Diario las Américas Newspaper, February 7, 1954, Page 21

CABEZA DE VACA'S GREAT JOURNEY This story begins in Spain, in the ancient city of Cadiz, a place of sunshine and sherry and Moor- ish traditions: There, about the time that Columbus discovered the New World, a little boy was born and named Alvar Nuiez Cabeza de Vaca. The last name, Cabeza de Vaca, means cow’s head. Almost three centuries before he was born, one of Alvar’s forefathers marked a mountain pass in Spain with the bleached swull of a cow, then guided the Spanish troops through it to surprise and defeat their enemies, the Moors. This act won him the name, Cabeza de Vaca. Like most of the sons of im- portant families, young Cabeza de Vaca very early began his military career. He was already an ex- perienced soldier when in 1527 he sailed westward with an expedi- tion to conquer Florida and the Jand westward and south into Mex- ico. A year later he was one of four hundred men who landed near what is now Tampa Bay, on the western coast of Florida. They had forty lean horses and almost no provisions. The adventurers imagined that they would find treasures richer than those Cortés had taken from the empire of the Aztecs. “| Cabeza de Vaca wrote the story of his adventures more than four hundred years ago. In it he tells of hardships in an unfriendly land, an attempt to escape by sea, ship- wreck, his survival, lonely years spent with the Indians in Texas and, finally, of his journey afoot to the Gulf of California. In addi- tion to his own experiences, Cabe- za de Vaca’s story gives a picture of the life of various tribes of Indians an the land on which they lived. He also describes the animals and the plants native to the South- west. Several people have tran- slated his narrative from the Spanish into English. Parts of three of these translations have been used in the brief account that fol- lows. Readers who relive his ex- periences must remember that he and his companions were in a strange, uncharted land, with only the sun, moon and stars to guide them: Many learned men have de- bated over de route that Cabeza de Vaca followed from Texas to the West coast. It can never be ac- curately traced. The Florida Wilderness @ The men first discovered a vil- lage of thatched huts from which the Indians had fled. While the soldiers rummaged through the hovels, turning over earthen pots and sticks, one of them found a “golden rattle.” Before the disco- very of America. Indians in north- ern Georgia washed small amounts of gold from streams and used it for barter. In another village a few miles up the coast, they found some corn, a bit of gold, and some ~ pieces of cloth. Here they captured four Indians, showed them the corn and the gold and by signs ask d the way to mere. The dazed savages ponited northward and cried, “Apa- lachen!, Apalachen!” To the Span- iards this meant that to the north they could find much gold and much food. + So eager were the Spaniards to press northward that they took no time to explore the coast. They rode away without setting a place and time to rejoin the ships which were to sail southward and be on hand to carry away the expected treasure. Each man took two pound |. of hardtack and half a pound of bacon. Soon their food was gone, and they were existing on the meager fruit of the dwarf fan-palm. After two weeks of plodding on without seeing an Indian, the searchers for golden Apalachen came to a river so wide that it took all day to cross. On the other side with corn. They took it, thanked God but not the natives, and marched on. A month later they came to a broad, deep river in which one of the men ahd his horse were drowned. That night they ate the horse. An Indian was persuade to guide them to Apalachen. He led them through a great forest in which the ground was so littered with fallen trees and often neither man nor horse could go forward. But at last they were in sight of Apal- achen, the promised land of food an gold, and the thought made them forget their hardships and weariness. There was, indeed, corn in the forty straw hovels making up the village. But where was the gold? The Indians proved hostile, and although the Spaniards remained there twentyfive days, eating fresh corn and resting, they were unable to take a horse to water without being shot at from ambush. Among the bear, deer and other wild animals they saw there was one that Cabeza de Vaca described as follows: “It carries its young in a pouch on its belly until they are old enough to look for their own food. Even then, if an enemy ap- pears, the mother does not move until her little ones are safe in the pouch again.” This was the first written description of the opos- sum. So many of the men became sick that there were not enough horses to carry them. Mosquitoes and other insects were more hostile than the Indians. The search for gold turned into a search for the ships so that they could leave this land of disease, starvation and hostile savages. The men turned towards the sea, but when they reached it they found no sign of a ship. They decided there was nothing to do but built such boats as they could and then to try to follow the shore line until they came to Panuco, the northernmost settlement in Mexico. But they had no tools, iron, forge, pitch or other necessities. One man in the expedition was a carpenter, but there were no shipbuilders. They also lacked food. From deerskin and a log hollowed out by fire, a soldier made a bellows. Wood. could be burned into charcoal, and the be- llows would force the charcoal fire to give enough heat for melt- ing stirrups, spurs, crossbows and other metal equipment. This me- tal could be hammered into