Page:Vol 2 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/568

548 of Ávalos. The province during the period now under consideration included ten or twelve corregimientos or districts, each with its head town, or cabecera, and its partidos, each under an alcalde. This officer, part of whose duty was the collection of tributes, was directly responsible to the audiencia. The head towns for the different districts were for the most part mining-camps, and the partidos were Indian towns under native alcaldes, regidores, and alguaciles, who were under the direction of the encomenderos, or of the friars in a few of the new and poorer places which had not excited the avarice of any Spanish officer.

The Spanish population of this vast district was as yet comparatively small. It is probable that there were not over five hundred settlers in New Galicia, at any time during the century, if we except the soldiers engaged in the conquest and in the suppression of the Mixton revolt, and the miners in Zacatecas and the districts south and north of it.

It soon became apparent that Compostela was not so well situated for a capital of the growing province as Guadalajara. The latter place enjoyed an abundance of fish, game, cattle, and fresh water, of which the old capital could not boast. The audiencia was therefore transferred by royal order to Guadalajara as the provincial capital.

The oidores do not appear to have been of a very select character, for in 1557 Doctor Morones came