hundred quintals of saltpetre arrived. We shall be obliged to use
what there is in the royal magazines here, that we may not lack so
necessary a thing; yet the whole is but little.

The said viceroy wrote me that the troops came paid for a year, and
that from the wages of the troops he had retained sixty-five pesos in
the case of each soldier. The total amount is forty thousand pesos,
which sum was sent under registry on the account and at the risk of
the said forces. This is a piece of excellent foresight; for if the
total amount of wages had been paid, as is customary, they would have
gambled and spent the whole in two days, and would be in need the
whole year, from which great evils would follow. For the expedition
the viceroy sent sixty thousand pesos, without considering that the
treasury here is in such a state that, even if the whole amount should
be paid into it on account of these islands, there would not be enough
to pay unavoidable debts and the loans which have been taken throughout
a whole year from private persons, some of which were granted on my
credit. I was expecting some good quantity of money on a separate
account; and I also hoped for the ordinary soldiers who are sent every
year to supply the places of those who are drowned and those who die of
disease and in battle. We are continually waging war in one province
or another, and sometimes at home. But I have been disappointed in
all this, and must expend my efforts to get on as best I can, using
some methods to prevent the service of your Majesty from failure.

As soon as I was informed that your Majesty would be pleased to
command this expedition to be undertaken, I began on the very
day when I arrived here to busy myself with the preparation of the
materials and other things necessary to build the galleys and also to
keep them in proper condition. I regard them as the most effective