In Sevilla. In Sevilla, which is the second stopping-place, another troop of difficulties are encountered.  In general, it is customary at the House of Trade to make some additions to the decrees of his Majesty; in order that these be accepted a great number of requirements must be fulfilled, the lack of any one of which is sufficient to invalidate the documents.  Usually some one of these is lacking, from which it is easy to understand the embarrassment in which he must be who has charge of this matter, when he finds himself and his companions already in Sevilla without sufficient means for their support.  This happened to me, and I am certain that I was not the first, and that he who follows me will not be the last, thus situated.  I found myself in such embarrassment as the result of this that I was almost on the point of abandoning the enterprise at that time.

The small allowance for provisions on the voyage. Moreover, the amount granted in Sevilla for the entire support of the religious is far from sufficient for this purpose.  If the amount commanded to be granted to them is divided into vestments, bedding, carriage of books, and freight-charges from Sevilla to Sanlucar, the amount allowed for the ship supplies for each person comes to only twenty-two ducados, which is all that they actually had.  It is easy to see that it is impossible to obtain with this, or even approach, all that is necessary.  It is certainly true that for bread and wine alone, I spent almost all of what the king granted me for supplies on the voyage; and that I had to encroach upon what was granted me for vestments and what clothes the friars themselves used for apparel.  In addition, I was unable to pay all that we owed in Sevilla to the convent for the days during which we had remained there; accordingly, when I left it I was out of favor with the prior and the other brethren of the convent and yet I reduced to a very limited amount the supplies for the voyage.  This is the statement of facts in verbo sacerdotis; for it may be evident in what straits we were, to anyone who has received as allowance for this purpose no more than that which the king gives, as ordinarily those who come from the Philippinas have only that amount.

The requirement that the Council shall approve the religious who are to go is severe and useless. After all this, the requirement of making the voyage under the very severe rule that the Council shall approve the friars who are to go to the Indias brings the whole undertaking within obvious risk of failure.  If the list of names of the religious who are going must be certain and accurate, it cannot be sent to the Council before they are all assembled in Sevilla; for up to that point it is very uncertain who are to go.  Even then it still remains uncertain, for many come back from Sevilla.  The ordinary state of affairs is that all are gathered there a few days only before the departure of the fleet, for, if they