Page:The Coronado expedition, 1540-1542.djvu/138

 had sent out under the command of Ulloa the previous summer, turned back from these shoals, and Alarcon's sailors begged him not to venture among them. But the question of a passage by water through to the South, or Pacific, sea, which would make an island of the California peninsula, was still debated, and Alarcon refused to return until he had definitely determined the possibility of finding such a passage. His pilots ran the ships aground, but after a careful examination of the channel, the fleet was floated across the bar in safety, with the aid of the rising tide. Alarcon found that he was at the mouth of a large river, with so swift and strong a current that it was impossible for the large vessels to make any headway against it. He determined to explore the river, and, taking twenty men in two boats, started upstream on Thursday, August 26, 1540, when white men for the first time floated on the waters of the Colorado. Indians appeared on the river banks during the following day. The silence with which the strangers answered the threatening shouts of the natives, and the presence of the Indian interpreters in the boats, soon overcame the hostile attitude of the savages. The European trifles which had been brought for gifts and for trading completed the work of establishing friendly relations, and the Indians soon became so well disposed that they entirely relieved the Spaniards of the labor of dragging the boats up the stream. A crowd of Indians seized the ropes by which the boats were hauled against the current, and from this time on some of them were always ready to render this service to their visitors. In this fashion the Spaniards continued northward, receiving abundant supplies of corn from the natives, whose habits and customs they had many excellent opportunities for observing. Alarcon instructed these people dutifully in the worship of the cross, and continually questioned them about the places whose names Friar Marcos had heard. He met with no success until he had traveled a considerable distance up the river, when for the first time he found a man with whom his interpreter was able to converse.

This man said that he had visited Cibola, which was a month's journey distant. There was a good trail by which one might easily leach that country in forty days. The man said he had gone there merely to see the place, since it was quite a curiosity, with its houses three and four stories high, filled with people. Around the houses there was a wall half as high again as a man, having windows on each side. The inhabitants used the usual Indian weapons—bows and arrows, clubs, maces, and shields. They wore mantles and ox hides, which were painted. They had a single ruler, who wore a long shirt with a girdle, and various mantles over this. The women wore long white cloaks which completely covered them. There were always many Indians waiting about the door of their ruler, ready in case he should wish for anything. They also wore many blue stones which they dug out of a rock—the turquoises of the other narratives. They had but one wife, and when they died all their effects were buried with them. When