whose powers were truly royal and limited only by the check imposed by the Supreme Court (the Audiencia) and by the ordeal of the residencia at the expiration of his term of office. Among his extensive prerogatives was his appointing power which embraced all branches of the civil service in the islands. He also was ex officio the President of the Audiencia.[1] His salary was $8,000[2] a year, but his income might be largely augmented by gifts or bribes.[3] The limitations upon the power of the Governor imposed by the Audiencia, in the opinion of the French astronomer Le Gentil, were the only safeguard against an arbitrary despotism, yet Zúñiga, a generation later pronounced its efforts in this direction generally ineffectual.[4] The residencia to which
- ↑ On the powers of the Governor, see Morga, pp. 344–345.
- ↑ Throughout this Introduction the Spanish "peso" is rendered by "dollar." The reader will bear in mind the varying purchasing power of the dollar. To arrive at an approximate equivalent ten may be used as a multiplier for the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, and five for the middle of the eighteenth century.
- ↑ It may be remembered that the official conscience in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was not so sensitive in regard to "tips" as it is expected to be today. Le Gentil writes: "Les Gouverneurs de Manille corrompent journellement leurs grâces, et les Manillois ne les abordent guère pour leur en demander, sans se précautioner auparavant du rameau d'or; seul et unique moyen de se les rendre favorables. Un soir étant allé voir le Gouverneur, in 1767, à peine m'eut-il demandé des nouvelles de ma senté qu'il alla me chercher une bouteille de verre de chopine, mesure de Paris, (half-pint) pleine de paillettes d'or, il me la fit voir en me disant que c'étoit un présent dont on l'avoit régalé ce jour-là même; Oi, me dit-il, me regalaron de este." Voyage dans Les Mers de L'Inde, Paris, 1781, ii, pp. 152–153. Le Gentil was in the Philippines about eighteen months in 1766–67 on a scientific mission. His account of conditions there is one of the most thorough and valuable that we have for the eighteenth century. As a layman and man of science his views are a useful offset against those of the clerical historians.
- ↑ Voyage, ii, p. 153. "The Royal Audience was established
