Causes for accepting the resignation of the reporter of the Audiencia from his office.

4.  The second point is in regard to their saying that I accepted the resignation of Licentiate Umana, reporter of this royal Audiencia, from his office.  It is a fact that the reasons which he gave me for it obliged me to do so—­not so much on account of his lack of health and eyesight, although he has that, as for the ill-treatment inflicted upon him by the auditors, without its being possible for me to give him any relief in it, as I am not always at the meetings.  The auditors are insufferable; and, although this man had served in this capacity for many years, they finally had him so harassed that they daily sought numberless excuses by which to avoid coming to the Audiencia.  And inasmuch as it is difficult to struggle all one’s life in one thing which concerns the ordinary despatch of business, I thought it less inconvenient to accept this resignation.  In the meanwhile, until your Majesty shall provide a remedy, they have been allowed to select whomever there is in the city.  But no one satisfies them; because, as there is no one who can endure them, there is no lawyer of high standing who will accept the office.

That the auditors, are giving malicious information when they say that the governor prevents a report of the government suits from being made to the royal Audiencia.

5.  The third point is that the auditors complain that I do not allow any report of the government suits to be made to the Audiencia.  As a sample, they cite an appeal made by the friars of St. Augustine from the edict, issued at the petition of the city, ordering all the Sangley shopkeepers to be collected in the Parian.  Although that was a necessary measure, and the royal Audiencia had no right to meddle in a matter so manifestly belonging to the government as the residence of the Sangleys in this or in that part yet I am not doing nor did I do what they say in this matter, about preventing the report to be made—­as will be seen by the acts which I enclose herewith, and which are cited in the letter on government affairs, which mentions this point.  By those acts will be seen the very opposite of what they tell me that they have written.

That those appointed to judicial offices be lawyers

6.  The fourth point is that they say that there are few advocates in this royal Audiencia, as I always keep them occupied in judicial posts, which ought to be kept for men of merit.  The truth is that there are not more than five lawyers in all the islands; and that in the four years while I have governed here I have not occupied in judicial offices more than two—­namely, Doctor Juan Fernandez de Ledo, in the Parian (which is an office that does not prevent him from exercising the profession of the law, since he does that in this same city, and already his term of office is over), and Doctor Luis Arias de Mora (whom I have only occupied in the office at La Laguna