Note 57 — Grau y Monfalcon’s Informatory Memorial of 1637 (continued 2)

In regard to the first part, which pertains to the merchandise, the trade of the Filipinas is so necessary today in Nueva España, that the latter country finds it as difficult as do the islands to get along without that trade; and its lack cannot be supplied with merchandise from these kingdoms. The wares taken to Acapulco are plain and figured velvets, satins, and damasks; grograms, taffetas, and picotes; headdresses and stockings; silk, loose and twisted, in skeins, that reeled on spindles, and woven; thread; tramas,57 plushes, and other silk stuffs and textiles. Of cotton, there are sinavafas,58 fine glazed buckrams [bocacies], glazed linen [olandilla], fine muslins [canequies], and semianas; and of cotton and silk, beds, curtains, coverlets, quilts, and other pieces. [They also carry] civet, musk, and amber; gold and pearls; crockery-ware, cabinets, and articles made of wood, and other things; and the products of the islands themselves, of which mention has been made [In the margin: “In number 15”]. But the bulk of the commerce is reduced to the silk and cotton textiles; for there is but little else that is rare or elegant, or that has much export. From the skeined silk, and the silk thread, and trama are manufactured in Nueva España velvets, veils, headdresses, passementeries, and many taffetas, which were taken to Perú when there were ships that went to Callao, and to other parts of the Indias—where the black, brown, and silver-colored goods that are sent from Sevilla do not arrive in good shape, because the sea rots them. It is known that the skein silk of China is more even and elegant for delicate and smooth fabrics than is the Misteca59 which is produced in that kingdom; besides that, there is less of the latter kind than is necessary in the country. By this trade and manufacture, more than fourteen thousand persons support themselves in Mexico, La Puebla, and Antequera, by their looms, the whole thing being approved by royal decrees. Of the cotton textiles, linens [lienzos] are used in Nueva España more than any other stuff, as they are so cheap that they sell for one and one-half or two reals per vara. Therefore, they are desired by the Indians and negroes; and when these are lacking, even though there should be an over-supply of the linens of Europa, they do not want them or use them, as those are dear and not so much used by them; and they get along with their own cloths from Campeche or La Guasteca, and others that they weave. Hence the importation of these linens (which are brought from China) is now proposed as an expedient measure; if that be administered at the account of the royal treasury, it would gain annually more than one hundred and twenty thousand pesos, as is apparent from a decree of November 20, 606.