Page:Vol 2 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/649

Rh Even the marqués de Falces was brought before the dread court of the royal emissaries; charges of disloyalty as well as offences of omission were made against him, to which he pleaded that his conscience was at peace, for he had done nothing incompatible with the duties of a loyal subject and servant of the crown. In view of his rank, the judges abstained from rendering a decision in his case, and referred it to the king. This was all Falces asked, and a few days later he went down to Vera Cruz to embark on the first ship for Spain.

Muñoz continued his abuse of power almost without a limit. The jails as well as his pestilence-breeding dungeons were filled with innocent victims, whose sons and wives dare not move in their release lest worse befall them. For once in their battered existence the Indians were saved by their insignificance from the horrid notice of their present rulers. It was the Spaniards and their descendants, and particularly those of high position, conquerors and sons of conquerors, who had themselves gloried in practising enormities on others, even as they were now wrought upon by fiends of injustice; it was these who were now the sufferers, and at the hands of those of their own race.