ABSTRACT
I have already said that our Proctors left the port of San Juan de Ulúa on the 6th July, 1519, and after a good passage they arrived at Havana and they soon passed through the Bahama Channel, and it is said that this was the first time that it was navigated, and in a short time they reach the Islands of Tercera 1 and thence went to Seville. They journeyed post haste to the court which was at Valladolid and to the President of the Royal Council of the Indies, Don Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca, Bishop of Burgos (who styled himself Archbishop of Rosano), and ruled all the Court because our Lord the Emperor was absent in Flanders. 2 When our proctors quite cheerfully, expecting that he would show them favour, went to kiss the hands of the President, and to give him our letters and narrative and deliver all the gold and jewels, and begged him to send a messenger at once to His Majesty to hand over to him the present and letters, with whom they themselves would go to kiss the Royal feet, he received them with such an evil frown and such ill will, and even spoke to them contemptuously because they had thus addressed him, that our ambassadors were about to retort. However, they restrained themselves and replied that his Lordship should consider the great services that Cortés and his companions were rendering to His Majesty and they again begged him at once to send all those golden jewels and the letters and narratives to His Majesty that he might know what had happened, and that they would go to him. He retorted very haughtily and even ordered that they should not have charge of it [the letters and jewels]; that he himself would write to say what was really happening, and not what they reported, for they had risen in rebellion against Diego Velásquez; and many other bitter words passed between them.
