AD. THE ENGLISH VOYAGES 



1539- 



wee shoulde inhabite this other Countrey of the seven 

 cities, and the kingdomes before mentioned, that then I 

 might better discover the same, without putting my selfe 

 in hazard, and leave it for this time, that I might give 

 relation of the things which I had now seene. At the 

 entrance of this plaine 1 sawe but seven Townes onely of 

 a reasonable bignesse, which were a farre off in a lowe 

 valley beeing very greene and a most fruitfull soyle, 

 out of which ranne many Rivers. I was informed that 

 there was much golde in this valley, and that the inhabi- 

 tants worke it into vessels and thinne plates, wherewith 

 they strike and take off their sweat, and that they are 

 people that will not suffer those of the other side of the 

 plaine to traffique with them, and they could not tell me 

 the cause thereof. Here I set up two crosses, and tooke 

 possession of the plaine and valley in like sort and order, 

 as I did at other places before mentioned. And from 

 thence I returned on my voyage with as much haste as 1 

 coulde make, untill I came to the citie of Saint Michael 

 in the province of Culiacan, thinking there to have found 

 Francis Vazquez de Coronado governour of Nueva Galicia, 

 and finding him not there, I proceeded on my journey 

 Compostella in till I came to the Citie of Compostella, where I found 



21. degrees of j^jj^^ J write not here many other particularities, because 

 Icititude . . • 



they are impertinent to this matter : I only report that 



which I have seene, and which was told me concerning the 



Countreys through which I travelled, and of those which 



I had information of. 



144 



