Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 2.djvu/232

 for it had to be done twice. It was very costly, as, besides the value of the metal, which amounted to twentyfour thousand pesos of gold, the mark of silver being at five dollars of gold, the cost of founding, engraving, and carriage to the port, came to more than three thousand pesos more. I set myself to make it so rich and so noteworthy and fit to go before such a High and Most Excellent Prince, that I beg of Your Majesty to receive my small gift measuring its value by my devotion and disposition to send greater if I possibly could; for though I am indebted, as I heretofore stated to Your Highness, I willingly went deeper into debt, desiring that Your Majesty might know my zeal, for I have been made so unhappy by the many contradictions I have suffered before Your Highness that I have never heretofore had opportunity to manifest this desire.

I likewise send Your Sacred Majesty sixty thousand pesos of gold, belonging to Your Royal revenues as Your Highness will see by the account which the officers and myself send respecting it, and we venture to send this sum together because we imagine that Your Majesty must need it on account of the wars and other things, and also that Your Majesty need not regret the past loss. Hereafter, every time occasion offers, I shall send to Your Majesty the most of what I obtain, and Your Sacred Majesty may believe, as things are being developed, that these kingdoms and dominions of Your Highness will provide surer revenues, with less cost than any of your kingdoms and dominions in Europe; that is, if no other such embarrassments present themselves as have