Page:Vol 2 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/623

Rh It is scarcely necessary to say that the petition was disregarded by the crown, with whose prerogatives it attempted to interfere. As the members of the council were mostly holders of encomiendas, the conclusion to be drawn from their unusual and rather bold proceeding was that, anxious to secure the perpetuity of their privilege, they looked to the possible rule of the marquis, the chief man among the encomenderos, and of Valderrama, his warm friend, as the best means of attaining their object. The death of the viceroy having occurred while the audiencia was still under investigation, the government of New Spain virtually devolved on the visitador, although under the instruction lately issued by the king in council the succession belonged to the audiencia. This body was, however, restrained by the authority held over it by their visitador.

On the whole, Martin Cortés, the marquis, was a worthy son of his father. In physique, or I might say in physical development, he was a trifle more delicate, of finer form but not so robust, as active but less enduring, as good a soldier, as ready, as brave, but less suited to the rugged life of a conqueror, less ready in resource, preferring the pleasures of refined society to the privations and self-denials of the colonist. In him the father's finer feelings were intensified, some of the father's less worthy qualities, his pride and love of ostentation, were more pronounced.

But comparisons of traits in parent and child cannot after all lead to much increase of knowledge as to their real differences of character. It is not possible so to reverse their situations as to tell what would be the character of the one in the position of the other. We may not determine the quality of the high-born boy in the home of the humble Hernan, or how he would have conducted himself at school, or how he