inal note_: "It is well."]

34th. The most considerable and valuable part of the abundant aid that
your Majesty was informed was given me in Nueva Spana, when I came
here, was the soldiers; and of them the most and best, and those who
made the best appearance, were the men that I brought from Spana. The
greater part of these, or nearly all, came aided and helped with my
money, and even with the plate and silver pieces of my household. I
do not know that notice of it should have been given to your Majesty,
for one should not charge to you so slight a service to whom all his
possessions, his blood, and his life are due. Consequently, I am not
surprised that this should have been passed by for another.

[_Marginal note_: "It is well."]

35th. The number of tributes will be placed in the titles of the
encomiendas, what they pay, the value of their products, and in what
district they are located, as your Majesty orders.

Your Majesty has some encomiendas apportioned to your royal crown,
some distance from here and in a district where their products cannot
be used. That is the most serious thing; for the collectors generally
defraud [the royal officials] by saying that it was a bad year,
and that they collected in money. If they confess to have collected
something in kind, they say that it was too great trouble to bring it;
and they sell it there, as they wish--perhaps selling it at retail to
one who immediately returns it to them, and, besides this, harassing
the Indians. On account of the distance, that is not often discovered,
and less often can it be proved. And so that your Majesty might have
much greater benefit from another equal number of tributes, I think
that, as the encomiendas of private persons of La Pampanga and those
in other districts near here, which yield a good harvest in products,
continue to fall vacant, they should be exchanged for the said distant
ones; for the latter will not be unsuitable with which to reward
services. If they have a private person as encomendero, the Indians
will be much better treated, and the tributes will be well collected
and administered, with more justification and mildness. The tributes
near here will result well for your Majesty through the profit on those
paid in kind, which can come from this bay overland and by rivers,
straight to the door of the magazines. It would be better for your
Majesty to have charge of them than the encomenderos, for they are
so near the Indian