Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 2.djvu/180

 and the lords and natives of the said province had received him cordially, and had offered themselves as vassals and subjects of Your Highness. I had received information that there was a very good harbour for ships at the mouth of a large river which flows through that province; for the said Ordaz and those with him had explored it and had found the country very well adapted for settling. The absence of harbours on this coast made me anxious to find a good one where I might found a town.

I ordered the alguacil mayor that, before entering the province, he should send certain messengers whom I gave him, natives of this city, to tell the inhabitants that he went there by my orders to discover if they were still loyal to Your Majesty's service and faithful to our amity, as they had formerly professed to be; and to tell them also that, on account of the wars I had carried on with the sovereign of this city and its dependencies, I had sent no one to visit them for a long time, but that I had always considered them as my friends and vassals of Your Highness and that, as such, they might count upon my friendship if they had need of it; and that hence I sent my people thither to pacify and to assist them in anything they might require, and to settle that province. The alguacil mayor departed with his people, and did as I commanded him, but did not find the natives well disposed as they had formerly professed, but rather they displayed a warlike disposition to prevent the alguacil mayor and his people from entering their country. He managed so well that, surprising a town one night, he seized a woman whom all in those parts obeyed, and everything quieted because she sent to call the chiefs and ordered them to observe whatever was commanded them in Your Majesty's name as she herself intended to do. They arrived at the river four leagues from its mouth where they founded a town on a good site — as no good place was found nearer