eans of working
the mines is quicksilver, this loss is caused by giving that metal
at so high a price to the miners. For in the first place, as most
of them are poor, they cannot buy it, and therefore a great deal of
metal is left unworked; and in the second place, because those who
are able to buy it cannot work poor mines (for they would be ruined
thereby), and as the greater part of those in the Indias are of this
kind, double the amount of silver [obtained] is left unmined. If your
Majesty would order the quicksilver to be given at cost and expenses,
it would be of incomparably more profit than today; and the Indias
would be in a better condition, more merchandise would be bought,
the duties would increase, and the merchants would not feel the want
of the silver which goes to the Filipinas--as they did not feel it
in times past, although there came much more merchandise from there
than at present. I would that there were so great an abundance of
quicksilver in the Indias, and so cheap, that it could be bought,
not only by the miners, but by other Spaniards and Indians, who would
then have so much silver that their complaints would cease."

If the trade were transferred to Espana, those who say that the
merchandise from this country would be carried to Filipinas, to be
exchanged for the goods of that country, are not aware that in those
regions there is no one to use Spanish goods except the Spaniards,
who with four pipas of wine, and other wares of little importance,
would be quite sufficiently supplied; and that, if this were so, the
Portuguese and Dutch would take the merchandise away, for nothing
escapes their notice. Both of these take silver, and whatever else
they take is of small importance; so that it would soon be necessary,
in order to maintain the trade, to carry silver from Espana and risk
it again. It is less trouble to carry it from the Indias, beside the
incomparably greater risk from the sea and from enemies [by the other
route]; and Nueva Espana would be ruined.

To the third reason, in which they say that many troops are used up,
I would say that it is true that there go each year sometimes two
hundred men, and other years less, and again none at all; and of
these more die from their excesses than from the war, and they do not
count those who return and go through India and other regions. If
those islands were to be abandoned on account of this difficulty,
the same reason holds in Flandes and Ita