in this matter (which all do not approve), and although I shall carefully do what is most advisable for the service of your Majesty, in accordance with justice and your royal decrees, yet I petition your Majesty to be pleased to declare your royal will—­as was done in what provisions were made by the Audiencia of Nueva Espana, although they were made by many auditors and not by one alone, as here—­so that we may all regulate ourselves thereby, without exceeding in any particular what pertains to it and what can be done.

Among other offices provided in the above manner was that of secretary of the registers, which is an office of importance.  I entreat that your Majesty will be pleased not to confirm its concession, nor that of others of the same date, until you can be informed of the pros and cons regarding it; for it will either be advisable to sell those offices for the relief of necessities here (although I do not think that such sale would go far toward that), or else let the matter take its course as hitherto, so that there be certain offices with which men who have served may be, with these employments, rewarded and gratified.  Well can your Majesty believe that I shall lose no occasion to do what I understand to be advisable for your service, both in this and in whatever else falls to me, and is in my power.

I shall now give Captain Luis de Contreras, whom I found filling the office of treasurer of the royal revenues here, one thousand two hundred Indians in encomienda (or a few more or less), and a pension of two hundred pesos as a gratification to another deserving man.  With that the former will have received a goodly part of the income that your Majesty orders me, by a royal decree that he presented to me, to give him in unassigned Indians or in those of an encomienda which may become vacant.  I could well wish that there were more Indians vacant than there are, in order to fulfil all that your Majesty orders me, and which the said Luis de Contreras merits by his character and good qualities.

Having seen the exactness with which I fulfilled the above, I am told that many are going about looking for decrees and trying to procure them now from your Majesty, in order to obtain like encomiendas and other posts.  I entreat your Majesty to postpone granting those favors until you shall first be informed by your governor of these islands and your Audiencia; for not all of them will be so well employed as is the aforesaid, if I may judge from the methods by which I have heard that they are seeking them, as they procure papers by means of witnesses presented on their part, which make much of what in itself is nothing.  Although the fiscal intervenes in the matter, it is to be noted that no one attempts to make investigations unless in some case when he regards the fiscal as quite on his side.

I am told that some persons here are trying to obtain the office of treasurer.  Besides, that the present holder of it has not left it, I do not as yet know many who could fill the place to be left vacant by him in this charge, because of the many qualifications necessary—­namely, trustworthiness, accuracy, system, and other qualities.  Although I do not think that there is lack of a person in whom these will be found, still I think it necessary to consider carefully the one who should be chosen for this post, to be sure of it.