Chapter XXX: Part 2: , No. 4. See also Torquemada (Monarch. Ind., lib. 2, cap. 66), (2)

[451] “Inter omnes eos non constat a quibus factæ sint, justissimo casu, obliteratis tantæ vanitatis auctoribus.” Pliny, Hist. Nat., lib. 36, cap. 17.

[452] _Ante_, p. 200.

[453] At least, this is true of the etymology of these languages, and, as such, was adduced by Mr. Edward Everett, in his Lectures on the Aboriginal Civilization of America, forming part of a course delivered some years since by that acute and highly accomplished scholar.

[454] The mixed breed, from the buffalo and the European stock, was known formerly in the northwestern counties of Virginia, says Mr. Gallatin (Synopsis, sec. 5); who is, however, mistaken in asserting that “the bison is not known to have ever been domesticated by the Indians.” (Ubi supra.) Gomara speaks of a nation, dwelling about 40° north latitude, on the northwestern borders of New Spain, whose chief wealth was in droves of these cattle (_buyes con una giba sobre la cruz_, “oxen with a hump on the shoulders”), from which they got their clothing, food, and drink, which last, however, appears to have been only the blood of the animal. Historia de las Indias, cap. 214, ap. Barcia, tom. ii.

[455] The people of parts of China, for example, and, above all, of Cochin China, who never milk their cows, according to Macartney, cited by Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. iii. p. 58, note. See, also, p. 118.

[456] The native regions of the buffalo were the vast prairies of the Missouri, and they wandered over the long reach of country east of the Rocky Mountains, from 55° north, to the headwaters of the streams between the Mississippi and the Rio del Norte. The Columbia plains, says Gallatin, were as naked of game as of trees. (Synopsis, sec. 5.) That the bison was sometimes found also on the other side of the mountains, is plain from Gomara’s statement. (Hist. de las Ind., loc. cit.) See, also, Laet, who traces their southern wanderings to the river Vaquimi (?), in the province of Cinaloa, on the California Gulf. Novus Orbis (Lugd. Bat., 1633), p. 286.

[457] _Ante_, p. 155.

Thus Lucretius:

“Et prior æris erat, quam ferri cognitus usus,
Quo facilis magis est natura, et copia major.
Ære solum terræ tractabant, æreque belli
Miscebant fluctus.”
DE RERUM NATURA, lib. 5.

According to Carli, the Chinese were acquainted with iron 3000 years before Christ. (Lettres Améric., tom. ii. p. 63.) Sir J. G. Wilkinson, in an elaborate inquiry into its first appearance among the people of Europe and Western Asia, finds no traces of it earlier than the sixteenth century before the Christian era. (Ancient Egyptians, vol. iii. pp. 241-246.) The origin of the most useful arts is lost in darkness. Their very utility is one cause of this, from the rapidity with which they are diffused among distant nations. Another cause is, that in the first ages of the discovery men are more occupied with availing themselves of it than with recording its history; until time turns history into fiction. Instances are familiar to every school-boy.

[458] [And in this connection also the reader may do well to consider these words of the distinguished Americanist, D. G. Brinton, uttered in the International Congress of Anthropology in 1893: “Up to the present time there has not been shown a single dialect, not an art or an institution, not a myth or a religious rite, not a domesticated plant or animal, not a tool, weapon, game, or symbol, in use in America at the time of the discovery, which had been previously imported from Asia, or from any other continent of the Old World.”--M.]

[459] [The grandson of Ferdinand and Isabella was not Charles the Fifth when the sceptre of Spain was thrust into his hands because his mother Joanna was unfit to rule. Charles called himself king when he made his triumphal entry into Valladolid in 1517. But it was only with the greatest difficulty that the Cortes of Castile was induced to accept him as titular sovereign _in conjunction with his mother_. Her name was to take precedence of his in all royal documents. Until her death in 1555, the year before her son’s abdication, Joanna was the rightful sovereign of Spain. Charles was elected emperor of the Holy Roman Empire in 1519, only two years after he had assumed the control of Spanish affairs. It is not remarkable, therefore, that he should be known to most people only by the more important title. Charles was born in Ghent, February 24, 1500. His father was Philip the Fair, the heir of the German possessions of the house of Hapsburg, and the territories of the house of Burgundy. When the marriage of Philip and Joanna was arranged no one dreamed that their son would succeed to the crown of Spain, for Joanna’s elder brother and elder sister were both alive. Charles scarcely knew his parents. When Isabella of Castile died his father and mother went to Spain to take possession of the kingdom she had left to her daughter. This was in 1506, and from that time until 1517 Charles did not see his mother. His character was slow in forming. Only in athletic sports did he early achieve success. In 1517 the Papal legate Campeggi declared him more fit to be governed than to govern. He was never a good scholar, and was a singularly bad linguist. French was the language he first learned to speak. His native tongue, Flemish, he did not begin to learn until he was thirteen. When he went to Spain he knew so little Spanish that one of the first demands made by the Cortes of Castile was that he should learn that language. He never thoroughly mastered German.--M.]