nails, saws, axes and the tools so des- perately needed. Some of the men were sent to raid Indian village for corn. They agreed to kill a horse every three days for meat. Trees were brought down to bel- lowed out into canoes or hewn into boards. Shirts were patched to make sails. Oars were fashion- ed out of poles. Meanwhile, In- dians constantly attacked the wor- kers. Finally, however, fiye open boats were made. Skins of the slain horses legs were carefully saved for “bottles” in which to carry water. Before the men were ready to embark many had died of sickness and hunger, and ten had been killed by the Indians. Years later Hernando de Soto’s men found horse skulls marking the place where Cabeza de Vaca’s companions had worked so hard and suffered so much, and named it Bahia de los Caballos —Bay of the Horses. . SHIPWRECKED ... Late in September —the season of Gulf hurricanes —247 men sailed away from the whitening skulls on the’ Florida sands. Ca- beza de Vaca was in charge of one of the home- made boats. They had a little corn, most of it unparched. The horse-leg water bottles soon rotted. A storm ‘dro- they found a village well suppliedve the awkward barges ashore DOMINGO 7 DE FEBRERO DE 1954. By J. FRANK Dobie where there was no fresh water. a straw would draw blood. I could would waken us with blows and For five days the voyagers thirsted and four men died from the effects of drinking sea water. Again they sailed on, found a harbor where the Indians provided food and water. Later, in a battle with them, more of Cabeza de Vaca’s party were killed. They pushed on, and found dark, fresh water flowing into the open sea. This was from the Mis- sissippi River, which had not yet been discovered by white men. A storm drove the boats far out and scattered them. After thirst, hun- ger, cold, fatigue and hardship hard to describe in mere words, two of the storm-tossed boats were cast on an island near where the city of Galveston now stands. The island of Ill Fate, the survivors called it. By tius time the men were little more than na- ked skeletons. “We looked like pictures of Death,’ Cabeza de Va- ca wrote. The miserable Indians could supply, only roots and: a poor type of fish. The north winds blew bitter cold. A plague swept over the survivors and spread to the Indians. The In- dians became hostile. Finally, of the two boat-loads, only Cabeza de Vaca and another man were left. The other man submitted to enslavement by the Indians. Cabeza de Vaca was res- pected as a medicine man at first. Then, as all his treatments did not cure, he was reduced to captive rank, which he kept with the various tribes he was with. He did not give up however. Al- ways he sought information about the southern coast, and hoped some day to get to Mexico, Far down the coast, almost three years after the shipwreck on the Island of Ill Fate, he found two other Spaniards and a negro slave who had escaped from one of the wrecked boats. They had remarkable tales of adventu re to tell Cabeza de Vaca. These men who had set out so bravely from Spain to find gold now dug for roots, ran naked after deer, feasted in summer on tunas, star- ved and shivered in the winter. For three more years they were held as slaves and often cruelly treated by different trives of the most degraded savages. An abbreviated account of Ca- beza de Vaca’s story of the ways of these Indians and of his own life with them is told from his own words as follows: SIX YEARS WITH INDIANS ON THE TEXAS COAST The Indians on the Island of Ill Fate wanted to make medici- ne men of us. The native medi cine man makes a few cuts in the patient’s body near the pain and then sucks the skin around the cut. He also cauterizes, then breathes on the sore place to dri- ve the disease away. We laughed at the suggestion that we turn medicine men, but the people said we must make ourselves use- ful. They kept all food from us until we agreed. We treated the sick by making the sign of the cross over them. At the same time we breathed on them and prayed to God that He cure them and have them: do fa- vors for us. God was merciful. Those we treated. said they were cured. They were grateful and went without food in order. to give it to us. They also gave us hides and other small things. So great was the lack of food that I often had none for three days. Neither did the Indians have any. All the people in this country go naked. Only the women cover part of their bodies with moss from trees. Going naked. among stubbly reeds to dig for roots, my body would be jabbed and and cut. I had to wade barefoot- ed in water to pull up other foots. My fingers became so tender from this work that the touch of sleeping, however, HEMISFERIC no longer bear such a life and managed to join another tribe of Indians, Among these I improved my condition a little by becoming a trader. On account of constant warfare, there was neither barter nor travel in the land. The people I was now with depended upon me to go from one place to ano- ther to get the things they need- ed. I went as much as forty lea- gues along the coast and as far inland as I cared to go. My wares consisted mainly of seashells and cockles. Some of these shells served the Indians for cutting a bean-like fruit used for healing and in their dances and feasts. This is of great value to them, as are shell-beads and other ob- jects. In exchange for these things, I brought back hides and red ochre, with which they dye their faces and hair, flint for arrow heads, glue and stiff reeds to make arrows, and tassels made of deer hair dyed red. The life of a trader suited me well because it gave me liberty to go wherever I pleased. Wherever I went I was well