CHAPTER I. THE REBELLION OF ENRIQUE.-THE VARIETY OF FORMS OF INDIAN SUBJECTION.INDIANS OF WAR.-INDIANS OF RANSOM.INDIANS OF COMMERCE. THE BRANDING OF SLAVES.PERSONAL SERVICES.-GENERAL QUESTIONS ARISING FROM THE ENCOMIENDA SYSTEM. CHAPTER II. NATURE OF ENCOMIENDAS RE-STATED.-HISTORY OF ENCOMIENDAS RESUMED FROM THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO.-ORIGINAL PLAN OF CORTEZ.-JUNTA, IN 1523, FORBIDS ENCOMIENDAS.- -MEAN WHILE CORTEZ GRANTS ENCOMIENDAS.-PONCE DE LEON COMES TO MEXICO AS JUDGE OF RESIDENCIA.HIS INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT ENCOMIENDAS.-THE QUESTION NOT DETERMINED ON ACCOUNT OF THE UNSETTLED STATE OF THE GOVERNMENT OF MEXICO. CHAPTER III. MEANING OF THE WORD RESIDENCIA.-ORIGIN OF THE PRACTICE OF TAKING RESIDENCIAS IN CASTILE AND ARAGON.THE GOOD AND EVIL OF RESIDENCIAS. CHAPTER IV. THE RESIDENCIA OF CORTEZ.-DEATH OF PONCE DE LEON.-CONFUSED STATE OF THE GOVERNMENT OF MEXICO.-PONCE DE LEON'S INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT ENCOMIENDAS COME TO NAUGHT. -ENCOMIENDAS ALLOWED BY THE SPANISH COURT.-AN AUDIENCIA CREATED FOR MEXICO.-INSTRUCTIONS TO THIS AUDIENCIA DO NOT VARY THE NATURE OF ENCOMIENDAS IN NEW SPAIN. CHAPTER V. ARRIVAL OF THE AUDIENCIA.—GREAT DISPUTES BETWEEN THE PROTECTORS OF THE INDIANS AND THE AUDIENCIA.-THE AUDITORS PROSECUTE THE BISHOP OF MEXICO.-THE BISHOP EXCOMMUNICATES THE AUDITORS.-A GREAT JUNTA IN SPAIN ON THE SUBJECT OF THE INDIES. CHAPTER VI. THE SECOND AUDIENCIA ARRIVES IN MEXICO.-PROCEEDINGS OF THE AUDITORS.-GREAT ERROR IN THEIR INSTRUCTIONS ABOUT ENCOMIENDAS. SEVERITY TOWARD THE COLONISTS.-THE NUMBER OF ORPHANS IN NEW SPAIN. CHAPTER VII. THE IMPORTATION OF NEGROES.-MONOPOLIES -MONOPOLIES OF LICENSES. DEPOPULATION OF THE WEST INDIA ISLANDS. CHAPTER VIII. GENERAL ADMINISTRATION OF THE BISHOP-PRESIDENT IN NEW SPAIN. THE NEW AUDIENCIA DID NOT ABOLISH ENCOMIENDAS. -WHY THEY FAILED TO DO SO.-PROCEEDINGS IN SPAIN WITH RESPECT TO ENCOMIENDAS.-THE CELEBRATED LAW OF SUCCESSION PASSED IN 1536. CHAPTER I. THE REBELLION OF ENRIQUE.THE VARIETY OF FORMS OF INDIAN SUBJECTION. INDIANS OF WAR. INDIANS OF THE BRANDING OF SLAVES. PERSONAL SERVICES. —GENERAL QUESTIONS ARISING FROM THE ENCOMIENDA SYSTEM. COMMENCE this chapter with a pleasant and unexpected episode in the affairs of the Indies. The swollen mountain torrent, though now and then retarded for a moment, bursts through, winds round, leaps over, or dashes along with it every obstacle, and still pursues its main, inevitable course-chafed, but not essentially diverted by any of these small interruptions. Such was the inpouring of the Spaniards upon the devoted territories of the New World. Tired with this uniform current of success, we naturally welcome any thing like a triumph on the other side. Even had the conquerors been a company of great and good personages, each man of them a Cato or an Aristides, whose efforts all the world were bound to further and approve, we should not wish them always to conquer, and could bear to see them and their virtues tried occasionally by a little adversity in the way of defeat. Much greater is this disrelish for any uniformity of good fortune on one side, when the reader, as in this case, has to summon up in imagination all manner of distant benefits and indirect advantages, as proceeding, or likely to proceed, from the conquest, in order to enable him to endure, with any patience, the recital of VOL. III. E |