JUAN PONCE DE LEON:
DREAMER AND SEARCHER FOR THE FOUNTAIN OF PERPETUAL YOUTH.
(1460-1521
"The tropic breeze fanned a fairy tale, a tale of the sheltering palms,
Where the grimy sea cow sunned herself, in the bay where the ground-swell calms.
It sang a song of a fountain clear in the depth of the tropic glade,
Where the bubbles sparkle clear and cool, o’er the rocks of brown and jade.
It spoke of the waters healing, which to bathe in meant joyous youth,
To the gray-haired and decrepit, with wrinkles and hollowed tooth.
And the breeze came to the ears of men, who believed it to be no lie.
So the agéd De Leon chimeras chased, in the land where he was to die."
“God’s will be done!” cried he. “Blessed be His holy name!”
"In sorrow and with downcast faces, the Spaniards turned about, and wearily, dejectedly, mournfully, wended their way back to the camp of the friendly Olatheta.
The good Knight Ponce de Leon traveled through much of this beautiful land of Florida, fought many a stiff fight with the native inhabitants, and finally sailed back to the isle of Porto Rico, bearing marvelous tales of this land of promise, but no water which would restore the aged to youth and beauty. He journeyed to Spain, was received right graciously by the King, and came back to his island home, expecting to remain there in peaceful pursuits, until his demise.
Yet, still hoping to find that mystical and fabled fountain, he finally fitted out two caravels, and, with a larger force than had followed his banner in the first expedition, resolved to again explore the western coast of beautiful Florida.
This journey was to be his undoing. At every point naked savage’s fought desperately against his mailed warriors. In one of these encounters he was attempting to rescue one of his comrades, when he was hit by an arrow in the thigh. The barb penetrated the protecting armor to the bone. He was rescued by his faithful followers and was carried to his ship, weak and fainting from the loss of blood. It is said by some, that, although the arrow was withdrawn, a part of the arrow-head, which was of flint, did not come wholly away.
Suffering and delirious, the brave old navigator was borne to the harbor of Matanzas in Cuba, where was a settlement which he, himself, had founded. His adventurous companions lifted the pallet upon which he lay on the upper deck, where the cooling breezes might alleviate his fever, lowered it into a boat, and, when the shore was reached, carried him tenderly into an unfinished house, which he was having constructed. They brought his suit of mail, his banner, and his sword, placing them around him so that he might feel at home. Delirium now seized the care-worn explorer, and thus he lay for days, as, in fancy he saw himself a boy again, climbing the bold rocks of the Sierras after young eagles, contending in the courtyard with his brothers, or chasing the brown deer in the leafy forests.
Then the camp and battle scenes passed before his eager vision; voyages over vast seas among beauteous islands; expeditions through palms and moss-grown mimosas; journeying to the villages of brown-skinned natives.
One night, peace came to the old warrior, and there was weeping and sorrow among his staunch and battle-scarred companions.
They carried the body of the good knight to the Isle of Porto Rico, where they first gave him a sepulcher within the castle, but eventually his ashes were deposited beneath the high altar of the Dominican church in San Juan de Puerto Rico, where they rested for more than three hundred years."
Famous Discoverers and Explores of America, Charles Haven Ladd Johnston, transcribed by Project Gutenberg
Ponce de León and the Fountain of Youth, Men of the West
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