These Spanish conquistadores were some real mean sons of bitches.

This much you gotta hand them, though: They didn't make any bones about it; they just made bones. They weren't there to trade twenty bucks worth of beads for the whole island. They were there to kill the men, capture the women, enslave the whole bunch of them, and work them literally all literally to death digging gold out of the earth. They weren't pioneers, settlers, or colonists. They were conquistadores. And there weren't too bashful to let you know it.

Nothing better typifies the Spanish method than the wonderful account of Hernando de Soto's four year expedition from Florida to Illinois to Texas to Mexico.

What's more, nothing better illustrates the raw excitement that you can get from first hand accounts of hair raising deeds than this detailed narrative by a guy who went with de Soto. We don't even know his name. He just called himself "A Gentleman from Elvas".

Hold on to your hats, guys. Elvas is in the building.