Among the documents of Alonso de Avila a large number of love letters were found; but neither in his papers nor in those of his brother, or of the many victims of these foul suspicions, who languished in prison, did they discover a single line to justify their arrest. Nevertheless, Don Alonso and his brother Don Gil Gonzalez, were singled out as victims and doomed to death. The authorities dared not, probably, strike at a person so illustrious and so popular as the Marques del Valle; but they resolved to justify, in the public eye, their inquisitorial investigation, by the sacrifice of some one. The public would believe that there was in reality a crime when the scaffold reeked with blood; and, besides, the blow would fall heaviest on the family of Cortéz when it struck the cherished companions of his home and heart.
On the 7th of August, at seven in the evening, Alonso and Gil Gonzalez were led forth to the place of execution in front of the Casa de Cabildo. Their heads were struck off and stuck on spears on the roof of the edifice; whence they were finally taken, at the earnest remonstrance of the Ayuntamiento, and buried with the bodies of the victims in the church of San Agustin. Every effort had been made to save the lives of these truly innocent young men. But although the principal persons in the viceroyalty, united in the appeal for mercy if not for justice, the inexorable oidores carried out their remorseless and bloody decree. It is even asserted that these cruel men would not have hesitated to inflict capital punishment upon the Marques himself had not the new viceroy, Don Gaston de Peralta, Marques de Falces, arrived at San Juan de Ulua, on the 17th of September, 1566.
As soon as this personage reached Mexico he began to enquire into the outrage. He was quickly satisfied that the whole proceeding was founded in malice. The oidores were removed, and others being placed in their posts, the viceroy despatched a missive to the court of Spain containing his views and comments upon the conduct of the late officials. But the document was sent by a man who was secretly a warm friend of the brutal oidores, and, to save them from the condign punishment they deserved, he withheld it from the king.
Yet these functionaries, still fearing that their crime would be finally punished, not only treacherously intercepted the despatch of the viceroy, but also took the speediest opportunity to send to the king accusations against Don Gaston himself, in which they charged him with negligence in his examination of the conspiracy, with treasonable alliance with the Marques del Valle, and with a design to usurp the government of New Spain. They founded their allegations upon the false oaths of several deponents, who alleged that the viceroy had already prepared and held at his orders thirty thousand armed men. This base imposture, as ridiculous as it was false, originated in an act of Peralta which was altogether innocent. Being a man of fine taste, and determining that the viceroyal residence should be worthy the abode of his sovereign's representative, he caused the palace to be refitted, and, among the adornments of the various saloons, he ordered a large painting to be placed on the walls of one of the chambers in which a battle was represented containing an immense number of combatants. This was the army which the witnesses, upon their oaths, represented to the king, as having been raised and commanded by the viceroy! It can scarcely be supposed possible that the Audiencia of Mexico would have resorted to such flimsy means to cover their infamy. It seems incredible that such mingled cruelty and childishness could ever have proceeded from men who were deputed to govern the greatest colony of Spain. Yet such is the unquestionable fact, and it indicates, at once, the character of the age and of the men who managed, through the intrigues of court, to crawl to eminence and power which they only used to gratify vindictive selfishness or to glut their inordinate avarice.
Philip the II. could not, at first, believe the accusations of the oidores against the family of Cortéz and the distinguished nobleman whom he had sent to represent him in Mexico. He resolved, therefore, to wait the despatches of the viceroy. But the oidores had been too watchful to allow those documents to reach the court of Spain; and Philip, therefore, construing the silence of Don Gaston de Peralta, into a tacit confession of his guilt, sent the Licenciados Jaraba, Muñoz, and Carillo to New Spain, as Jueces Pesquisidores, with letters for the viceroy commanding him to yield up the government and to return to Spain in order to account for his conduct.
