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of October, 1541, reported to Charles the Fifth, that
poor as were the villages on the
Del Norte, nothing better had been found, and that the region was not fit to be colonized.
Persuaded that no discoveries could be made of lands rich in gold or thickly enough settled to be worth dividing as estates,
Coronado, in 1542,
with the hearty concurrence of his officers, returned to New Spain.
His failure to find a
Northern Peru threw him out of favor; yet what could have more deserved applause than the courage and skill of the men who so thoroughly examined the country north of
Sonora, from Kanzas on the one side to the chasm of the
Colorado on the other, and portrayed it so accurately, that succeeding travellers verify their description!
The expedition from
Mexico had not yet been be-
gun, when, in 1537,
Cabeza de Vaca, landing in
Spain, addressed to the
Imperial Catholic King a narrative of his adventures, that they might serve as a guide to the men who should go under the royal banners to conquer those lands; and the tales of ‘the
Columbus of the continent’ quickened the belief, that the country between the river
Palmas and the
Atlantic was the richest in the world.
The assertion was received even by those who had seen
Mexico and
Peru.
To no one was this faith more disastrous than to
Ferdinand de Soto, of Xeres.
He had been the favorite companion of
Pizarro, and at the storming of
Cusco had surpassed his companions in arms.
He assisted in arresting the unhappy
Atahualpa, and shared in the immense ransom with which the credulous Inca purchased the promise of freedom.
Perceiving the angry jealousies of the conquerors of
Peru,
Soto had seasonably withdrawn, to display his opulence in
Spain, and to solicit advancement.
