means of them the whole is exposed to risk and danger, and the principal [illegible in MS.], as your Lordship may discern in the case of the religious fathers, who, because they attempted to place the Indians in charge of justice, desired them to give up all, and thus there was constraint. Yet they had charity and love for them, for otherwise all would be lost. The same injury will be inflicted on the encomendero, if we oblige him to relinquish the tribute, and give him no other means of support. This the king can do, by the decree which is expected.
It is certain that the very success of the affair admits of no other outcome than this. For, assuming that his Majesty, to unburden his own conscience, should commit to your Lordship and to myself the conduct and decision of what should be done in this matter, and should order me to execute what we both might determine, and agree upon, provided your Lordship should decide that what you have set down in your opinion and in your conclusions, ought in conscience to be done; and if I should find that, although such action is just and right according to law, yet in attempting to carry it out it would be in no wise proper to run the risk of ruining these islands—in this case your Lordship and I do not hold the same opinions, and we should report this to his Majesty. In the meantime matters will remain as they now are; and, if resolutions must be adopted, it is much better that we should propose them conjointly to his Majesty, with complete harmony and satisfaction on our part, in order that he may give such orders as shall seem best to him. In the meantime we should not undertake [illegible in MS.] all the more because, considering the affair in its beginnings, the commis-
