his return, of course, from the
voyage with Ojeda and La Cosa. The particulars of this transaction we
will let him relate in the following letter contained in this chapter.
He does not quite satisfactorily explain how he came to break with
King Ferdinand, especially as both the sovereign and Fonseca had
received him with marked attention, the latter having presented him at
court, where he was consulted as to new expeditions, and "his accounts
of what he had already seen listened to with the greatest interest."
The affair is all the more inexplicable from the fact that during the
interval between his return from the second voyage and his going to
Portugal he was married to a charming lady of Seville. This lady, Dona
Maria Cerezo, was his betrothed during the time he was engaged with
the house of Berardi, but the mania for exploring having seized him,
their marriage was not consummated until after the two voyages had
been made. She went with him to the court, sharing there the honors
heaped upon him by the king; but after this little is heard of her,
though it is known that she survived him several years, and on account
of his distinguished services to Spain received a liberal pension from
the government.

Leaving his newly wedded wife in Seville, Vespucci went to Portugal,
"where he was received with open arms by King Emanuel, and commenced
with ardor the preparation of the fleet." Respecting his sudden
departure from Spain, his Italian eulogist, Canovai, has this to say:
"It does not appear that King Ferdinand considered himself wronged by
the sudden flight and, to say the least, apparent discourtesy of
Amerigo in leaving the kingdom and the king, his patron, without
salutation or leave-taking. It was probably looked upon as a trait of
his reserved character, or an evidence of his aversion to idle and
slanderous rumors, which he was unwilling to take the pains to
contradict. Rumors and whisperings soon die away when they have
nothing to feed upon, and when Vespucci returned, as though from a
journey, the slight was forgotten, and he was treated with greater
honor than before."

To what cause King Emanuel owed this acquisition of King Ferdinand's
skilled navigator does not appear; but he was not to retain him very
long. He made, however, two voyages under the flag of Portugal, the
first of which is outlined in this letter to his friend, the
Gonfaloniere of Florence, Piero Soderini:

"I was reposing myself in Sev