ABSTRACT

As I have at greater length reported, this captain issued to the English a license to sell a certain number of slaves, as is set forth in the license itself, of which I sent your majesty a copy. That it may not be lacking, I enclose another copy4

herewith. 1 A. de I. 53-6-5, u, ff. 286 et seq., zl pliegos, original. 2 Cf. p. 64, note 2. 3 The correctness of the translation as embodied in this last phrase is

not guaranteed. Licentiate Echegoyan, a 16th-century lawyer, determined to enter charges against his associates but to do it so deftly that he could not be held to account for it, becomes something of a problem to a 20th-century translator! This despatch is in his own not too excellent handwriting. In addition to being intentionally vague in places, the text is complicated by the unintentional omission of a few verbs.