United States or United Kingdom ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
When the bewildered chief of the Seloy Indians found that these strange white men were about to destroy his village, he made a bitter protest against their cruelties; but he was no more regarded than if he had been a barking dog.
In fact he was the young Indian from Seloy who had been captured by the Seminoles on the same day with Réné. Having unexpectedly obtained three instead of two white prisoners, and being in need of recruits, Cat-sha had offered to spare this lad's life and set him at liberty if he would become a Seminole and a member of their band.
Short as was the time since they had been discovered off Seloy, swift runners had already conveyed the great tidings of their coming to Micco, the chief of this part of the country, and he and his people were thus prepared to greet them upon their arrival.
In solemn procession, with four priests in front chanting Te Deum, the victors entered St. Augustine in triumph. On the twenty-eighth, when the weary Adelantado was taking his siesta under the sylvan roof of Seloy, a troop of Indians came in with news that quickly roused him from his slumbers. They had seen a French vessel wrecked on the coast towards the south.
Then, while all present listened with the closest attention, E-chee told of the destruction of Seloy and the capture of Fort Caroline by the Spaniards; of his own capture, and that of Réné de Veaux and two other white men, by the Seminoles; of his escape, and of the terrible fate now awaiting those still in the hands of the outlaws.
"I am E-chee from Seloy, where I saw thee when thou first set foot on the land of my people. Dost thou not remember?" "Art thou not E-chee the Seminole?" "To all appearance I am become one of these runaways, but my heart is that of a true man, and I seek only an opportunity to escape from them and to rejoin my own people. If indeed any of my people be left alive," he added, bitterly.
As they left, Réné gave many a backward glance at the pleasant little village of Seloy, and would have loved to linger there among its simple and kindly people.
After thus taking possession of the country, Menendez proclaimed that the new city, founded upon the smoking blood-stained ruins of the pleasant little Indian village of Seloy should be called "San Augustin," which name it bears to this day, and that the River of Dolphins should be thereafter known as the "San Augustin River."
Laudonniere thought he recognized the inlet as one leading into a broad river, on the opposite side of which was located an Indian village called Seloy.
Guests began to arrive, coming from Seloy and other coast villages from the north, and from the broad savannas of the fertile Alachua land, until many hundred of them were encamped within a few miles of Fort Caroline.
Word Of The Day