11. From this place the wanderers passed across Northern Georgia from the Chattahoochee to the Coosa; thence down that river to Lower Alabama. Here they came upon the Indian town of Mauville, or Mobile, where a battle was fought with the natives. The town was set on fire, and two thousand five hundred of the Indians were killed or burned to death. Eighteen of De Soto's men were killed and a hundred and fifty wounded. The Spaniards also lost most of their horses and baggage. [Illustration: De Soto Reaches the Mississippi.] 12. De Soto and his men next turned to the north, and by the middle of December reached the country of the Chickasaws. They crossed the Yazoo, and found an Indian village, which promised them shelter for the winter. Here, in February, 1541, they were attacked by the Indians, who set the town on fire, but Spanish weapons and discipline again saved De Soto and his men. [Sidenote: Discovery of the Mississippi.] 13. The Spaniards next set out to journey farther westward, and the guides brought them to the Mississippi. The point where the Father of Waters was first seen by White men was a little north of the thirty-fourth parallel of latitude; the day of the discovery can not certainly be known. The Indians came down the river in a fleet of canoes, and offered to carry the Spaniards over; but a crossing was not effected until the latter part of May. 14. De Soto's men now found themselves in the land of the Dakotas. The natives at one place were going to worship the Spaniards, but De Soto would not permit such idolatry. They continued their march to the St. Francis River; thence westward for about two hundred miles; thence southward to the tributaries of the Washita River. On the banks of this stream they passed the winter of 1541-42. [Sidenote: Death of De Soto.] 15. De Soto now turned toward the sea, and came upon the Mississippi in the neighborhood of Natchez. His spirit was completely broken. A fever seized upon his emaciated frame, and death shortly ensued. The priests chanted a requiem, and in the middle of the night his companions put his body into a rustic coffin and sunk it in the Mississippi. 16. Before his death, De Soto had named Moscoso as his successor. Under his leadership, the half-starved adventurers next crossed the country to the upper waters of the Red River, and then ranged the hunting-grounds of the Pawnees and the Comanches. In December of 1542 they came again to the Mississippi, where they built seven boats, and on the 2d of July, 1543, set sail for the sea. The distance was almost five hundred miles, and seventeen days were required to make the descent. On reaching the Gulf of Mexico, they steered to the southwest, and finally reached the settlement at the mouth of the River of Palms.