Juan de Oñate, 1596 
367 
In case God allows that there shall come by the fleet another commis¬ 
sioned by his Majesty to undertake the expedition and supersede me in it, 
your lordship may depend upon me most certainly and positively, and 
upon those with me, not to make any disturbance whatever. On the con¬ 
trary I shall try with all my strength to prevent it, and not only will I 
deliver the conduct of the expedition to whomsoever his Majesty orders, 
but I will also hand over the arms, cattle, provisions, and other things 
which I have provided for if it be necessary to do so, and his Majesty 
and your lordship would be served by it, simply not to impede or delay 
the great undertaking in the service of God and his Majesty that I have 
begun, for it is understood, as I said further back, that this has been and 
is my chief end and purpose and that I have desired to employ my life and 
fortune for it rather than for my own profit and advancement. Believing 
in the upright justice and Christianity of the king, our lord, and of his 
royal Council of the Indies, I am satisfied that, after being informed of 
the justice of my right and claim to the said expedition, which was granted 
to me by his viceroys in his royal name, and the great amount of property 
which I have spent in his service, he will do me the favor to order me to 
go on with the said expedition and exploration of New Mexico, and that 
your lordship will favor my claims with special earnestness, for that is 
what your lordship owes to yourself and to your great worth and Chris¬ 
tianity, and that is what is due to my earnest desire to serve you and 
the sincerity and promptness with which I have hastened to do all that 
you have been pleased to order me to do, and because I am your creature 
and your lordship is master in this expedition which I have begun, and 
for which I have used up such a large amount of property. Indeed, until 
I had a letter from your lordship and your order for it I did not wish to 
put hand to anything, although the señor Don Luís de Velasco had given 
me authority to do it. For these reasons and considerations, and many 
others, your lordship is under a thousand obligations to defend and sup¬ 
port me, for the great difficulties that will follow from my removal, which 
I have mentioned in this, are known to you, besides others which I leave 
to the consideration of your lordship and your upright conscience, and 
those that will pursue the royal conscience, all of which cry aloud for my 
justification. This and all my affairs I put in the hand of your lordship 
and under your protection and favor. May our Lord preserve your lord- 
ship for many years. At the Rio de las Nazas, September 13, 1596. 
I forgot to say to your lordship that in order that the people who are 
here ready for the expedition may be more easily kept and held, and that 
those who are coming behind shall come more quickly and not turn back, 
your lordship should set some punishment, even a severe one, if only in 
appearance, by which arrest and punishment might be meted out to 
offenders—soldiers who remained behind or turned back, for it seems by 
the lists that I have that there are lacking more than two hundred of those 
that were recruited in this city and district. And let your lordship give 
this order that I ask for in such a way that rumors of it shall reach here, 
besides a letter to Don Lope and to me in which your lordship gives us 
strict orders to punish, not only those who depart or absent themselves, 
but also those who attempt to do so. 
Servant of your lordship. Don Juan de Oñate. 
