a. All these things are in this land
usually worth double their value and cost in Nueva Espana. Many times
we have experienced lack of wine for saying mass and for the sick;
sometimes a jar holding an arroba of wine has been worth at least one
hundred gold pesos, and even much more. These things which are brought
from Nueva Espana are so necessary that the people, especially those
of gentle birth, could not do without them. For instance, they cannot
clothe themselves with stuffs that are made in this land, or with
those that are brought from the mainland; for these are thin silks
of such quality that garments made of them are worthless, for lack
of durability and fineness. Consequently, they would not be worn if
the people were not very poor. The supplies that we have at present
in this country are pork and buffalo meat, fowls, rice, wax candles,
and lard; and the Sangleys' flour, which is very poor and cannot be
eaten. It is now held at so high a price that what was bought four
years ago for a toston cannot now be bought for three pesos. Where they
used to give six fanegas of rice for one toston, they now ask three
pesos, at one toston a fanega. They used to sell twelve to sixteen
fowls for four reals; at present, when there are no large fowls,
they cost two or three reals apiece, instead of a toston. A hog that
used to cost alive four to six reals now costs six or seven pesos,
and no one is found to buy. This witness thinks that the cause for
the high prices in this country is that so many Spaniards have come
hither, that so many of the natives of these islands have perished,
and that so few people cultivate the soil or breed fowls or swine. [4]
The witness knows this because, during the four years that he has
spent in this land, he has seen that the conditions and events are as
he has described them. He asserts this to be the truth, on the oath
that he has taken. He declares that he is twenty-seven years of age,
rather more than less; that he has no personal interest in this affair;
and is fully competent to be a witness. He signed this with his name,

The licentiate Pedro de Rojas
Don Antonio Gofre Carrillo

Before me:

Luis Velez Cherino

[Then follow the depositions of Juan Arze de Sadornel, Andres
Cauchela, the captain Juan Pacheco Maldonado, Pedro Carballo,
the ensign Christobal de Axcueta, Don Juan de Bivero (treasurer
of the Manila cathedral, and a priest), and Don Juan de Armendares
(canon of the cath