Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1891-12-10
TIE RIVER OF LOST SOULS.
March into Oblivion That Gave the Name
to a Mexican stream.

March into Oblivion That Gave the Name
to a Mexican stream.
Over three ceDturies backward. and be
fore the inql isitive De Soto had lighted his
camp fire on the banks of the Mississippi,
the Spaniarls had achieved two settle
meGtS in this land of the Occidcnt-Sauta
Fe and st. Augustine. They had no
knowledge If the country which lay be
tween these points or its inhabitants As
to what might he the dangers and dead
falls of a journey from one place to an
other they were as blindly ignorant as of
the history IF the moon. But this igno-
rance afTecte them not. and full of the I'M
easy spirit OF the hour military party in
Santa re resolved ON an overland eNpedi-
tion to st. Augustine. They knew the dis
tance, for they could figure the latitude
and longitude, and they could get the di-
rection of the compass; but this was tbe
sum of their knowledge
The expedition, numbering some hun
dreds of men, left Santa Re late in the
summer, and crossing the mountains at
the Ration PISS, the present route of the
Santa Fe railroad, they camped that win
ter on the present site of Trinidad The
grass was long in the valley. the game WAS
plenty on the hills, their own stores were
minstrel and glee maiden. these gentle
men of the sword got in as CAV Il season as
they ever have since. Those old dons were
lads of spirit and possessed high hearts As
well as taste for travel. Before them to
the eastward as far as the eve could sweep
spread he desert uncoufined. What was
to he met there they knew not, but their
lack OF know edge was coincident with an
equal lack OF care
With the melting of the SHOWS in the
spring sunshine their women and camp
followers returned to Santa Fe The last
hand was waved Coodby, the last atlios
were uttered and the explorers turned their
resolute faces to the work in hand They
marched down the valley of the little
muddy river, which flows as You read this
through the town of Trinidad The ones
who were to return to Santa Fe watched
them for miles, assisted by the light of the
sun on steel cap and harness. At last
| they were hidden in the willows far down
the valley, AMI this was the last that was
ever known o. them.
With the last flap of the last banner it
was as if they had marched ont of exist
| ence, and whether they sunk in rivers, per
| ished in the drifting SHOWS, or were done
to death by Indians was never told No
sign or trace Of this expedition or its peo-
pie was ever found. There was something
| so eerie and mysterious in the complete
disappearance of this band, something so
dark in the silence of their fate, that the
| superstitious Spaniard made the sign Of
the holy cross when he recalled it. With
| that effort at commemoratiOn which was
the spirit of that time the little muddy
torrent in whose valley the lost explorers
last were seer was called FL Rio de Los
Animas-"The River of Lost Souls
This was the Spanish name when Soub-
tette, Chouteau, Bent, Carson, st. Nrain
and other Representatives of the French
Fur company, of st. Louis, first saw it.
Knowing nothing of the story and assisted
only by their differences drawn from the
name, these translated the appellatiou
into Purgatoire. When the iocund bull
whacker of the overland trail got to it in
his free and easy French he called it the
Picketwire Every brand it ever had
still sticks, all today you will find the
| little vagrant of n stream pursuing its
| glistening mis- sion to the sea.-Kansiis CITY
! Star.