These men immediately departed on their mission and arrived safely in America without accident, save in the death of Jaraba one of their colleagues. As soon as they reached Mexico, they presented their despatches to the viceroy, and Muñoz took possession of the government of New Spain. The worthy and noble Marques de Falces was naturally stunned by so unprecedented and unexpected a proceeding; but, satisfied of the justice of his cause as well as of the purity of his conduct, he left the capital and retired to the castle of San Juan de Ulua, leaving the reins of power in the hands of Muñoz whose tyrannical conduct soon destroyed all the confidence which hitherto had always existed, at least between the Audiencia and the people of the metropolis. [32] It was probably before this time that the Marques del Valle was released;—and deeming the new empire which his father had given to Spain no safe resting place for his descendants, he departed once more for the Spanish court. The viceroy himself had fallen a victim to deception and intrigue.
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It seems to have been one of the weaknesses of Philip the Second's character to have but little confidence in men. With such examples as we have just seen, it may, nevertheless, have been an evidence of his wisdom that he did not rely upon the courtiers who usually surround a king. He had doubted, in reality, the actual guilt of the Marques de Falces, and was, therefore, not surprised when he learned the truth upon these weighty matters in the year 1568. The government of Muñoz, his visitador, was, moreover, represented to him as cruel and bloody. The conduct of the previous Audiencia had been humane when compared with the acting governor's. The prisons, which already existed in Mexico were not adequate to contain his victims, and he built others whose dark, damp and narrow architecture rendered incarceration doubly painful to the sufferers. Don Martin Cortéz, the half brother of the Marques del Valle, who remained in the metropolis as the attorney and representative of his kinsman, was seized and put to torture for no crime save that the blood of the conqueror flowed in his veins, and that he had enjoyed friendly relations with the suspected conspirators. Torture, it was imagined would wring from him a confession which might justify the oidores. The situation of New Spain could not, indeed, be worse than it was, for no man felt safe in the midst of such unrestrained power and relentless cruelty; and we may be permitted to believe that outraged humanity would soon have risen to vindicate itself against such brutes and to wrest the fruits of the conquest from a government that sent forth such wicked sattelites. Even the Audiencia itself,—the moving cause of this new and bad government,—began to tremble when it experienced the humiliating contempt with which it was invariably treated by the monster Muñoz.
But all these acts of maladministration were more safely reported to the Spanish court by the nobles and oidores of Mexico, than the despatches of the unfortunate Marques de Falces. Philip eagerly responded to the demand for the removal of Muñoz. He despatched the oidores Villanueva and Vasco de Puga, to Mexico, with orders to Muñoz to give up the government in three hours after he received the royal despatch, and to return immediately to Spain for judgment of his conduct. The envoys lost no time in reaching their destination, where they found that Muñoz had retired to the convent of Santo Domingo, probably as a sanctuary, in order to pass Holy Week. But the impatient emissaries, responding to the joyful impatience of the people, immediately followed him to his retreat, and, after waiting a considerable time in the anti-chamber, and being, at last, most haughtily received by Muñoz, who scarcely saluted them with a nod, Villanueva drew from his breast the royal cedula, and commanded his secretary to read it in a loud voice.
For a while the foiled visitador sat silent, moody and thoughtful, scarcely believing the reality of what he heard. After a pause, in which all parties preserved silence, he rose and declared his willingness to yield to the king's command; and thus, this brutal chief, who but a few hours before believed himself a sovereign in Mexico, was indebted to the charity of some citizens for a carriage in which he travelled to Vera Cruz. Here a fleet was waiting to transport him to Spain. The late viceroy, the Marques de Falces, departed in a ship of the same squadron, and, upon his arrival at the court, soon found means to justify himself entirely in the eyes of his sovereign. But it went harder with Muñoz. He vainly tried his skill at exculpation with the king. Philip seems to have despised him too much to enter into discussion upon the merits of the accusations. The facts were too flagrant. The king returned him his sword, declining to hear any argument in his justification. "I sent you to the Indies to govern, not to destroy!" said Philip, as he departed from his presence; and that very night the visitador suddenly expired!