The Spanish in the Southwest . l the vast country traversed by Coro-nado? Why was Coronado sad when he wrote his letter to the king ofSpain ? Why was Alarcons expedition a failure? CHAPTER VII THE SPANISH CLAIM TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN To understand why Spain thought that she had so gooda claim to the Pacific Ocean, to all the islands in it, andto all the lands border-ing it, we must go backto the beginning of theperiod of discoveries. Before Columbusstarted out from Spainto find Asia by sailingwest, several of thenations of Europe hadbeen getting rich goodsfrom India and China,which had been car-
The Spanish in the Southwest . l the vast country traversed by Coro-nado? Why was Coronado sad when he wrote his letter to the king ofSpain ? Why was Alarcons expedition a failure? CHAPTER VII THE SPANISH CLAIM TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN To understand why Spain thought that she had so gooda claim to the Pacific Ocean, to all the islands in it, andto all the lands border-ing it, we must go backto the beginning of theperiod of discoveries. Before Columbusstarted out from Spainto find Asia by sailingwest, several of thenations of Europe hadbeen getting rich goodsfrom India and China,which had been car-ried by caravans across the deserts of Asia. The cara-van routes, however, were so dangerous and the journeyrequired so much time, that people began to wonderif some easier way could not be discovered. This thoughtled Columbus to study all the maps and charts he couldfind, to see how much truth there was in the theorythat the world is round. The same idea caused the Por-tuguese to send out ships to see if, by sailing around 79. Spanish ships of war 80 Discoverers arid Explorers Africa, a water route to China and India might not bediscovered. Both Spain and Portugal were trying to findan easier way to reach the far East; the one by goingwest, the other by going east. It must be remembered that at this time most of thepeople of Europe thought the world to be flat, and theonly countries known to them outside of Europe werethose in Asia and Africa which bordered the Mediterra-nean Sea. Africa was almost unknown, except that itwas a large region south of the Mediterranean. With allthe world so strange to them, it required as much couragefor the Portuguese sailors to explore the hot coasts ofwestern Africa as it did for Columbus to steer his vesselacross the seemingly shoreless Atlantic. The Portuguese were the first to reach the hoped-forrich lands of the East, and they came back loaded withthe silks, spices, and jewels for which all Europe was soready to pay the highest prices. The
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