that his pilot Ximenes entered into a plot for his assassination, which he carried into effect, and took the command of the vessel.  Continuing the voyage, he discovered an island which he named Santa Cruz, which was inhabited by savages, and where he set on shore two Franciscan friars and several persons who had refused to join in the mutiny.  Being in want of water, he went at the same time on shore for that purpose; but he and all who landed were put to death by the savages within view of the ship.  After this misfortune the survivors returned to New Spain.

The Marquis del Valle was so much vexed by these disappointments that he resolved to go in person upon discovery, with three ships which he had ready for launching at Teguantepec.  When the Spaniards learnt that he meant to embark on a voyage of discovery, they thought that success was quite certain, and great numbers resolved to accompany him.  Above 320 persons, including women, offered their services, as there were above 130 of them married men, who brought their wives along with them.  Leaving Teguantepec in May 1536 or 1537, accompanied by Andres de Tapia and several other officers, with some ecclesiastics, physicians and surgeons, and as many colonists as the vessels could contain, he sailed for the island of Santa Cruz, where he arrived after a prosperous voyage, and sent back the ships to bring over the remainder of the people[10].  The second voyage was not so fortunate, as they separated in a gale of wind near the river of St Peter and St Paul, one only of the ships arriving at the island of Santa Cruz, where the marquis anxiously expected them, as provisions were growing scarce.  One of the other vessels, which contained the provisions, was stranded on the coast of Xalisco, whence most of the people returned to New Spain.  The other vessel came to a bay which the people named Guayaval, from the quantity of guayavas which they found there.  During this time, the marquis and his people were experiencing extreme distress on the uncultivated island of Santa Cruz, twenty-three of the soldiers dying of famine, and the rest sinking daily, and cursing his expeditions and discoveries.  Taking fifty soldiers with him in the ship which had arrived, he went in search of the other two; and after some considerable search he found one stranded, as already mentioned, on the coast of Xalisco, and abandoned by the people, and met the other among some rocks.  Having repaired these vessels, he brought them with a quantity of provisions to Santa Cruz, where his famished colonists eat so voraciously that half of them died.  Anxious to quit this scene of misery, the marquis embarked from Santa Cruz, and, continuing his project of discoveries, fell in with the land of California, heartily tired of his fruitless pursuit, yet unwilling to return to New Spain without effecting some important discovery.  When the Marchioness del Valle had notice of the loss of one of the vessels, she became very apprehensive