[168] Montes Claros describes them as Indians domiciled on the estates or in the houses of Spaniards, like servants; their masters giving them food, clothes, and a bit of land, and paying their tribute for them. Lest the system should degenerate into slavery, the king, in a cedula of 1601, declared that they were free, and desired that this should be made known to them.—Memorias, i. p. 27.
[169] Ordenanzas, No. 34, 12, 140.
[170] Especially in those of the Count of Alba de Liste in 1660. In September of that year this viceroy assembled a Junta, in obedience to an order from Spain, to consult respecting the instruction and good treatment of the Indians. The proceedings, still in MS., may be seen in the national library at Lima.
[171] Cuzco and Lima, chap. vii., from the Noticias Secretas of the Ulloas.
[172] II. p. 304 of the Memorias de los Vireyes. But no safe calculation can be made respecting the actual population from these numbers.
[173] Papeles Varios. No. 4. MS. in the library at Lima.
[174] The amalgamation with quicksilver was introduced at Potosi by Velasco in 1571. The quicksilver was sent down from Huancavelica to the port of Chincha, thence to Arica by sea, and from Arica over the cordillera to Potosi.—Report of the Prince of Esquilache.
[175] Carta sobre trabajos, agravios, y injusticias que padecen los Indios del Peru; por Don Juan de Padilla, 1657.—MS. in the National Library at Lima.
[176] Papeles Varios. No. 4. MS.
[177] MS. in Lima library.