94 Mackenzie’s Voyages

in Europe, Spain was fated, in the race for supremacy, to
be ousted by more vigorous nations.

Her advance northward was blocked by a desert region,
but by the end of the seventeenth century her missions had
reached Santa Fé on the upper Rio Grande, in latitude
35°-40°. This thin line of settlement, however, was a mere
outlier, isolated from the central government. With seaports
at Acapulco and San Blas and navigators who had sailed
both oceans at her command, it may be wondered why she
had not already taken possession of the entire Pacific
Coast.

As early as 1539, under the direction of Cortes, Ulloa
had explored the coast to within 200 miles of the present
city of San Diego. In 1543 de Soto with a band of adventurers
had traversed the vast region now forming the south-western
states, up as far as the Ohio, from which point he descended
the Mississippi to the Gulf. This expedition convinced the
authorities that no wealthy nations were to be found in the
north, and explorations by land were not pursued.

In the same year Cabrillo sailed north to about the
forty-third parallel. “The navigators of the day found the
prevailing north-west winds a hindrance, and did not pursue
their voyages in that direction.

Portugal had lost the Philippines to Spain, and the Spanish
ships, in order to avoid the Portuguese buccaneers off the
Cape of Good Hope, found it expedient to open up a line of
travel to their new possessions across the Pacific from
Mexico. ‘The trade-winds were followed across to Asia,
and a return was made by the westerlies which brought them
to land in the neighbourhood of .Cape Mendocino. The
shipping was thus absorbed in a lucrative trade.

The early history of this coast discloses a curious hiatus
between Cape Mendocino and Alaska which persisted until

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