This round of interviews with native leaders, and the preparations for the voyage, were sufficient to revive among opponents and tattlers the oft-spread report of disloyalty on the part of one who so recently had threatened the governor, and was still smarting under humiliation. The reports were not altogether devoid of foundation, for a number of Spanish and native partisans who had witnessed the indignities heaped upon their leader, and presumed upon his resentment, offered him their aid to redress his wrongs, even so far as to seize the whole country for himself.[1] But Cortés was too wise to entertain the project; he even shrank from allusion to it, and also threatened to hang one or two of his advisers; others he severely reprimanded, and prudently so, since the proposals in more than once instance covered a trap to criminate him withal. Estrada is said to have been so alarmed that he sent Bishop Garcés to sound Cortés, and to exert his influence if needful.[2]
The desire of Cortés to be saved from friends so apt to embroil him, formed another motive for leaving, and this was hastened by the receipt of a letter from the president of the India Council,[3] urging him to come to Spain so that the king might consult him on needful measures, and reward his services. This letter was the first move in a rather elaborate scheme on the part of a misinformed sovereign to withdraw a dangerous subject from a tempting field. As will be
- ↑ The persistent Ocaña dwells on this movement with a desire to criminate Cortés. Carta, in Icazbalceta, Col. Doc., i. 530-1. Testimony in Cortés, Residencia, i. 309-11, 407-8, declares that Cortés did ask the opinion of several persons whether it would be advisable to seize Estrada and hold the government for the king, or to go to Spain. Dominican friars warned Estrada of this. If he ever alluded to an arrest, it must have been when his resentment was hot. Letters were sent from Mexico on the subject, to entrap him, observes Bernal Diaz. Hist. Verdad., 223.
- ↑ Bernal Diaz assumes that the two leaders were not reconciled, and that the efforts of Garcés were to unbend Cortés. Guzman intimated that Cortés left orders for the natives to rise after his departure. Herrera, dec. iv. lib. iii. cap. vii. This accusation was also intended to reflect on Estrada's inefficiency to control the natives.
- ↑ The successor of the intriguing Fonseca was Fray García de Loaisa, confessor of the king and bishop of Osma, afterward made cardinal in recognition of his services, influence, and admirable traits.
