Nebraska State Historical Society
Date of this Version
1887
Abstract
It is curious and somewhat romantic to note, that this territory, which was for several years the battle ground of a constitutional struggle over the question of slavery, was, if we are to accept the theory so eloquently defended by Colonel Savage,* first pointed out to a modern race by one himself a bondsman; and that later, a patriotic slave, in order to save his own country from the ravages of the Spaniards. led them to this territory in search of the "seven cities of Cibola," in the land of Quivera. It had been the dream of the Spaniards to rob these cities of their fabled wealth, and enslave the people. The project, however, was but one of the many romantic schemes of this chivalrous race in his search after the marvelous, a disease of the age, of which the Spaniard was typical, and not confined to any particular nation. Instead of the cities whose steeples shone in the light of the sun resplendent with gold and silver, these adventurers, weary with their long journey, found only a country terrifying in its barrenness and vastness of extent, peopled by a race whose aspect was so un-forbidding, and whose nature so fierce and warlike, their only wealth vast herds of untamed buffalo, that after offering up the life of the false slave as some atonement for the hardships they had undergone, they turned their faces wearily towards Mexico.
Comments
Published in TRANSACTIONS AND REPORTS OF THE NEBRASKA HISTORICAL SOCIETY, vol. 2 (Lincoln, NE, 1887).