Book 7, folio 87. On those three section_The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 27 of 55 1636-37 Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century

and the royal officials their rebuttal. The visitor ordered that,

notwithstanding what they alleged, the royal officials should give

a sworn statement of the collections made and of those still due,

for the general account of the year 631.

In charge 3. The disadvantage and loss to the royal treasury alleged by

the visitor, because the statements are not so given, is that that has

resulted in there being more than sixty thousand pesos of royal revenue

to collect, of which results [_resultas_] have been made in the visit

against the said royal officials, besides others that are being made.

Point 3

In regard to the inconveniences from having this office or tribunal in

those islands, I do not find that the royal officials of the islands,

who are the ones who could best make such a representation, have

made it. They have only opposed the jurisdiction and authority that

the auditor of accounts has possessed or claimed to possess for the

exercise of his duty; and they declare that the tribunal of accounts

of those islands, which is composed of the governor and two auditors

[_oidores_] is the one that truly holds and exercises this ministry of

the auditing department of accounts, and that the auditor [_contador_]

whom they call "auditor of accounts" cannot be that official, and

cannot be so called, but only "auditor-arranger of accounts." They

say that it is not fitting for one man alone to be superior to the

tribunal of the royal officials, for thereby is lost their authority

and the superiority and influence that they ought to have for the

efficient management and exercise of their duties; and that the

expenses incurred with the said auditor of accounts and his clerks

ought to be dispensed with, for the said reasons. In this regard what

appears from the records of the visit is that Governor Don Juan de

Silva, in a treasury meeting held in the year 610 (Book 7, folio 301),

resolved to assign to the auditor of accounts and results [_resultas_]

(joining those two offices, which had up to that time been divided)

a salary of 1,000 pesos of common gold per annum, payable from

the royal treasury, for the work of both offices. Until that time,

it appears that the auditors of accounts had had only one official

notary of accounts, with 250 pesos of salary per annum. By the said

resolution it was raised to 300 pesos; and the clerks were increased

by three, each with 200 pesos salary per annum--in consideration of

the fact that there were many accounts in arrears to catch up with,

and that the said two offices were joined into one. Other appointments

resembling the one aforesaid were made in the persons of Pedro de

Leuzarra, in the year 618, and Luis de Vera Encalada, in the year

620. At this time the said chief official notary of this exchequer

was given a salary of 450 pesos, without its appearing when or why

this increase was granted; and that same practice was continued. In

the year 626, Alonso Garcia de la Vega was appointed with the title

of "auditor-arranger" (Book 7, folio 65), in accordance with the act

of the Audiencia above mentioned. In the year 629, Juan Baptista de

Zubiaga was appointed [_In the margin_: "Memorial, folio 266, Book 1,

folios 49, 128"] with the title of "auditor-arranger," and four clerks,

of whom we shall treat at the end of this paper, its proper place.

Against the statements of the royal officials, in regard to its being

possible to avoid those expenses, the auditor of accounts, Luis

de Encalada, stated in the year 625, in the suit that he had with

them, that they could not be avoided, for the tribunal of accounts,

consisting of the governor and two auditors [_oidores_] cannot

personally arrange or audit them, both because of their occupations

and because it is outside their profession; and their only duty is

to dispose of the uncertainties and results [_resultas_] which may

be proposed to them by the auditor of accounts.

[Point 4]

Papers of the secretary's office. In regard to the advantages in having

this office or tribunal, it seems that Governor Don Alonso Faxardo,

in a letter of August 10, 619, [74] petitioned your Majesty to have

intelligent persons sent as clerks; and informed your Majesty that

he had appointed Pedro de Leuzarra, a trustworthy person, auditor of

accounts, because of the incompetency of Francisco Lopez Tamayo. The

Council, upon examining that letter, decreed, November 17, 620, that

persons be named for that office, and that it was to be filled from

that time thenceforth by his Majesty; and accordingly the appointment

by the governor must cease.

