the fact that he was restored
to favor and received a pension of two thousand ducats. He died in
Seville at a good old age.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] Pronounced Hay-ress.

II.

THE GREATEST AMERICAN TRAVELLER.

The student most familiar with history finds himself constantly
astounded by the journeys of the Spanish Pioneers. If they had done
nothing else in the New World, their walks alone were enough to earn
them fame. Such a number of similar trips over such a wilderness were
never heard of elsewhere. To comprehend those rides or tramps of
thousands of miles, by tiny bands or single heroes, one must be familiar
with the country traversed, and know something of the times when these
exploits were performed. The Spanish chroniclers of the day do not
dilate upon the difficulties and dangers: it is almost a pity that they
had not been vain enough to "make more" of their obstacles. But however
curt the narrative may be on these points, the obstacles were there and
had to be overcome; and to this very day, after three centuries and a
half have mitigated that wilderness which covered half a world, have
tamed its savages, filled it with convenient stations, crossed it with
plain roads, and otherwise removed ninety per cent of its terrors, such
journeys as were looked upon as everyday matters by those hardy heroes
would find few bold enough to undertake them. The only record at all
comparable to that Spanish overrunning of the New World was the story of
the California Argonauts of '49, who flocked across the great plains in
the most remarkable shifting of population of which history knows; but
even that was petty, so far as area, hardship, danger, and endurance
went, beside the travels of the Pioneers. Thousand-mile marches through
the deserts, or the still more fatal tropic forests, were too many to be
even catalogued. It is one thing to follow a trail, and quite another to
penetrate an absolutely trackless wilderness. A big, well-armed
wagon-train is one thing, and a little squad on foot or on jaded horses
quite another. A journey from a known point to a known point--both in
civilization, though the wilderness lies between--is very different from
a journey from somewhere, through the unknown, to nowhere; whose
starting, course, and end are all untrodden and unguessed wilds. I have
no desire to disparage the heroism of our Argonauts,--they made a record
of which any nation should be proud; but they never had a chance to