[29] In the letter addressed by the survivors to the Audiencia of Santo Domingo (Oviedo, _Historia General y Natural de las Indias_, III., cap. i. 583, Madrid, 1853), it is stated that when the natives were asked whence came these intrusive articles, which included also some pieces of shoes, canvas, broadcloth, and iron, they replied by signs that they had taken them from a vessel that had been wrecked in the bay. Compare also cap. VII. 615. It has been suggested that possibly the objects may have come from the vessel which Lucas Vazquez de Ayllon lost in 1526, but as this wreck occurred at the mouth of Cape Fear River, on the southern coast of North Carolina, it does not seem likely that they could have been derived from this source. That natives of the West Indies had intercourse by canoe with Florida, and that an Arawakan colony was early established on the southwest coast of the peninsula, is now well established. [30] The Apalachee were one of the Muskhogean tribes that occupied northwestern Florida from the vicinity of Pensacola eastward to Ocilla River, their chief seats being in the vicinity of Tallahassee and St. Marks. In 1655 they numbered six or eight thousand, but about the beginning of the eighteenth century they were warred against by the Creeks, instigated by the English of Carolina, and in 1703 and 1704 expeditions by English troops, reinforced by Creek warriors, resulted in the capture and enslavement of about fourteen hundred Apalachee and in practically exterminating the remainder. The town of Apalachicola, on the Savannah River, was inhabited by Apalachee refugees colonized later by the Carolina government, but these were finally merged with the Creeks. Appalachee Bay and the Appalachian Mountains derive their names from this tribe. [31] "Apalachen," as above, in the edition of 1542 (Bandelier translation). Taking these Indians for guides, we departed, and travelling ten or twelve leagues[32] we came to a town of fifteen houses. Here a large piece of ground was cultivated in maize then ripe, and we likewise found some already dry. After staying there two days, we returned to where the comptroller tarried with the men and ships, and related to him and the pilots what we had seen, and the information the natives had given. [32] The Spanish league varied greatly, but in these early narratives the judicial league, equivalent to 2.634 English miles, is usually meant. Distances, however, while sometimes paced, were generally loose guesses, as is often shown by the great disparity in the figures given by two or more chroniclers of the same journey.