Note XXVII-5 — Chapter XXVII · REVOLT OF THE CAKCHIQUELS. 1524-1525.

The cabildo, as an assumption of its official prerogatives, entered into session the same day, and arranged legal prices for provisions. Remesal, Hist. Chyapa, 4. On July 27th we find that an act was passed regulating the blacksmith's rates. Two dollars was to be his charge for making 100 nails, the iron being furnished to him. The charge for shoeing a horse one gold dollar, and the same for bleeding. It is curious to observe that the price of horseshoes in Alvarado's army in April, 1524, was $190 a dozen, at which rate they were bought and sold in his camp. Alvarado, Relacion, i. 160. Remesal says that operatives, knowing the necessity of their services, charged what they liked. The tailor charged a real a stitch, and shoemakers worked only at such high wages that while soling other people's shoes with leather they might have used silver for their own; and the blacksmith could have made his tools of gold had he wished. On the 12th of December, 1524, the cabildo deemed it necessary to establish fixed rates for labor of all kinds. The measures adopted were punctually carried out by those in power. The regulations were modified as time required, and every two years, at most, new rates were adapted to the condition of affairs, with which even the lords of estates were compelled to comply. The artisans, however, still contrived to cause the other colonists much inconvenience by refusing all payment for work except in gold coin, the tailor otherwise retaining his customer's clothes, even on a feast-day, and the shoemaker his shoes. This state of things lasted till 1529, when the corporation on the 19th of February made the aboriginal currency of the country, cacao, feathers, and clothing, legal tender. Hist. Chyapa, 6; Arévalo, Actas Ayunt. Guat., 8-67, passim. Another of the first acts of this new corporation was the appointment of a town-crier, his salary being fixed at $100 a year. Id., 7-8. With regard to this office of crier, Remesal states that it had to be accepted by the person selected to fill it under pain of death. Hist. Chyapa, 4. On the present occasion the person chosen was Diego Diaz, who strongly objected to the calling, but was compelled to accept. Remesal, with his death penalty, goes beyond the act of the corporation, which says 'so pena de cient azotes.' Arévalo, Actas Ayunt. Guat., 8. As an instance of the dearness of provisions, we find an act passed on the 6th of May, 1525, limiting the price of eggs to one gold real apiece. Id., 12, 14.