“It is useless to publish such immunities in the Indies:  to the settlers who have taken up residence it is a pure gain, for the best lands are given to them, and at a low valuation they will be worth two-hundred thousand at the end of the four years when the period of residence is ended, without their digging a spadeful in them.  I would not speak thus if the settlers were married, but there are not six among them all who are not on the look-out to gather what they can and depart speedily.  It would be a good thing if they should go from Castile, and also if it were known who and what they are, and if the country could be settled with honest people.

“I had agreed with those settlers that they should pay the third of the gold, and the tenths, and this at their own request; and they received it as a great favour from their Highnesses.  I reproved them when I heard that they ceased to do this, and hoped that the Commander would do likewise, and he did the contrary.

“He incensed them against me by saying that I wanted to deprive them of what their Highnesses had given them; and he endeavoured to set them at variance with me, and did so; and he induced them to write to their Highnesses that they should never again send me back to the government, and I likewise make the same supplication to them for myself and for my whole family, as long as there are not different inhabitants.  And he together with them ordered inquisitions concerning me for wickednesses the like whereof were never known in hell.  Our Lord, who rescued Daniel and the three children, is present with the same wisdom and power as He had then, and with the same means, if it should please Him and be in accordance with His will.

“I should know how to remedy all this, and the rest of what has been said and has taken place since I have been in the Indies, if my disposition would allow me to seek my own advantage, and if it seemed honourable to me to do so, but the maintenance of justice and the extension of the dominion of her Highness has hitherto kept me down.  Now that so much gold is found, a dispute arises as to which brings more profit, whether to go about robbing or to go to the mines.  A hundred castellanos are as easily obtained for a woman as for a farm, and it is very general, and there are plenty of dealers who go about looking for girls:  those from nine to ten are now in demand, and for all ages a good price must be paid.

“I assert that the violence of the calumny of turbulent persons has injured me more than my services have profited me; which is a bad example for the present and for the future.  I take my oath that a number of men have gone to the Indies who did not deserve water in the sight of God and of the world; and now they are returning thither, and leave is granted them.