Page:The Coronado expedition, 1540-1542.djvu/287

  Tiguex, twelve villages. Tutahaco, eight villages. These villages were below the river. Quirix, seven villages. In the snowy mountains, seven villages. Ximena three villages. Cicuye, one village. Hemes seven villages. Aguas Calientes, or Boiling Springs, three villages. Yuqueyunque, in the mountains, six villages. Valladolid, called Braba, one village. Chia, one village.

In all, there are sixty-six villages. Tiguex appears to be in the center of the villages. Valladolid is the farthest up the river toward the northeast. The four villages down the river are toward the southeast, because the river turns toward the east. It is 130 leagues — 10 more or less — from the farthest point that was seen down the river to the farthest point up the river, and all the settlements are within this region. Including those at a distance, there are sixty-six villages in all, as I have said, and in all of them there may be some 20,000 men, which may be taken to be a fair estimate of the population of the villages. There are no houses or other buildings between one village and another, but where we went it is entirely uninhabited. These people, since they are few, and their manners, government, and habits are so different from all the nations that have been seen and discovered in these western regions, must come from that part of Greater India, the coast of which lies to the west of this country, for they could have come down from that country, crossing the mountain chains and following down the river, settling in what seemed to them the best place. As they multiplied, they have kept on making settlements until they lost the river when it buried itself underground, its course being in the direction of Florida. It comes down from the northeast, where they could certainly have found signs of villages. He preferred, however, to follow the reports of