Note 51 — Grau y Monfalcon’s Informatory Memorial of 1637 (continued 2)

Many examples might be mentioned which prove this truth. Let the first be the one that was disputed in Sevilla by the exporters of the Indias, namely, that they had not furnished sworn invoices of their cargoes. And although the administrators of the customs insisted upon that, the exporters secured [permission] to furnish, as they are doing, mere lists [of the goods]. Nevertheless, they do not open the bales or boxes; and, although at times these contain cloths, silks, and fine Holland linen, and other rich stuffs, they pass as coarse linen,51 in great part,52 and at most as Rouen linen; and they pay as duties the fourth part of what they would have paid had the bales been opened. Let the second be the existing ordinance that no bale be opened, until it is apparent by information that it carries more or different articles than are stated on the enclosures. That ordinance is observed in all ports of Europa. The third, the custom that has been introduced into Sevilla of imposing on every bale exported to the Indias a certain duty above the amount of the invoice and measure of it that is presented. That can only be justified by the presumption from evidence that the bale carries different goods from what are declared. In the Indias, in the appraisals that are made at Cartagena for the collection of the customs, although it is apparent to the royal officials that the merchants are selling the entire invoices at a profit of ten or twelve per cent over the cost in España, they add to them forty-four per cent of the cost that they [nominally] bear, and then collect ten per cent on the bulk of all. That would be an excessive burden and grievance, if it were not understood as certain that this is charged upon what is shipped registered and what is concealed by substituting some goods for others. Let the fourth be the notable denunciation made in the year 624 by Don Christoval de Balvas, while factor of Tierrafirme, in which he gave information against seventy exporters and merchants concerned with the one fleet that went that year under command of Don Gaspar de Azevedo Bonal. He ascertained that they had carried and shipped to Perú by the house of Cruzes, located between Puerto Velo and Panamá, besides 1,446,346 pesos which were registered, another 7,597,559 pesos, by which the royal duties were defrauded of 1,370,656 pesos. And when it was feared that for so flagrant a violation of the law there would be an equal punishment, the affair was all settled for 200,000 pesos, besides 6,000 which were given to the informant, whereupon the whole case and matter was relegated to silence; and there was no change in the despatch [of the ships], nor in the registers, nor in anything else of the previous practices. For if the burdens of your vassals are not eased in this manner, so that they can make up their losses, risks, injuries, expenses, and other damages that they suffer in so long voyages and so distressing navigations, everything will be ruined. If that has been experienced in Sevilla, and in the trade of the Indias, the magnitude of which is what is known, and where rigor would be more important than in Acapulco (which can not at all be compared to the other), why, if the greater transgression is overlooked (although there is the same and stronger argument), should not the less be excused, and why should not the islands be treated like all the ports of the world?