furnished his men with an abundance of maize-bread, chickens, and fruits.

Continuing their march, the Spaniards came to a third village, and as the news that they abstained from pillage had spread, they were received without hesitation and furnished with provisions; but not enough for their needs. In consequence, a revolt broke out in this place because Garay would not permit the village to be sacked. Farther on the Spaniards crossed a third river, and in so doing they lost eight of their horses, which were carried away by the force of the current. Beyond this river they found themselves in vast swamps infested with poisonous gnats, and overgrown with various creepers and stubborn plants, which gathered about their legs and retarded their march. In my Decade addressed to the Duke Sforza I have spoken of the impediments created by these vines. Struggling through water, up to the men's waists and the horses' bellies, the Spaniards, half exhausted, finally emerged from these swamps into an admirably fertile country, where there were many villages.

Garay forbade the use of violence towards any of the natives. One of his servants, who escaped from the barbarous massacre we shall describe farther on, wrote a long letter to Pedro Espinosa, Garay's paymaster and at the present time guardian of his children's interests at the Emperor's court. This letter, written in Latin, is full of harrowing details, but the following are the facetious terms in which he alludes to the difficulties of the march: "We arrived in a land of misery, where no order prevails, but where eternal fatigue and all calamities habitually dwell; in a land where thirst, odious mosquitoes, stinking bugs, cruel bats, arrows, stinging flies, strangling creepers, and engulfing slime have worn us cruelly."

It was the Spaniards' misfortune to reach the neighbourhood of the Panuco River. Garay halted to await the fleet, for he found no food. Cortes was

suspected of having captured the supplies, in order to force them either to retreat for want of provisions for themselves and their horses, or to starve. They had to await the fleet to obtain provisions. Garay's men scattered among the native towns and villages, and even he began to suspect the ill-will of Cortes towards himself. He therefore sent ahead his brother-in-law, Gonzales Ocampo, to inform himself concerning the attitude of the colonists established by Cortes. Whether Gonzales was won over or deceived I do not know, but he came back saying that there was nothing to fear and that everybody was willing to obey Garay. The latter accepted as true the report brought by his brother-in-law and those who had accompanied him. Driven by adverse destiny he approached the Panuco; but at this point we must digress in order to more fully understand the events which are to follow.

I

There stands upon the banks of this great Panuco River not far from its mouth, an important town bearing the same name as the stream. According to common report, this town contained fourteen thousand houses, built of stone, many royal palaces, and magnificent temples. This town had refused obedience to Cortes, who destroyed it from top to bottom, afterwards burning it and refusing thereafter to allow any other to be built upon its site. He treated another town which stands some twenty-five miles higher up the river in the same manner; this place was larger than the first, for it is reported that it numbered twenty thousand houses. Because it refused obedience Cortes razed it to the ground and burnt it. The name of this town was Chillia. Some three miles distant from

'While Panuco is proven by the comparatively extensive ruins still existing to have been a place of considerable importance, this statement is certainly open to doubt. A town of fourteen thousand houses would have a population of some seventy thousand people.

Cortes describes the Panuco campaign in his Fourth Letter. He calls this town Chila. Between the lake of Chila and the sea-coast, he founded the town of San Estevan del Puerto.

its ruins Cortes founded on a small hill which dominated a beautiful plain a colony which he called SantEsteven.

The Panuco is navigable for freight-boats a distance of several miles. It was the inhabitants of this province who had twice put Garay to flight, an episode I have related above at length. The natives could not resist Cortes, before whom all obstacles are broken. It appears that this region is extremely fertile, and is adapted not only for crops and other vegetable products, but abounds likewise in deer, hare, rabbits, wild-boars, and many other wild animals, as well as aquatic and forest birds. Lofty mountains, covered in places with snow, rise along the horizon. It is alleged that beyond these mountains there are civilised towns and important fortified places, situated in an immense plain, separated from the maritime provinces by the mountains.