That decree does not appear to have had any effect; for since that time

and until the present, as has been seen, the governors have filled that

office, notwithstanding that the Council gave that advice in the said

year, and your Majesty granted the office to Alvaro de Revolledo. As

it was then believed that the salary of this office was 500 pesos,

the said Alvaro de Revolledo petitioned that it be increased to

2,000 ducados or to 510,000 maravedis, the same as that of the royal

officials of those islands, so that he could exercise the said office

with greater authority. No decision was made on the petition, and the

said Alvaro de Rebolledo was afterward appointed to the accountancy

of San Miguel de Piura, with a salary of 300 pesos ensayados.

The tribunal of accounts of Mexico state, in a letter of June 27, 625,

that they have seen the necessity, from what they have examined of the

accounts of the said Filipinas Islands, of sending a person to visit

them who can adjust affairs pertaining to the expenses of the royal

estate of those islands, and lay down a system [of conducting them]

for the future. The person who must go should be of the ability,

authority, and qualifications that the matter demands. He should be

highly compensated and honored, in order that his office be respected

and the end in view obtained. It is the most important action for

your Majesty's service, and has most need of reform.

It appears that the said Alvaro de Rebolledo again petitioned, in

the year 626, that his warrant be despatched to him, with the salary

that your Majesty might be pleased to grant him, so that, its value

being known, he might be able to fulfil his duties. February 19, 626,

it was decreed by the Council that he should be heard. Thereupon,

the Council ordered the viceroy to investigate this matter, and to

submit a relation of whatever had happened in regard to the office of

auditor of accounts of Manila, and whether this office is necessary,

whether it be for life, and what are its qualifications and duties; and

of the tribunal of accounts. In obedience to this order, the viceroy,

Marquis de Cerralbo, in a letter of May 22, 627, states that what he

understands is that it is necessary that this office be permanent,

and that very suitable persons trained in the tribunal of accounts

and the other duties of the royal estate, should be found [for it];

and that it will be advisable that the official who should exercise

it be approved by the governor of Filipinas.

The tribunal of accounts of Mexico, in a letter of May 28, of the

same year 627, sent a report regarding the aforesaid which had been

drawn up, by order of the viceroy, by one of the auditors [_oidores_]

of the tribunal, Gaspar Bello de Acuña. In this it is declared that it

is necessary that not only should the accounts of the royal treasury

in Manila be audited, but also the accounts of all the royal estate

which should be in the keeping of any person whatever; for this was

a thing that has never been customary there, or had regular course,

because of the resistance offered by the royal officials. The said

accounts are of much more importance than any others; and it is

therefore important to appoint a person who is thoroughly competent

and reliable to inspect everything pertaining to the royal estate

of the said islands; for the accountants hitherto appointed have

been remiss in their proceedings. That has arisen from the poverty

of the country, and from all being united there; or because those

who try to proceed with any show of thoroughness in your Majesty's

service do not find aid in those who can give it in a matter that

is of so great importance; and because this office, from what is

understood of the condition of the royal estate in those islands,

is subject to ordinary occupation and residence, and has a salary of

one thousand pesos per annum. Since not more than one is appointed,

he will need a clerk to help him in the methodical arrangement of the

said accounts, and what is dependent on them. For the said office

of accountant, a fully competent person, and one of abilities,

will be needed. He should be well equipped, and honored with the

necessary writs of prohibition for matters pertaining to his office,

and with the privileges that may pertain to it. It is advisable that

he should be sent as visitor of all things that concern the royal

estate, to audit the accounts that are to be audited, and review those

that are concluded, notwithstanding the visitor-general appointed;

for the latter cannot have the intelligence, experience, and method

which your Majesty orders to be exercised in such matters--which are

understood only by those who have gained their knowledge in the chief

bureau of accounts of those kingdoms. Such a person can be appointed

with a time-limit, and, at the expiration of that time, he may return;

and another man of skill and experience may remain as the ordinary and

usual one, with the title of "auditor of accounts" for your Majesty;

and he should receive the ordinary salary that your Majesty cares to

grant him, and have a clerk to help him.

