Pedro Ponce de León , 1596 
317 
duties shall be charged you upon all that you and they may take for the 
provisioning of your house and theirs for what may belong to me in 
those parts, provided that the things that you thus take are for the 
aforesaid purpose and none other, and if you sell them or any part of 
them, duties shall be collected for me upon the whole. 
44. Item: I grant you license and power to give to the persons who 
may go with you to the said explorations, pacifications, and settlement of 
the said provinces of New Mexico and who may aid you there, and to 
their children and descendants, lands and ground for pasture and farms, 
not taking away from the Indians those that belong them, but rather giv¬ 
ing them what they need. In order that they may rest content and satis¬ 
fied, those who shall have settled and resided in the said provinces for 
the term of five years shall have the lands in perpetuity, and upon those 
who shall have erected sugar-mills and maintained them with negro slaves 
no execution shall be made, nor upon the said slaves, tools, or stores with 
which they are worked. 
45. Item: I give you license and power to erect, in the parts of the 
said provinces of New Mexico most suitable for their guarding and 
preservation, three forts, and after you have built and supported them, 
I grant you for the rest of your days the lieutenancies of them, with a 
salary of 100,000 maravedís 32 annually for each one, which is to be paid 
from the property belonging to me in the provinces that you may thus 
pacify. 
46. Item: I agree and it is my will that you should act as a court of 
appeal in all the verdicts given by the judges and justices that you may 
appoint in my name or that I may appoint in all the said province and 
provinces that you may pacify and settle and explore, for which I grant 
you the same and equal power as that which I have. 
47. Item: I grant you and I consider it to be right that you shall be in 
immediate contact with my royal Council of the Indies and I order that 
none of the viceroys or neighboring audiencias shall interfere in the 
district of the said provinces officially nor a pedimento de parte ni por via 
de apelación appoint commissioned judges for them. My Council of the 
Indies shall try the affairs of the said district officially and a pedimento de 
parte y por via de apelación , in civil cases of one hundred dollars up and 
in criminal cases in which the sentence would be death or mutilation by 
the removal of a member, provided that those who wish to do so may 
go to the Audiencia of Nueva Galicia, and the same with those whom you 
may appoint. 
48. Item: I grant you permission to give public lands and watering 
places to the towns in New Mexico that may be settled, and to open roads 
and paths in conjunction with their councils, without prejudice to the 
Indians but rather to their benefit. 
49. Item: I likewise grant you permission to appoint aldermen and 
other administrative officials for the towns that may be settled, for the 
time that I may will, provided that those who are thus appointed shall 
receive my confirmation within four years; and I grant you permission to 
raise and recruit in New Spain and Nueva Galicia and in all the cities, 
towns, and places of both provinces, the said three hundred men. 
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