NOTICES OP PERU. 



185 



ditors. They entered the corps, and appeared at certain times 

 at the fortification, to prove that they were in the service of 

 the king, which exempted them from the grasp of the officers 

 of justice. This nominal enlistment was effected by bribing 

 the officers of the artillery, with a third or two thirds, and 

 sometimes even with the whole of the pay receivable by law. 



At the fortress in Valdivia, the viceroy paid the troops, part- 

 ly in clothing and the necessaries which they required, and 

 which could not be purchased there. The commander or go- 

 vernor was intrusted with the disbursements. He kept all the 

 goods ; opened a shop, and, paying the money sent, sold the 

 goods to the soldiery at most exorbitant prices ; necessity com- 

 pelled them to purchase, and thus the chieftain received as his 

 own, what he had held only in trust.* 



Ulloa complained loudly of the want of discipline through- 

 out all the garrisons of the whole coast, from Valdivia to Pana- 

 ma, and in order to remedy it, proposed to send yearly to Spain, 

 a proportional number of men from each province, according 

 to its population, there to be drilled, taught, and accustomed 

 to war in the armies of the monarch. He thought that a mili- 

 tary education, sufficient for one of these small garrisons, could 

 not be taught in America, even if all the officers, superior and 

 subaltern, had been Spaniards, as he recommended. He sug- 

 gests, however, the propriety of giving to the newly educated, 

 some subaltern offices, as serjeant-major, &c., to encourage 

 them to make themselves worthy of greater preferment. He 

 represents the Creoles as having been extremely vain of such 

 royal favor and distinction. 



During the last two years, Callao has much improved, and 

 the population has increased to probably eight thousand souls. 

 There is a fine wharf or mole, nearly completed, provided 

 with cranes and landing slips for the convenience of vessels in 

 the harbor. Its foundation is the ruined hulk of an old sloop 

 of war, around which piles have been driven ; these are filled 

 in with stone, brought from San Lorenzo, where it is quarried 

 and broken by convicts. 



* Noticias Secretas de America. 



24 



