If sometimes the commanders have inflicted injury or waged any war, it is because the malice of the natives is so great, that wherever they sally out in war, with their ambuscades and other treacheries they provoke the Spaniards to self-defense. If the latter go with the mailed hand, it is for the security of their own persons; for, if they were unarmed and unprepared, the natives would kill them--as they have done to many Spaniards whom they have caught astray and alone, killing them and practicing great cruelties upon them. Therefore it is necessary to go everywhere with weapons in hand, for the security of the Spaniards; for there is so little justice and reason among these natives, and they never obey one another, or have lords or headmen among them, but all sorts of disorders, clans, and factions. Before the Spaniards came hither, the natives killed one another in their own villages for very slight causes. Wherefore it is clear that wherever the Spaniards go, they must go ready and prepared to defend themselves, as they are but few among many infidels, and loyal among traitors. Therefore it is a perfectly good argument to say that wherever they go they go with weapons in hand. As to the matter of maintaining the natives in peace and justice, it is a just one. Therefore we try in every way to protect those who are friendly to us. Those who are in the neighborhood of the Spaniards are very well protected and defended--not only from their enemies, who aforetime were wont to make war on them, but even from their servants and the members of their households, who among them were wont to kill, punish, and enslave one another, a thing not done now. And if this is done in any remote district, it is in places in which, on account of their remoteness, no remedy can be had from the Spaniards. Thus it is of great use and profit that the Spaniards have come to the natives hereabout, on account of the security that they have from one another, and because they have free recourse to their trade and interests without being hindered or robbed by any one. They were not accustomed to this security before the Spaniards came hither, because it is a thing publicly known and notorious that even in their own houses they were captured and robbed. They were not free to go fishing on the sea without being captured. Now not only are they safe in their houses, but they go safely to different places, without any harm being done them. If there are piracies, they are very far from this town and in places where the Spaniards do not go. It is a very ancient custom that the natives had among themselves, of capturing, robbing, killing, and imprisoning one another. Now there are few injuries committed, in comparison with what used to be committed before the Spaniards came here. Every day there will be fewer, because we are ever striving to take and punish such pirates, as today there were some taken in this town. In regard to the tribute that has been raised, and the