WHOLE VOL. THE WEST INDIES — ^VAZQUEZ DE ESPINOSA I33 



them along and give them food for the love of God ; without this 

 assistance and comfort it is certain that many would perish, and thus 

 by the agency of this blessed work and aid, all the poverty-stricken 

 are relieved. 



375. There is a hospital of the Brethren of San Juan de Dios, in 

 which they care for the indigent sick and the poverty-stricken ; there 

 are other hospitals, churches, and pilgrimage shrines. The city is 

 a great commercial center, both because it is located at the junction 

 of the highways to the ports of Vera Cruz and Acapulco, so that the 

 wealthy encomenderos and residents of this city profit by the volume 

 of the merchandise which they freight to both ports with greater 

 ease and less expense, and also because it lies within the radius of 

 many large and wealthy cities; here they gather a huge amount of 

 very fine cochineal. It contains woolen mills, etc., and native products, 

 as will be detailed in the following chapter. Thus this city has grown 

 and is growing extensively, and its residents are successful and 

 wealthy. 



Chapter VIII 



Continuing the Description of the Features of This City and Dio- 

 cese, and of Other Cities. 



376. There are in this city large woolen mills in which they weave 

 quantities of fine cloth, serge, and grogram, from which they make 

 handsome (gentiles) profits, this being an important business in this 

 country; and those who run these mills are still heathen (gentiles) 

 in their Christianity. To keep their mills supplied with labor for the 

 production of cloth and grograms, they maintain individuals who are 

 engaged and hired to ensnare poor innocents ; seeing some Indian 

 who is a stranger to the town, with some trickery or pretext, such as 

 hiring him to carry something, like a porter, and paying him cash, 

 they get him into the mill ; once inside, they drop the deception, and 

 the poor fellow never again gets outside that prison until he dies and 

 they carry him out for burial. In this way they have gathered in 

 and duped many married Indians with families, who have passed 

 into oblivion here for 20 years, or longer, or their whole lives, with- 

 out their wives and children knowing anything about them ; for even 

 if they want to get out, they cannot, thanks to the great watchfulness 

 with which the doormen guard the exits. These Indians are, occu- 

 pied in carding, spinning, weaving, and the other operations of mak- 

 ing cloth and grograms ; and thus the owners make their profits by 

 these unjust and unlawful means. 



