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Our men landed about day-break, a mile and a half from the village, but the inhabitants took the alarm, and got all away, except two old women, from whom we learnt that the viceroy, on receiving intelligence of enemies having come across the isthmus of Darien into the South Sea, had ordered all their ships to be set on fire, all the goats in the isle of Plata to be destroyed, and that the inhabitants on the coast should keep no more provisions than were necessary for their present use.
After remaining for some time on the coast, gathering all the information he could obtain, Balboa led his travel-worn men back to Darien, resolved to return with a stronger force next year and seek that distant land of gold. But this exploit was left for Pizarro, one of the ablest and bravest of the men who took part in this pioneer expedition.
So that when I shall hereafter detail to you all the specialities and concentrations of potency everywhere lurking in this expansive monster; when I shall show you some of his more inconsiderable braining feats; I trust you will have renounced all ignorant incredulity, and be ready to abide by this; that though the Sperm Whale stove a passage through the Isthmus of Darien, and mixed the Atlantic with the Pacific, you would not elevate one hair of your eye-brow.
"I am a little frazled, I admit, and a breath of mountain-air will do me good. I will visit my brother Walt in Darien. It's hard to go. My heart begins to ache already with prospective hunger. You have been my world, my one ambition for three months my incessant care and thought." "All the more reason why you should forget me and things dramatic for a while.
For more than nine months he followed the windings of these shores, in the face of all kinds of perils and difficulties, and succeeded in laying down the chart of the coast from the part since named Truxillo, as far as the Gulf of Darien.
First, to speak of men of action: there was Madoc, the son of Owain Gwynedd, who discovered America, centuries before Columbus was born; then there was "the irregular and wild Glendower," who turned rebel at the age of sixty, was crowned King of Wales at Machynlleth, and for fourteen years contrived to hold his own against the whole power of England; then there was Ryce Ap Thomas, the best soldier of his time, whose hands placed the British crown on the brow of Henry the Seventh, and whom bluff Henry the Eighth delighted to call Father Preece; then there was who? why Harry Morgan, who led those tremendous fellows the Buccaneers across the Isthmus of Darien to the sack and burning of Panama.
Vasco Nunes de Balboa, a Spaniard, as you see by his name, was born in 1475. He was one of the adventurers who pursued the path which Columbus had pointed out. He led a party of Spaniards, who going out from Darien founded a colony in the neighboring regions. Some gold being found the Spaniards got into a violent quarrel.
France had Louisiana; Spain held the Floridas, Mexico, Darien, Terra Firma, Buenos Ayres, Paraguay, Chili, Peru and California; and Portugal ruled the whole of Brazil. All these immense regions are now independent states.
Whether or not he played that music himself on the back of the performing steed is not recorded. Ferdinand was unable to decide between the rival claimants. Finally he determined to send out two expeditions. The Gulf of Uraba, now called the Gulf of Darien, was to be the dividing line between the two allotments of territory.
In 1498, Columbus landed on the continent of South America, and in a few years the entire western coast was explored by subsequent adventurers. In 1512, Ponce de Leon discovered Florida, and the following year, Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Darien, and gazed for the first time upon the Pacific.
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