158 



FALL OF MUNOZ AND HIS RETURN. 



pared with the acting governor's. The prisons, which already- 

 existed in Mexico were not adequate to contain his victims, and 

 he built others whose dark, damp and narrow architecture rendered 

 incarceration doubly painful to the sufferers. Don Martin Cortez, 

 the half brother of the Marques del Valle, who remained in the 

 metropolis as the attorney and representative of his kinsman, was 

 seized and put to torture for no crime save that the blood of the 

 conqueror flowed in his veins, and that he had enjoyed friendly 

 relations with the suspected conspirators. Torture, it was ima- 

 gined would wring from him a confession which might justify the 

 oidores. The situation of New Spain could not, indeed, be worse 

 than it was, for no man felt safe in the midst of such unrestrained 

 power and relentless cruelty ; and we may be permitted to believe 

 that outraged humanity would soon have risen to vindicate itself 

 against such brutes and to wrest the fruits of the conquest from a 

 government that sent forth such wicked sattelites. Even the 

 Audiencia itself, — the moving cause of this new and bad govern- 

 ment, — began to tremble when it experienced the humiliating 

 contempt with which it was invariably treated by the monster 

 Munoz. 



But all these acts of maladministration were more safely re- 

 ported to the Spanish court by the nobles and oidores of Mexico, 

 than the despatches of the unfortunate Marques de Falces. Philip 

 eagerly responded to the demand for the removal of Munoz. He 

 despatched the oidores Villanueva and Vasco de Puga, to Mexico, 

 with orders to Munoz to give up the government in three hours 

 after he received the royal despatch, and to return immediately to 

 Spain for judgment of his conduct. The envoys lost no time in 

 reaching their destination, where they found that Munoz had 

 retired to the convent of Santo Domingo, probably as a sanctuary, 

 in order to pass Holy Week. But the impatient emissaries, re- 

 sponding to the joyful impatience of the people, immediately fol- 

 lowed him to his retreat, and, after waiting a considerable time in 

 the anti-chamber, and being, at last, most haughtily received by 

 Munoz, who scarcely saluted them with a nod, Villanueva drew 

 from his breast the royal cedula, and commanded his secretary to 

 read it in a loud voice. 



For a while the foiled visitador sat silent, moody and thought- 

 ful, scarcely believing the reality of what he heard. After a pause, 

 in which all parties preserved silence, he rose and declared his 

 willingness to yield to the king's command ; and thus, this brutal 

 chief, who but a few hours before believed himself a sovereign in 