[460] The following passage--one among many--from that faithful mirror of the times, Peter Martyr’s correspondence, does ample justice to the intemperance, avarice, and intolerable arrogance of the Flemings. The testimony is worth the more, as coming from one who, though resident in Spain, was not a Spaniard. “Crumenas auro fulcire inhiant; huic uni studio invigilant. Nec detrectat juvenis Rex. Farcit quacunque posse datur; non satiat tamen. Quæ qualisve sit gens hæc, depingere adhuc nescio. Insufflat vulgus hic in omne genus hominum non arctoum. Minores faciunt Hispanos, quam si nati essent inter eorum cloacas. Rugiunt jam Hispani, labra mordent, submurmurant taciti, fatorum vices tales esse conqueruntur, quod ipsi domitores regnorum ita floccifiant ab his, quorum Deus unicus (sub rege temperato) Bacchus est cum Citherea.” Opus Epistolarum (Amstelodami, 1610), ep. 608.

[461] Yet the nobles were not all backward in manifesting their disgust. When Charles would have conferred the famous Burgundian order of the Golden Fleece on the Count of Benavente, that lord refused it, proudly telling him, “I am a Castilian. I desire no honors but those of my own country, in my opinion quite as good as--indeed, better than--those of any other.” Sandoval, Historia de la Vida y Hechos del Emperador Cárlos V. (Ambéres, 1681), tom. i. p. 103.

[462] [The tone of the preceding paragraphs is that of the Spanish chroniclers of the seventeenth century, and shows how the author, despite his natural candor and impartiality of mind, had acquired insensibly the habit of considering questions that affected Spain from the national point of view of the class of writers with whom his studies had made him most familiar. Spain is called the “native country” of Charles V., and the “land of his fathers,” although, as hardly any reader will need to be reminded, he was born in the Netherlands and was of Spanish descent only on the maternal side. The term “foreigner” is applied to him as if it indicated some vicious trait in his nature; and the training which he had received as the heir to the Austro-Burgundian dominions is spoken of as erroneous, merely because it had not fitted him for a different position. His manners are contrasted with those of native Spanish sovereigns, as if wanting in graciousness and affability; yet the Spaniards, who alone ever made this complaint, recognized their own ideal of royal demeanor in that of the taciturn and phlegmatic Philip II. In like manner, Charles is supposed to have made his first acquaintance with free institutions on his arrival in Spain; whereas he had been brought up in a country where the power of the sovereign was perhaps more closely restricted by the chartered rights and immunities of the subject than was the case in any other part of Europe. That the union of Spain and the Netherlands was a most incongruous one, disastrous to the freedom, the independence, and the development of both countries, is undeniable; but it was not Charles’s early partiality for the one, but his successor’s far stronger partiality for the other, which rendered the incompatibility apparent and led to a rupture of the connection.--K.]

[463] I will take the liberty to refer the reader who is desirous of being more minutely acquainted with the Spanish colonial administration and the state of discovery previous to Charles V., to the “History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella” (Part 2, ch. 9, 26), where the subject is treated _in extenso_.{*}

{*} [All the documents relative to the commission sent out by Ximenes, including many reports from the commissioners, have been printed in the Col. de Doc. inéd. relativos al Descubrimiento, Conquista y Colonizacion de las Posesiones españolas en América y Oceanía, tom. i.--K.]

[464] See the curious document attesting this, and drawn up by order of Columbus, ap. Navarrete, Coleccion de los Viages y de Descubrimientos (Madrid, 1825), tom. ii. Col. Dip., No. 76.

[465] [Now Haiti and Santo Domingo.--M.]

[466] The island was originally called by Columbus Juana, in honor of Prince John, heir to the Castilian crown. After his death it received the name of Fernandina, at the king’s desire. The Indian name has survived both. Herrera, Hist. general, Descrip., cap. 6.

[467] “Erat Didacus, ut hoc in loco de eo semel tantum dicamus, veteranus miles, rei militaris gnarus, quippe qui septem et decem annos in Hispania militiam exercitus fuerat, homo probus, opibus, genere et fama clarus, honoris cupidus, pecuniæ aliquanto cupidior.” De Rebus gestis Ferdinandi Cortesii, MS.

[468] The story is told by Las Casas in his appalling record of the cruelties of his countrymen in the New World, which charity--and common sense--may excuse us for believing the good father has greatly overcharged. Brevíssima Relacion de la Destruycion de las Indias (Venetia, 1643), p. 28.

[469] [Santiago de Cuba.--M.]

[470] Among the most ancient of these establishments we find the Havana, Puerto del Príncipe, Trinidad, St. Salvador, and Matanzas, or _the Slaughter_, so called from a massacre of the Spaniards there by the Indians. Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 8.

[471] [This statement is erroneous. Prescott did not know that the Havana, or San Cristobal, whence Cordova sailed, was on the south side of Cuba. All authorities agree that the expedition sailed directly westward, that the storm did not occur until Cape San Antonio had been passed, and that the fleet sailed westward by the will of its commander. See Bancroft’s Mexico, vol. i. p. 7.--M.]

[472] Gomara, Historia de las Indias, cap. 52, ap. Barcia, tom. ii.--Bernal Diaz says the word came from the vegetable _yuca_, and _tale_ the name for a hillock in which it is planted. (Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 6.) M. Waldeck finds a much more plausible derivation in the Indian word _Ouyouckatan_, “listen to what they say.” Voyage pittoresque, p. 25.

