It is my opinion that since it has been impossible to check the practice of sending every year money for these parts from Nueva Espana (and I suspect that two millions are sent, and that the dearness occasioned by this abundance of silver results only to the benefit of Great China, where the money stops without your Majesty having collected your duties), it will be considered as an aid to the great expenses of the galleons of this line that your Majesty allow the money that shall have to pass to be openly registered in Acapulco, at the rate of five per cent. By so doing your Majesty will enjoy what has hitherto been usurped by the officers (both the higher and the lower) of the said ships; and at a reasonable price, and with permission, no one would conceal the money that he was sending. And now since no other remedy is found, it will be right for your Majesty to do this, so that you may not lose your duties. In regard to the difficulties on account of which they might at Acapulco refuse to accept this tax, which will reach so great an amount of income, I answer that the trade of these islands is not injured nor will the exchanges of the money that comes annually from Nueva Espana increase. Only that which has hitherto been done surreptitiously will be done openly in the future, to the benefit of the royal treasury. The higher and lower officers of the galleons will content themselves with the emoluments of their offices, which are those that they are enjoying for this. Will your Majesty have this matter considered very closely; for here, to one who has the matter before him, it is a clear case. In the port of Acapulco, your Majesty has three royal officials, who are present from the time of the arrival of these ships until they have once more set sail. In the despatching of the vessels they look as much to their own comforts as to the service of your Majesty. They make friends among the registrars, and shut their eyes to the money that is wont to be sent on commission. The governors are powerless to remedy this from here. I think that your Majesty can dispense with all these three positions; and that, besides saving their salaries, your Majesty will be much better served if, at the arrival of the ships, your Majesty order that the castellan and the alcalde-mayor of Acapulco do not permit them to discharge their cargoes, and that an accountant-in-chief of the bureau of accounts be always sent from Mexico on the first of December to attend to the unlading; and that he be accompanied by the alcalde-mayor of Acapulco, or by the castellan of that fort.