In 1604, Don Juan de Onate, the wealthy governor of New Mexico, determined to cross from his headquarters at the village of San Juan on the Rio Grande, by this route to the South Sea, and, accompanied by thirty soldiers and two padres, he set forth, passing west by way of the pueblo of Zuni, and probably not seeing at that time the celebrated Inscription Rock,* for, though his name is said to be first of European marks, the date is 1606.

From Zuni he went to the Moki towns, then five in number, and possibly somewhat south of the present place.

Beyond Moki ten leagues, they crossed a stream flowing north-westerly, which was called Colorado from the colour of its water,--the first use of the name so far traced.

This was what we now call the Little Colorado.

They understood it to discharge into the South Sea (Pacific), and probably Onate took it for the very headwaters of the Buena Guia which Alarcon had discovered over sixty years before.