27. Item:  No auditor shall sit when a suit is begun that will affect him, his sons, fathers, sons-in-law, or brothers, or when he shall be challenged.  As regards the penalty for challenging our president and auditors, the ordinances of Madrid shall be followed, the fine contained therein being doubled.

28. Item:  Our president and auditors shall have no authority to bring before our Audiencia in the first instance any suit of their own, of their wives, or of their children.  The said suits shall be tried by the alcaldes-in-ordinary, and shall come on appeal before our council of the Yndias if the case involves a thousand pesos or upwards.  If the other party to the suit desires to appeal to our Audiencia and not to the council, he may do so; but the auditor, his wife, and his children shall have no such right of choice.

29.  Further:  The said auditors shall not appear for others in the said Audiencia or in any other, nor shall they undertake to arbitrate cases that may come before them, except that cases already begun may be submitted to all the auditors of the Audiencia for arbitration, and except where our permission may be given—­under penalty of being suspended from the Audiencia for thirty days and losing salary for two months.

30.  Our said president and auditors shall have no share with an advocate or commissioner [receptor] in his fees or salary.  Nor shall they have the right to receive anything but food from any corporation or individual, or other person, who shall have been interested in a suit within a year previous, or who shall expect to be so interested, and the same as to their wives and children—­under the penalty for forswearing, besides loss of office, being rendered incapable of holding any other office, and being required to pay double for what they have taken.  They shall take great care not to converse much or be very familiar with advocates or attorneys who are pleading cases.

31. Item:  We command that our president and auditors shall not be engaged in military expeditions, or expeditions of discovery, without my express command.  They shall have no income-bearing estates [granjerias] either in cattle or in arable land, or in mines.  They shall carry on no mercantile business by themselves, or in partnership, or through intermediaries; nor shall they avail themselves of the services of Indians in procuring water or wood or grass, or for other purposes on pain of being deprived of their offices.

32. Item:  There shall be appointed to no position as corregidor or other officer of justice the son, brother, father-in-law, son-in-law, or brother-in-law of any president, auditor, or fiscal of our audiencias; and if any one shall be so appointed he shall not perform the duties of the office, under a penalty of a thousand pesos of gold for our treasury.

33. Item:  We command that when any person desires to bring any suit or action against any of our auditors he may do so before our said Audiencia, or before the alcaldes-in-ordinary, and he may appeal from the said alcaldes to the said Audiencia.