ral cavaliers have very justly put to me; namely,
how it was possible for me to relate these things, as I was not present
myself, but making the campaign in New Spain, when our agents were
despatched with the letters and presents, and met with this ill
treatment from the archbishop of Rosano? To which my answer is, that our
agents forwarded to us, the true conquistadores, verbatim all that had
passed between them and the latter, as also the favorable decision which
the emperor came to in our behalf; of which Cortes sent copies to all
the towns where we happened to be stationed, to show us how favorably
everything had terminated, and what a great enemy we had in the
archbishop. After this digression we will return to our quarters in New
Spain, and see what happened there in the meantime.

CHAPTER LVII.

_What took place in our camp after the departure of our agents to
his majesty with the gold and the letters; and the instance of
severity which Cortes was compelled to give._

The suspicions of Velasquez's adherents were again aroused at the
departure of our agents, and the following occurrence took place a few
days after. A conspiracy was set on foot by Pedro Escudero, Juan
Cormeno, Gonzalo de Umbria, a pilot, the priest Juan Diaz, Bernardino de
Coria, (who afterwards became a citizen of Chiapa, and was father of a
certain Centeno,) and some seamen of Gibraleon. All these were
excessively embittered against Cortes; some because he had refused to
grant them the promised discharge to return to Cuba; others because they
had lost their share of the gold by the present which had been sent to
the emperor; and the seamen because they could not forget the lashes
which he had given them on the island of Cozumel for stealing the
flitches of bacon. They had determined to seize upon one of our small
vessels, to sail to Cuba, and acquaint the viceroy Diego Velasquez that
he had merely to send to the Havannah and the possessions of Montejo in
order to capture our agents with all the riches. We concluded from this
that the conspirators had been counselled by persons of authority among
our officers, since they knew that Montejo, notwithstanding the strict
injunctions which he had received to the contrary, had landed at his
commendary. The affair was already so far advanced that the conspirators
had sent on board the necessary provisions of cassave-bread, oil, dried
fish, water, and such like, and were about to set