The mines of Potosi were supplied with labourers from the nearest provinces, by enforcing a _mita_ of a seventh of the adult male population. In 1573 this _mita_ consisted of 11,199 Indians, in 1620 of 4249, and in 1678 of 1674,[172] a decrease which marks the rapid depopulation of the country; and, at the latter date, when the authorities at Potosi failed to receive a sufficient number of labourers by the ordinary _mita_, they kidnapped people in their homes, and on the roads, and carried them off to forced labour in the mines. The law was that the _mitayos_ should be paid for coming and going, and that they should not be forced to work at night; but these laws were habitually set at nought, and Potosi became an exhausting drain to the surrounding country.[173] The mines of Huancavelica, which supplied the quicksilver necessary for extracting the silver of Potosi from its ores,[174] also desolated the ten adjoining provinces. In 1645 the _mita_ or seventh part of the adult male population amounted to 620, and in 1678 to only 354 Indians. The _mita_ was a service which was abhorred and dreaded by the people, and mothers maimed the arms and legs of their children to deliver them from this slavery. Don Juan de Padilla relates that, in 1657, when he was at Santa Lucia, in the province of Lucanas, he saw the women of the village go out to assist each other in sowing their fields, and, at the end of their labour, they returned hand in hand, singing a most melancholy song, and lamenting the cruel fate of their husbands and brothers, who were slaving in the mines of Huancavelica, while they were obliged to work in the fields like men. They declared that when a man was once taken for the _mita_ his wife seldom or never saw him again, unless she went herself to the place of his torments.[175] The oppression of the owners of _obrajes_ or manufactories of coarse woollen and cotton cloths, in enforcing the _mitas_, was as crushing as that of the miners. These people employed men, called _guatacos_, to hunt the Indians, and drive them into the _obrajes_. If they could not find the particular men for whom they were in search, they took their children, wives, and nearest neighbours, robbed them of all they possessed, and frequently violated the women and young girls.[176] The masters, in the _obrajes_, then forced their victims to get deeply in debt to them, and thus obtained an excuse for keeping them in perpetual slavery. In many _obrajes_ there were Indians who had not been outside the walls for forty years and upwards. The law was that the natives should be free from tribute and personal service until they attained the age of eighteen; but it was the general practice to drag children from their homes at the ages of six or eight, force them to work hard at twisting woollen and cotton threads, and flog them cruelly.[177]