Four days after leaving Tallahassee, the Spaniards came to a deep river, which Colonel C. C. Jones, jun., in his "History of Georgia," says was the Ocklockonnee, very close to the southwest boundary of Georgia. Two days later they came to an Indian village from which the inhabitants fled, but a little later a squad of five soldiers was set upon by the Indians hiding near the encampment. One of the Spaniards was killed, while three others were badly wounded. De Soto left this Indian village on the 11th of March, and presently came to a piece of country which the Spanish historian describes as a desert. But it was not a desert then, and it is not a desert now. It was really a pine barren, such as may be seen to this day in what is called the wire-grass region of southern Georgia. In these barrens the soil is sandy and the land level, stretching away for miles. De Soto and his men saw the primeval pines; but these have long since disappeared, and their places are taken by pines of a smaller growth. On the 21st of March, the Spaniards came to the Ocmulgee River, near which they found an Indian town called Toalli. There will always be a dispute about the route followed by De Soto in his march. This dispute is interesting, but not important. Some say that the expedition moved parallel with the coast until the Savannah River was reached, at a point twenty-five miles below Augusta; but it is just as probable that the route, after reaching the Ocmulgee, was along the banks of that stream and in a northwesterly direction. At Toalli the Indians had summer and winter houses to live in, and they had storehouses for their maize. The women wore blankets or shawls made of the fiber of silk grass, and the blankets were dyed vermilion or black. Thenceforward the Indians whom the Spaniards met with were of a higher order of intelligence, and of a more industrious turn, than those left behind in Florida and along the southern boundary of Georgia. As De Soto marched along, he seized Indians and made guides of them, or made prisoners and held them until he was furnished with guides and interpreters. He also announced to the Indians that he was the Child of the Sun, who had been sent to seek out the greatest Prince and Princess. This made a great impression on the Indians, many of whom were sun worshipers.