condition that if he ever said the least word against me and my state the pardon should be revoked and he should be under condemnation.  I send you a copy of the case in this letter.  I send you a legal document about Camacho.  For more than eight days he has not left the church on account of his rash statements and falsehoods.  He has a will made by Terreros, and other relatives of the latter have another will of more recent date, which renders the first will null, as far as the inheritance is concerned:  and I am entreated to enforce the latter will, so that Camacho will be obliged to restore what he has received.  I shall order a legal document drawn up and served upon him, because I believe it is a work of mercy to punish him, as he is so unbridled in his speech that some one must punish him without the rod:  and it will not be so much against the conscience of the chastiser, and will injure him more.  Diego Mendez knows Master Bernal and his works very well.  The Governor wished to imprison him at Espanola and left him to my consideration.  It is said that he killed two men there with medicines in revenge for something of less account than three beans.  I would be glad of the licence to travel on muleback and of a good mule, if they can be obtained without difficulty.  Consult all about our affairs, and tell them that I do not write them in particular on account of the great pain I feel when writing.  I do not say that they must do the same, but that each one must write me and very often, for I feel great sorrow that all the world should have letters from there each day, and I have nothing, when I have so many people there.  Commend me to the Lord Adelantado in his favour, and give my regards to your brother and to all the others.

“Done at Seville, December 29.

“Your father who loves you more than himself.

.S.
.S.A.S. 
XMY
Xpo FERENS.”

“I say further that if our affairs are to be settled according to conscience, that the chapter of the letter which their Highnesses wrote me when I departed, in which they say they will order you placed in possession, must be shown; and the writing must also be shown which is in the Book of Privileges, which shows how in reason and in justice the third and eighth and the tenth are mine.  There will always be opportunity to make reductions from this amount.”

Columbus’s requests were not all for himself; nothing could be more sincere or generous than the spirit in which he always strove to secure the just payment of his mariners.

Otherwise he is still concerned with the favour shown to those who were treasonable to him.  Camacho was still hiding in a church, probably from the wrath of Bartholomew Columbus; but Christopher has more subtle ways of punishment.  A legal document, he considers, will be better than a rod; “it will not be so much against the conscience of the chastiser, and will injure him (the chastised) more.”