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Our Cae/iolic Heritage in T ezas
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as many as forty Indian pueblos on either side of the river. The natives were friendly and a lively trade was carried on with them during the stay. From here Pineda resumed his homeward journey, still following the coast closely and noting the character of the land, the vegetation, and the natives. Upon his arrival in Jamaica, about nine months after his departure, he reported that no strait had been discovered; that the entire coast line from Florida to Veracruz was part of the mainland; and that the country visited was healthy, fertile, and peaceful. He declared there were many rivers where fine gold could be obtained, as shown by the ornaments which the natives wore on their noses, ears, and other parts of the body. The Indians, he said, were tranquil, kindly disposed towards the Spaniards, and inclined to become Christians. Still obsessed with the belief in races of giants and pigmies, it wa5 declared in the official report that there were, in the lands visited, men who were very tall, as much as ten and twelve spans, and others who were medium size, and still others who were very small, five or six spans in height. 26 A careful map was drawn, perhaps by Alaminos, based on the informa- tion acquired during the expedition, on which the entire coast line of Texas and the Gulf of Mexico is delineated from Florida to Yucatan. On this map the points where the exploration of Pineda began and where it ended are indicated. He seems to have claimed the right of first dis- covery for Garay from a point slightly west of Pensacola Bay to a point well to the south of Panuco River. In the original draft of the map, the mouths of six rivers are shown within the area explored by Pineda from Pensacola Bay to about thirty leagues south of Panuco. Of these rivers, however, only two are labeled : Rio del Espiritu Santo, which has been identified with the Mississippi, and the Panuco River. Between these two rivers there are four others left unlabeled. 27 From the details given in the report just described and the declarations of Pineda's men to Cortes, it appears that the expedition visited two distinct rivers on which they stopped at different times. One of these was unquestionably the Panuco, which was entered on the way to Vera- 26 /bid., III, 147-148. 27 Compare the outline map published for the first time in Navarrete, Coleccion de Viages, which appears to be a tracing of the original draft, with the photostat copy of the original published for the first time by Francisco del Paso y Troncoso in his edition of Cervantes de Salazar, Cronica de la Nueva Es,pa1ia (Madrid, 1914). The tracing published by Navarrete shows only five rivers in all, but the original draft of the map shows six.
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