32 HOME LIFE IN FLORIDA. 



those sturdy adventurers whose minds were set on the dis- 

 covery and conquest of " golden countries," and for a time 

 Florida was relegated to her wonted quiet and obscurity. 



Individual merchants, however, made repeated visits to 

 her shores, and on one of their expeditions a certain Diego 

 Miruelo obtained a considerable quantity of gold. We 

 are not told how much nor in what shape, but, however 

 it was, the fact was sufficient to revive all the old delusive 

 stories of Florida's fabulous wealth in gold and silver. 



These Spaniards, be it remembered, had before their 

 eyes the solid facts of the enormous wealth in these metals 

 already, ' ' in sight " of the recent conquests in Peru and 

 Mexico, and readily conceived that other lands might prove 

 as rich. Not only so, but by this time they had learned 

 from communications with the Indian inhabitants that 

 Florida, so far from being the island they had supposed, 

 was --only a small section of a vast country, and therefore 

 so much the more worth conquering. They accordingly 

 claimed as ''Florida," and the property of the Spanish 

 Crown, the whole continent of North America, even includ- 

 ing Quebec. 



In February, 1528, the second would-be Spanish con- 

 querer of Florida, the Adelantado Narvaez, landed on her 

 beautiful coast and took possession for Spain with solemn 

 ceremonials. Noticing some golden ornaments in the pos- 

 session of the Indians, and learning that they had obtained 

 them at "Apalachen, a country in the interior," Narvaez, 

 despite of his total ignorance of the land he was to pene- 

 trate, of the difficulties and foes he might encounter, took 

 up his line of march for the interior, with only one day's 

 provisions. 



The history of that march is pitiful indeed. Unspeakable 

 hardships awaited the adventurers ; a third of their num- 

 ber perished by the arrows of the Indians, and more than 



