Note 233 — Chapter V
Reading edition
“Yo assimismo quedé manco de dos dedos de la mano izquierda”—is Cortés’ own expression in his letter to the emperor. (Rel. Seg., ap. Lorenzana, p. 152.) Don Thoan Cano, however, whose sympathies—from his Indian alliance, perhaps—seem to have been quite as much with the Aztecs as with his own countrymen, assured Oviedo, who was lamenting the general’s loss, that he might spare his regrets, since Cortés had as many fingers on his hand at that hour as when he came from Castile. (See Appendix, No. 11.) May not the word manco, in his letter, be rendered by “maimed”?