La Salle and the discovery of the great West - North Central ...

APPENDIX. 487While thus employed, they found another river, fourteenleagues distant, flowing south-southwest. They carriedtheir canoes thither, meeting on the way many lions,leopards, and tigers, which did them no harm ; then theyembarked, paddled a hundred and fifty leagues farther, andfound themselves in the midst of the great nation of theAcanibas, dwelling in many fortified towns, and governs!by King Hagaren, who claimed descent from Montezuma.The King, like his subjects, was clothed with the skins ofmen. Nevertheless, he and they were civilized and polishedin their manners. They worshipped certain frightfulidols of gold in the royal palace. One of them representedthe ancestor of their monarch armed with lance, bow, andquiver, and in the act of mounting his horse; while in hismouth he held a jewel as large as a goose's egg, whichshone like fire, and which, in the opinion of Sagean, was acarbuncle. Another of these images was that of a womanmounted on a golden unicorn, with a horn more than afathom long. After passing, pursues the story, betweenthese idols, which stand on platforms of gold, each thirtyfeet square, one enters a magnificent vestibule, conductingto the apartment of the King. At the four corners of thisvestibule are stationed bands of music, which, to the tasteof Sagean, was of very poor quality. The palace is of vastextent, and the private apartment of the King is twen freightor thirty feet square; the walls, to the height ofeighteen feet, being of bricks of solid gold, and the pavementof the same. Here the King dwells alone, served onlyby his wives, of whom he takes a new one every day. TheFrenchmen alone had the privilege of entering, and weregraciously received.These people carry on a great trade in gold with a nation,believed by S&gean to be the Japanese, as the journey tothem lasts six months. He saw the departure of one of thn