of territory. Wherever Grijalva landed, he experienced the same unfriendly reception as Cordova, though he suffered less, being better prepared to meet it." He succeeded, however, at last, in opening a friendly conference and traffic with one of the chiefs, on the Rio de Tabasco, and "had the satisfaction of receiving, for a few worthless toys and trinkets, a rich treasure of jewels, gold ornaments and vessels, of the most fantastic forms and workmanship. Grijalva now thought that in this successful traffic--successful beyond his most sanguine expectations--he had accomplished the chief object of his mission." He therefore dispatched Alvarado, one of his captains, to Velasquez, with the treasure acquired, and continued his voyage along the coast, as far as the province of Panuco, returning to Cuba at the end of about six months from his departure. "On reaching the Island, he was surprised to learn that another and more formidable armament had been fitted out to follow up his own discoveries, and to find orders at the same time from the governor, couched in no very courteous language, to repair at once to St. Jago. He was received by that personage, not merely with coldness, but with reproaches, for having neglected so fair an opportunity of establishing a colony in the country he had visited."

_W. H. Prescott, Conquest of Mexico, book 2, chapter 1._

ALSO IN: C. _St. J. Fancourt, History of Yucatan, chapter 1-2._

_Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Memoirs, V. 1, chapter 2-19._

AMERICA: A. D. 1519-1524. The Spanish Conquest of Mexico.

See MEXICO: A. D. 1519-1524.

AMERICA: A. D. 1519-1524. The Voyage of Magellan and Sebastian del Cano. The New World passed and the Earth circumnavigated. The Congress at Badajos.

Fernando Magellan, or Magalhaes, was "a disaffected Portuguese gentleman who had served his country for five years in the Indies under Albuquerque, and understood well the secrets of the Eastern trade. In 1517, conjointly with his geographical and astronomical friend, Ruy Falerio, another unrequited Portuguese, he offered his services to the Spanish court. At the same time these two friends proposed, not only to prove that the Moluccas were within the Spanish lines of demarkation, but to discover a passage thither different from that used by the Portuguese. Their schemes were listened to, adopted and carried out. The Straits of Magellan were discovered, the broad South Sea was crossed, the Ladrones and the Phillipines were inspected, the Moluccas were passed through, the Cape of Good Hope was doubled on the homeward voyage, and the globe was circumnavigated, all in less than three years, from 1519 to 1522. Magellan lost his life, and only one of his five ships returned [under Sebastian del Cano] to tell the marvelous story. The magnitude of the enterprise was equalled only by the magnitude of the results. The globe for the first time began to assume its true character and size in the minds of men, and the minds of men began soon to grasp and utilize the results of this circumnavigation for the enlargement of trade and commerce, and for the benefit of geography, astronomy, mathematics, and the other sciences. This wonderful story, is it not told in a thousand books? ... The Portuguese in India and the Spiceries, as well as at home, now seeing the inevitable conflict approaching, were thoroughly aroused to the importance of maintaining their rights. They openly asserted them, and pronounced this trade with the Moluccas by the Spanish an encroachment on their prior discoveries and possession, as well as a violation of the Papal Compact of 1494, and prepared themselves energetically for defense and offense. On the other hand, the Spaniards as openly declared that Magellan's fleet carried the first Christians to the Moluccas and by friendly intercourse with the kings of those islands, reduced them to Christian subjection and brought back letters and tribute to Cæsar. Hence these kings and their people came under the protection of Charles V. Besides this, the Spaniards claimed that the Moluccas were within the Spanish half, and were therefore doubly theirs. ... Matters thus waxing hot, King John of Portugal begged Charles V. to delay dispatching his new fleet until the disputed points could be discussed and settled. Charles, who boasted that he had rather be right than rich, consented, and the ships were staid. These two Christian princes, who owned all the newly discovered and to be discovered parts of the whole world between them by deed of gift of the Pope, agreed to meet in Congress at Badajos by their representatives, to discuss and settle all matters in dispute about the division of their patrimony, and to define and stake out their lands and waters, both parties agreeing to abide by the decision of the Congress. Accordingly, in the early spring of 1524, up went to this little border town four-and-twenty wise men, or thereabouts, chosen by each prince. They comprised the first judges, lawyers, mathematicians, astronomers, cosmographers, navigators and pilots of the land, among whose names were many honored now as then--such as Fernando Columbus, Sebastian Cabot, Estevan Gomez, Diego Ribero, etc. ... The debates and proceedings of this Congress, as reported by Peter Martyr, Oviedo, and Gomara, are very amusing, but no regular joint decision could be reached, the Portuguese declining to subscribe to the verdict of the Spaniards, inasmuch as it deprived them of the Moluccas. So each party published and proclaimed its own decision after the Congress broke up in confusion on the last day of May, 1524. It was, however, tacitly understood that the Moluccas fell to Spain, while Brazil, to the extent of two hundred leagues from Cape St. Augustine, fell to the Portuguese. ... However, much good resulted from this first geographical Congress. The extent and breadth of the Pacific were appreciated, and the influence of the Congress was soon after seen in the greatly improved maps, globes, and charts."

