ATTACKS BY DUTCH REMOVAL OF CAPITAL PROPOSED. 197 



subsequent attacks. These fortifications were hardly commenced 

 when another Dutch fleet appeared before the town. But this time 

 the visit was not of a hostile nature ; — it was an exhausted fleet, 

 demanding water and provisions, after recovering which it resumed 

 its track for the East Indies. Whilst the Spaniards were thus 

 succoring and sustaining their enemies the Dutch, a dreadful 

 famine scourged Sinaloa and neighboring provinces, carrying off 

 upwards of eight thousand Indians. 



During the long reign of the present monarch, Philip IV., Spain 

 was frequently at war with England, Holland, and France ; and 

 the Dutch, who inflicted dreadful ravages on the American coasts, 

 secured immense spoil from the Spaniards. In 1628, Pedro Hein, 

 a Hollander of great distinction, placed a squadron in the gulf on 

 the coasts of Florida to intercept the fleet of New Spain. The 

 resistance made by the Spaniards was feeble, and, their vessels 

 being captured by the Dutch, the commerce of 'Mexico experienced 

 a severe blow from which it was long in recovering. 



In 1629, there were ecclesiastical troubles in the colony, 

 growing out of an attempt by the higher order of the Spanish 

 clergy to prevent the increase of the regular priesthood from among 

 the natives of the country. They feared that in the course of time 

 the dominion of the establishment would thus be wrested from their 

 hands by the power of the Mexicans. The king, himself was 

 appealed to on this subject and caused it to be examined into 

 carefully. In 1631, in consequence of the repeated danger of the 

 capital from floods, the project of removing the site from its present 

 location, to the loftier levels between Tacuba and Tacubaya, was 

 seriously argued before the people. But the interest of property 

 holders, and inhabitants of the city would have been so seriously 

 affected by this act, that the idea was abandoned. 



The remaining years of this viceroyalty were consumed in 

 matters of mere local detail and domestic government, and in fact 

 we know but little of it, save that the severe inundations of 1629 

 caused the authorities to use their utmost efforts in prosecuting the 

 work of the desague, as we have already seen in the general 

 account given of that gigantic enterprise. In 1635 this viceroy's 

 reign terminated. 



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