Juan de Oñate, 1596 
357 
liberality as I have spent 100,000 ducats of Castile in bringing the affairs 
of the expedition to the state in which they now are, so that your lord- 
ship's orders might be more completely and fully carried out, and so that 
my zeal and loyalty might be truly seen and understood, as well as that 
the principal end and desire which I have and always have had in this 
expedition has been solely the service of God and of our lord the king, and 
the happiness and conversion of those souls, with many other aims than 
my own profit and advantage, of which God is the witness. 
But I consider it to be quite impossible, no matter what efforts I may 
make, to hold the people, or that twenty in the whole number will remain 
the day that they learn that there has been a change and that the expedi¬ 
tion has been taken from me and that no other person is coming to take 
it up. There are many strong and obvious reasons for this, the first of 
which is that those who fill the principal offices of the army are my rela¬ 
tives, and many of the people are going because of attachment to them, 
some through friendship and others through other special obligations; 
if the first leave there is no doubt that the others will also. In the same 
way many relatives of my relatives are going, each one of whom brings 
his allies and friends with him, who will leave without fail the day the 
news of the change comes. Besides this many old soldiers are going 
divided among the various offices, for which reasons and because they knew 
me at the time when I served his Majesty in the war with the Chichimecos, 
I have induced them to join the expedition, and they have induced others 
of their comrades and friends. All of these will abandon it unless I lead 
it, as they expect, for they are following me more through affection than 
because of any advantage that may result to them. Outside of this I 
hold many of the people attached to me because of help which I have given 
them and am now giving them, and the day that this ceases not a man of 
all those will be left. What has most strongly influenced all of these 
people to make the expedition with me, apart from the privileges and 
prerogatives which his Majesty is granting them, is the acquaintance 
which I have with them and the different treatment which I give them 
from what they will receive from the new person who will come. For, in 
everything, I have followed the custom which has been used in this coun¬ 
try in war and in the treatment of its people, as one who has followed and 
practised it for years; on the other hand the one who comes will have to 
follow the customs of Spain, although the methods of war with other 
nations used in Spain are very different from those practised with the 
Indians, and it is only by the years of experience and practice which I 
have that one may understand how it should be done. 
And if for these reasons and causes it is held to be impossible to detain 
the people who are going, for the reasons which I have said, with still 
greater difficulty could those be detained who are not coming for these 
obligations and special reasons. For they are working people and offi¬ 
cials who will not fail to find, at any time that they may return to the 
places whence they came, the same that they had and were earning before 
their departure. Furthermore they were persuaded to join this expedi¬ 
tion because of the profit which they were to receive from it, and they 
began it willingly without paying attention to the hardships of the road 