But for the jealousy of the Spaniards, who can never agree amongst themselves in their keen dispute about honours, all these countries would already be conquered. How each is the declared enemy of his companions in this dusty squabble of ambition, which blinds them; how nobody can endure to be commanded by the others, I have already sufficiently explained in my preceding Decades when I spoke of the quarrels between Diego Velasquez, viceroy of Fernandina, and Fernando Cortes; and again between Fernando Cortes and Panfilo Narvaez or Grijalva, who gave his name to a river in the province of Yucatan; again of Cristobal Olid's defection from Cortes and the rivalry between Pedro Arias, governor of the mainland, and Egidius Gonzales, and finally of that general conflict of contradictory interests in searching for the strait giving communication between the south and north oceans. To say the truth, all the leaders in that country who exercise any authority in the King's name are open rivals, as I have already noted.

I shall later give some particulars concerning these internal dissensions.

I now return to Garay, from whom I had strayed. He was not slow to note the ravages the country had suffered, and he perceived his brother-in-law had deceived him in regard to the colonists of Sant-Esteven, for he found no friendship among them. Partisans of Cortes alleged that the latter's officials had carried all the provisions away from the native villages in order that their rivals might be driven by hunger to withdraw or, at least, to scatter through the country in search of food, the expected ships having been delayed by storms.

There is in that country a large town of about fifteen thousand houses, called Naciapala. An officer of Garay called Alvarado, who went there with about forty horsemen to collect forage, was surprised by the people of Cortes, who accused him of trespassing on land he did not legitimately own, and brought him in chains to their town of Sant-Esteven. The unfortunate Garay, taken between Charybdis and Scylla, was therefore obliged to await his fleet.

Finally the sailors reached the mouths of the Panuco; out of the eleven ships three, or other people say four, had been lost. Two of the commanders of Cortes, Diego Ocampo, the judge, and Diego Vallejo, the military commander, went on board the flag-ship and captured the sailors without much difficulty, easily enrolling the remainder under the standard of Cortes. The ships sailed up the river to the colony of Sant-Esteven.

While these things were happening, Garay was informed that the country along the Rio de las Palmas, contrary to the false report of his brother-in-law, Diego Ocampo, was fertile and in many places was even richer than the Panuco region. Intimidated by the good fortune of Cortes, Garay would have transferred his colony to that region had he not been deceived by the persistent opposi

tion of his brother-in-law. Unhappily situated as he was, he failed to perceive what decision he should take, nor did he suspect that the more he insisted upon his claim to the province the Emperor had granted him by letters patent, the more serious did his position become.

Acting on the advice of Diego Ocampo, he sent messengers to Cortes; one of them, called Pedro Cano, was an old friend of Garay, and the other, Juan Ochoa, was a former officer under Cortes, reputed to be well acquainted with the country. Both these men were won over by Cortes; at least, so the partisans of Garay complain. Pedro Cano returned, Ochoa remained with Cortes, whom it had been arranged Garay should come to meet. I have already mentioned this fact when the Council of Hispaniola, acting upon a rumour which circulated, transmitted this news to the Emperor and to our India Council.

The unfortunate Garay seemed to have a presentiment of his downfall, but he feigned pleasure at setting out and, although he had been forced to move, he concealed his sentiments and accepted the invitation of Cortes, who had really delivered it in the form of a command. Accompanied by Diego Ocampo, he started to meet Cortes, who at that time lived in the immense lake city of Temistitan called Mexico, and which is the capital of numerous kingdoms. His reception was cordial; whether it was sincere is another question, to be answered only by Him who reads the hearts of men.

When the news of Garay's disgrace and his departure spread, the barbarians attacked the soldiers quartered in their houses, and surprised stragglers throughout the country. They massacred about two hundred and fifty, or, according to some reports, even more. They regaled themselves with copious banquets, for they are anthropophagi.

Upon hearing the news of this massacre, Cortes sent