give him, everything might be well arranged.  I dare say that I have information of no other person who is more suitable, by his abilities and qualifications, which are well known and have been shown in the service of your Majesty; and I have such information concerning his conduct of affairs that I should consider him very good for you to approve for this commission.  If your Majesty shall decide to send anyone to do this work, I warn you, in order that he may fulfil his duties with exactness, as is due to the service of your Majesty, that he should not come as subordinate to or dependent upon the Audiencia or the governor, if it can be avoided; but his only business should be to separate entanglements and untie the knots.  It will be no less unadvisable to have him remain here with an office or allowance; for in such case he would not wish to offend many persons, but would conciliate their good-will.  If your Majesty will accept mine, you will pardon me for being longer in the answer than was the question.

As for several points mentioned in the royal decree of your Majesty of the twelfth of December, one thousand six hundred and ten—­by which persons who come with the viceroys, governors, presidents, captains-general, auditors, and royal officials, are prohibited and incapacitated from receiving the favors and rewards of offices, encomiendas, and other things which are usually given to those who serve and labor; and preference over other claimants is given to the sons and descendants of conquistadors, and likewise of the settlers; and it is directed that for the distribution of the said favors or rewards the new order and form should be followed which your Majesty ordains in the said decree, taking away the power from those who before held it in this matter, and giving what was held by them to the auditors and fiscals—­it has seemed best to me to inform your Majesty of what presents itself to me in this regard, so that concerning all this you may provide and command what is most suitable for your royal service, and for the divine service, in behalf of which the former is conducted.

This country is most distant from Espana of any which is known in the world and it, with the persons who inhabit and maintain it, are today the most borne down with troubles of all the Indias; for here is the force of the war which is not felt there, and between so many nations as are our neighbors, who can wage and maintain it; it seems, therefore, as if no person who is free to do what he will, and who aspires to honor and fortune, would come here to serve, without expectation of those rewards, if he were able to do it nearer the eye of your Majesty and of his fatherland.  For if it is true that hitherto there have been many of this kind who have come, it has been in the hope that after three years they could leave, entering the honored or profitable occupations which they might have merited.  The official persons with whom they came, or to whose land they belonged, and who were