[473] Two navigators, Solís and Pinzon, had descried the coast as far back as 1506, according to Herrera, though they had not taken possession of it. (Hist. general, dec. 1, lib. 6, cap. 17.) It is, indeed, remarkable it should so long have eluded discovery, considering that it is but two degrees distant from Cuba.

[474] Oviedo, General y natural Historia de las Indias, MS., lib. 33, cap. 1.--De Rebus gestis, MS.--Carta del Cabildo de Vera Cruz (July 10, 1519), MS.--Bernal Diaz denies that the original object of the expedition, in which he took part, was to procure slaves, though Velasquez had proposed it. (Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 2.) But he is contradicted in this by the other contemporary records above cited.

[475] Itinerario de la Isola de Iuchathan, novamente ritrovata per il Signor Joan de Grijalva, per il suo Capellano, MS.--The chaplain’s word may be taken for the date, which is usually put at the eighth of April.

[476] [The fleet left Santiago, April 8, 1518, and Cape San Antonio, May 1.--M.]

[477] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Itinerario del Capellano, MS.

[478] According to the Spanish authorities, the cacique was sent with these presents from the Mexican sovereign, who had received previous tidings of the approach of the Spaniards. I have followed Sahagun, who obtained his intelligence directly from the natives. Historia de la Conquista, MS., cap. 2.

[479] Gomara has given the _per_ and _contra_ of this negotiation, in which gold and jewels of the value of fifteen or twenty thousand _pesos de oro_ were exchanged for glass beads, pins, scissors, and other trinkets common in an assorted cargo for savages. Crónica, cap. 6.

[480] Itinerario del Capellano, MS.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.

[481] “Hombre de terrible condicion,” says Herrera, citing the good Bishop of Chiapa, “para los que le servian, i aiudaban, i que facilmente se indignaba contra aquellos.” Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 3, cap. 10.

[482] At least, such is the testimony of Las Casas, who knew both the parties well, and had often conversed with Grijalva upon his voyage. Historia general de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 113.

[483] Itinerario del Capellano, MS.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 113.--The most circumstantial account of Grijalva’s expedition is to be found in the _Itinerary_ of his chaplain above quoted. The original is lost, but an indifferent Italian version was published at Venice in 1522. A copy, which belonged to Ferdinand Columbus, is still extant in the library of the great church of Seville. The book had become so exceedingly rare, however, that the historiographer Muñoz made a transcript of it with his own hand; and from his manuscript that in my possession was taken.{*}

{*} [Several editions of the Itinerario have been published. The most easily accessible may be found in the _Coleccion de documentos para la historia de Mexico, etc._, tom. i.--M.]

[484] [The house in which he was born, in the Calle de la Feria, was preserved until the present century, and many a traveller has lodged there, desirous, says Alaman, of sleeping in the mansion where the hero was born. In the year 1809 the building was destroyed by the French, and only a few fragments of wall now remain to commemorate the birthplace of the Conqueror. Alaman, Disertaciones históricas, tom. ii. p. 2.]

[485] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 1.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 203. I find no more precise notice of the date of his birth, except, indeed, by Pizarro y Orellana, who tells us that “Cortés came into the world the same day that that _infernal beast, the false heretic Luther_, entered it,--by way of compensation, no doubt, since the labors of the one to pull down the true faith were counterbalanced by those of the other to maintain and extend it”! (Varones ilustres del Nuevo-Mundo (Madrid, 1639), p. 66.) But this statement of the good cavalier, which places the birth of our hero in 1483, looks rather more like a zeal for “the true faith” than for historic.

[486] Argensola, in particular, has bestowed great pains on the _prosapia_ of the house of Cortés; which he traces up, nothing doubting, to Narnes Cortés, king of Lombardy and Tuscany. Anales de Aragon (Zaragoza, 1630), pp. 621-625.--Also, Caro de Torres, Historia de las Ordenes militares (Madrid, 1629), fol. 103.

[487] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Las Casas, who knew the father, bears stronger testimony to his poverty than to his noble birth. “Un escudero,” he says of him, “que yo conocí harto pobre y humilde, aunque cristiano, viejo _y dizen que hidalgo_.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 27.

[488] [His parents had cast lots to decide which of the apostles should be chosen as his patron saint. The lot fell upon Peter, which explains the especial devotion which Cortés professed, through his whole life, to that saint, to whose watchful care he attributed the improvement in his health. Alaman, Disertaciones históricas, tom. ii. p. 4.]

[489] Argensola, Anales, p. 220.--Las Casas and Bernal Diaz both state that he was Bachelor of Laws at Salamanca. (Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.--Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 203.) The degree was given probably in later life, when the University might feel a pride in claiming him among her sons.

[490] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 1.

[491] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Ibid.--Argensola states the cause of his detention concisely enough: “Suspendió el viaje, _por enamorado y por quartanario_.” Anales, p. 621.

[492] Some thought it was the Holy Ghost in the form of this dove. “Sanctum esse Spiritum, qui, in illius alitis specie, ut mœstos et afflictos solaretur, venire erat dignatus” (De Rebus gestis, MS.); a conjecture which seems very reasonable to Pizarro y Orellana, since the expedition was to “redound so much to the spread of the Catholic faith, and the Castilian monarchy”! Varones ilustres, p. 70.

