[1] From Coronado's letter to Mendoza, dated August 3, 1540,
Mendoza being Viceroy of Mexico, by whom Coronado had been sent
out. Coronado's expedition was a great disappointment to all
concerned in it, inasmuch as it resulted in failure to find the
fabled "seven cities of Cibola." He had 300 Spaniards with him and
800 Indians. Instead of finding great towns, as promised by Marcos
and others, he discovered only a poor village of 200 people,
situated on a rocky eminence. The expedition, however, in spite of
this failure, remains one of the most important exploring
expeditions ever undertaken in America. Opinions differ as to how
far north Coronado went, some maintaining that he reached a point
north of the boundary line between Kansas and Nebraska. His letter
was printed by Hakluyt in Volume III of his "Voyages," and may be
found in the "Old South Leaflets." Mr. Thwaites says of the
expedition:

"Disappointed, but still hoping to find the country of gold,
Coronado's gallant little army, frequently thinned by death and
desertion, for three years beat up and down the southwestern
wilderness: now thirsting in the deserts, now penned up in
gloomy canons, now crawling over pathless mountains, suffering
the horrors of starvation and of despair, but following this
will-o'-the-wisp with a melancholy perseverance seldom seen in
man save when searching for some mysterious treasure. Coronado
apparently twice crossed the State of Kansas. 'Through mighty
plains and sandy heaths,' says the chronicler of the expedition,
'smooth and wearisome and bare of wood. All that way the plains
are as full of crookback oxen (buffaloes) as the mountain Serena
in Spain is of sheep. They were a great succor for the hunger