In the days remaining at San Juan de Ulúa , Bernal Diaz shows the Spanish contingent as hungry, beset by mosquitoes, showing signs of fatigue, conflict and running out of provisions.
The group led by Francesco de Montejo returned ten or twelve days after they had left, reporting that they had found a better port farther north. This was near Quiahuiztlan, a "town like a fortified port" near to what later this summer became Veracruz. Meanwhile, food had become scarce to the hundreds of Spaniards left at San Juan de Ulúa. Bernal Diaz did not relish the idea of scavenging for shellfish. The men were trading with the locals for food and soon those resources would disappear. Some of those described as still loyal to Diego Velazquez began complaining about the lack of food, the men trading food for gold and saying they should return to Cuba and report back. Cortes said he agreed that they needed food right then, that there should be no more widespread trading and that one man they nominated should be put in charge of that. For now, the grumbling subsided. [p. 66,68-9]
The group led by Francesco de Montejo returned ten or twelve days after they had left, reporting that they had found a better port farther north. This was near Quiahuiztlan, a "town like a fortified port" near to what later this summer became Veracruz. Meanwhile, food had become scarce to the hundreds of Spaniards left at San Juan de Ulúa. Bernal Diaz did not relish the idea of scavenging for shellfish. The men were trading with the locals for food and soon those resources would disappear. Some of those described as still loyal to Diego Velazquez began complaining about the lack of food, the men trading food for gold and saying they should return to Cuba and report back. Cortes said he agreed that they needed food right then, that there should be no more widespread trading and that one man they nominated should be put in charge of that. For now, the grumbling subsided. [p. 66,68-9]
Later, though, these discussions, after awhile, led to arrests and proclamations, more discussions. The establishment of Veracruz, the march into Mexico. Only some of these are alternately, told at length, expanded and sometimes only, briefly alluded to, in the so called 'First Letter' of Cortes. And they're mentioned not as resolving conflicts, which they wanted quickly to paper over, but as looking to do the right thing for the king. Bit by bit, using a linear progression in anecdotes, is how Diaz unveils his story.
Diaz also gives a description of meeting a different group of tribal messengers who had a different opinion of the Mexica. There were many such groups of locals with longstanding histories and relations of their own stretching back into the mists of time. Both Doña Marina and Aguilar could not understand them at first until Marina asked if any of them were nahuatlatos. Two of them replied to this and they began conversing. These locals praised the Spaniards on what they'd heard of their success in arms in Tobasco and Potonchon. They also made it plain that they had not come earlier, "for fear of the people of Culua", their name for the Mexica of Moctezuma whom they were not allied with. These also, they told them, had fled "to their lands" and so, they themselves could come forward. After more questioning, Cortes was pleased to learn that Moctezuma did have enemies and pitted forces against him. These locals were welcomed, given gifts and told he would come and meet their leader soon. These were called lopes luzios after what the locals first said when they saw the Spaniards. Words the interpreters didn't understand at first but were later told meant "lord, and lords". So the Spaniards called them that! Cortes would later use them in the fight against Moctezuma. [pp. 67-8]
Upon hearing of the better port farther north, Cortes ordered they should all go there. Some of those most loyal to Velazquez balked and complained saying that without provisions, with so many men dead and ailing, they should return to Cuba, and give a record and the gifts of Moctezuma, etc., instead. Cortes disagreed saying, according to Diaz:
"... it was not good advice to return without seeing everything, that until now we have not been able to complain of fortune, that we should give thanks to God who has helped us in everything, and, as for those that have died, it usually happens in times of war and hardships, and it will be good to know what there is in the land, so in the meantime, unless he was much mistaken, we could eat maize and provisions that the Indians of neighboring towns had."There was still talk about returning to Cuba. This is how Diaz ends his chp xli [p. 69]
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All quotes from from Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012
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