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324 hold no encomiendas, and exactions by them should be redressed and punished.

The nuns sent to teach native girls should be protected and favored both by the audiencia and the bishops. The care of the natives was particularly enjoined, and Bishop Zumárraga received praise for his energetic defence of them. There must be no more branding, and traffic in slaves must be reformed or abolished. Wrongfully enslaved natives were to be liberated. Conversion being a main object, churches should be erected, religious education promoted, and exemplary life set forth. In order to promote the spread of Spanish customs and culture the audiencia should appoint, from among Indians dwelling in the towns of the Spaniards, two regidores and an alguacil, to sit in cabildo with the Spanish officers, who under penalty of the royal displeasure must treat them with the greatest consideration. On the other hand, they must not be initiated into branches of knowledge which might endanger the colonists. They should not be allowed to ride, and neither horses nor mules must be sold or given to them under penalty of death and confiscation. The sale or gift of arms to them was also forbidden. A full report of the condition and resources of all the provinces subjugated must be sent in, also information concerning adjoining districts, officials, and other subjects. Encouragement should be given to the cultivation of flax and other products, and all women, natives and Spanish, should know how to spin and weave.

The belief in the existence of a hill of silver in Michoacan still lingered in the royal imagination, and it was ordered that careful assays should be made, not only here but in all provinces where the precious metals existed. The crown had abandoned its claim to all tithes on gold taken from mines, which were