University of Virginia Library

EPISTLE DEDICATORY.

I very well know the deep interest which you take in all
researches which aim to develope the early history of our State
and country, and sympathize with you very sincerely in that local
feeling which delights to trace, on your own grounds, and in your
own neighborhood, the doubtful progresses of French and
Spaniard, in their wild passion for adventure or eager appetite for
gold. I have no doubt that the clues are in your hands which
shall hereafter conduct you along a portion of the route pursued
by that famous cavalier, Hernando de Soto; and I am almost
satisfied that the region of Silver Bluff was that distinguished in
the adventures of the Spanish Adelantado, by the presence of that
dusky but lovely princess of Cofachiqui, who welcomed him with
so much favor and whom he treated with an ingratitude as
unhandsome as unknightly. But I must not dwell on a subject
so seductive; particularly, as I entertain the hope, in some future

labor, to weave her legend into an appropriate, and I trust not
unworthy history. For the present, inscribing these pages to you,
as a memorial of a long and grateful intimacy, and of inquiries
and conjectures, musings and meditations, enjoyed together, which,
it is my hope, have resulted no less profitably to you than to
myself, I propose briefly to give you the plan of the volume in
your hands.

The design of the narrative which follows, contemplates, in
nearly equal degree, the picturesque and the historical. It
belongs to a class of writings with which the world has been long
since made familiar, through a collection of the greatest interest,
the body of which continues to expand, and which has been
entitled the “Romance of History.” This name will justly apply
to the present sketches, yet must not be construed to signify any
large or important departure, in the narrative, from the absolute
records of the Past. The romance here is not suffered to supersede
the history. On the contrary, the design of the writer has
been simply to supply the deficiencies of the record. Where the
author, in this species of writing, has employed history, usually,
as a mere loop, upon which to hang his lively fancies and audacious
inventions, embodying in his narrative as small a portion of
the chronicle as possible, I have been content to reverse the
process, making the fiction simply tributary, and always subordinate
to the fact. I have been studious to preserve all the vital
details of the event, as embodied in the record, and have only
ventured my own “graffings” upon it in those portions of the
history which exhibited a certain baldness in their details, and
seemed to demand the helping agency of art. In thus interweaving
the history with the fiction, I have been solicitous always of
those proprieties and of that vraisemblance, in the introduction of

new details, which are essential to the chief characteristics of
the history; seeking equally to preserve the general integrity
of the record from which I draw my materials, and of that art
which aims to present them in a costume the most picturesque.
My labor has been not to make, but to perfect, a history; not to
invent facts, but to trace them out to seemingly inevitable
results;—to take the premise and work out the problem;—recognize
the meagre record which affords simply a general outline;
and endeavor, by a severe induction, to supply its details and processes.
I have been at no such pains to disguise the chronicle,
as will prevent the reader from separating,—should he desire
to do so,—the certain from the conjectural; and yet, I trust, that
I have succeeded in so linking the two together, as to prevent the
lines of junction from obtruding themselves offensively upon his
consciousness. Upon the successful prosecution of this object,
apart from the native interest which the subject itself possesses,
depends all the merit of the performance. It is by raising the
tone of the history, warming it with the hues of fancy, and making
it dramatic by the continued exercise of art, rather than by any
actual violation of its recorded facts, that I have endeavored to
awaken interest. To bring out such portions of the event as
demand elevation—to suppress those which are only cumbrous,
and neither raise the imposing, nor relieve the unavoidable; and
to supply, from the probable, the apparent deficiencies of the
actual, have been the chief processes in the art which I have
employed. What is wholly fictitious will appear rather as episodical
matter, than as a part of the narrative; and a brief historical
summary, even in regard to the episode, shall occasionally be
employed to determine, for the reader, upon how much, or how
little, he may properly rely as history.

The experiment of Coligny, in colonizing Florida, is one of
those remarkable instances in the early settlement of this country,
which deserve the particular attention of our people. Its wild and
dark events, its startling tragedies, its picturesque and exciting
incidents, long since impressed themselves upon my imagination,
as offering suitable materials for employment in romantic fiction.
In the preparation of the work which follows, I have rather yielded
to the requisitions of publishers and the public, than followed the
suggestions of my own taste and judgment. Originally, I commenced
the treatment of this material, in the form of poetry; but
the stimulus to a keen prosecution of the task was wanting: not
so much, perhaps, in consequence of my own diminished interest
in the subject, as because of the indifference of readers; who, in
all periods have determined the usual direction of the writer.
Hereafter, I may prosecute the experiment upon this history in
still another fashion. I do not regard this work as precluding me
from trying the malleability of its subject, and from seeking to
force it into a mould more grateful to the dictates of my imagination.
In abandoning the design, however, of shaping it to the
form of narrative poetry, I may, at least, submit to the reader
such portions of the verse as are already written. My purpose,
as will be seen, by the fragmentary passages which follow (in the
Appendix at the close of the volume) was to seize upon the strong
points of the subject, and exhibit the whole progress of the action,
in so many successive scenes; as in the plan adopted by Rogers
in his “Columbus”—the one scene naturally forming the introduction
to the other, and the whole, a complete and single history.
To these fragments let me refer you. With these, my
original design found its limit; the spirit which had urged me thus
far, no longer quickening me with that impatient eagerness which

can alone justify poetic labors. The plan is one which I am no
longer likely to pursue. It will no doubt have a place of safe-keeping
and harborage in some one of Astolpho's mansions. It
need not be deplored on earth. I shall be but too happy if those
who read the performance which follows, shall forbear the wish
that it had shared the same destiny. To you, at least, I venture
to commend it with a very different hope.