[493] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 2.

[494] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 203.

[495] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 3, 4.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 27.

[496] Hist. de las Indias, MS., loc. cit.--“Res omnes arduas difficilesque per Cortesium, quem in dies magis magisque amplectebatur, Velasquius agit. Ex eo ducis favore et gratia magna Cortesio invidia est orta.” De Rebus gestis, MS.

[497] Solís has found a patent of nobility for this lady also,--“doncella noble y recatada.” (Historia de la Conquista de Méjico (Paris, 1838), lib. 1, cap. 9.) Las Casas treats her with less ceremony: “Una hermana de _un_ Juan Xuarez, _gente pobre_.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 5, cap. 17.

[498] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 4.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.--De Rebus gestis, MS.--Memorial de Benito Martinez, Capellan de D. Velasquez, contra H. Cortés, MS.

[499] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.

[500] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., loc. cit.--Memorial de Martinez, MS.

[501] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 4.--Herrera tells a silly story of his being unable to swim, and throwing himself on a plank, which, after being carried out to sea, was washed ashore with him at flood tide. Hist. general, dec. 1, lib. 9, cap. 8.

[502] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 4.--“Cœnat cubatque Cortesius cum Velasquio eodem in lecto. Qui postero die fugæ Cortesii nuntius venerat, Velasquium et Cortesium juxta accubantes intuitus, miratur.” De Rebus gestis, MS.

[503] Las Casas, who remembered Cortés at this time “so poor and lowly that he would have gladly received any favor from the least of Velasquez’ attendants,” treats the story of the bravado with contempt. “Por lo qual si él [Velasquez] sintiera de Cortés una puncta de alfiler de cerviguillo ó presuncion, ó lo ahorcara ó á lo menos lo echara de la tierra y lo sumiera en ella sin que alzara cabeza en su vida.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 27.

[504] “Pecuariam primus quoque habuit, in insulamque induxit, omni pecorum genere ex Hispania petito.” De Rebus gestis, MS.

[505] “Los que por sacarle el oro muriéron Dios abrá tenido mejor cuenta que yo.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 27. The text is a free translation.

[506] “Estando conmigo, me lo dixo que estava tan contento con ella como si fuera hija de una Duquessa.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 4.

[507] The treasurer used to boast he had passed some two-and-twenty years in the wars of Italy. He was a shrewd personage, and Las Casas, thinking that country a slippery school for morals, warned the governor, he says, more than once “to beware of the twenty-two years in Italy.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 113.

[508] “Si él no fuera por Capitan, que no fuera la tercera parte de la gente que con él fué.” Declaracion de Puertocarrero, MS. (Coruña, 30 de Abril, 1520).

[509] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 19.--De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 7.--Las Casas, Hist. general de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 113.

[510] Declaracion de Puertocarrero, MS.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Probanza en la Villa Segura, MS. (4 de Oct., 1520).

[511] The letter from the Municipality of Vera Cruz, after stating that Velasquez bore only one-third of the original expense, adds, “Y sepan Vras. Magestades que la mayor parte de la dicha tercia parte que el dicho Diego Velasquez gastó en hacer la dicha armada fué emplear sus dineros en vinos y en ropas, y en otras cosas de poco valor para nos lo vender acá en mucha mas cantidad de lo que á él le costó, por manera que podemos decir que entre nosotros los Españoles vasallos de Vras. Reales Altezas ha hecho Diego Velasquez su rescate y granosea de sus dineros cobrandolos muy bien.” (Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.) Puertocarrero and Montejo, also, in their depositions taken in Spain, both speak of Cortés’ having furnished two-thirds of the cost of the flotilla. (Declaracion de Puertocarrero, MS.--Declaracion de Montejo, MS. (29 de Abril, 1520).) The letter from Vera Cruz, however, was prepared under the eye of Cortés; and the last two were his confidential officers.

[512] The instrument, in the original Castilian, will be found in Appendix, No. 5. It is often referred to by writers who never saw it, as the Agreement between Cortés and Velasquez. It is, in fact, only the instructions given by this latter to his officer, who was no party to it.

[513] Declaracion de Puertocarrero, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 7.--Velasquez soon after obtained from the crown authority to colonize the new countries, with the title of _adelantado_ over them. The instrument was dated at Barcelona, Nov. 13th, 1518. (Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 3, cap. 8.) Empty privileges! Las Casas gives a caustic etymology of the title of _adelantado_, so often granted to the Spanish discoverers. “Adelantados porque se adelantaran en hazer males y daños tan gravísimos á gentes pacíficas.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 117.

[514] “Deterrebat,” says the anonymous biographer, “eum Cortesii natura imperii avida, fiducia sui ingens, et nimius sumptus in classe parandâ. Timere itaque Velasquius cœpit, si Cortesius cum eâ classe iret, nihil ad se vel honoris vel lucri rediturum.” De Rebus gestis, MS.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 19.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114.

[515] “Cortés no avia menester mas para entendello de mirar el gesto á Diego Velasquez segun su astuta viveza y mundana sabiduría.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114.

[516] Las Casas had the story from Cortés’ own mouth. Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 7.--De Rebus gestis, MS.

