INDIAN AMELIORATIONS DEATH OF PHILIP II. 175 



and refractory vagabond Indians who wandered about the territory 

 under the name of Mexicans and Otomies. Whilst they main- 

 tained their perfectly nomadic state it was evident that they were 

 useless either as productive laborers for the Spaniards, or as objects 

 of taxation for the sovereign. It was a wise policy, therefore, to 

 attempt what was philanthropically called — their civilization; — 

 but upon this occasion, as upon all the others that preceded it, the 

 failure was signal. Commissioners and notaries were selected and 

 large salaries paid these officials to ensure their faithful services in 

 congregating the dispersed natives. But the government agents, 

 who well knew the difficulty if not the absolute impossibility of 

 achieving the desired object, amused themselves by receiving and 

 spending the liberal salaries disbursed by the government, whilst 

 the Indians still continued as uncontroled as ever. The Count 

 of Monterey was nevertheless obstinately bent on the prosecution 

 of this favorite policy of the king, and squandered, upon these vile 

 ministerial agents, upwards of two hundred thousand dollars, with- 

 out producing the least beneficial result. In the following viceroy's 

 reign he was sentenced to pay the government this large sum as 

 having been unwisely spent ; but was finally absolved from its 

 discharge by the court to which he appealed from the decision of 

 his successor. 



In the beginning of 1599, the news was received in Mexico of 

 the death of Philip II. and of the accession of Philip III. This 

 event was perhaps the most remarkable in the annals of the colony, 

 during the last year of the sixteenth century, except that the town 

 of Monterey in New Leon was founded, and that a change was 

 made by the viceroy of the port of Vera Cruz from its former sickly 

 site at la Antigua, to one which has since become equally unhealthy. 



The first three years of the seventeenth century were chiefly 

 characterized by renewed viceroyal efforts among the Indians. 

 The project of congregating the nomadic natives was abandoned, 

 and various attempts were made to break up the system of 

 repartimientos, which had been, as we have seen, the established 

 policy of the colony if not of the king, ever since the conquest. 

 If the Indians were abandoned to their own free will, it was 

 supposed that their habits were naturally so thriftless that they 

 would become burthensome instead of beneficial to the Spanish 

 colonists, and, ultimately, might resolve themselves into mere 

 wanderers like the Otomies and their vagabond companions. Yet, 

 it was acknowledged that their involuntary servitude, and the 

 disastrous train of impositions it entailed, were unchristian and 



