Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 1.djvu/63

Rh their influence upon his motives or his actions is never discernible. In Cuba his rôle of Don Juan brought him into a conflict with the Governor, which was the origin of their life-long duel for supremacy in the colonies. But Catalina Xuarez, about whom the trouble first began, is quickly lost sight of; she passes like a pale shade across that epoch of her husband's life, and is never heard of again, until her uninvited presence in Mexico, followed quickly by her unlamented death, is briefly mentioned. The most important woman in his life was his Indian interpreter, Marina, and some writers have sought to weave a romance into the story of their relations, for which there seems, upon examination, to be little enough substantial material. During the period when she was indispensable to the business in hand, she was never separated from Cortes, but we know that he was not faithful to her even then, while, as soon as she ceased to be necessary, she was got rid of as easily as she had been acquired.

Montezuma gave him his daughter, who first received Christian baptism to render her worthy of the commander's companionship, and was known as Doña Ana. She lived openly with Cortes in his quarters, and had with her, her two sisters, Inez and Elvira, and a sister of the King of Texcoco who was called Dona Francisca. Doña Ana was killed during the retreat on the Sorrowful Night, and was pregnant at the time. A third daughter of the Emperor, Doña Isabel, married Alonso de Grado, who shortly afterwards died, when she also passed into the household of the conqueror, to whom she bore a daughter. (Bernal Diaz, cap. cvii.; Bernaldino Vasquez de Tapia, tom. ii., pp. 244, 305-306; Gonzalo Mejia, tom. ii., pp. 240-241). According to Juan Tirado two of Montezuma's daughters bore sons to Cortes, and one bore a daughter. (Orozco y Berra, Conquista de Mexico, ih. ii.,cap. vi., note.) In his last will, Cortes mentions another natural