The most interesting of the New Granada papers are naturally those of Antonio de Lebrixa, who received the royal moneys at the time of the conquest. Here are some of his items:

Lo perteneciente á su Magestad de quintos de lo que se hubieron y allegaron mientras duró la conquista, lo qual se hizo partes y dividió entre los conquistadores:

Soetbeer, with nothing to guide him but the vague and often exaggerated reports of contemporary chroniclers, fixed the average annual production of gold in New Granada in the sixteenth century at 2,000 kilo

1 of these receipts, Quesada carried to Spain as a present to the emperor, 11,000 pesos "oro fino," and all the emeralds, 562. (Oviedo, lib. xxvi, cap. 11.) All of Oviedo's figures in this connection are substantially trustworthy.

Griales

Taking as a

grams. Lexis adopts the same figure.
basis the Spanish official ratio of gold to silver in the
first half of the sixteenth century, this represents for
the years 1538-60 a value of almost 19 million pesos
fuertes. Soetbeer's reckoning, based on the ratio in
1879, was 30 millions.

A Colombian scholar, Vicente Restrepo, in his volume entitled Estudio sobre las minas de oro y plata de Colombia, published in 1888, reached conclusions materially reducing Soetbeer's figures. Restrepo estimated the value of the gold produced in New Granada before 1600, as 53 million pesos. This presumes an annual production of 1,325 marcs, or a total of 31,800 marcs for the years 1538-60. At the sixteenth century ratio it was equal to about 12,600,000 pesos, over 6 millions less than the conclusions of Soetbeer.

In the ledgers of the royal treasurers, we find the receipts from the quinto and diezmo, between 1538 and the end of 1557, to be as follows:

No clear indication of the relative values of these various
forms of gold is vouchsafed us, either in these ledgers or
in the writings of contemporary colonists. It seems
most probable, however, that the peso de buen oro was
peso de oro de minas" of Mexico, of 450 mara-
vedis. "Oro fino " may be identified with treasure
secured by the Spaniards in the form of gold-dust, and
granted a value of about 490 maravedis. The "
The "peso
de oro bajo " was perhaps worth anywhere from 200 to
300 maravedis.

Reducing the above figures to pesos of 8 reals, we have the quinto amounting to 516,600 pesos, and the

Ora fin

diezmo to 57,100. To cover the period, 1558-60, for which there are no figures, we may strike an average for the preceding five years, and add a 35 per cent increase. On this basis, the entire income of the crown from the mines was 720,000 pesos, representing a total registered production of about 4,054,000 pesos.

As in the case of Peru, however, there is reason to believe that a considerable percentage of the gold mined never paid the government tax. There may also be mistakes or omissions in the records themselves, for these ledgers, as I indicated above, are in some places imperfect. To meet such possibilities, we may make the liberal allowance of 50 per cent. The figure, 4,054,000, would then represent about two-thirds of the gold-production of the country, registered and unregistered. The entire output would amount to 6,081,000 pesos. But even this result is less than one-half the estimate of Restrepo, and about 32 per cent of that of Soetbeer and Lexis.

V. WEST INDIES AND TIERRA FIRME

It was the half-circle of the West Indian islands which Columbus reached on his momentous voyage to the coasts of Cathay. And it was from these islands and from the neighboring shores of Central America that the first remittances of gold were sent back to Europe. If Columbus had a higher motive in seeking the Indies, perhaps the delivery of the Holy Places from the infidel, the explorers who followed immediately in his steps were mostly prompted by the hope of find

ing lands where gold was to be easily secured. Even Columbus believed that "el oro es excellentissimo con el se hace tesoro y con el tesoro quien lo tiene hace quanto quiere en el mundo y llega á que hecha las animas al paraiso.'

The reports of these early Spanish adventurers did more credit to their fancy than to their observation. And altho they served to nerve the nation to new undertakings, they also prepared the way for deep disillusion. The actual returns of gold during the first decade must have been in sharp contrast to the expectations thus engendered.

Only after the coming of Bobadilla to Hispaniola as governor in 1499, apparently, did the colonists develop the gold-washings on the island to any great extent; largely, perhaps, because the new governor granted them exemption from the payment of the royal tax.1 The fleet of eighteen vessels which sailed for Spain with Bobadilla and Roldan in 1502, and the greater part of which perished by the tempest in which Columbus almost lost his life, was considered the richest of its time. The treasure it carried was little over 100,000 pesos de oro, divided between the king and private individuals.2

Altho Bodadilla's successor, Ovando, was strictly enjoined to enforce the royal dues and collect the arrears of Bodadilla's time, the exploitation of the goldwashings continued, entailing the rapid extermination of the unfortunate native population. It reached its zenith probably toward the end of the second decade of the sixteenth century. There were two regions on the island round which these activities centered: one some

1 Navarrete, Colecc. de viajes, etc., vol. ii, p. 273.

* Gómara, Hist., lib. i, cap. 32; Oviedo, Hist., lib. iii, cap. 9. The treasure included a nugget for the queen weighing 3,600 pesos. Las Casas says that there were 28 vessels carrying 200,000 pesos.

thirty miles from the city of San Domingo, called San Cristobal; the other, the more famous Cibao, about ninety miles from the capital. Peter Martyr wrote,

probably in 1510, that the two districts produced over 300,000 pesos de oro a year. The annual yield was perhaps never more than 400,000 or 450,000.

After 1520 the gold-production of Hispaniola seems to have rapidly declined. Small-pox and ill-treatment decimated the Indian laborers; the gold-washings themselves were gradually exhausted; the introduction of sugar mills diverted the colonists' attention to agriculture; the newly explored regions on the mainland drew men more and more from the islands. The annual output of gold dwindled to 30,000 pesos. If the remittances from Hispaniola continued to be larger than such a figure would warrant, it is because bullion from the neighboring islands of Porto Rico, Cuba and Jamaica, as well as from Central America and Venezula, generally passed through the hands of the San Domingo treasurer on its way to Spain.

Porto Rico and Cuba, settled by Spaniards in the second decade of the century, at first also yielded considerable quantities of gold-dust and nuggets. They made their largest returns about the same time as did Hispaniola, each producing perhaps 100,000 pesos a year. But the duration of the gold-washings, especially

1 Decade I, lib. 10, cap. 3.

2 Colecc. de doc. ined., 2d ser., vol. ii, p. 370. Soetbeer, p. 49, incorrectly makes the figure refer to Sta. Marta.

In the meantime, between 1500 and 1520 the percentage reserved to the crown was gradually reduced. At first, by an ordinance of April 10, 1495 (Nav. Colecc., vol. ii, p. 165), the crown was to receive two-thirds of the gold collected on the island. This had been the rule in Spain, at least since the time of Juan II (Gallardo, vol. vi, pp. 1–19). Between 1500 and 1504, in reply to petitions from the colonists, the crown's share was successively reduced to one-half, one-third and one-fifth. (Colecc. de doc. ined., 1st ser., vol. xxxi, pp. 13, 216; 2d ser., vol. v, p. 43.) The "quinto" was established for ten years by a cedula of February 5, 1504, and continued till 1520. In the latter year the tax on placer gold was fixed at a diezmo, or one-tenth (ibidem, 2d ser., vol. ix, p. 460), suffering no other reduction till 1552, when it was made one-twelfth (A. de I., 6-3-2/14, ramo 5).