[XIV-9] I follow the commander's own statement, made to the royal authorities from Santo Domingo, March 6, 1524. Of this, which I quote as Carta de Gil Gonzalez Dávila al Rey, I have several copies in manuscript, the best being a part of the first volume of the Squier Collection. This collection, consisting of twenty-three volumes of manuscripts, beside separate pieces on various early affairs in Central America and Mexico, fell into my hands at the sale of the library of the late E. G. Squier, so widely known as an antiquarian and historical writer, a review of whose works will appear in a subsequent volume. The opportunities afforded Mr Squier by his official position as chargé d'affaires to Central America, in 1849, and by his researches, combined with a natural bent as student and author, prompted the collection of books and manuscripts relative to Central America, a large proportion of which I found useful in filling gaps in my own sixteenth-century material. It seems that Mr Squier intended the publication of a series of documents for history, of which the Carta de Palacio was printed at Albany, 1859, and numbered I. The first volume of the Squier Collection of Manuscripts contains, beside the Carta de Gil Gonzalez, several documents on Nicaraguan discovery certified by Navarrete, Buckingham Smith, and Squier, as true copies of the originals in the archives at Seville and in the Hydrographic Collection, notable among which are Real Cedula de S. M. expedida en 18 de Junio de 1519, á, Pedrarias Dávila, para que entregase los Navios de Basco Nuñez a Gil Gonzales de Avila y los requerimtos que pasaron sobre ello; and Relacion Del Asiento y Capitulacion que se tomó con Andres Niño, Piloto de su Magestad para el descubrimiento que prometió hazer en el Mar del Sur con 3 Navios, y por Capitan de ellos á Gil Gonzales Dávila.
[XIV-10] Peter Martyr states that they passed over a body of water to get to it; Herrera and Oviedo both testify to a large island, which we might believe were any such island there. The truth is, parts of the land were inundated at this time by the heavy rains, so that the peninsula being cut off from the mainland by the water made it appear an island.
[XIV-11] Later called Nicoya, from the cacique of that country, which name it bears to-day. This was the San Lúcar of Hurtado. See [chap. xi., note 11, this volume]. Kohl thinks it may have been the 5th of April, the day of San Vicente Ferrer, that the Spaniards arrived here. Gomara states that in early times it was also called Golfo de Ortiña, and Golfo de Guetares; Goldschmidt's Cartography of the Pacific Coast, MS., ii. 111-13.
[XIV-12] Which was received by 9,017 natives, large and small, in one day, and with such enthusiasm that the Spaniards even wept. This is as much as one having only ordinary faith can be expected to believe at once, yet the strain on one's credulity becomes more severe when the right honorable Gil Gonzalez calls heaven to witness that he told each man and woman, apart from the others, that God did not want unwilling service, and that each for himself expressed a desire for it. If we allow him 15 hours for his day's work, it makes 61 persons an hour, or one a minute, who were examined and baptized.
[XIV-13] The Spaniards were at this time ignorant of the use to which these mounds were put. Had they known them to be great altars upon which were sacrificed human beings, the mild and philosophic Nicaragua might have had occasion to prove the valor of his warriors.
[XIV-14] 'I digo mar,' says Gil Gonzalez, Carta al Rey, MS., 'porque creze i mengua.'
[XIV-15] 'Los pilotos qve conmigo llebaba certifican qve sale a la mar del norte; i si asi es, es mui grand nueba, porqve abra de vna mar a otra 2 o 3 legvas de camino mui llano.' Thus it will be seen that the question of interoceanic communication attracted the attention of the first Europeans who saw Lake Nicaragua, and this very naturally; for it must be remembered that Gil Gonzalez was in search of a strait or passage through the continent, and if perchance he should find the Moluccas thereabout, his whole object would be attained.
[XIV-16] The word Nicaragua was first heard spoken by Europeans at Nicoya, where Gil Gonzalez had been notified of the country and its ruler. In the earliest reports it is found written Nicaragua, Micaragua, Nicorragua, and Nicarao. Upon the return of Gil Gonzalez the name Nicaragua became famous, and beside being applied to the cacique and his town, was gradually given to the surrounding country, and to the lake. It was by some vaguely used to designate the whole region behind and between Hibueras and Veragua. Later there was the Provincia de Nicaragua, beside El Nuevo Reyno de Leon. Herrera and many others mention the Indian pueblo by the lake. For a time the lake was known as the Mar Dulce. Thus Colon lays it down on his map, in 1527, as the mar duce, and the town or province micaragua. Ribero, 1529, calls the lake mar dulce and the town nicaragua. Munich Atlas, No. vi., gives only micaragua, which No. vii. makes nicaragua. Ramusio, Viaggi, iii. 455, gives Nicaragva as a province. Mercator, in his Atlas of 1574, gives the town of Nicaragua. Iudocus Hondius, in Drake's World Encomp., applies the term Nicaragva to a province or large extent of country. Ogilby, Dampier, De Laet, and other contemporary and later authorities extend the name to the lake.
[XIV-17] The narrative says 3,000 or 4,000; I name the lowest number, giving the reader the right of reducing at pleasure.
[XIV-18] The name of the bay remains; that of the island is lost. The early names of the islands in this bay were S. Miguel la Possession, La Possession, and Esposescion; Amapalla, Amapala, or I del Tigre; y. de flecheros, Mangera, or Manguera. Jefferys calls the bay Fonseca or Amapalla. East of b: de fomsequa Vaz Dourado places the wood monic. Mercator locates the town Canicol on the southern shore. Ogilby places the town Xeres, De Laet Xerez, near B. de Fonseca. On one map there is Xeres or Chuluteca, on the eastern shore, and El viejo las Salinas river flowing into the bay.