For if one did that, he could necessarily attend to nothing else, because as the auditors here have few important matters that oblige them to close application, they must apply the greater part of their time to devising petty tricks on the president in order to vex and weary him, until [as they hope], not only will he allow them to live according to their own inclination, but also their relatives and followers shall, in whatever posts they desire, be employed and profited.

And since harmony has never been seen here without this expedient, one would think it easy to believe such a supposition.

Regarding what your Majesty writes in this matter of posts being given to the relatives or followers of the auditors, there is not much to amend.

Perhaps that is the reason that some are ill satisfied and to such an extent that they show it not only by inflicting annoyances on the persons who aid me in the obligations of my office and in your Majesty's service--because they know that I esteem such men for that reason, and see our gratefulness for it--but in doing whatever can cause injury, and also in any acts of discourtesy, which are much to be regretted.

Such has been the demonstration that they made by public act when, the chairs of this Audiencia having been carried in order to go to one of the sermons and festivals to which they go here; and the chair of my wife, Dona Catherina Maria Cambrana y Fajardo, having been placed behind them--just as is the custom in other places, and as was continued here, without exceeding in anything what is permitted to the wife of a president--the auditors voted that my wife's chair should be placed outside, or that they would not take theirs, as did Doctor Don Alonso de Mesa and Doctor Don Antonio Rodriguez.