The most prominent feature of their religion was sun-worship, and, like other wild American tribes, they abounded in “medicine-men,” who combined the functions of priest, physician, and necromancer.

Social distinctions were sharply defined among them.  Their chiefs, whose office was hereditary, sometimes exercised a power almost absolute.  Each village had its chief, subordinate to the grand chief of the nation.  In the language of the French narratives, they were all kings or lords, vassals of the great monarch Satouriona, Outina, or Potanou.  All these tribes are now extinct, and it is difficult to ascertain with precision their tribal affinities.  There can be no doubt that they were the authors of the mounds and other remains at present found in various parts of Florida.

Their fort nearly finished, and their league made with Satouriona, the gold-hunting Huguenots were eager to spy out the secrets of the interior.  To this end the lieutenant, Ottigny, went up the river in a sail-boat.  With him were a few soldiers and two Indians, the latter going forth, says Laudonniere, as if bound to a wedding, keen for a fight with the hated Thimagoa, and exulting in the havoc to be wrought among them by the magic weapons of their white allies.  They were doomed to grievous disappointment.

The Sieur d’Ottigny spread his sail, and calmly glided up the dark waters of the St. John’s.  A scene fraught with strange interest to the naturalist and the lover of Nature.  Here, two centuries later, the Bartrams, father and son, guided their skiff and kindled their nightly bivouac-fire; and here, too, roamed Audubon, with his sketch-book and his gun.  Each alike has left the record of his wanderings, fresh as the woods and waters that inspired it.  Slight, then, was the change since Ottigny, first of white men, steered his bark along the still breast of the virgin river.  Before him, like a lake, the redundant waters spread far and wide; and along the low shores, or jutting points, or the waveless margin of deep and sheltered coves, towered wild, majestic forms of vegetable beauty.  Here rose the magnolia, high above surrounding woods; but the gorgeous bloom had fallen, that a few weeks earlier studded the verdant dome with silver.  From the edge of the bordering swamp the cypress reared its vast buttressed column and leafy canopy.  From the rugged arms of oak and pine streamed the gray drapery of the long Spanish moss, swayed mournfully in the faintest breeze.  Here were the tropical plumage of the palm, the dark green masses of the live-oak, the glistening verdure of wild orange-groves; and from out the shadowy thickets hung the wreaths of the jessamine and the scarlet trumpets of the bignonia.