A WINTER IN AN INDIAN VILLAGE. The soldiers passed the severe winter of 1540-1541 comfortably quartered in the best houses of the Indian village. A plentiful supply of corn and beans had been left by the unfortunate owners. The live stock brought from Mexico furnished an abundance of fresh meat. Coronado required the Indians to furnish three hundred pieces of cloth for cloaks and blankets for his men, to take the place of their own, now worn out. Nor did the officers give the Indians time to secure the cloth that was demanded, but forced them to take their own cloaks and blankets off their backs. When a soldier came upon an Indian whose blanket was better than his, he compelled the unlucky fellow to exchange with him without more ado. Coronado's strenuous efforts to provide well for the comforts of his men made him much loved by them, but much hated by the Indians. It is no wonder that such treatment drove the Indians into rebellion, and that Coronado was obliged to carry on a cruel war of reconquest and revenge. THE TALE OF QUIVIRA. An Indian slave in one of the villages cheered Coronado and his followers with a fabulous tale about a wonderful city, many days' journey across the plains to the northeast, which he called Quivira. The king of Quivira, he said, took his nap under a large tree, on which were hung little gold bells, which put him to sleep as they swung in the air. Every one in the city had jugs and bowls made of wrought gold. The slave was probably tempted by the eagerness of his hearers to make his tale bigger. He perhaps made it as enticing as he could in order to lead the strangers away to perish in the pathless plains where water would be scarce and corn unknown. THE SEARCH FOR QUIVIRA. The slave's story deceived the Spaniards. Coronado grasped eagerly at the only hope left of finding a rich country and marched away in search of Quivira. He traveled to the northeast for seventy-seven days. There were no guiding land marks. Soldiers measured the distance traveled each day by counting the footsteps. The plains were flat, save for an occasional channel cut by some river half buried in the sand; they were barren, except for a short wiry grass and a small rim of shrubs and stunted trees along the watercourses. QUIVIRA. The most marvelous sight of the long journey was the herds of buffaloes in countless numbers. The Indians guided Coronado in the end to a cluster of Indian villages which they called Quivira. This was somewhere in what is now central Kansas near Junction City. The Indians were in all probability the Wichitas. Here again the great explorer met with a bitter disappointment. [Illustration: INDIAN TEPEES]