SPANISH OEANTS. ' 231 



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^^the Indians should be brouglit to 



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11 



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settle," and tliafc such laiids be chosen for them as are 

 "healthy, ascertaining if there may live in them men of 

 great ago, and youths .of good condition .... whether 

 animals and flocks are healthy and of ample size . . . . 

 fruits and articles of food good .... the land suitable for 

 sowing . . . ." (Charles Y., 21st March, 1551. Decrees 

 dated June 26th, 1523, and Dec. 1st, 15^3.) Also decrees 

 of Philip II., 1638, are to a similar effect. But one dated 

 Madrid, June 4th, 1687, is of especial importance, for it no 

 longer talks of placing the Indians upon reservations ; but it 

 extends the system of giving Spanish grants to the Pueblo 

 Indians, and it presents them with those very letters patent 

 which they now hold, and which the United States Grovern- 

 ment has promised to respect. 



The following are a few abridged quotations from it : 

 "Whereas, as in my Eoyal Council of the Indos, the 

 Marquis Polces, Yiceroy of ^N'ew Spain, ordered that each 

 pueblo as might need land to sow, &c. .... should be 

 given 5,000* varas, and more if necessary, and that no land 

 should be granted to any one nearer than 1,000 varas, cloth 

 or silk measure, to the houses and lands of the Indians. 

 «... And whereas these Indian lands have been encroached 

 upon by owners of estates and lands, thereby depriving the 

 Indians of them, and seizing upon them, Sometimes violently, 

 sometimes fraudulently, for which cause the miserable Indians 

 have lost houses and towns, which is what the Spaniards seek 

 for and desire I have thought it wise to order and com- 

 mand that there be given and assigned generally to all the 

 Indian pueblos of -N"ew Spain for their farming lands not only 

 5,000 varas around the place of settlement, measured from 



5,000 varas = 1 legua = 2-636 Englisli miles. 