The Council, upon examination of the above-mentioned reports, decreed

on December 6, 627, that the papers that occasioned them should

be collected, and taken to the Council. From that time, it does not

appear that anything pertaining to this matter has been done in or out

of the Council until the year 631, upon the arrival of the visitor,

Licentiate Don Francisco de Rojas, at the said islands. He having found

Juan Baptista Zubiaga holding the said office of auditor-arranger of

accounts and results [_resultas_], by the appointment of the governor

in the year 629, ordered the said Juan Baptista to cease to exercise

his duties, and to bring the papers in his charge to the visitor's

office; and ruled that there the said Juan Baptista and Diego Ortiz

de Vargas, auditor [_contador_] of the visit, should together review

all the accounts of the royal treasury and estate, with four other

clerks. They were to receive the following salaries: the said Diego de

Ortiz de Vargas, 2,000 ducados; the said Juan Baptista, 1,000 pesos,

the same as he had received before [when exercising his office];

to one clerk 400 pesos, to another, 350, to another 300, and to the

fourth 200.

Later, at the end of the visit in the year 633, the said visitor gave

the said Juan Baptista de Zubiaga the title of "auditor of accounts

and results" [_resultas_] with a salary of 1,000 ducados per annum,

increasing his salary [_In the margin_: "Memorial, folio 266"]

because of the extra work which he would have in collecting [the

amounts due from] the results [_resultas_] which remained drawn in

his possession. He was to get a confirmation from your Majesty for

the increase, namely, from the 1,000 pesos which he received before

to the 1,000 ducados assigned to him by the visitor, within six

years. Besides the above, he was to have two clerks to assist him

and commission to audit all the accounts, both general and private,

pertaining to the royal estate. [_In the margin_: "The title is to

be found in the collection of papers for the claim of this man in

regard to the confirmation."]

He made rules in regard to its execution, and ordered them to be

obeyed and observed, and to be inscribed in the royal books for that

purpose. Although the royal officials were opposed to both things,

the visitor ordered them to obey the enactment. Because the said

royal officials refused to inscribe the said ordinances in the royal

books, he fined them five hundred ducados apiece, which remained in

the royal treasury. He had those ordinances inscribed in the books,

getting the books for that purpose from the royal treasury, for

the royal officials refused to do it [_In the margin_: "Memorial,

folio 266"]. In the report made for your Majesty by the said visitor

in the year 634, regarding the visit, he states that he thinks that

those islands have the greatest need of a tribunal of the bureau of

accounts, so that the accounts of the royal treasury may be audited

there annually for the preceding year, and results made of all for

which warrants have been improperly issued, and that has failed to be

collected, thus avoiding the delays which have occurred hitherto. It

is very necessary to have not only the said auditor of accounts

appointed by him in the said bureau of accounts, but also a greater

force of men and more authority in the said bureau of accounts. If

that course had been pursued hitherto, it is undeniable that so great

a quantity of funds would not have been badly administered, lost,

and uncollectible. In his opinion, those islands have much greater

need of a tribunal or a bureau of accounts than of an Audiencia,

president, and auditors [_oidores_].

By a certification given by the said auditor of accounts and of the

visit, Juan Baptista Zubiaga, it appears that the results [_resultas_]

drawn up against the royal officials and other private persons

during the visit amounted to six hundred and ninety-five thousand

and sixty pesos.

The governor of Filipinas, in a letter written to your Majesty August

10, 634, [75] declares that it will be advisable that your Majesty be

pleased to send an auditor of accounts, and that such auditor should

be a person of authority, who shall receive an adequate salary; and

states that he who is holding that office _ad interim_ was a servant

of one of the auditors [_oidores_] of those islands, and thinks more

of spending his time in maintaining his friendships than in attending

to what is necessary. He thinks that with the above appointment, and

the correction of some recent ordinances, the condition of affairs

would be improved.

A report made from the secretary's office having been examined in the

Council on September 26, 635, regarding what appeared to be there on

this matter, it was ordered that your fiscal should examine it; and

that, after also examining what advices had been received concerning

it and the letters of the visitor, he should inform the Council in

regard to it all. The said your fiscal declared that the ordinances and

papers sent by the royal officials had come without authentication;

and therefore, until they should come with that requisite, he had

nothing to say.

