Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 2.djvu/366

 Islands and mainland put together, which we discovered and peopled thirty odd years ago at great expense and outlay, made by the Catholic Kings, your grandparents, which was not the case in this country. Not only have I sent to Your Majesty all belonging to Your Royal dues, but I have also sent what belonged to me, and those who attended me, taking no account of what we have here spent in Your Royal service. When I sent the first remission to Your Majesty, with Alonzo Hernandez Puertocarrero, and Francisco de Montejo, we not only sent the fifth of all that had been acquired which belonged to Your Majesty, but the entire amount of what had been obtained; for it seemed right of me to do so, being, as these things were, the first fruits.

Afterwards, the fifth of all the gold obtained in this city during the lifetime of its sovereign, Montezuma, was sent to Your Majesty; I mean of that part which was smelted, and which amounted to thirty odd thousand castellanos; and, although the jewellery ought also to have been distributed, giving the people their shares, both they and I were glad to send all of it to Your Majesty, which amounted to more than five hundred thousand pesos in gold. The loss of all this when it was taken from us on our expulsion from this city during the rebellion, caused by the coming of Narvaez to this country, although deserved for my sins, was not caused by my negligence.

When the city was reconquered and reduced to the royal service of Your Highness the same course was followed; of the gold that was smelted, one-fifth was assigned to Your Majesty; and I also obtained that all of jewels and other valuable objects belonging to my men should be sent to Your Highness, and these were certainly not less valuable and precious than the first we had secured. I despatched them together with thirty thousand pesos of gold, in bars, in charge of Julian