Page:Young Folks History Of Mexico.pdf/347

Rh discovery and conquest, and fitted out two ships to explore the Pacific. This expedition proving a failure, he fitted out two more vessels, which accomplished nothing more than the discovery of Lower California. Still undaunted, he launched three more ships, at Tehuantepec, in 1537, and attempted a colony in Lower California; but nearly all the colonists perished, and he at last gave up his attempts at fresh discoveries after having expended over 300,000



crowns. In 1540, a disappointed and sorrowful man, he returned to Spain to seek restitution for his losses; but, after years of vain endeavor, he at last died, in the state of misery he merited, in the year 1547.

We will not stop to inquire if his conscience was ever oppressed by feelings of remorse for the unparalleled calamities he had entailed upon the innocent Mexicans, but will turn from him with the same sense of relief we would feel at the death of a venomous serpent that had drawn its loathsome trail over this fair earth.