This defect no longer operates, for the above-mentioned ordinances

have arrived duly authenticated, in the body of the [records of the]

visit; and the officials, in a letter in which they set forth the

objections to those ordinances, have sent some authenticated papers

for the proof of their statements.

On February 20, 637, the papers on the matter having been examined

in the Council, it was ordered that they be taken to your fiscal,

with the rest of the papers concerning the visit that touch the royal

estates and its accounts--so that, upon receiving his statement,

the advisable decision may be made as to whether it is best to send

an auditor of accounts to Filipinas, or not. It does not appear that

the said your fiscal has as yet answered. This is the condition that

appears from the above-cited records; and your Majesty will ordain

the measures that seem best to you.

THE CONQUEST OF MINDANAO

_Letter from Father Marcelo Francisco Mastrili, [76] in which he

gives account of the conquest of Mindanao to Father Juan de Zalazar,

[77] provincial of the Society of Jesus in the Filipinas Islands._

_Gratia, et pax Christi, etc._

I would by no means have expected, Father, your Reverence's command

to inform you of our expedition to Mindanao, had you known that

the letters which I wrote to Father Juan de Bueras from Lamitan had

remained at Sanboanga; because, since I recounted in them, with much

detail, all the events of the conquest of Mindanao, I asked him to

read them to your Reverence, so that, without fatiguing yourself

with my separate letter, you might know what had happened. And now,

having in obedience to your command, departed for Taytay, I will here

relate to you faithfully as much as I can remember.

Your Reverence of course knows how Don Sebastian Hurtado de Corcuera,

governor of these islands, having determined on the expedition to

Mindanao, called a general council of war, in which all were of adverse

opinion, saving only his nephew, Sargento-mayor Don Pedro Hurtado de

Corcuera. In spite of this, constrained by desire for his own glory,

and for the honor of the two Majesties, the human and the divine,

he resolved, notwithstanding the contrary opinion of the entire

council, to persevere in his pious intentions. On the day, therefore,

of the Purification of our Lady, February second of this year 1637,

having with all the soldiers attended confession and communion in the

chapels of the palace, he ordered them to embark in eleven champans,

which were already provided for this purpose. Father Juan de Barrios

and I embarked in the flagship with his Lordship, and Sargento-mayor

Don Marcos Zapata, whom he brought for a companion, and to sit at

his table. The priest Don Juan, chaplain of the fleet, sailed on

the almiranta, with Sargento-mayor Don Pedro Hurtado de Corcuera;

and an Augustinian friar came, as confessor for the Pampangos, in

Lorenço Ugalde's champan.

The previous day a letter had come from the archbishop, stating

that there were eighty hostile caracoas at the island of Mindanao;

so his Lordship, in order to surprise them, sailed with five champans

for the opposite and outer coast of the island, and directed Captain

Ugalde to skirt the inner coast, with the rest of the boats, as far

as Point Nasso, [78] on the shore of the island of Othon. The fact

that they found no trace of enemies anywhere, stamped the report as

false, and as inspired by the effort of the devil for the purpose

of hindering us in our journey; for we were compelled, by taking

this route, to toil for more than twelve days in order to cover the

distance of twelve leguas to this Point Nasso in Othon, the brisas

being dead ahead when we attempted to round the cape. One day when

(an opportunity offering) we were trying to double it, the fury of

the wind and the sea was so great that we broke the steering-gear,

and there was great danger of the ship's foundering, and of our being

drowned. I would have been drowned more quickly than anyone else, for,

being at the stern, I became entangled with the sheets of the sail,

[79] at the time of the furious and unexpected turn which the ship

(being no longer under control) gave, through the force of the wind.

So great, in fact, was the rage and pain which the evil one suffered

on account of our expedition, and what he already feared [from it]

that, as I afterward knew with certainty, he often complained to a

certain person, speaking in an audible voice in the woods, saying:

"Why come ye? What do ye seek? Who brought you here? Curses on you;

I will deprive you of life, and we will have done with this!" I did

not believe this at the time, as coming from the father of lies; but he

taught us later, by experience, how much he did to make his word good.

