You informed me that at the death of Don Geronimo de Silva his property was distrained, on account of the suit that was proceeding against him for beating a retreat two years ago with the fleet. You petition that in such a case property should be distrained from no one, except the proceedings be always taken in conformity with justice. The same[2] in the other matter which you mention, that in prosecuting the commanders of the ships of the said fleet, process should be conducted by written charges.
You say also that because the Order of Saint John was the heir to the estate of the said Don Geronimo, you ordered that whatever property might be found should be deposited in the probate treasury, and that the landed property should be administered by the courts. You also notified the said order, that it might decide what course to take, and that any debts of the said Don Geronimo must first be paid. The matter has been considered, and you and that Audiencia will take such measures as are just, in case the estate is any further indebted.
You say also that the office of sargento-mayor was held at first by alférezes, and afterward by captains—who drew, however, only the pay of captains; and that sixty-five escudos of ten reals were assigned to Don Fernando de Silva by the treasury council that was held in that city—which sum you understood was paid everywhere to captains ranking as sargentos-mayor—on condition of obtaining my approval, which has not yet been presented, and you ask me to approve it because it seems just that if captains and the master-of-camp receive what is elsewhere received by the sargento-mayor, who has more arduous duties, the latter should receive a salary accordingly. It has seemed unwise to me to make any change. You will give orders, then, that the payment of this salary shall proceed no further; and that no person filling the said position of sargento-mayor shall receive any more than the salary formerly paid; and you will cause the increase to be collected from those who have obtained it, or ordered it, or from their bondsmen, so that the amount shall be immediately deposited in my royal exchequer. In order that this be more exactly fulfilled, I have had decrees to this effect sent to the inspector of that Audiencia and the officers of my royal exchequer in that city. This must also be understood in the case of Don Juan de Quinones, whom you appointed to this place.
In conformity with what you wrote regarding the sentence which Doctor Don Alvaro de Mesa y Lugo issued against Captain Miguel de Villegas (who had been a captain in the infantry, and was a substitute in your personal service), of three hundred lashes and ten years in the galleys, I have sent a decree that the said sentence shall not be executed. The said sentence is overruled; and the said Don Alvaro is to send to my said Council an official copy of the proceedings, and the reasons which he had for giving that sentence. In the future military customs must be observed, and no such punishments imposed, as you will see by the said decree, which is sent to you with this letter.
In regard to your request that it be proclaimed that the shipmen who serve in those islands—such as pilots, masters, and other officers—need not pay the tax on their salaries in virtue of the decree which I commanded to be sent, ordering the collection of dues on all the grants for offices, incomes and gratuities that are conferred, I think it well that the said shipmen—mariners, pilots, masters, or other persons who draw pay on the rolls—shall be excused from paying the said salary tax; but it must be collected from all other officers holding commissions or decrees in which our favor is declared. You will cause the said decree to be executed in conformity with this.
In the letter in which you spoke of the offices to which you had made appointments after you took possession of your duties, you say that on account of the resignation of Pedro Sotelo de Morales,[3] who served as the warden of the Santiago fort in that city, you appointed Don Antonio de Leoz to that office with a yearly salary of eight hundred pesos, the same salary which his predecessors have received, with the condition of receiving my approval within five years. But because persons who hold the offices ad interim are not to take more than half the salary which is attached to the office, in conformity with the provisions of various royal decrees, you will take measures and give orders that the said Don Antonio de Leoz or his bondsmen shall return to my royal exchequer any sum that he has received exceeding half the said salary; and I shall write to my royal officials in that city to collect it. You are advised that in the future such appointees are not to receive more than half the salary. [Madrid, September 3, 1627.]
I The King
Countersigned by Don Fernando Ruiz de Contreras.
[1] The name Manados (now Menado) was applied to a province (now called Minahasa) in the northernmost peninsula of Celebes; see Colin’s description of it in his Labor evangélica (ed. 1663), pp. 109, 110. Jesuit missions were early established there (Colin, ut supra, p. 820), from the island of Siao.
[2] There is apparently some defect in the text at this place, as if the royal comment or decision on Tavora’s request had been omitted.