Page:Vol 3 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/692

672 April, 1550; in 1591 Philip II. repeated the prohibition and adopted measures for the purpose of making the supply of coin adequate to the demands of trade.

By an act of 1552 the chief smelter and the assay master were made royal officials. This step appears to have been the first instance of the crown withdrawing any part of the management from the control of the lessees. The principal officials were the treasurer, smelter, marker, weigher, blancher, engraver, and secretary. By cédula of August 21, 1565, these positions were declared vendible and instructions were issued ordering the sale of them to the highest bidders, provided that they were duly qualified to fill them.

From this time until the year 1731 no affair of great importance, with one exception, occurred in connection with the mint. A few events caused temporary excitement, it is true, and occasionally disturbed its management. About the middle of the seventeenth century three hundred thousand pesos of Peruvian money were imported into the country, and were so violently objected to that it required a special order from the king to enforce its circulation. In 1663 the viceroy imprisoned Juan Vazquez Medina, the treasurer, and confiscated his property for refusing to pay into the royal treasury two hundred thousand pesos which he had demanded of him a demand in contravention of the contract by which the office had been sold to Medina. Permission was granted by