Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 1.djvu/29

Rh of service in European wars. The anonymous author of De Rebus Gestis confirms these points adding, "He was covetous of glory and somewhat more so of money." The latter also represents that an intimate friendship existed during several years between the two in Hispaniola, and that Velasquez had insisted on Cortes's joining his expedition, to which the latter counselled by friendship and his longing for adventures, readily consented. Velasquez had the habit of command, which as Governor of Cuba he exercised with the scarcely restricted and arbitrary freedom which his own temperament dictated, and the usage amongst Spanish colonial governors sanctioned. With all this he was amiable, accessible, and fond of dispensing favours. Prescott estimates him as one of those captious persons who "when things do not go exactly to their taste, shift the responsibility from their own shoulders where it should lie to those of others," and Herrera describes him as "ungenerous, credulous, and suspicious!" Fray Bartolome de Las Casas, who knew him personally in Cuba gives more place to his virtues in the description he has left of him, than do some others; while admitting that he was quick to resent a liberty, jealous of his dignity, easily taking offence, he adds that he was not vindictive nor slow to forgive. As an administrator of the affairs of the island he showed himself active and capable, encouraging immigration, assisting the colonists, and extending the zone of Spanish influence. He founded many towns, some of which still bear the names he gave them, notably Havana, Puerto del Principe, Matanzas, Trinidad, and Santiago where he had his seat of government. It appears therefore that Diego Velasquez was a man whose rather petty defects of character did not usually interfere with his public conduct and who discharged his official duties satisfactorily to the colonists and as a faithful representative of the crown. He was, however, unquestionably avaricious, egotistical, and