Father Naharro, a contemporary, and
resident at Lima even allows a hundred and twenty-nine. Relacion
sumaria de la entrada de los Espanoles en el Peru, Ms.]
[Footnote 11: There is the usual discrepancy among authors about
the date of this expedition. Most fix it at 1525. I have
conformed to Xerez, Pizarro's secretary, whose narrative was
published ten years after the voyage, and who could hardly have
forgotten the date of so memorable an event, in so short an
interval of time. (See his Conquista del Peru, ap. Barcia, tom.
III. p. 179.)
The year seems to be settled by Pizarro's Capitulacion with the
Crown, which I had not examined till after the above was written.
This instrument, dated July, 1529, speaks of his first expedition
as having taken place about five years previous. (See Appendix,
No. VII.)]
The time of year was the most unsuitable that could have been
selected for the voyage; for it was the rainy season, when the
navigation to the south, impeded by contrary winds, is made
doubly dangerous by the tempests that sweep over the coast. But
this was not understood by the adventurers. After touching at the
Isle of Pearls, the frequent resort of navigators, at a few
leagues' distance from Panama, Pizarro held his way across the
Gulf of St. Michael, and steered almost due south for the Puerto
de Pinas, a headland in the province of Biruquete, which marked
the limit of Andagoya's voyage. Before his departure, Pizarro had
obtained all the information which he could derive from that
officer in respect to the country, and the route he was to
follow.
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