that some or the majority of the encomiendas are so small that they do
not suffice to support their encomenderos, who thus cannot attend to
matters of divine worship. Consequently, the natives come to regard
the things of God as of little worth, and have little esteem for our
faith and the Christian religion, seeing that we who profess to be
Christians pay so little attention to them. Moreover, the natives of
these islands are so harassed and afflicted with public and private
undertakings, that they are not able to take breath; nor do they have
time to observe the instruction, and hold it of so little account that
when they lack for anything, it must be in the instruction and not in
temporal affairs. I cannot picture to your Majesty, nor declare what
I feel in my heart about this matter. Moreover, I am very sure that
all the chastisements given us by God, the hardships, misfortunes, and
calamities sent us, all are because of evil treatment of the Indians
and the little heed taken for the principal reason for our coming--that
is, their conversion and protection. The remedy therefor is not that
your Majesty send decrees and orders charging good treatment of the
Indians, as in the letters which have already been received here; but
that a number of the best religious be sent. They can deal with these
natives, and defend them from the labors imposed by the Spaniards,
and from the outrages that they inflict upon them. Again, it is of
even more importance that, if your Majesty, as is rumored here, is
to send hither a governor or president, he be a man free from all
human interests, whose head could not be turned by the great gains
in this country. He should not be married, nor should he bring with
him relatives or followers for whom to provide. For under any one of
the aforesaid conditions it is impossible to avoid the destruction of
this country, beyond the power of your Majesty to remedy it. I have
written this to your Majesty several times before, and now I repeat it,
since it is the most necessary thing for the betterment of this land,