_H. Stevens, History and Geographical Notes, 1453-1530._

{63}

"For three months and twenty days he [Magellan] sailed on the Pacific and never saw inhabited land. He was compelled by famine to strip off the pieces of skin and leather wherewith his rigging was here and there bound, to soak them in the sea and then soften them with warm water, so as to make a wretched food; to eat the sweepings of the ship and other loathsome matter'; to drink water gone putrid by keeping; and yet he resolutely held on his course, though his men were dying daily. ... In the whole history of human undertakings there is nothing that exceeds, if indeed there is anything that equals, this voyage of Magellan's. That of Columbus dwindles away in comparison. It is a display of superhuman courage, superhuman perseverance."

_J. W. Draper, History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, chapter 19._

"The voyage [of Magellan] ... was doubtless the greatest feat of navigation that has ever been performed, and nothing can be imagined that would surpass it except a journey to some other planet. It has not the unique historic position of the first voyage of Columbus, which brought together two streams of human life that had been disjoined since the Glacial Period. But as an achievement in ocean navigation that voyage of Columbus sinks into insignificance by the side of it, and when the earth was a second time encompassed by the greatest English sailor of his age, the advance in knowledge, as well as the different route chosen, had much reduced the difficulty of the performance. When we consider the frailness of the ships, the immeasurable extent of the unknown, the mutinies that were prevented or quelled, and the hardships that were endured, we can have no hesitation in speaking of Magellan as the prince of navigators."

_J. Fiske, The Discovery of America, chapter 7 (volume 2)._

ALSO IN _Lord Stanley of Alderley, The First Voyage Round the World (Hakluyt Society, 1874)_.

_R. Kerr, Collection of Voyages, volume 10._

AMERICA: A. D. 1519-1525. The Voyages of Garay and Ayllon. Discovery of the mouth of the Mississippi. Exploration of the Carolina Coast.

In 1519, Francisco de Garay, governor of Jamaica, who had been one of the companions of Columbus on his second voyage, having heard of the richness and beauty of Yucatan, "at his own charge sent out four ships well equipped, and with good pilots, under the command of Alvarez Alonso de Pineda. His professed object was to search for some strait, west of Florida, which was not yet certainly known to form a part of the continent. The strait having been sought for in vain, his ships turned toward the west, attentively examining the ports, rivers, inhabitants, and everything else that seemed worthy of remark; and especially noticing the vast volume of water brought down by one very large stream. At last they came upon the track of Cortes near Vera Cruz. ... The carefully drawn map of the pilots showed distinctly the Mississippi, which, in this earliest authentic trace of its outlet, bears the name of the Espiritu Santo. ... But Garay thought not of the Mississippi and its valley: he coveted access to the wealth of Mexico; and, in 1523, lost fortune and life ingloriously in a dispute with Cortes for the government of the country on the river Panuco. A voyage for slaves brought the Spaniards in 1520 still farther to the north. A company of seven, of whom the most distinguished was Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon, fitted out two slave ships from St. Domingo, in quest of laborers for their plantations and mines. From the Bahama Islands they passed to the coast of South Carolina, which was called Chicora. The Combahee river received the name of Jordan; the name of St. Helena, whose day is the 18th of August, was given to a cape, but now belongs to the sound." Luring a large number of the confiding natives on board their ships the adventurers treacherously set sail with them; but one of the vessels foundered at sea, and most of the captives on the other sickened and died. Vasquez de Ayllon was rewarded for his treacherous exploit by being authorized and appointed to make the conquest of Chicora. "For this bolder enterprise the undertaker wasted his fortune in preparations; in 1525 his largest ship was stranded in the river Jordan; many of his men were killed by the natives; and he himself escaped only to suffer from the consciousness of having done nothing worthy of honor. Yet it may be that ships, sailing under his authority, made the discovery of the Chesapeake and named it the bay of St. Mary; and perhaps even entered the bay of Delaware, which, in Spanish geography, was called St. Christopher's."

_G. Bancroft, History of the U. 8., part 1, chapter 2._

ALSO IN _H. H. Bancroft, History of the Pacific States,