176 Instructions for the "Audiencia." B. XIV. Moreover, no encomendero was to compel the Ch. 4. Indians to build any house for him but his own. If he sold his own house, he must build another at his own charge. During seedtime the Indians were not to be employed by their masters; and when they were sent to the mines they were to be provided with clergy there. This last order, if it had been generally acted up to, would have been a great protection. Indians not to be removed from their districts. Another important order given for the benefit of the Indians was, that they should not, even when they were slaves, be removed from their own districts. With regard to slaves, the orders quoted before, that the proof of slavery should rest with the master, and that the branding-iron should be in official custody, are found in these instructions. To men practised in government, as Charles the Fifth and his ministers were, the old difficulty (quis custodiet ipsos custodes?) naturally occurred. It was very well to make all these wise laws for the Indians; but who was to see that Protectors they would be obeyed? To meet this difficulty, appointed. a plan for the protection of the Indians was pre llevase con Bestias, como qui- pasando de veinte Leguas de su los Encomenderos residian, no 4, lib. 4, Instructions for the "Audiencia.' 177 pared, as early, apparently, as the date of the first B. XIV. draught of the instructions for the Audiencia. Ch. 4. The plan was similar to that which had been adopted in 1516 by the great Cardinal Ximenes. The office formerly held by Las Casas was renewed, and Protectors were appointed for the Indians, who were "charged and commanded to have much care to visit and inspect the said Indians, and to cause that they should be welltreated and taught in secular things (for so we may render the word endustriados), and instructed in the Articles of the Holy Catholic Faith, by the persons who have charge of them in encomienda."* "Por la presente vos man- | enseñados en las cosas de nuesdamos cometemos y encargamos tra sancta fee cathólica."— El y mandamos, que tengais mucho EMPERADOR al OBISPO DE cuydado de mirar y visitar los MÉXICO, 10 Henero, 1528, dichos Indios y hazer que sean PUGA, Provisiones, fol. 64. bien tratados y endustriados y CHAPTER V. B. XIV. Ch. 5. First Audiencia arrives in New Spain. Dec. 1528. ARRIVAL OF THE AUDIENCIA GREAT DISPUTES BETWEEN THE PROTECTORS OF THE INDIANS A GREAT JUNTA IN SPAIN ON THE SUBJECT OF THE INDIES. THE HE officers constituting the Audiencia having received their instructions, set sail from Seville for New Spain at the end of August, 1528, and arrived at Vera Cruz on the 6th of December of that year. From thence they sent to summon Nuño de Guzman, who was to be their President; but, without waiting for him, having the Emperor's command to that effect, they made their entrance into the city of Mexico. The climate of this place seems to have constantly had all the bad effects which ill-doers could have wished for upon the unhappy official men and lawyers who were sent thither from the mother country. Two of the Auditors, the Licenciates Parada and Francisco Maldonado, fell ill, and died within thirteen days after their arrival. This circumstance would tend to diminish the suspicions, if any still existed, of Cortes having been concerned in the opportune death of Ponce de Leon. The other Residencia Auditors commenced taking the residencia amidst a perfect hubbub of complaints, demands, and of Cortes. Nuño de Guzman's appointment. 179 law-suits, principally directed against the absent B. XIV. Cortes, who was more happily engaged than in Ch. 5. replying to them, by solemnizing his marriage with Juana de Zuñiga, daughter of the Count of Aguilar, and niece of the Duke of Bejar. The appointment of Nuño de Guzman was a most deplorable one. He appears to have had nothing about him of the nature of a statesman, but to have been a cruel, rapacious, inconsiderate man, whose career is strikingly similar to that of some of the captains who, under Pedrarias, had desolated the Terra-Firma. This bad appointment was probably caused by the desire of the Government in Spain to have a military man, of some repute in the Indies, to supply the place of Cortes, the fear of that great Conqueror being the ruling motive which had given rise to the appointment of the Audiencia. When Nuño de Guzman came to join his colleagues in Mexico, though some care was taken in the general affairs of Government, yet the Auditors were accused of attending more to their private interests than to their public duties, and of being wholly neglectful of those royal orders, upon which so much stress had been laid, touching the liberty and good treatment of the Indians. Thence grew Great vehement disputes between the Auditors and dispute the Protectors of the Indians,-not only the the Proofficial Protectors, but the Franciscan Monks in the Indians the city of Mexico, who demanded the execution new of these royal orders, saying, that otherwise the royal conscience would not be discharged. Nuño de Guzman and his Auditors, in the usual way of between tectors of and the Audiencia. 180 Disputes between the Protectors B. XIV. factious persons, who meet an accusation made Ch. 5. against them by charges against the opposite Nuño de Guzman's cruelty. party which have nothing to do with the matter in hand, replied that the Monks and the Protectors were partisans of Cortes, and rather defenders of him than of the Indians. Instantly the whole town was engaged on one side or other of these two factions; and, to use the words of the royal historiographer, "so things went on with much confusion and shamefulness." He Without entering into the degrading disputes which arose from this state of things, one or two exploits of Nuño de Guzman's, in a foray against the Chichimecas, may be mentioned, as serving to show his want of fitness for his new office. acted, indeed, throughout, with the utmost intemperance, partiality, and even want of knowledge of the world. Upon grounds which at the time were thought tyrannical, he caused the Chief of the Chichimecas to be put to the torture and burnt. Other Chiefs, even in friendly districts, when they failed in bringing food or gold, were tormented by a savage dog being let loose upon them. Altogether the expedition was one continual course of cruelty and folly. We may say folly, because when Cortes or Vasco Nuñez committed the acts of barbarity, which, alas! will for ever sully their great names, their cruelty always had much of policy in it, and little or nothing of mere wantonness. But now there was no occasion * HERRERA, Hist. de las Indias, dec. 4, lib. 4, cap. I I. For instance, he endeavoured to prevent any letters coming from Spain but his own. |