Page:Don Coronado through Kansas.djvu/313

296 NINETEENTH. The Missouri river is mighty indeed; But it 's treacherous and will deceive; It robs a man of his land and fee, Wrenches from its roots the largest trefi- Today a man may be rich, Tomorrow his land be a ditch; His riparian rights be switched Down the stream others to enrich. ORONADO was only a frail man, and as such must be excused from becoming impatient to get back to New Spain; and is there any wonder when you know that he had only a year before married Beatrice de Estranda, "a cousin by blood" (if gossip was true) of Emperor Charles V.? Her father, Alonso de As- trada, had been Royal Treasurer of New Spain. From his mother-in-law, Coronado received as a marriage gift a considerable estate, "The Half of Tlapa," which was cohfirmed ta him by a royal grant. Cortes com- plained that the income from this estate was worth more than 3,000 ducados (about $3,000), and that it had been unduly and inconsiderately alienated from the crown. Coronado obtained also the estate of one