[517] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114.--Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 3, cap. 12.--Solís, who follows Bernal Diaz in saying that Cortés parted openly and amicably from Velasquez, seems to consider it a great slander on the character of the former to suppose that he wanted to break with the governor so soon, when he had received so little provocation. (Conquista, lib. 1, cap. 10.) But it is not necessary to suppose that Cortés intended a rupture with his employer by this clandestine movement, but only to secure himself in the command. At all events, the text conforms in every particular to the statement of Las Casas, who, as he knew both the parties well, and resided on the island at the time, had ample means of information.{*}

{*} [Las Casas was not residing in Cuba, as Prescott supposes, when Cortés sailed. The weight of authority seems to indicate that the departure of Cortés was hasty but not clandestine. Velasquez in his report to the Emperor does not say the Conqueror of Mexico stole away.--M.]

[518] Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114.

[519] [Juan Sedeño was the richest man in the fleet. His possessions included a ship, a mare, a negro, and some cazabi bread and bacon. Bernal Diaz very properly gives a list of the horses belonging to the expedition, remarking that neither horses nor negroes could be had without great expense. (See Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 23.) A horse cost from four to five hundred _pesos de oro_.--M.]

[520] [Bancroft (Mexico, i. p. 66) thinks Prescott has made a slight mistake as to these ships, and that Sedeño was the commander of the second vessel. Bancroft also will have it that the standard of Cortés was made of “taffeta,” not _velvet_.--M.]

[521] Las Casas had this, also, from the lips of Cortés in later life. “Todo esto me dixo el mismo Cortés, con otras cosas cerca dello despues de Marques; ... reindo y mofando é con estas formales palabras, _Á la mi fée andube por allí como un gentil cosario_.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 115.

[522] De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 8.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 114, 115.

[523] [But not across the island. There was no need for Cortés to sail round the westerly point of Cuba with his squadron. Havana, or San Cristóbal de la Habana, was then upon the south side of the island. The town where the Havana of to-day stands was not founded until 1519. Many writers besides Prescott, knowing nothing of this fact, have fallen into this same error. From Trinidad to the new Habana would have been a long and difficult march for Alvarado and his party, and a long and unnecessary voyage for the fleet of Cortés.--M.]

[524] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 24.--De Rebus gestis, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 8.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 115.--The legend on the standard was, doubtless, suggested by that on the _labarum_,--the sacred banner of Constantine.

[525] The most minute notices of the person and habits of Cortés are to be gathered from the narrative of the old cavalier Bernal Diaz, who served so long under him, and from Gomara, the general’s chaplain. See in particular the last chapter of Gomara’s Crónica, and cap. 203 of the Hist. de la Conquista.

[526] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 115.

[527] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 24.

[528] Ibid., loc. cit.

[529] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 26.--There is some discrepancy among authorities in regard to the numbers of the army. The Letter from Vera Cruz, which should have been exact, speaks in round terms of only four hundred soldiers. (Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.) Velasquez himself, in a communication to the Chief Judge of Hispaniola, states the number at six hundred. (Carta de Diego Velasquez al Lic. Figueroa, MS.) I have adopted the estimates of Bernal Diaz, who, in his long service, seems to have become intimately acquainted with every one of his comrades, their persons, and private history.

[530] Incredibly dear indeed, since, from the statements contained in the depositions at Villa Segura, it appears that the cost of the horses for the expedition was from four to five hundred _pesos de oro_ each! “Si saben que de caballos que el dicho Señor Capitan General Hernando Cortés ha comprado para servir en la dicha Conquista, que son diez é ocho, que le han costado á quatrocientos cinquenta é á quinientos pesos ha pagado, é que deve mas de ocho mil pesos de oro dellos.” (Probanza en Villa Segura, MS.) The estimation of these horses is sufficiently shown by the minute information Bernal Diaz has thought proper to give of every one of them; minute enough for the pages of a sporting calendar. See Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 23.

[531] “Io vos propongo grandes premios, mas embueltos en grandes trabajos; pero la virtud no quiere ociosidad.” (Gomara, Crónica, cap. 9.) It is the thought so finely expressed by Thomson:

“For sluggard’s brow the laurel never grows;
Renown is not the child of indolent repose.”

[532] The text is a very condensed abridgment of the original speech of Cortés,--or of his chaplain, as the case may be. See it, in Gomara, Crónica, cap. 9.

[533] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., cap. 115.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 10.--De ebus gestis, MS.--“Tantus fuit armorum apparatus,” exclaims the author of the last work, “quo alterum terrarum orbem bellis Cortesius concutit; ex tam parvis opibus tantum imperium Carolo facit; aperitque omnium primus Hispanæ genti Hispaniam novam!” The author of this work is unknown. It seems to have been part of a great compilation “De Orbe Novo,” written, probably, on the plan of a series of biographical sketches, as the introduction speaks of a life of Columbus preceding this of Cortés. It was composed, as it states, while many of the old Conquerors were still surviving, and is addressed to the son of Cortés. The historian, therefore, had ample means of verifying the truth of his own statements, although they too often betray, in his partiality for his hero, the influence of the patronage under which the work was produced. It runs into a prolixity of detail which, however tedious, has its uses in a contemporary document. Unluckily, only the first book was finished, or, at least, has survived; terminating with the events of this chapter. It is written in Latin, in a pure and perspicuous style, and is conjectured with some plausibility to be the work of Calvet de Estrella, Chronicler of the Indies. The original exists in the Archives of Simancas, where it was discovered and transcribed by Muñoz, from whose copy that in my library was taken.

