am affected in part by these hardships and dangers,
as it is now two years since your Majesty wrote me a reprimand, as
if I were the man to blame for the dissensions of the Audiencia. God
knows, as do all in this community, that if I had not made peace,
the dissensions between the president and auditors would have lasted
until today. The same I say of the five decrees which I received
this year. Among them are several which show that he who informed
your Majesty did so in an account entirely malicious and totally
contrary to the truth. Others show that, although the informer told
something of the truth, he did so in an entirely different manner from
the way in which things happened, concealing what he ought to say,
and affirming what he should not. This will appear by my reply to
each decree--not as an excuse for myself, as I consider myself to be
very rightly judged elsewhere; but in order to satisfy your Majesty,
as I shall proceed to relate.

Beginning with the first decree, which treats of the confessions of the
conquerors, they being constrained to make restitution _in solidum_,
I say that I have never done anything in this bishopric which leaves
me so vexed and conscience-stricken, as that I dealt so mildly with
those who came to this country nominally as conquerors, but actually
as destroyers. According to the true and sound doctrine of St. Thomas,
and of all right-feeling men, they are all bound to pay _in solidum_
for the damage which they have done. I, with more than necessary
boldness, have planned so that no one has been asked to pay more
than he himself has confessed that he owed; but that is nothing in
comparison with the innumerable injuries which have been committed in
this country. Four years have passed since I gave this order obliging
them to pay one hundred pesos, and then another two hundred pesos,
the largest amount not exceeding five hundred pesos. There were
very few persons taxed for the larger sum, and they were captains or
leaders of expeditions. They have put me off from one year to another
and even yet they have not paid me, always alleging poverty. I have
found it necessary to take from the little that I have to pay some
of these obligations, on account of the needs of the Indians, and
because the Spaniards had not the wherewithal to pay them. When I
considered the hardships suffered by Spaniards in this land, and that
it will utterly ruin them, if the matter with which we have to deal be