In Puebla the governor’s agents soon began to experience difficulty in securing the full amount of the subsidy. Joseph Benedit Horruitiner, dispatched to Mexico in 1712, found he could not obtain his quota of money and supplies because of other warrants on the Puebla sales taxes that had drained this source of revenue. In all there was a shortage of 13,000 pesos in the subsidy. The bishop’s agents, however, offered him a solution to the problem. They induced Horruitiner—against his will—to accept as a substitute for the money, fine china, silk, and woolen cloth, valued at 13,000 pesos. These articles, they claimed, could easily be sold for this amount to merchants in Vera Cruz. Reluctantly Horruitiner made his way to the coast, but there he found no one to buy his niceties, and he had to return to Florida with the unwanted dishes and cloth—and a shortage of 13,000 pesos in his accounts. Corcoles, who needed pesos, not table service or a dress coat, was so angry he threw Horruitiner in prison for dereliction of duty. From all reports the situadista was not a model prisoner. (Tepaske GSF)