[534] See _ante_, p. 241, note 27.

[535] Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 25, et seq.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 10, 15.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 115.--Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 4, cap. 6.--Martyr, De Insulis nuper inventis (Coloniæ, 1574), p. 344.--While these pages were passing through the press, but not till two years after they were written, Mr. Stephens’s important and interesting volumes appeared, containing the account of his second expedition to Yucatan. In the latter part of the work he describes his visit to Cozumel, now an uninhabited island covered with impenetrable forests. Near the shore he saw the remains of ancient Indian structures, which he conceives may possibly have been the same that met the eyes of Grijalva and Cortés, and which suggest to him some important inferences. He is led into further reflections on the existence of the cross as a symbol of worship among the islanders. (Incidents of Travel in Yucatan (New York, 1843), vol. ii. chap. 20.) As the discussion of these matters would lead me too far from the track of our narrative, I shall take occasion to return to them hereafter, when I treat of the architectural remains of the country.{*}{**}

{*} [In the passages here referred to, the author has noticed various proofs of the existence of the cross as a symbol of worship among pagan nations both in the Old World and the New. The fact has been deemed a very puzzling one; yet the explanation, as traced by Dr. Brinton, is sufficiently simple: “The arms of the cross were designed to point to the cardinal points and represent the four winds,--the rain-bringers.” Hence the name given to it in the Mexican language, signifying “Tree of our Life,”--a term well calculated to increase the wonderment of the Spanish discoverers. Myths of the New World, p. 96, et al.--K.]

{**} _Ante_, p. 239.

[536] See the biographical sketch of the good bishop Las Casas, the “Protector of the Indians,” in the Postscript at the close of the present Book.

[537] “It may have been that the devil appeared to them as he is, and left these forms stamped on their imagination, so that the imitative power of the artist reveals itself in the ugliness of the image.” Solís, Conquista, p. 39.

[538] Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 13.--Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 4, cap. 7.--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 78.--Las Casas, whose enlightened views in religion would have done honor to the present age, insists on the futility of these forced conversions, by which it was proposed in a few days to wean men from the idolatry which they had been taught to reverence from the cradle. “The only way of doing this,” he says, “is by long, assiduous, and faithful preaching, until the heathen shall gather some ideas of the true nature of the Deity and of the doctrines they are to embrace. Above all, the lives of the Christians should be such as to exemplify the truth of these doctrines, that, seeing this, the poor Indian may glorify the Father, and acknowledge him, who has such worshippers, for the true and only God.” See the original remarks, which I quote _in extenso_, as a good specimen of the bishop’s style when kindled by his subject into eloquence, in Appendix, No. 6.

[539] “Muy gran misterio y milagro de Dios.” Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.

[540] [Not long ago, a history of the Spanish Conquest of Yucatan, written in the Maya language, but in Roman letters, by a native chief, Nakuk Pech, about the year 1562, was brought to light. This account, the “Chronicle of Chicxulub,” was translated by Dr. Brinton, and was published by him in the “Maya Chronicles,” Philadelphia, 1882, pp. 187-259. This chronicle, from the pen of one who was almost contemporary with the Conquest, corroborates the accounts given by the Spanish historians in most particulars. It refers to Chichen Itza and Izamal as inhabited when the Spaniards descended upon the country. It is sometimes inaccurate as to details, as in this reference to Aguilar: “Thus the land was discovered by Aguilar, who was eaten by Ah Naum Ah Pat at Cuzamil in the year 1517.” We know, of course, that it was another Spaniard who was eaten by Ah Naum Ah Pat. The matter is of small consequence to us, though undoubtedly important to Aguilar.--M.]

[541] They are enumerated by Herrera with a minuteness which may claim at least the merit of giving a much higher notion of Aguilar’s virtue than the barren generalities of the text. (Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 4, cap. 6-8.) The story is prettily told by Washington Irving, Voyages and Discoveries of the Companions of Columbus (London, 1833), p. 263, et seq.

[542] Camargo, Historia de Tlascala, MS.--Oviedo, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 33, cap. 1.--Martyr, De Insulis, p. 347.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 29.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 115, 116.

[543] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 31.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 18.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 118.--Martyr, De Insulis, p. 348.--There are some discrepancies between the statements of Bernal Diaz and the Letter from Vera Cruz; both by parties who were present.

[544] Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 31.

[545] “See,” exclaims the Bishop of Chiapa, in his caustic vein, “the reasonableness of this ‘requisition,’ or, to speak more correctly, the folly and insensibility of the Royal Council, who could find, in the refusal of the Indians to receive it, a good pretext for war.” (Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 118.) In another place he pronounces an animated invective against the iniquity of those who covered up hostilities under this empty form of words, the import of which was utterly incomprehensible to the barbarians. (Ibid., lib. 3, cap. 57.) The famous formula, used by the Spanish Conquerors on this occasion, was drawn up by Dr. Palacios Reubios, a man of letters, and a member of the King’s council. “But I laugh at him and his letters,” exclaims Oviedo, “if he thought a word of it could be comprehended by the untutored Indians!” (Hist. de las Ind., MS., lib. 29, cap. 7.) The regular Manifesto, _requirimiento_, may be found translated in the concluding pages of Irving’s “Voyages of the Companions of Columbus.”

