This whole country has been well satisfied at your Majesty’s suppression of the Audiencia, for without doubt it was a greater burden than a country so feeble and poor could bear; although I was always of the opinion that, if it were paid from Mexico, the Audiencia would work no harm here.  But what your Majesty orders and commands is expedient for all of us; and so we hold it a great favor, especially as your Majesty sends in place of the Audiencia, as governor, Gomez Perez Dasmarinas—­who, from the good example which he has furnished and the zeal which he has disclosed in the service of your Majesty and the good of these realms, has given universal satisfaction, and the hope that he will improve the condition of the land, and give it the orderly condition which it was losing.  May the divine Majesty preserve in him these excellent intentions, and give him strength and grace to execute them; because as the heart of man is so hard to understand, and of itself so variable, and this land is so exposed, it is not strange that we fear some alteration, having seen it in others who also gave excellent examples.  But if the governor who has now come to us shall persevere in what he has begun (as I hope in God he will persevere), your Majesty has sent us the man whom we need.

When Doctor Santiago de Vera came by command of your Majesty to establish the Audiencia in this country, he set up for himself a seat of honor in the church, as the viceroys do.  The adelantado, Miguel Lopez de Legaspi, did not establish one, nor did the governors who afterward succeeded him.  Gomez Perez, who is now governor, did not wish to set one up; for in this and in all other things he has shown himself very moderate.  But it seemed to me that he should not fail to establish it, and thus at my importunity, and that of other persons, he has done so.  Because your Majesty has already honored him in other respects, favoring him with a guard of halberdiers, and as people from all the kingdoms of the infidels by whom we are surrounded resort to this city, and as these barbarians respect their superiors as gods, it did not appear to me to be right that the person who represented your Majesty should discontinue the dignity which was required to represent you.  And in order that your Majesty in the future may be pleased to provide this land with a governor who shall be capable and worthy to use his authority, I beg your Majesty to approve this and send him the order to continue and make permanent the practice.

The twelve thousand ducats which your Majesty has ordered to be paid in three installments for the work on this church, were necessary enough, although I fear that they are to avail as little as the rest; because, although your Majesty has so often commanded it, and we on our part have exercised the greatest possible diligence, it has not been possible to draw out from the royal treasury what was due from it for the said work; and so it has come to a standstill,