Alonso de Zorita and the Breve y sumaria relación de los señores de la Nueva España

A judge of the audiencia of Mexico wrote to Philip II to argue that the crown had got its own tax base wrong. Read in the 1864 first printing, his memorial turns out to be a fiscal argument before it is a moral one: tribute in pre-conquest Mexico fell on land and labour, never on heads, and the new count by heads had caused, in his words, great unrest and scandal. He ends with people fleeing to the hills and leaving their children behind.