Procuradores of New Spain 
137 
Another reason. It has not been experienced that the Indians make use 
of the land as the Spaniards use it, by observing them, either for planting 
or other purposes, for they are brought up to do whatever their nature 
inclines them to do and what their ancestors were brought up to do. They 
have no care for succession or perpetuity, but only for what they have in 
front of them and have need of for themselves, without any thought of 
the morrow. Rather it has been learned by experience that in many 
towns that were under encomiendas, when the Spaniards 
died and the towns were placed under the rule of your 
Majesty, vines and fruit-trees and orchards and mulberries 
and other crops and cattle that were left there were torn 
out and cut away by the Indians themselves, so that no vestige or sign 
remained. Much less, then, would they be willing to plant anew or raise 
cattle. 
Another reason. Against this it cannot be said that the Indians them¬ 
selves, in order to pay the tributes to be collected from them for your 
Majesty, would raise crops or what was ordered, and that they could 
maintain it thus, for this is without foundation. Before they became 
Christians they paid their caciques these tributes and many others much 
larger, but they did not for this reason apply themselves to cultivating the 
land, and the tributes that they give now are of the things that they raise 
and make—such as blankets, maize, beans, and other things of that sort. 
Another reason. Supposing that they will raise cattle and plant and 
build, it is certain that they will do neither the one nor the other except 
by having perpetual masters. And if they 
do raise cattle and give tributes there will be 
no one with whom to trade, nor to whom to 
sell, nor for whom it will be done; for if 
they say it is for the corregidores or persons 
to whom salaries will be given, it is clear 
that neither will they buy nor will they have 
the means or motive, for the salaries that 
are given in the towns that are under the rule of your Majesty are spent 
on the living of the corregidores themselves, and there is nothing left, 
as has been said, nor can there be anything left, nor have they any reason 
to buy, since they have neither house nor vineyard nor land nor wherein 
to put it, unless there be perpetuity. Thus, necessarily, for what would 
remain above your Majesty’s share of blankets and awnings 5 and things 
of the land, there would be no one to sell them to, nor with whom to 
trade them, and they would be lost. 
Another reason. When the Spaniards have held the towns in perpetuity 
it has always been the custom to take friars or clergymen with them, and 
to take their wives and children and male and female servants, and they 
encourage the Indians and treat them well. They do not ill treat them in 
any way, nor have they any reason to do it, and therefore it has been 
proved by experience that it seldom or never happens that there are dis¬ 
putes or quarrels on the part of the Spanish encomenderos. On the con¬ 
trary, the experience is that the audiencia is always full of disputes about 
The tributes of the In¬ 
dians who are under the 
rule of your Majesty are 
spent in the salaries of cor¬ 
regidores, and thus are not 
enough. 
Note this. 
