Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/176

150 of the kingdom, at the time of the promulgation of the forty ordinances, for the freedom and kind treatment of the Indians, drawn up by the council appointed to regulate the affairs of America, and confirmed at Barcelona by the Emperor in November, 1542. It therefore became essential to their strict observance, to make choice of a man of integrity and good moral conduct; which qualities having been found in Blasco Nunez Vela, inspector-general of the guards of Castille, he was appointed viceroy of Peru, and president of the royal audience, in preference to the Marechal of Navarre, and Don Antonio Leiva, who had been also named for these high employments.

The judges were appointed at the same time, and the choice fell on the licentiate Zepeda, who had held a similar employment in the Canary Isles; on Doctor Lison De Texada, alcaid of the court of Valladolid; on the licentiate Alvarez, advocate of that court; and on the licentiate Pedro Ortiz De Zarate, alcaid-major of Segovia. They embarked at San Lucar, with the viceroy, -in the month of November, 1543, and reached Panama on the eighteenth of February of the following year.

On the succeeding day, the licentiate Ramirez De Quinones, governor of Terra-Firma, visitor of the audience of Panama, and supreme judge of that of the confines of Guatemala and Nicaragua, ordered the licentiate Martinez, in his quality of chancellor, to deliver to the viceroy the royal seal. With the seal in his possession, the latter reached Lima on the 15th of May, 1544, without being accompanied by the judges, although they had been solicited to that effect.

This delay prevented the public entry of the royal seal from being