In these islands there are many veterans who have done good service. Some are sick or wounded; and since there is here no occupation or support for them all, and since they are at such a distance from your Majesty that they cannot come before you to ask that you will show them favor in return for their services, some suffer the extremity of want, and feel greatly discontented and discouraged at seeing themselves in such misery, without anyone to turn to for relief. Hence it seems that it would be just if they were to receive rewards and gifts as your Majesty commands, and as is done in Espana for those who come from other regions to ask for such bounty. Inasmuch as affairs of greater consequence are entrusted to me, I beg your Majesty to be pleased to give me authority to aid such persons from the royal treasury of these islands, bestowing upon them annually such an amount as their service to your Majesty shall have deserved. I beg also for authority to give some false musters to such as deserve them, that they may be able to live and maintain themselves. Such a course, in addition to being worthy of your Majesty's greatness, will have the important effect of animating the others to do good service on occasion, stimulated as they will be by the hope of reward. Our Lord protect the Catholic person of your Majesty in the happiness necessary to the good of Christendom. Manila, the twenty-sixth of October, 1602. _Don Pedro de Acuna_ [_Endorsed_: "Manila. To his Majesty; Don Pedro de Acuna, the [twenty-sixth] of October. Let it be seen if this is a duplicate, and if the original has been filed." "Filed and registered within. Let attention be paid to the part on which a consultation is directed." "Two sections have already been epitomized, and were sent on to the council of war in Valladolid, on the twenty-eighth of June, 1605."] PRINCIPAL POINTS IN REGARD TO THE TRADE OF THE FILIPINAS First Point _The quantity of merchandise which may be traded with; and that which, contrary to the prohibition, is brought from the Western Indias to the Filipinas._ By decrees of his Majesty, of January 11, 93, and of July 9 and 5, 95, the trade of the Western Indias with China and the Filipinas Islands is prohibited. It is only permitted therein that the citizens of the Filipinas may trade with Nueva Espana; and that two ships, each of no more than three hundred toneladas, shall sail from Nueva Espana every year, in which may be sent 250,000 pesos of Tepuzque [6] in coin, and which may carry back the proceeds thereof in merchandise, which, under fixed penalties, shall not exceed another 250,000 pesos--that is, in all, 500,000 pesos. Notwithstanding these prohibitions, and although the same is also commanded by other decrees to be strictly observed, two million reals are usually taken out of the Indias for the Filipinas, according to advices from the viceroy of Nueva Espana, and from Senor Don Bernardino de Avellaneda. Second Point