Your Majesty has yet in this kingdom a revenue amply sufficient for all the expenses thereof, if it be administered with fidelity and care, and if many present superfluous expenses be suppressed. There are not more than a hundred paid soldiers in camp, and six captains of infantry and their officers draw salaries. The forts are without garrisons; but for more than a year the wardens thereof have been improperly drawing salaries. Your Majesty has no galleys whatever, and there is one commander, who, though unemployed, draws a yearly salary of eight hundred pesos; and there are many officers who get a salary in the same manner. There are many garrisons of soldiers, sailors, artillerymen, and others in various capacities who draw pay from your Majesty's exchequer; and they are of no service, nor will they ever in their lives be of any use, except as servants and attendants upon the officers and other persons, who pay them from your Majesty's revenues. In this way much of your Majesty's revenue is being spent and wasted. It would be necessary to institute a reform, and to make many investigations of the accounts of your Majesty's debtors and the collectors of your Majesty's revenue, in order to regain much property which is lost. Every day more will be wasted unless your Majesty orders a speedy remedy, with punishment of the guilty, which shall serve as a warning for the future. In the meanwhile much suffering will be felt here, as at present; and even a large part of your Majesty's estate in Nueva España will not suffice to meet the needs here. There are very few in these islands capable of handling the arquebus, although they used to be the best and most skilful soldiers in the Yndias. The cause of this is that they have so devoted themselves to trade that they have no desire for anything else. Nevertheless, your Majesty ordered, in the instructions given to Gomez Perez, when he came here to govern, that those who drew pay from your Majesty as fighting men should not be allowed to trade. Afterward in a clause of the letter of January, 1593, replying to another of his, your Majesty ordered the same thing. This has not been complied with, however, and as the captains and higher officers are rich and rewarded by their salaries and grants, it is not just that they be merchants, as is the case. They are so diverted from military exercise that they are as useless as if they were in Toledo; and elsewhere they engross, by their large shipments, the space required for the merchandise and freight of the citizens. Your Majesty therefore spends the revenue on them and their soldiers uselessly; and it is necessary that this be corrected, in order that affairs may return to their normal condition.