voted only a few
weeks, but his observations were so exact, thorough and comprehensive
that the Council for the Indies, on receiving his charts, immediately
approved them and ordered them to be regarded as the authority for
navigation of those waters.

The administration of Sancho Pardo Osorio was marked with much energy in
advancing the defences of Havana and in caring for the commerce which
frequented or touched at Cuban ports. The former work proceeded slowly,
because of the necessity of depending almost exclusively upon the local
community for aid. At this time also was effected the immensely
important reform of codifying the municipal ordinances. This work was
done under a commission of the Supreme Court by Dr. Alfonso Casares, of
Havana, who on January 14, 1577, presented the results of his labors to
a council consisting of Sancho Pardo, the Alcaldes Geronimo de Rojas
Avellaneda, and Alfonso Velasquez de Cuellar, and the Regidores Diego
Lopez Duran, Juan Bautista de Rojas, Baltasar de Barreda, Antonio Recio,
and Rodrigo Carreno. The code was unanimously approved by them, and it
remained in force and active practice until the War of Independence in
1898.

CHAPTER XVII

Menendez was governor of Cuba for a little more than six years, from
October 24, 1567, to December 13, 1573. Those were important years for
the world at large. They saw the Duke of Alva, as governor of the
Netherlands, establish there the Bloody Tribunal, and in return the
"Beggars of the Sea" engage in their indomitable campaigns against the
oppressor, extending even to the coasts of Cuba. Spain engaged in a
great war with the Ottoman Turks. France had the second and third civil
wars, culminating in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day. Elizabeth of
England fully committed herself to the Protestant cause and was
excommunicated by the Pope. Mary of Scotland fled from her throne and
was succeeded by young James VI.

Menendez, more a statesman of world-wide vision than any of his
predecessors, was not unmindful of these transactions, or of the far
greater events which they portended, and he strove after his fashion to
prepare Cuba for her part in great affairs. He realized that in the wars
of the European powers their American possessions were increasingly
likely to become implicated. Despite his utmost efforts, various other
nations sent vessels to West Indian waters, to harry the fleets of
Spain. The numbers of such intruders were incre