ico. His
route has not been accurately traced, but it is certain he travelled the
Gulf States and crossed the Mississippi. De Soto himself found a grave
in the waters of this river, but under new leaders the expedition pushed
on through Arkansas, and probably found its most western point on the
prairies of the West, where, disheartened, it turned back to near
where De Soto died, constructed some rude boats, and floated down the
Mississippi, and so to Mexico. We have two accounts written by members
of this expedition,<13> and a third, written by Garcilasso de La Vega
from the statements of eye-witnesses and memoranda which had fallen into
his hands.

From these considerable can be learned of the Southern Indians before
they had been subjected to European influences. One of the first things
that arrests attention is the description of the villages. They found,
to be sure, some desert tracts, but every few miles, as a rule, they
found villages containing from fifty to three hundred spacious and
commodious dwellings, well protected from enemies--sometimes surrounded
by a wall, sometimes also by a ditch filled with water. When west of the
Mississippi they found a tribe living in movable tents, they deemed that
fact worthy of special mention. But in the same section they also found
many villages.

One hundred and forty years afterward the French explorer, La Salle,
made several voyages up and down the Mississippi. He describes much the
same state of things as do the earlier writers. The tribes still dwelt
in comfortable cabins, sometimes constructed of bark, sometimes of
mud,<14> often of large size, in one case forty feet square, and having
a dome-shaped roof. Nor was this village life confined to the more
advanced tribes. The Dakota tribes, which include the Sioux and others,
have been forced on the plains by the advancing white population, but
when first discovered they were living in villages around the headwaters
of the Mississippi. Their houses were framed of poles and covered with
bark.<15>

Lewis and Clark, in 1805, found the valley of the Columbia River
inhabited by tribes destitute of pottery, and living mainly on fish,
which were found in immense quantities in the river. They describe them
as living in large houses, one sometimes forming a village by itself.
They describe one house capable of furnishing habitations for five
hundred people. Other authorities could be quoted, showing that the
Algonquin Indians, l