Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 2.djvu/202

 advantage to my health, because for sixty days I had hardly slept, and was so overcome with work that to travel at such a time was to risk my life.

I had however, put all considerations aside and held it better to die on the march than to live and be the cause of such scandals and troubles and deaths as would notoriously have followed; so I immediately sent Diego de Ocampo, alcalde mayor, with the said cedula to follow Pedro de Alvarado, to whom I also sent a letter ordering him on no account to go where the people of the adelantado were, so as to avoid disturbances; and I ordered the said alcalde mayor to notify the adelantado of that cedula and to let me know immediately what he said. He set out as quickly as possible and reached the province of the Guatescas, through which Pedro de Alvarado had passed into the interior of the province. When the latter learned that the alcalde mayor had come, and that I had remained behind, he told Ocampo that one of Garay's captains, called Gonzalo Dovalle, was scouring the country with twenty-two horsemen, pillaging the villages, and disturbing the Indians, and that he had been told that this captain had placed spies on the road where Alvarado must pass; all of which greatly vexed the said Alvarado and convinced him that Gonzalo Dovalle intended to attack him. He pushed on ahead with his people to a village called Las Lajas, where he found Gonzalo Dovalle with his people. Alvarado spoke with him and told him that he knew what he had been doing, and marvelled much at it, because the governor and his captains had in no way intended to offend the people of Garay, but on the contrary planned to aid them and furnish them with whatever they might need; however, since things had taken another turn, he asked him as a favour, and in order to ensure that no scandal or mischief should ensue amongst the people on one side or the other, not to take it ill if his arms and horses were sequestrated