1\)4 MYTHS OF THE CHEKOKEE [ktii. an.nM9 



till' Creeks, heUl cjr i-luiined umiJt of the territory uii both lianks of Savannah river 

 from the Cherokee border to within about forty miles of Savannah and westward to 

 the Ogeechee and Cannouchee rivers (see Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, r, 17-24). 

 The lOiintry was already on the decline in 1540 from a recent fatal epidemic, but 

 was yet populous and wealthy, and was ruled by a woman chief whose authority 

 extended for a considerable distance. The town was visited also by Pardo in 1567 and 

 again by Torres in 1628, when it was still a principal settlement, as rich in pearls as in 

 De .Soto's time ( Brooks MSS, in the archives of the Bureau of American Ethnology) . 



Somewhere in southern Georgia De Soto had been told of a rich province called 

 Coi;a (Coosa, the Creek country) toward the northwest. At Cofitachi<iui he again 

 hearil of it and of one of its principal towns called Chiaha (Chehaw) as being twelve 

 days inland. Although on first hearing of it he had kept on in the other direction 

 in order to reach Gofitachiqui, he now determined to go there, and made the 

 queen a prisoner to comi)el her to accompany him a part of the way as guide. Co^a 

 province was, though he did not know it, almost due west, and he was in haste to 

 reach it in order to obtain corn, as his men and horses were almost worn out from 

 hunger. It is apparent, however, that the unwilling queen, afraid of being carried 

 beyond her own territories, led the Spaniards by a roundabout route in the hope of 

 making her escape, as she finally ditl, or perhaps of leaving them to starve and die in 

 the mountains, precisely the trick attempted by the Indians upon another Spanish 

 adventurer, Coronado, entering the great plains from the Pacific coast in search of 

 golden treasure in the same year. 



Instead therefore of recrossing the river to the westward, the Spaniards, guided 

 by the captive queen, took the direction of the north ("la vuelta del norte" — 

 Biedma), and, after passing through several towns subject to the queen, came in 

 seven days to "the province of Chalaque" (Elvas). Elvas, Garcilaso, and Ranjel 

 agree upon the spelling, but the last named makes the distance only two days from 

 Gofitachiqui. Biedma does not mention the country at all. The trifling difference 

 in statement of five days in seven need not trouble us, as Biedma makes the whole 

 distance from Gofitachiqui to Xuala eight days, and from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, 

 where Elvas makes it, respectively, twelve and seven days. Chalaque is, of course, 

 Cherokee, as all writers agree, and De Soto was now probably on the waters of 

 Keowee river, the eastern head stream of Savannah river, where the Lower Chero- 

 kee had their towns. Finding the country bare of corn, he made no stay. 



Proceeding six days farther they came next to Guaquili, where they were kindly 

 received. This name occurs only in the Ranjel narrative, the other three being 

 entirely silent in regard to such a halting place. The name has a Cherokee sound 

 (Wakili), but if we allow for a dialectic substitution of I for r it may be connected 

 with such Catawba names as Congaree, Wateree, and Sugeree. It was probably a 

 village of minor importance. 



They came next to the province of Xuala, or Xualla, as the Elvas narrative more 

 often has it. In a French edition it appears as Ghouala. Ranjel makes it three 

 days from Guaquili or five from Chalaque. Elvas also makes it five days from 

 Chalaque, while Biedma makes it eiglit days from Gofitachiqui, a total discrepancy 

 of four days from the last-named place. Biedma describes it as a rough mountain 

 country, thinly populated, but with a few Indian houses, and thinks that in these 

 mountains the great river of Espiritu Santo (the Mississippi) had its birth. Ranjel 

 describes the town as situated in a plain in the vicinity of rivers and in a country 

 with greater appearance of gold mines than any they had yet seen. The Portuguese 

 gentleman describes it as having very little corn, and says that they reached it from 

 Gofitachiqui over a hilly country. In his final chapter he states that the course 

 from Gofitachiqui to this place was from south to north, thus agreeing with Biedma. 

 According to Garcilaso (pp. 136-137) it was fifty leagues by the roail along which the 

 Spaniards had couje from Cofitachi(iai to the first valley of the i)r(ivince of Xuala, 