Now, although all these things were enough in themselves to cause some

trouble, yet the most agreeable conversation of his Lordship, with

the pious division which he made of the hours of the day, left the

evil one no opportunity. For, in the morning, Father Juan de Barrios

and I said mass; there with his Lordship we recited the canonical

hours, the office to our Lady, matins, and the prayers for the dead;

in the afternoon at vespers, the same prayers, and the holy matins,

and the prayers to the Virgin; in the early evening we had the _Salve_

[_i.e._, "Hail, Mary"], with the public litany; and at night prayers

for the souls in purgatory, usually relating some miracle, which

was of great profit to many. Nor need your Reverence think that we

lost any time because of the contrariety of the winds at Point Nasso

that I mentioned; for orders were despatched to the Pintados Islands

by the Indian volunteers, and sent to Othon with the _falua_ [80]

by Adjutant Don Francisco Olozaran--who returned in a champan with

the father rector of Othon, Father Francisco Angel, [81] and Father

Gregorio Belin. The latter was going from Samboanga to Manila to give

his Lordship the news of the victory won by Sargento-mayor Nicolas

Gonçalez over seven caracoas from Mindanao, which were returning, with

some slaves and sacred ornaments, from plundering the islands. The

father rector brought with him from Othon excellent provisions, and

afterward he gave the whole fleet much better at Iloilo. His Lordship

arrived at that place with the aforesaid father, in the falua, three

days before we did, in order to have time to visit the fort, and see

whether the boats of Captain Briones were prepared for the relief of

our troops in Mindanao. On the arrival of the champans, Father Angel

disembarked, to return to his mission in the island of Negros; and the

father rector of Othon embarked in Captain Martin Monte's champan,

with his Lordship's orders for Samboanga, which place we reached on

the twenty-second of February.

Here his Lordship commanded that neither the [cannon of the] fort

nor the musketry should be discharged at his approach, in order not

to make a noise and thus make his presence known; and for the same

reason he ordered that no vessels should go out of the river. In

spite of all this Corralat soon knew of his coming, through the son

of a chief of Basilan, who at that time was imprisoned in the fort

of Samboanga, with orders that he was not to be released except upon

urgent request by the [Jesuit] fathers, so that in this way they might

secure the goodwill of the Moros. The next day general communion

was proclaimed, together with an indulgence and full jubilee for

the whole camp, for the first Sunday in Lent--his Lordship obliging

all the soldiers to give certificates of confession and communion to

their officers; and he had his own servants do the same thing, for I

found him one day collecting the certificates with his own hands. All

this was done with great fervor, and with many general confessions,

in which the continual discourses and sermons of those days aided

greatly. All received communion on Sunday with his Lordship, the

blessed sacrament being exposed, and all were present later at Father

Berlin's [_sic_] sermon. In the evening, at the time of replacing the

Host, his Lordship was again present with all the soldiery, because

he had appointed me in the morning to preach the evening sermon on

the reverence and devotion necessary to be observed in church, in the

presence of so great a Majesty. This I did to the best of my ability,

at the end inspiring the soldiers for the campaign, and inciting them

to battle by showing them, painted on canvas, [82] a figure of Christ,

whose feet and right arm the Moros had cut off; in the middle of it

they had made a large hole, using the cloth as a _chinina_, or small

mantle. This a Moro actually wore, and they killed him while he had

it on, the day when Nicolas Gonçalez captured the caracoas. Father

Berlin brought it with the sacred ornaments to his Lordship; and he,

knowing that I had been on the lookout for some such thing in Manila,

as soon as he saw it at Point Nasso, gave it to me. When I showed

this image to the soldiers, and exhorted them to avenge with arms the

injuries of the holy Christ, such were the tears, and so great the

tender devotion and holy desire for vengeance with which they were

fired, that (as they afterward told me) they would, on leaving the

church, have been willing to offer battle with all the world [against

them]. The effects were very marked, and much tenderness [of feeling

was displayed], so that at last it was openly said that the mother

who had no sons in this glorious enterprise was very unfortunate.

