before his visit—­for his poor health did not permit him to do more.  It is not to be believed that a well-informed lawyer would try to obstruct the service of your Majesty, for nearly all his ordinances are directed to and reflect distrust of the fidelity of the royal officials, to whom your Majesty has hitherto entrusted your revenues.  From the good disposition that I observe in them and the work that they do, I judge them to be your very good and faithful servants.

It is advisable that your Majesty be pleased to send an accountant for settling accounts, and that he be a person of authority, with adequate pay.  He who serves in that office in the meanwhile was formerly the servant of one of these auditors; and he is more concerned in occupying his time in sustaining friendships than in attending to what is necessary.  On that account if some of the new ordinances were to be remade, this would be bettered.

I received some decrees in these last ships, which were despatched in the year thirty-two, and others of the year thirty-three, concerning the treasury, which are obeyed and will be carried out as is therein contained.  When these ships set sail—­and that has not been done before as the decrees were received late, and by way of India—­I shall give an account of the condition of these matters.

The viceroy of Nueva Espana has sent me four companies as a reenforcement, and this camp has six others.  I have reorganized five, so that there are now six companies in this city, each with more than one hundred soldiers, which is the least number that a company generally has.

Since the month of August of last year, when I began to govern these islands, the half-annats [103] have been collected with the care ordered by your Majesty, in which I cooeperated with the commissary for that tax.  The royal officials and the auditor who was appointed commissary are doing as they should.

In the ships of last year, and by way of Yndia, I informed your Majesty how expedient it was to charge five per cent duty on the silver and reals that are sent annually from Nueva Espana, as no remedy has been found whereby that commerce can be adjusted to the permission of only five hundred thousand pesos, which your Majesty has conceded to these islands.  Past times can ill be compared with the present; and granting the accidents which oblige the viceroys of Nueva Espana not to practice the rigor which they themselves make the governors of Philipinas overlook, and considering the present thing, and watching out for the greater service of your Majesty, I am grieved because the royal officials of the ships enjoy this advantage—­which as I have seen, amounts to more than one hundred thousand pesos per year—­and, notwithstanding this new tax, the inconvenience of the quantities of money passing from those regions will increase; for it is most certain that those to whom belongs the trade of Philipinas always find a way by which to attain their objects; and because the viceroy of Mexico undertook to check it this year, by only threats, the inhabitants of these islands are ruined and left without their capital, which remained in Nueva Espana.  May our Lord preserve and prosper the royal person of your Majesty, as we your vassals desire and need.  Manila, August 10, 1634.