"It is a well known fact, that far from promoting the felicity of the provinces to which he is appointed, the Alcalde is exclusively occupied with advancing his private fortune, without being very scrupulous as to the means he employs to do so: hardly is he in office than he declares himself the principal consumer, buyer, and exporter of every production of the province. In all his enterprises he requires the forced assistance of his subjects, and if he condescends to pay them, it is at least only at the price paid for the royal works. These miserable beings carry their produce and manufactures to him, who directly or indirectly has fixed an arbitrary price for them. To offer that price is to prohibit any other from being offered--to insinuate is to command--the Indian dares not hesitate--he must please the Alcalde, or submit to his persecution: and thus, free from all rivalry in his trade, being the only Spaniard in the province, the Alcalde gives the law without fear or even risk, that a denunciation of his tyranny should reach the seat of government. "To enable us to form a more correct idea of these iniquitous proceedings, let us lift a little of the veil with which they are covered, and examine a little their method of collecting the 'tributo' (poll-tax). "The government, desirous of conciliating the interests of the natives with that of the revenue, has in many instances commuted the payment of the poll-tax into a contribution in produce or manufactures: a year of scarcity arrives, and this contribution, being then of much higher value than the amount of the tax, and consequently the payment in produce a loss, and even occasioning a serious want in their families, they implore the Alcalde to make a representation to government that they may be allowed to pay the tribute for that year in money. This is exactly one of those opportunities, when, founding his profits on the misery of his people, the Alcalde can in the most unjust manner abuse the power confided to him. He pays no attention to their representations. He is the zealous collector of the royal revenues;--he issues proclamations and edicts, and these are followed by his armed satellites, who seize on the harvests, exacting inexorably the tribute, until nothing more is to be obtained. Having thus made himself master of the miserable subsistence of his subjects, he changes his tone on a sudden--he is the humble suppliant to government in behalf of the unfortunate Indians, whose wants he describes in the most pathetic terms, urging the impossibility of their paying the tribute in produce--no difficulty is experienced in procuring permission for it to be paid in money--to save appearance, a small portion of it is collected in cash, and the whole amount paid by him into the treasury, while he resells at an enormous profit, the whole of the produce (generally rice) which has been before collected!" Comyn, p. 134 to 138.