In all the exploring expeditions, the need of guides, interpreters, camp laborers and burden bearers was imperative. At one time, Soto possessed eight hundred Indians, given him by an Indian chief, to act as porters.[135] The leaders must have some means of rewarding the services of their soldiers. Gold and other desirable objects were scarce. Indian slaves helped satisfy this need. Soto had the foresight, before setting out on his journey of exploration, to provide guides, consisting of Indian slaves seized in the territory which he expected to traverse,[136] and seized others to act in this capacity as occasion required.[137] Slaves were used for the same purpose by Coronado.[138] The women slaves were used largely as cooks and as mistresses. Soto apportioned women slaves among his men.[139] The narrators relate the capture and distribution of such women in groups of one hundred to three hundred.[140] Women were sometimes given by the chiefs to the white men for this purpose, as in the case of Coronado’s expedition.[141] In general, the treatment of slaves must have depended upon the individual owners. It must be noted that it was held an act of clemency on the part of the victor to enslave rather than to slaughter the captives taken in war, for, according to the ideas of the time, conquered enemies were at the disposal of the conquerors. In the case of Soto’s expedition, the treatment of the slaves appears, on the whole, to have been kind. After the death of Soto, the Spaniards decided to quit the scene of exploration. The Indian slaves could not be taken, for there was no way of transporting them, so it was decided to dismiss them, except about three hundred belonging to the leader Moscoso and some of his friends. To satisfy others who desired to take their Indians with them, Moscoso granted permission to take the slaves as far as the mouth of the river. The owners, moved by an humanitarian motive, and preferring to give up the Indians before sailing, rather than to free them at the mouth of the river to become the prey of enemies, set free five hundred men, women and children.[142] Many of them had learned to speak Spanish, had become Christians, and were so attached to their Spanish owners that they wept bitterly at the separation. This scene indicates an affection between master and slaves that would exist only with kind treatment. It has been held that Soto’s treatment of the Indians was probably better than that practiced by most of the discoverers—a treatment at least partly dictated by policy, for the Indians of the section traversed by him were superior to those of Central and South America, both in courage and perseverance.[143] Those Indians who continued the journey with the Spaniards were set free by the viceroy on reaching Mexico.[144] In the siege of Tigeux