_Testimony_: In the city of Manila, on the thirtieth day of the month
of September in the year one thousand five hundred and ninety-three,
Gomez Perez Dasmariñas, governor and captain-general in these islands
for the king our lord, declared before me that he has been informed
that the infidel king of Chanpa is responsible for many wrongs,
assaults, and thefts committed at sea by his men and fleets, and by his
orders, upon the persons and property of both Christians and Pagans,
on the route to many trading-places of Christians--as, for instance,
Malaca, Macan, Goa, Xapon, and other places. Many of them he has
attacked, robbed, and deprived of life and property--causing them to
enter his ports under his word and promise of safety; but afterward
breaking it, and inflicting great cruelties upon them, to the great
offense of God and injury of Christendom. In order to give the king
our sovereign an account of what is going on, and that he may know
the truth, the said governor ordered the following deposition to be
made before me.
_Joan de Cuellar_
_Testimony_: Then, on this said day, an oath was received in due form
of law, regarding the aforesaid, from Gregorio de Vargas. Being in
the said city, and questioned about the matter, this witness said
that, being three leagues more or less beyond the harbor of Chanpa,
the king of Chanpa sent him a message, saying that he was a friend
of the Portuguese (ten or twelve of whom he named), who were in his
country building a junk. He also said that since the weather was very
unfit to continue his voyage, he would better enter his port until
the weather improved. Upon receiving this message, he entered with
his junk, but he found that it was all a lie, for the king immediately
took him prisoner, and seized his ship, with all its cargo. He found
out that the statement regarding the Portuguese was all a lie, because
there was not one of them there. He also found out that the king had
captured many others by this deception, for many Christians told him
that they were taken the same way. He knows that the king captures
ships on the sea, and goes about robbing the neighboring kingdoms,
impeding trade, commerce, and free passage, and disturbing the peace
on the seas. He likewise compels the Portuguese Christians to sail on
the said ships for the purpose of robbery. He is a pirate and thief,
and a pagan who, in accordance with the teachings of his idolatry,
has two hundred men killed, in order to bathe in their bile; and
those by whom he has himself washed must be virgins. There is also
a diabolical custom that, when a chief dies, they burn his body;
his wife and his women are also burnt in the same fire. Because of
this and other abuses and pernicious idolatries, and, above all,
by the general injuries which he inflicts upon all travelers, on a
route so general and so necessary as that for Japon, China, Yndia,
and many other places, and for Çian, Patan, and Canboja (which is the
key to all that region), this witness thinks that it would be a very
acceptable service to God to go to attack him and to clear the sea
of those tyrannies and robberies, and take from them their land and
their harbor, which will be much to his Majesty's purpose for great
designs. The said witness declares that the king has a great deal of
artillery, which he has seen, moreover, with his own eyes. The other
things he has heard said by captives. This is all that he knows, and it
is true, according to the oath which he swore. His age is thirty-seven.