Oviedo,
the Spanish historian, commemorates the circumstance that this
cacique, Tumaco, subsequently furnished Balboa with a canoe formed
from the trunk of an enormous tree and managed by a great number of
Indians. The handles of the paddles were inlaid with small pearls, a
fact which Balboa caused his companions to testify before the notary,
that it might be reported to the sovereigns as a proof of the wealth of
this newly discovered sea. In another bay of the Pacific coast, this
bold navigator saw groups of islands abounding with pearls, many of
them as large as a man's eye.
Barnard
Shipp states, " The first Spaniards who landed on terra firma found
savages decked with necklaces and bracelets of pearls, and among the
civilized people of Mexico and Peru, pearls of a beautiful form were
generally sought after. The Indians of Virginia wore pendants in their
ears, and round their arms chains and bracelets of pearls."'
When
the King of Spain made Hernando De Soto Governor of Cuba and conqueror
of Florida, with the title of Adelantado, his concession provided that
one-fifth of all the gold and silver, precious stones and pearls, won
in battle, or entering towns, or obtained by barter with the Indians,
be reserved to the Crown. It was further stipulated that the gold and
silver, stones, pearls, and other things which might be found and
taken, as well in the graves, sepulchers, ocues or temples of the
Indians, as in other places where they were accustomed to offer
sacrifices to idols, or in other concealed religious precincts or
buried houses, or in any other public place, " should be equally
divided between the king and the party making the discovery.""
It
is evident that among the valuable trophies of this expedition,
precious pearls were confidently anticipated, and that the Spaniards
were not disappointed in this expectation the early narratives
abundantly testify. These establish beyond all controversy that pearls
were used as ornaments among the Indians of Florida and the South.
It is related how, near the Bay of Espiritu Santo (now Tampa Bay), in Florida, the followers of De Soto came upon
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