With this fervor and so excellent preparation, the champans departed

on the trip to Mindanao, [83] which is sixty leguas from Samboanga,

on the third of March, and on the fourth all the rest of us set out,

with his Lordship, in eleven caracoas. In all, four companies embarked,

three of Spaniards, and one of Pampangos. His Lordship's company

consisted of a hundred and fifty soldiers; Nicolas Gonçalez had one

hundred, and Ugalde as many more, who were seamen; the master-of-camp

had that of the Pampangos. I would not fail to write of what happened

on Tuesday, when the champans departed. We all wished that his Lordship

would not go until Saturday, that we might see whether some of the

Indian scouts would not return in the meanwhile; but I did not wish

to ask it from him until I had commended the matter to God. I asked

the father rector to say mass to St. Francis Xavier for my intention,

and I also said it. Then we withdrew into a room, and, after suitable

prayer, his Lordship opened the book of the letters of that saint

(which I hold to be a divine guide), pointing out beforehand the part

which was to be read, and these were the words: _Many times we think

that our own opinion might be better; nevertheless, we must leave

affairs to Him who governs them, if we wish to succeed._ The will of

the saint was plain to be seen, nor did I desire to contrive further

speech about the arrangements with his Lordship. And truly all things

were guided by Heaven in order to give him the glorious victory which

he attained--to the confusion of the Moros and the undeceiving of

the Indians, who now know that the Spaniards can, when they choose,

fight in their territory without them.

In the gulf of La Silanga we met with a very severe and dangerous

tempest, of which we rid ourselves by exorcisms and sacred relics,

as is our way in dealing with things evidently planned by the evil

one. Here Nicolas Gonçalez waited with eight caracoas to tow the

champans through La Silanga, which is a strait of the sea two leguas

long, between the great island of Mindanao and another and small

island. His Lordship, with four of the caracoas, went to Punta de

Flechas, so called from the ceremony and superstition of the Moros in

shooting arrows at one of its rocks when they are returning to their

own country, to show their thankfulness to Mahomet. Here we remained

for two days, awaiting the vessels of the fleet; during this time I

said mass on shore, having beforehand uttered tremendous conjurations

against the evil one, as holy Mother Church is wont to do, with her

exorcisms, holy water, etc. Then our people burned all the arrows,

of infinite number, that were fixed on that headland, with a thousand

other things--articles of food, such as fish, eggs, etc.--which,

as a sign of their devotion, they are wont to leave fastened to the

rock with black pegs. We set up a number of crosses in different

places, and then the name of the place was solemnly changed to Punta

de San Sebastian, in order that that saint, with his holy arrows,

might complete the destruction of those infernal and accursed ones

which for so many years have vexed us. The name was given also in

commemoration of the fact that Don Sebastian [_i.e._, Corcuera]

has been the first governor to cast anchor here and to round this

cape; besides this, the marvelous fall of this rock in the night

when Nicolas Gonçalez fought within sight of it, we all attribute

to this saint, who desired to give to Don Sebastian pledges for the

glorious campaign of Mindanao, since only that part of the rock fell

which faced toward Mindanao--as we all saw with wonder. While we were

here, a light vessel came from the enemy to reconnoiter our fleet;

our falua gave chase, but, being very far away, could not overtake

it. We, however, encountered a small boat containing four of our

Indian captives who had fled from the enemy; they informed us that

several Javanese ships were on the point of departure from Mindanao,

laden with Christian slaves. I confess to your Reverence that this was

not news to his Lordship, but he was cut to the heart by the misery

of so many souls, and he at once decided to sail night and day in

order to overtake the ships. This holy zeal was the sole and true

reason for his pushing on without halt till he came up with them,

instead of waiting for his fleet; and he was well rewarded by Heaven

with so fortunate a victory, as your Reverence will see.

Now the evil spirit, who for so many years had dwelt at this Punta

de Flechas, undertook to oppose us and hinder our advance. For three

times, by the violence of the wind and sea, we were turned back; and

the fourth time, without any contrary wind, we remained motionless

for more than an hour, although our caracoa had ninety _barrigas_

(as they call rowers on the Pintados Islands). Thus the work of the

evil one was plainly to be seen; but, by casting a few holy relics

into the sea and pronouncing exorcisms, as before, we soon passed on.

