Cortes Laughed Heartily At
This Exploit; And We Learned Afterwards That Salvatierra Gave Much
Amusement To The Soldiers Of Narvaez, By His Absurd Behaviour On
Discovering The Trick Which Had Been Played Upon Him.
It was now resolved in a general consultation of our little army, to send
a letter in all our names to Narvaez, by the hands of Father Olmedo, of
which the following is the purport:
"We had rejoiced on hearing of the
arrival of so noble a person with so fine an army, by which we expected
great advantages to have been derived to our holy religion and to the
service of our sovereign; but on the contrary he had reviled us as
traitors, and had occasioned the whole country to revolt. Our general had
already offered to resign to him whatever provinces or territories he
might be inclined to occupy, but nothing would serve him except treating
our general and us as rebels, who had proved ourselves by our actions
faithful subjects to the emperor. If he came by the authority of a
commission from his majesty, we demanded to see the original within three
days, for which purpose we had advanced to this place, and were ready to
obey it in all humility and reverence: but, if he had no such authority,
we required him to return immediately to Cuba, and not to make any attempt
to throw the country which we had conquered into confusion; as otherwise
we should deem it our bounden duty to send him as a prisoner to his
majesty, to be dealt with according to his royal pleasure. We declared
that he was answerable for all the lamentable consequences which might
follow from his unlawful conduct; and that we had sent this letter by its
present conveyance, since no royal notary could undertake to deliver our
remonstrance in due form, after the violence which he had committed
against his majesties oydor Vasquez, a treasonable act, the perpetrator of
which our general was bound to apprehend and bring to justice, and for
which we now cited him to appear and answer for his conduct." This letter
was concluded in terms of great respect, and was signed by Cortes, all the
captains, and several of the most confidential of the soldiers. It was
sent by the reverend Father Olmedo, accompanied by a soldier named Ulagre,
whose brother was in the army of Narvaez as commander of his artillery.
Olmedo waited on Narvaez with great respect on his arrival at Chempoalla;
and proceeded afterwards to execute the secret commission with which he
had been entrusted, by a liberal distribution of gold among certain
officers of the army of Narvaez, among whom were Rodrigo Mira, Ulagre, and
Andres de Duero, which last he invited to pay a visit to Cortes. Narvaez
soon began to suspect the real object of Olmedo, and was much inclined to
have made him a prisoner: but Duero, who had much influence over Narvaez,
both on account of his situation and because they were in some degree
related, represented the impropriety of such an outrage against a person
of his holy functions, and dissuaded him from doing so.
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