George Bancroft, History of the Colonization of the United States, Vol. 1, 17th edition.

[36] hundred leagues of the coast, and taking possession

Chap. II.} 1519.

of the country for the crown of Castile. 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. The account of the expedition having been laid before Charles the Fifth, a royal edict in 1521, granted to Garay the privilege of colonizing at his own cost the region which he had made known, from a point south of Tampico to the limit of Ponce de Leon, near the coast of Alabama. 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.

1520 still further 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 the Jordan; the name of St. Helena, given to a cape, now belongs to the sound. The natives of this region had not yet learned to fear Europeans; and they fled at their approach, more from timid wonder than from a sense of peril. Gifts were interchanged, and the strangers received with confidence and hospitality. When at length the natives returned the visit of their guests, and covered the decks with cheerful throngs, the ships were got under way and steered for Saint Domingo. Husbands were torn from their wives, and children from their parents. Thus the seeds of war were lavishly