“To Mexico!” was now the cry, and preparations for the march were at once made. Escalante, whose character and services had endeared him to Cortés,
was placed in command of Villa Rica. The native chiefs were directed to regard him as the representative
of the general, and to supply him with every requirement.7
Some nine days after the sinking of the fleet a messenger arrived from Escalante, announcing that four vessels8 had passed by the harbor, refusing to enter, and had anchored three leagues off, at the mouth of a river. Fearing the descent upon him of Velazquez, Cortés hurried off with four horsemen, after selecting fifty soldiers to follow. Alvarado and Sandoval were left jointly in charge of the army, to the exclusion of Ávila, who manifested no little jealousy of the latter. Cortés halted at the town merely to learn particulars, declining Escalante’s hospitality with the proverb, “A lame goat has no rest.” On the way to the vessels they met a notary with two witnesses,9 commissioned to arrange a boundary on behalf of Francisco de Garay, who claimed the coast to the north as first discoverer, and desired to form a settlement a little beyond Nautla. It appeared that Garay, who had come out with Diego Colon, and had risen from procurador of Española to become governor of Jamaica, had resolved to devote his great wealth to extending his fame as explorer and colonizer. On learning from Alaminos and his fellow voyagers of the coasts discovered in this direction, he resolved to revive the famed projects of Ponce de Leon, and with this view despatched a small fleet in 1518, under Diego de Camargo.10 Driven back by the Floridans with great slaughter, says Gomara, the expedition sailed down to Pánuco River, again to be repulsed, with the loss of some men, who were flayed and eaten. Torralba, steward of Garay, was then sent to Spain, and there, with the aid of Garay’s friends, obtained for him