mpa Bay, over three hundred men had fallen from the
attacks of the natives. De Soto was thrown into a state of the deepest
despondency. All hope seemed to be extinguished. World-weary, and in
despair, he apparently wished only to die. Distress was all around
him, with no possibility of his affording any relief. Sadly he buried
the dead of his own army, while he left the bodies of the natives
thick upon the plain, a prey for wolves and vultures. The smouldering
ruins of Chickasaw were abandoned, and an encampment was reared of
logs and bark at a distance of about three miles; where they passed a
few weeks of great wretchedness. Bodily discomfort and mental
despondency united in creating almost intolerable gloom.

Terribly as the natives had been punished they soon learned the extent
of the calamity they had inflicted upon the Spaniards. Through their
spies they ascertained their diminished numbers, witnessed their
miserable plight, and had the sagacity to perceive that they were very
poorly prepared to withstand another attack. Thus they gradually
regained confidence, marshalled their armies anew, and commenced an
incessant series of assaults, avoiding any general action, and yet
wearing out the Spaniards with the expectation of such action every
hour of every night.

In the daytime, De Soto sent out his horsemen to scour the country
around in all directions for a distance of ten or twelve miles. They
would return with the declaration that not a warrior was to be found.
But before midnight the fleet footed savages would be swarming around
the encampment, with hideous yells, often approaching near enough to
throw in upon it a shower of arrows. Occasionally these skirmishes
became hotly contested. In one of them forty Indians were slain,
while two of the horses of the Spaniards were killed and two severely
wounded.

In their thin clothing the Spaniards would have suffered terribly from
the severe cold of the nights, but for the ingenuity of one of their
number, who invented a soft, thick, warm matting or coverlet which he
wove from some long grass that abounded in the vicinity. Every soldier
was speedily engaged in the manufacture of these beds or blankets.
They were made several inches in thickness and about six feet square.
One half served as a mattress, and the other folded over, became a
blanket. Thus they were relieved from the cold, which otherwise would
have been almost unendurable.

The foraging parties succee