[1] We Shall Afterwards Have Occasion To Give An Account Of This And Other Spanish Expeditions Of Discovery And Conquest, Written By Bernal Diaz Del Castillo, Who Was Actually Engaged In All Those Which He Described.

- E.

SECTION XII.

Farther Discoveries on the Continent by Juan Grijalva, under the orders of Velasquez, by which a way is opened to Mexico or New Spain.

However unfortunate Cordova had been in his expedition, yet Velasquez considered the intelligence he had transmitted concerning his discoveries as of high importance, and he determined to pursue these discoveries on the first opportunity, chiefly because the people among whom Hernandez had been so roughly bandied seemed much more civilized than any Indians hitherto met with, and consequently were likely to prove proportionally richer. These sentiments were no sooner made public, than several of the principal inhabitants of the island offered their assistance, so that he was soon in a condition to send out a small squadron of three ships and a brigantine, having 250 men on board. These were commanded by the captains Alvaredo, Montejo, and de Avila, and under chief command of Juan Grijalva, who was ordered by Velasquez to make what discoveries he could, but to form no settlement. They sailed from Cuba on the 8th of May 1518; and having visited the coast of Florida, they doubled Cape St Anthony, and discovered the island of Cozumel, to which Grijalva gave the name of Santa Cruz, because discovered on the day of the invention of the Holy Cross, yet it has always retained its Indian name of Cozumel, by which it is still known.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 664 of 789
Words from 184643 to 184912 of 219607