162 PESTILENCE NO INDIAN TRIBUTE EXACTED. 



their business, they were unable to force the viceroy to retract his 

 measure. His determination was founded on the fact that trade 

 had now become established on a firm and robust basis, and that it 

 could well bear without injury an impost of this character. 



In the years 1574 and 1575 there were serious discussions 

 between the temporal and spiritual powers of Mexico, growing out 

 of a royal order that no prelate should be admitted in the country 

 unless he bore a suitable license from the Council of the Indies. 

 In 1576, Mexico was again visited by a frightful pestilence, which 

 spread rapidly, and carried off large numbers of victims. The 

 whole of New Spain was ravaged by it, and neither care, nor 

 medical science, seems to have had the least effect either in curing 

 or in alleviating the sufferers. The symptoms of this malady were 

 a violent pain in the head which was succeeded by a burning fever, 

 under which the patient sank. None survived the seventh day, 

 and it is reported that near two millions perished under the dread- 

 ful scourge. The malady abated at the close of the rainy season, 

 and disappeared entirely at the beginning of 1577. 



In the two succeeding years, Don Martin commanded that 

 the usual annual tribute should not be collected from the Indians. 

 This measure was designed to alleviate the lot of these suffering 

 subjects of the king and to testify the paternal regard which he 

 cherished for a race that served him and his subjects so beneficially 

 in the mines. It was in the mineral districts that the Indians were 

 in reality the greatest sufferers and laborers in New Spain. Their 

 toil was incessant. Their task masters gave them no respite in 

 the bowels of the earth, for they wrought as if they designed to 

 scrape every vein and artery of the colony's soil. Silver and labor 

 were calculated with exactness, and no limit to the Indian's indus- 

 try was prescribed save that which was imposed by his capacity 

 for work and his power of endurance. The viceroy, seeking to 

 alleviate this, introduced a milder system, as far as he was able, 

 among the leading miners of the colony. He insisted upon per- 

 mitting the Indians regular repose, and he forbade their entire 

 confinement within the mines, but commanded that they should be 

 allowed time to breathe the fresh air on the surface of the earth, and 

 suffered to attend to their own domestic labors, or to toil on public 

 works for a competent recompense. 



The government of Don Martin had thus far been unusually 

 calm, but his last moments in Mexico were to be disturbed by a 

 quarrel with a Franciscan monk, named Rivera, who had called at 



