The Portland daily press., 1883-05-25
A Florida Legend of the Fountain of Per-
petual Youth.
TSt, Aurustine Cor. philadelnhia press

lSt. Augustine Cor. Philadelphia Press.l
No place has more romantic history than
St. Augustine. 1t is a fact that little is
really known of the early days of the place.
This uncertainty has developed the natural
tendency to involve such obscurity in ro-
nance, and the result is several pretty stor-
les, which are interesting, and may be true.
1t is believed that Juan Ponce de Leon, the
gallant old Spanish navigator and companion
of Columbus, in the later days of his event
full life, discovered the site of the city, (which
was an Indian village. A beautiful Carib
maiden, Aleida, whom the gallant Spaniard
had seized in some of the Virgin islands off
the coast, told De Leon of the spring of
eternsl youth, and her beauty, as we'll as his
advancing years, caused him to make a val
liant effort to find it. For this purpose, ,as well
as that of discovery De Leon made perma-
nent settlement at st. Augustine in 1912
and laid the foundations of the old fort
which stands just north of the town, COW
cred with the mold and dust of three CEN
turies and officered and garrisoned by a vet
eran ordnance sergeant.
De Leon's mission, peaceful and romantic
as 1t was, led him to make treaties with the
Indians, the friendly Selooes and the war
like Yotematoes. Following the custom of
European courts, though in an humble way,
he established bull fights at Torroville
Villa del Torro) in the city limits, and
taught the savages the pleasures of life as
he understood them. Tomoka, the chief of
the Caribs, the most savage of tribes, became
enamored of Aleida at one of the games in
stituted by De Leon, and demanded that he
and the Spanish cavalier should fight for
her fair hand. This De Leon, who was
aged and infirm, refused to do, but proposed
grand combat between his soldiers and the
tribe Of Tomoka. Meantime, De Leon had
discovered a spring, which is still shown
just above the Sebastian river, which was
regarded with venerable superstition by the
Indians. The waters had such effect on De
Leon that he believed that it was fountain
of youth. According to tradition an angel
came every evening to drink of the s'water
of life," as he Indians called it, and the
fewdrops falling from his wings gave to the
spring its continual curative and restoring
powers. A curiously wrought cup of clay
from which the angel drank is still in the
whose son Jim was so drunk IN TIE KTssIIi-
NEE City saloon the other day, aud is re-
garded as the most sacred of relics by the
SemlnOleS. 1OmOka 0lQ not Delleve IN the
superstition, and he greatly offended the
Setooes and Yotematoes by drinking ou. Of
and at last seizing the cup, which was
thought to be the vilest sacrilege. Ponce de
Leon, angered at Tomoka's love for Aleida
and full of the superstition of the time, de
termined upon the destruction of that chief,
and sailed out of the fort with his soldiers
to attack him.
The two warriors met De Leon's page
threw himself before Tomokas spear and
saved De Icons life for the moment, but it
was still at the mercy of the savage. Sud
denly Aleida, attired in the dress of Carib
which she had slain, darted forward and,
drawing her bow, pierced Tomoka to the
heart, and reaching forward to snatch the
sacred cup from the dead chiefs neck, was
struck by poisoned arrow and fell dead.
The battle was decided by De Icons friends,
the Selooes and Yetomatoes, appearing and
killing every one of the Caribs. Tomoka's
body was buried on Anastasia island, near
the Coquina quarries, where the giant re-
mains were discovered some years ago.
Aeida and the page were buried near the
spring, and Ponce De Leon ,sorely wounded,
was borne into the fort. An old slab of
marble dug up near the spring, which now
bears De Icons name, has this inscription
in Spanish: "This narrow place is the
sepulchre of a hero, who was in name lion
and much more so in reality, Ponce De
Leon"