I wish to advise those of you who speak now of a burden of four days and nights in luxurious Pullman cars to step out on the soil of California as though you had performed a deed of heroism, that a Spanish soldier, Cabeza de Vaca, with the courage of primitive Christianity, walked from Florida to the Gulf of California, though it took him seven years to accomplish his task; and the wonderfully brave Friar Marcos de Niza pioneered his way on foot thirteen hundred miles into the heart of Arizona through deserts and hordes of Apaches, in his efforts to plant the cross of civilization among the children of the new world. Nay, the Grand Canyon of Arizona, now one of the greatest natural wonders of the world, was seen by a young Spanish lieutenant and his twenty soldiers three hundred years before the Anglo-Saxon took a glimpse at its wonderful and awe-inspiring beauty. These and other similar facts are attested by the report of the Bureau of Ethnology of Washington, as well as by many other reliable authorities, including that singularly gifted and scholarly student of Spanish history and folk lore, Charles F. Lummis of Los Angeles, himself a Puritan on both sides of his house for several generations back. It was the fortitude of this Spanish race, coupled by its strong devotion to the faith which you and I profess, which enabled them to solve the Indian problem as it has never been attempted since. While under our present system of the government of this United States, the Indian has been an outcast and a derelict to be robbed and cheated by his white brother, yet on the other hand the Spanish missionary brought into the life of the simple native of the new world the wholesome light of Christianity, which made him recognize in the Red Man the same soul which was made in the image and likeness of the common Creator of us all. In that spirit of brotherhood and charity he obtained the confidence and good will of the Indians, almost without exception, throughout the length and breadth of the countries that he explored. And while his path was beset with dangers from the grim forces of nature, and occasionally the crown of martyrdom was given to him by an unthinking hand of those he was coming to evangelize, yet he faltered not in his footsteps. Today the memory of Columbus may be coupled with and attributed, on our part, to the splendid heroism and Christian fortitude of the great Spanish race which continued the work of Columbus with all that it entailed for the betterment of humanity."