[546] “Halláronlas llenas de maiz é gallinas y otros vastimentos, oro ninguno, de lo que ellos no resciviéron mucho plazer.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.

[547] Peter Martyr gives a glowing picture of this Indian capital. “Ad fluminis ripam protentum dicunt esse oppidum, quantum non ausim dicere: mille quingentorum passuum, ait Alaminus nauclerus, et domorum quinque ac viginti millium: stringunt alij, ingens tamen fatentur et celebre. Hortis intersecantur domus, quæ sunt _egregiè lapidibus et calce fabrefactæ, maximâ industriâ et architectorum arte_.” (De Insulis, p. 349.) With his usual inquisitive spirit, he gleaned all the particulars from the old pilot Alaminos, and from two of the officers of Cortés who revisited Spain in the course of that year. Tabasco was in the neighborhood of those ruined cities of Yucatan which have lately been the theme of so much speculation. The encomiums of Martyr are not so remarkable as the apathy of other contemporary chroniclers.

[548] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 31, 32.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 18.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 118, 119.--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 78, 79.

[549] According to Solís, who quotes the address of Cortés on the occasion, he summoned a council of his captains to advise him as to the course he should pursue. (Conquista, cap. 19.) It is possible, but I find no warrant for it anywhere.

[550] Las Casas, Hist. de las Ind., MS., lib. 3, cap. 119.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 19, 20.--Herrera, Hist. gen., dec. 2, lib. 4, cap. 11.--Martyr, De Insulis, p. 350.--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 79.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 33, 36.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.

[551] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 79.--“Cortés supposed it was his own tutelar saint, St. Peter,” says Pizarro y Orellana; “but the common and indubitable opinion is that it was our glorious apostle St. James, the bulwark and safeguard of our nation.” (Varones ilustres, p. 73.) “Sinner that I am,” exclaims honest Bernal Diaz, in a more skeptical vein, “it was not permitted to me to see either the one or the other of the Apostles on this occasion.” Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 34.{*}

{*} [The remark of Bernal Diaz is not to be taken as ironical. His faith in the same vision on subsequent occasions is expressed without demur. In the present case he recognized the rider of the gray horse as a Spanish cavalier, Francisco de Morla. It appears from the account of Andrés de Tápia, another companion of Cortés, whose narrative has been recently published, that owing to canals and other impediments, the cavalry was unable to effect the intended détour, and it therefore returned and joined the infantry. The latter, meanwhile, having seen a cavalier on a gray horse charging the Indians in their rear, supposed that the cavalry had penetrated to that quarter. Cortés, on hearing this, exclaimed, “Adelante, compañeros, que Dios es con nosotros.” (Icazbalceta, Col. de Doc. para la Hist. de México, tom. i.) Tápia says nothing about St. James or St. Peter, and perhaps suspected that the incident was a ruse contrived by Cortés. Generally, however, such legends seem to be sufficiently explained by the religious belief and excited imagination of the narrators. See the remarks, on this point, of Macaulay, who notices the account of Diaz, in the introduction to his lay of the Battle of the Lake Regillus.--K.{**}

{**} [The apparition of St. James is not infrequent in the history of Spain. The apostle first appeared as a leader of the Spanish hosts in the battle of Clavijo, 846. He rode upon a white charger, and carried in his left hand a snow-white banner. In his right hand was a flashing sword. Because of his wondrous aid sixty thousand Moslems were vanquished that day by the soldiers of King Ramiro. Mariana, Book vii, chap, xiii, tells the story, and many writers accepted the legend. Unfortunately, however, careful investigation has shown that the battle itself was apocryphal.

In the tenth century he appeared again when Ramiro II defeated the great Abderahman, and as a result pilgrims innumerable flocked to the shrine of Santiago de Compostella.

Again his white horse led the Spanish cavalry when Fernando was besieging Coimbra in 1058, or thereabout, as one may read in Southey’s Chronicle of the Cid.

At Xeres, in 1237, Alfonso of Castile, with fifteen hundred men, defeated a force seven times larger than his own because all men saw plainly the glorious vision. The Moors fled panic-stricken at the sight. “They could not fight against God.” The instances might be multiplied.--M.]

[552] It was the order--as the reader may remember--given by Cæsar to his followers in his battle with Pompey:

“Adversosque jubet ferro confundere vultus.”
LUCAN, Pharsalia, lib. 7, v. 575.

[553] “Equites,” says Paolo Giovio, “unum integrum Centaurorum specie animal esse existimarent.” Elogia Virorum Illustrium (Basil, 1696), lib. 6, p. 229.

[554] Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. iii. p. 11.

[555] “Crean Vras. Reales Altezas por cierto, que esta batalla fué vencida mas por voluntad de Dios que por nras. fuerzas, porque para con quarenta mil hombres de guerra, poca defensa fuera quatrozientos que nosotros eramos.” (Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 20.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 35.) It is Las Casas who, regulating his mathematics, as usual, by his feelings, rates the Indian loss at the exorbitant amount cited in the text. “This,” he concludes, dryly, “was the first preaching of the gospel by Cortés in New Spain!” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 119.

