holiness pope Clement, and beg his acceptance of a valuable present in jewels and gold trinkets. He ordered Herrada to take along with him two Indian buffoons, and likewise wrote a lengthened epistle to his holiness, in which he gave him a full account of the countries he had discovered and subdued; of the great services he had above all rendered to God, and then to his majesty; of the idol worship practised among the Indians, and what a great number of the latter had already been converted to Christianity. What he further told his holiness I cannot say; but we learnt from Herrada, when he afterwards returned to New Spain, that Cortes had begged his holiness to remit a certain portion of the tithes.
I ought also to mention that this Juan de Herrada was an excellent soldier, and that he had accompanied us on our expedition to the Honduras. After his return from Rome he went to Peru, where Don Diego de Almagro appointed him governor to his younger son Don Diego, and otherwise placed implicit confidence in him. He likewise commanded the small but determined body of men who put the elder Pizarro to death, and afterwards became a chief officer under Almagro the younger.
At Rome, Herrada, with his fine presents and Indian buffoons, met with the best reception; and his holiness declared, during the audience which he granted him, that he could not sufficiently thank the Almighty that he lived in an age when so many extensive countries were discovered, and so many heathens converted to our holy religion. He said that Cortes and his troops had rendered the greatest services to God, to our master the emperor Don Carlos, and to the whole of Christendom, and we were deserving of the highest rewards. His holiness even ordered a solemn procession and a day of thanksgiving, and sent especial bulls, by which he granted us absolution of our sins, and gave other indulgences to the cloisters and churches. He likewise confirmed and approved of everything Cortes had done in New Spain, only he refused to grant the latter's request with respect to the tithes.