BIOGRAPHY. 



381 



in the sixty-first year of bis age, having preserved his judgment 

 and faculties until the latest hour. His funeral was attended 

 by the archbishop of Lima, the ecclesiastical and secular chap- 

 ters, the religious communities, and the whole of the nobility 

 residing in the capital. The tears of the poor, the enco- 

 miums of the learned, and the grief of all, were his funereal 

 panegyric and his triumph. 



Don Antonio Leon Pinelo was the eldest of three brothers, 

 all of them distinguished by their learning and accomplish- 

 ments. It has not been precisely ascertained M^hether he was 

 born in Lima, or in another part of the kingdom ; but it is 

 certain that he was entered as a student in the royal university 

 of St. Mark, where his preceptor. Dr. Velazques, a native 

 of Lima, inspired hirn with a taste for the study of the juris- 

 prudence of the Indies. Accordingly, in 1623, he published 

 a discourse on the importance, and methodical compilement 

 (recopilacion), of the laws of the Indies, which was so well 

 received in Spain, that it procured him the appointment of re- 

 porter to the supreme council for the affairs of the Indies. He 

 afterwards composed two volumes, in which he made a prac- 

 tical application of the theory of his discourse ; and, which, 

 under the title of " Compilement of the Laws of the Indies,'* 

 are consulted at this hour in all affairs relative to the jurispru- 

 dence of the Spanish colonies. Jn prosecuting this very ar- 

 duous and useful task, he appears to have laboured with a 

 most indefatigable industry. " Having," he observes, *' ob- 

 tained permission to consult all the books and papers con- 

 tained in the departments of the two secretaries of Peru and 

 New Spain, I perused, in the space of two years, five hun- 

 dred books of manuscript schedules, and, in them, upwards 



of 



