this entire country; and we humbly entreat that your Majesty be pleased to give him entire faith and credit, to listen to him, and to show us the mercy and favor that we hope from the munificence of your Majesty. Although we have charged him to petition your Majesty for everything needful, yet we shall give a brief relation of the most necessary, in which, if such be your Majesty's pleasure, you may favor and protect this your city and these your vassals.
Section 2. It has been proved by experience that the royal Audiencia cannot be maintained here without the total destruction of this state; for in this city there are scarcely seventy citizens, and in all the other settlements together not as many more. The military power, which maintains this frontier, is totally disorganized, because its usages are so at variance with the procedures and exactness rendered necessary by the rigor of the laws forcibly enacted by the Audiencia. Furthermore, our Portuguese neighbors imagine that this tribunal has been instituted here to overpower and govern them, since they cannot believe that it was established for one hundred and thirty households and so few soldiers. Accordingly, they have shut the door to the commerce, friendship, and intercourse, which was commencing between them and us. In addition to this your Majesty possesses no income here with which to pay the salaries of president, auditors, fiscal, and other officials of the Audiencia. These salaries, added to what is wasted in this country, would establish it, and put it in a better state of defense; while now it is subject to any piratical invasion whatever. For all these reasons, and others that Father Alonso Sanchez will tell you in greater detail, we beg that your Majesty be pleased