[556] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 21, 22.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Martyr, De Insulis, p. 351.--Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., ubi supra.

[557]

“Cata Francia, Montesinos,
Cata Paris la ciudad,
Cata las aguas de Duero
Do an á dar en la mar.”

They are the words of the popular old ballad, first published, I believe, in the Romancero de Ambéres, and lately by Duran, Romances caballerescos é históricos, Parte I, p. 82.

[558] Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 37.

[559] Las Casas notices the significance of the Indian gestures as implying a most active imagination: “Señas é meneos con que los Yndios mucho mas que otras generaciones entienden y se dan á entender, por tener muy bivos los sentidos exteriores y tambien los interiores, mayormente que es admirable su imaginacion.” Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 120.

[560] “Hermosa como Diosa,” _beautiful as a goddess_, says Camargo of her. (Hist. de Tlascala, MS.) A modern poet pays her charms the following not inelegant tribute:

“Admira tan lúcida cabalgada
Y espectáculo tal Doña Marina,
India noble al caudillo presentada,
De fortuna y belleza peregrina.

* * * * *

Con despejado espíritu y viveza
Gira la vista en el concurso mudo;
Rico manto de extrema sutileza
Con chapas de oro autorizarla pudo,
Prendido con bizarra gentileza
Sobre los pechos en ayroso nudo;
Reyna parece de la Indiana Zona,
Varonil y hermosísima Amazona.”
MORATIN, Las Naves de Cortés destruidas.

[561] [“Malinche” is a corruption of the Aztec word “Malintzin,” which is itself a corruption of the Spanish name “Marina.” The Aztecs, having no _r_ in their alphabet, substituted _l_ for it, while the termination _tzin_ was added in token of respect, so that the name was equivalent to Doña or Lady Marina. Conquista de Méjico (trad. de Vega, anotada por D. Lúcas Alaman), tom. ii. pp. 17, 269.]

[562] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 120.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 25, 26.--Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. iii. pp. 12-14.--Oviedo, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 33, cap. 1.--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 79.--Camargo, Hist. de Tlascala, MS.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 37, 38.--There is some discordance in the notices of the early life of Marina. I have followed Bernal Diaz,--from his means of observation, the best authority. There is happily no difference in the estimate of her singular merits and services.

[563] The name of the Aztec monarch, like those of most persons and places in New Spain, has been twisted into all possible varieties of orthography. Cortés, in his letters, calls him “Muteczuma.” Modern Spanish historians usually spell his name “Motezuma.” I have preferred to conform to the name by which he is usually known to English readers. It is the one adopted by Bernal Diaz, and by most writers near the time of the Conquest. Alaman, Disertaciones históricas, tom. i., apénd. 2.

[564] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 79.--Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. iii. p. 16.--New Vera Cruz, as the present town is called, is distinct, as we shall see hereafter, from that established by Cortés, and was not founded till the close of the sixteenth century, by the Conde de Monterey, Viceroy of Mexico. It received its privileges as a city from Philip III. in 1615. Ibid., tom. iii. p. 30, nota.

[565] The epidemic of the _matlazahuatl_, so fatal to the Aztecs, is shown by M. de Humboldt to have been essentially different from the _vómito_, or bilious fever of our day. Indeed, this disease is not noticed by the early conquerors and colonists, and, Clavigero asserts, was not known in Mexico till 1725. (Stor. del Messico, tom. i. p. 117, nota.) Humboldt, however, arguing that the same physical causes must have produced similar results, carries the disease back to a much higher antiquity, of which he discerns some traditional and historic vestiges. “Il ne faut pas confondre l’epoque,” he remarks, with his usual penetration, “à laquelle une maladie a été décrite pour la première fois, parce qu’elle a fait de grands ravages dans un court espace de temps, avec l’époque de sa première apparition.” Essai politique, tom. iv. p. 161 et seq., and 179.

[566] Gomara, Crónica, cap. 26.

[567] Las Casas, Hist. de las Indias, MS., lib. 3, cap. 119.

[568] [According to a curious document published by Icazbalceta (Col. de Doc. para la Hist. de México, tom. ii.), two of the principal caciques present on this occasion communicated secretly with Cortés, and, declaring themselves disaffected subjects of Montezuma, offered to facilitate the advance of the Spaniards by furnishing the general with paintings in which the various features of the country would be correctly delineated. The offer was accepted, and on the next visit the paintings were produced, and proved subsequently of great service to Cortés, who rewarded the donors with certain grants. But the genuineness of this paper, though supported by so distinguished a scholar as Señor Ramirez, is more than questionable.--K.]

[569] Ixtlilxochitl, Relaciones, MS., No. 13.--Idem, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 79.--Gomara, Crónica, cap. 25, 26.--Bernal Diaz, Hist. de la Conquista, cap. 38.--Herrera, Hist. general, dec. 2, lib. 5, cap. 4.--Carta de Vera Cruz, MS.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 4, cap. 13-15.--Tezozomoc, Crón. Mexicana, MS., cap. 107.