The visita de la tierra — the circuit-riding oidor of the Spanish Indies

Every three years each American Audiencia had to send one of its own judges out to ride his district in person: to hear what the Indian towns had suffered and from whom, whether tribute exceeded the assessment, whether men were used as carriers, whether the apothecaries held spoiled drugs, whether the inns posted tariffs — and he was not paid until he proved it. The same laws policed indigenous religion on the way, and capped the tour's frequency because the tour itself cost the towns.