From the period of Philip II. becoming possessed of Portugal, and having, in consequence, some controul over its colonies, till the day of acclamation, which restored the crown to John IV. the Paulistas did not deem themselves under the jurisdiction of the Castilian court, but opposed the Spaniards who were in possession of the rich lands to the south and west of the Paraguay; and had begun to approximate to the centre of the continent with their establishments. This induced the Paulistas to enter upon a secret expedition in 1631, in order to interrupt their progress. Having traversed, with eight hundred men, the certâms, or interior, the rivers Parannapanema and Tibagy, they fell upon Villa Rica, and Ciudad Real. The town of Xerez, situated near the heads of the river Mondego, experienced the same misfortune; also thirty-two aldeias that constituted three small provinces. The Paulistas, although they did not designate the domestic Indians by the appellation of captives, or slaves, but by that of _administrados_, disposed of them as such, giving them to their creditors in payment of debts, and by way of dowry on occasions of marriage. The Jesuits, who possessed or had the controul over a great number of Indians, and under whose power they received the denomination of _administrados_, without any consequences of slavery being attached to the term, declaimed against the abuses practised by the Paulistas, and demonstrated to them the impropriety of usurping a right to dispose of the liberty of the Indian. The Paulistas, who were opulent, and owed all their wealth to the arms of their numerous _administrados_, determined to expel the Jesuits, in order that the truths which they promulgated should not militate against their interest. The reciprocal opposition of two families, each wishing to have the entire administration of the government, led them, with their respective partizans, to open warfare, which would have conducted to the most disastrous results, if the prudence of some ecclesiastics had not disarmed them on the field of battle, by persuading the chiefs to a compromise, by which an equal number of the contending families, from thence forward, were to enter upon the functions of the government. This compact, accomplished in the year 1654, continued until the middle of the following century, when a cavalheiro, not related to the privileged families, was elected for a judge, which appointment was protested against by them, and finally settled in their favour at Rio de Janeiro, about the time when this individual had completed the term of his jurisdiction. The ability with which he had discharged the duties of the office, convinced the Paulistas that personal merit ought, in conducting the government, to be preferred to the old system.