most advisable method possible.  But as it is my own affair, and a matter akin to vanity (from which I believe myself quite free)—­for when I have finished the public acts of pomp and display in my office, I return to that of sailor, which is the chief thing of this government—­I lay it before your Majesty, so that you may be pleased to provide in this matter and in other things touching auditors, as may best suit you. [I ask that your Majesty act] without greater inclination to one side than the other, since this office is yours, not mine; and since I shall live in the same manner with or without it, without coveting greater honors than your Majesty (may God preserve you for us) has granted me and grants me in employing my services.

[Marginal note:  “After considering what you mention in this matter, it is reduced to the following points.  The first and more essential is that which you mention (although in ambiguous terms) regarding the trading of the auditors and government employees there, for which reason they prevented the sending of the cloves.  The testimony that you send of it does not concern this matter, but only that of the goods and money that were to be sent to Terrenate for trading.  That indeed was done in accordance with your opinion.  The opinion that you shall hold in matters so worthy of reform you must always send to me distinctly and clearly expressed; for if there are such officials who commit illegal acts—­not only in trading, but in hindering the profit of the royal treasury—­it is advisable not only for the greater security of the treasury, but also for the administration of justice, that such persons be punished with the rigor that the case requires.  Consequently, you shall do this, sending me information of what is done in this matter.  If any proven guilt results you shall sequester the property of offenders, in order to assure the judgment.  In accordance with this, we are writing to the Audiencia, advising it of what it must do.  In order that no official may have any cause to think that you, of your own accord, are trying to prove him guilty in a matter so grave, you shall be accompanied, in whatever concerns the sequestration of goods, by the archbishop resident there, in whose person we have the necessary confidence.  The second point is that you will have been informed of all the things that concern the advantage of the royal treasury.  You shall accordingly declare those things in the tribunal of the treasury and in the assembly.  This reply by letter will be your authority, so that you shall need nothing more special than this for whatever may be to the benefit of my royal treasury, and shall procure that benefit by all and any justifiable means.  The third point is—­as you have been informed and instructed in other letters concerning the purpose of the factory at Terrenate—­that all the benefit received from the islands of Maluco by the enemy is by way of barter; and that so vast profits are obtained by them in this that these enable