Note 1148 — Chapter VI · (continued 2)

There are curious stories about this book, in which there is not entire accord with one another. The fact seems to be that Bustamante got hold of the manuscript, and supposed it an original work of Chimalpain, and announced it for publication in a Spanish dress, as translated from the Nahuatl, under the title of Historia de las conquistas de Hernando Cortés, under which name it appeared in two volumes in Mexico in 1826 (Ticknor Catalogue, p. 207). Bandelier and others referring to it have supposed it to be what the title represented (Amer. Antiq. Soc. Proc., new series, i. 84; cf. Bibl. Amer. Vet., p. 204); but it is printed in Spanish nevertheless, and is nothing more than a translation of Gomara. Bustamante in his preface does not satisfy the reader’s curiosity, and this Mexican editor’s conduct in the matter has been the subject of apology and suspicion. Cf. Quaritch’s Catalogues, nos. 11,807, 12,043, 17,632; H. H. Bancroft, Central America, i. 315; Sabin, vii. no. 27,753. Quaritch adds that Bustamante’s text seems rather like a modern improvement of Gomara than a retranslation, and that a manuscript apparently different and called Chimalpain’s history was sold in the Abbé Fischer’s sale in 1869.