In June 1784 Fray Antonio de San Miguel Iglesias arrived in Mexico after an exhausting journey from Comayagua in Central America, which left him prostrate with ‘an attack of hernia’ and other afflictions. Unable to take formal possession of his see at Valladolid until December of that year, he appointed José Pérez Calama, the archdeacon, and Juan Antonio de Tapia, the chancellor, as governors of the diocese. Both these men, he later declared, exemplified ‘priestly moderation and conduct as Christian as it was polished and affable’. In particular, it was largely thanks to Pérez Calama that he was able to cope so effectively with the devastating effects of the great harvest failure which occurred in the autumn of 1785 when maize prices, already unusually high because of a preceding poor harvest, soared. In Mexico City the young viceroy, the count of Gálvez, strove to ensure that the capital had a sufficient supply of foodstuffs, and Archbishop Haro distributed over 100,000 ps. to finance the planting of maize in irrigated lands or in the tierra caliente. Nowhere was the crisis more severe than in the Bajío where by November prices were already 28 reales a fanega of maize, with speculators confident that prices would soon reach 48 reales, which is to say, ten times their lowest point in the annual cycle. It was at this point that San Miguel decided to mobilise all the resources available in the coffers of the cathedral in an attempt to avert the human tragedy of thousands dying of hunger.