He had been suspected because he had formerly been a slave and had secured
his liberty by means of a considerable sum. After that, he had bought his
farm and much of the surrounding land and had considerably increased his
original holdings. To his inquisitors he replied that, "when young and
still a slave he had a kind master who suffered him to do what he pleased,
and that by economy he had accumulated where-with to buy his liberty and
afterwards a little house to live in; and God had given His blessing to
that and let him have the means for increasing his funds."

Another one of Gage's accounts discloses the abuses common among the
slave-holders under Spanish rule, and the silliness of the belief that the
masters for their own benefit would treat their human property well. This
account refers to one Juan Palomeque, a rich landowner and promoter of
mule-transports, who lived in Gage's parish of Mexico, near the actual
capital of Guatemala. He was believed to be worth six hundred thousand
ducats, about 1,400,000 dollars. He owned about a hundred Negroes, men,
women, and children, but was so stingy that, to avoid the expense of decent
house-keeping, he never lived in the city, though he had several houses
there. Instead, he lived in a straw-hut and feasted on hard, black bread
and on _tasajo_, or thin strips of salt beef dried in the sun.

He was so cruel to his Negroes, that, when one of them behaved badly, he
would whip him almost to death. He had among others a slave named Macaco,
"on behalf of whom," said Gage, "I often pleaded, but in vain. At times he
hung him by the hands and beat him until he had his back entirely covered
with blood, and in that state, the skin being entirely torn to pieces, in
order to heal up the slave's sores the master poured hot fat over them.
Moreover, he had marked him with a hot iron face, hands, arms, back, belly,
and legs, so that this poor slave got tired to live and intended several
times to suicide himself; but I prevented him from doing so every time by
remonstrances I made him."

Juan Palomeque was so sensual and voluptuous that he constantly abused the
wives of his slaves as he liked, and even when he saw in the city some girl
or woman of that class whom he wanted, and she was not attracted to him, he
would call upon her master or mistress and buy her, "giving much more than
she had cost; afterwards he boasted that he would break down her pride in
one year of slavery." "In my time