Avila was made a close prisoner in France, but by gaining the friendship of the officer to whose custody he had been confided, he was enabled to correspond with his friends in Spain, to whom he transmitted all the documents with which he had been entrusted, which were all laid before the emperor Don Carlos by Martin Cortes, our generals father, and Diego de Ordas, by means of the licentiate Nunez, _relator_ of the royal council, who was cousin to Cortes. The emperor was pleased, on due consideration of these documents, to order that all favour should be shewn to our general, and that the proceedings respecting the government of New Spain should be suspended until his majesty returned into Spain. We were much disappointed on receiving intelligence of the loss of our treasure, and the detention of our agent in France; yet Cortes honourably reserved the district of Guatitlan for Avila, notwithstanding his captivity, and gave it three years afterwards to a brother of Alonzo de Avila, who was then promoted to be _contador_ of Yucutan. [1] The province here named Panuco, is situated on the coast of the gulf of Mexico, at the mouth of a considerable river which drains the superfluous waters of the Mexican vale, named at first Rio del Desague, then Rio de Tula, and Rio Tampico at its mouth, in about lat. 22° 15' N. The Modern town of Panuco is about 200 miles almost due north from Mexico.--E. [2] These were probably the Chichimecas and Otomies, who inhabited to the north-west of the Mexican empire.--E. [3] From these slight notices, nothing certain can be gathered respecting these large bones: Yet there is every reason to believe they must have been of the same kind with those now familiar to the learned world, under the name of _Mammoth_. The vale of Mexico has every indication of having once been an immense inland lake, and the other _big bones_ of North America have all been found in places of a similar description. The greatest deposit of these hitherto known, is at a place called _big-bone-swamp_, near the Mississippi, in the modern state of Kentucky.--E. SECTION XV. _Expeditions of Gonzalo de Sandoval, Pedro de Alvarado, and others, for reducing the Mexican Provinces_.