Note 11 — Chapter VI

Old Peter Martyr gives quite a minute account of the interview between Gonzales and Nicaragua, calculated to give a very high opinion of the shrewdness of the latter. He inquired about a flood, and how the Spaniards got their information on religious matters from heaven, who brought it, and whether he came down on a rainbow or otherwise; about “the sun, and moon, and stars, and of their motion, quality, distance, and effects!” All these things were noted down on the spot, by Cerezeda, the king’s treasurer, who also affirms that Nicaragua was curious about the cause of day and night, and the blowing of the winds, “which Gonzales answered to the best of his ability, commending the rest to God.” Gonzales had a long argument with him to prove that his idols were representatives of devils, and warned him in a style not yet wholly obsolete, to avoid them, “lest he should be violently carried away by them from eternal delights to perpetual torments and miserable woes, and be made the companion of the damned.” To all of these things the Indians did not offer particular objection, but when they came to talk about temporal affairs, “they made a wry mouth.”