treated, and given food for my wares. My main object was to find out how I might get farther away. I became well known, and those who did not know me tried to meet me. I spent nearly six years among these Indians, going as naked as they did. Their principal food as two or three kinds of roots, for which they hunted all over the land. They were usually bitter and un- healthful and it took two days to roast them. But they had so lit- tle food that they often walked two and three leagues to get them. Now and then they killed deer and at times caught fish. But often they were so hungry that they ate spiders, ant eggs, worms, lizards, salamanders and serpents. They eat earth and other things, and I believe that if there were any stones ‘in the country they would eat them, too. They preserve the bones of the fish and animals they eat, pulve- rize them and eat the powder. The women and old men have to carry burdens and loads. The women get only six hours rest out of twenty-four. They spend most of the night drying roots in the fire. At day break they begin to dig and carry firewood and water to their houses and attend to other chores. Most of these Indians are great thieves, liars and drunkards. They have great endurance and without rest- ing or getting tired, they can run from morning till night after deer. Their huts were made of mat- ting placed over four arches. Ev- ery two or three days they put them on their backs and move in search of food. They are a very gay people, and even when al- most starved they dance and ce- lebrate their feasts. The best time of the year is when tunas are ripe. Then they have plenty of food and spend day and night in dancing and eating. So long as the tunas last, they squeeze and. open them and set then to dry. When dried they are put in. bas- kets like figs and kept to be eat- en on the way. Often when we were three or four days without food, they said not to des,apri for soon e would have tunas to eat and their juices to drink. Yet at that time it might be five or six months before tunas would be ripe. But summer with its tunas, brought also many kinds of mos- quitoes to torture us. To protect ourselves, we built big fires of damp, rotten wood. Then at night we wept from the smoke. Some- times the heat of the fires was so intense that we went to the shore to rest. If we succeeded in the Indians send us to kindle the fires. Far- ther inland the Indians go about with firebrands, setting the fire to the prairies and timber to drive off the mosquitoes and to bring out of the ground lizards and other creatures they eat. They also kill deer by encircling them with fire. All over this country there are a great many deer, fowl and o- ther animals. Here also -we came upon cows (buffaloes). I ate their meat, which is better than that of cattle in Spain. Their horns are small, like those of the Mo- orish cattle. Their hair is very long, like fine wool. Some are brownish and other black. The Indians make blankets of the small hides, and of the larger ones they make shoes and _ shields, These cows come from the north, where people live upon their flesh, One time while we were search- ing for fruit of certain trees in a country without trails, I be- came cut off and the people re- turned without me: Trying to find them, I stumbled upon a burning tree and the fire kept me from freezing that night. ‘In the morning I loaded myself with wood, took two burning sticks and set out. For five days I con- tinued my journey, carrying with me the wood and firebrands so that if the fire went out where there was no wood I ould have something of which to make tor- ches, It was my only protection against the cold, for I went ag naked as a new-born child. Before sunset each evening I stopped along a stream. There I scratche. a hole in the ground and warmed the earth with fire before lying down on it. I also built four fires around the hole and, from time to time, got up to poke them. I made bundles of the long grass that’ grew there and cover myself with them at night. One night sparks fell on the straw while I was asleep and I was severely burned before I could jump out. During the five days I did not eat a mouthful of food, and my bare feet bled a great deal. AFOOT ACROSS THE CONTI- NENT Despite the fact that Cabeza de Vaca had become a trader and the other two Spaniards and the negro slave were medicine men, they found it difficult to get together to travel. They were not with the same Indians, and usual- ly the tribes met only when the tunas were ripe. The longer the Spaniards remained with the In- dians, however, the more power they had over them, and the farther their fame spread as po- werful healers. In the spring of 1535, almost seven years after the expedition to Florida had been all but wiped out, the four survivors began to travel in a southwest - direction, People who begged to be healed followed them. By the time mes- quite beans were ripening, they were on the Rio Grande, perhaps not a great distance below the present city of Laredo. The poor natives were so anxious to touch them and’ to be under their pro- tection, that bands from ohe tribe followed them to the camps of the next tribe. So, no matter how far they went, their fame as “children of the sun” went with or before them. The Spaniards were from moun- tainous Spain, and after spending such a long, wretched time on the plains, sight of mountains in northeastern Mexico gave them great joy. Why they did not turn southward, keeping on the east- ern slopes of these mountains is not clear. Westward they con- tinued, lingering here and there to gorge at one place against hunger and thirst beyond. — (Continued on Page 15)—— PAG. 13 ,