These deceptions and obstacles of the invisible enemy being overcome,

we came in sight of Mindanao, without recognizing it, on Friday the

thirteenth of March, with four caracoas. When I had finished saying

mass--this was before dawn--his Lordship embarked in the falua,

and with only six soldiers went to reconnoiter the place, to sound

the rivers and harbors of the coast, and to see whether any Moro who

could serve as a guide might be captured, for we had none. He pursued

several of them up to their own shore, discharged two muskets at them,

and nevertheless they fled up the river, abandoning their vessels. In

response to these shots, the report of a cannon was heard from inland;

this gave us much cause for fear, seeing that his Lordship was so bold,

and we dreaded lest he had engaged with the enemy. Then we recited the

litany, and other prayers; and, rowing as fast as possible, met them

coming back. The governor embarked in his caracoa at eleven o'clock in

the morning, and placed in order all four of the caracoas, with the

two champans of our fleet--those of Captains Don Rodrigo and Ugalde,

which had arrived three days before, and captured three caracoas from

the enemy. [84] From another direction there came, under a white flag,

a letter from the Recollect fathers whom the Moros held captive there,

that [our men?] should inform them of what was going on. He cast

anchor near the mouth of the river, where some huts were to be seen,

without knowing what village it was; [85] and turning to me, said:

"I will quarter my men in those cabins tonight." Then he ordered all

to eat; and having sent Adjutant Don Francisco Olazaran to land with

twenty-five musketeers to seize the shore, and sounding the trumpets

and the drums, discharging the ship's cannon in the direction of the

harbor, his Lordship disembarked, with all his soldiers--who, between

Spaniards and Pampangos, amounted to seventy men. The sargento-mayor of

the forces and the admiral of the fleet, Don Pedro Hurtado de Corcuera,

drew up the forces on the beach, placing, at his Lordship's direction,

two field-pieces in the vanguard; and these were the terror of the

enemy. Here, after I had aroused and encouraged the soldiers with the

[sight of the] miraculous picture of St. Francis Xavier on one side,

and that of the holy Christ (which I mentioned above) on the other--the

two suspended from a lance--I walked between the vanguard and the body

of the troops, with Father Juan de Barrios, the Augustinian father,

and the chaplain of the fleet, which line of march we preserved

during the whole campaign. At the time when we were disembarking one

of our captive Indians came swimming toward us from the land, and

we learned from him that this was the port of Corralat; but he was

in such terror of the many musket-shots which the Moros, on seeing

us, fired at him from an ambuscade which they had prepared against

our people, that he could tell us nothing more. And so we marched on

without knowing whether in the aforesaid port there were any force of

arms or soldiers; we took for granted that what had always been said

of the place was true--namely, that all the defenses of Corralat

were upon the hill above, and not in the town below. Yet because

this was the cause of God, where human means failed, I besought His

Divine Majesty, together with the saints, to illumine with especial

light his Lordship [the governor], so that, leaving the open road

from the shore to the town, he should march with his soldiers by the

road on the right. This route compelled us to cross the river twice,

with considerable difficulty for the two cannon and for the person

of his Lordship, who plunged into the water with all the rest of

the soldiers. In spite of all this, it saved us from two very great

dangers: one of them the armed ambuscade on the left side of the road,

in the thickly-wooded part of a little hill--which we could hardly

have escaped, as the road was very marshy, and was blocked by reeds,

fruit plantations, and houses. The other peril was even greater; all

the cannon of the fort were trained in the aforesaid direction [toward

the left], and could not harm us, because they could not be turned to

the right. The truth is that they had trained two chambered culverins

very low against our path at the foot of the fortification--which

would doubtless have done us much injury, but, through their great

fear and confusion, no one succeeded in firing them.

After God had delivered us, without our knowing it, from perils so

great, considering the small numbers of our expedition, his Lordship

was marching in the vanguard, by the road which he had miraculously

chosen. We had crossed the river for the first time, and the artillery

and musketry were soon clearing the field as far as a stockade near

the river, where the Moros made their first stand. Here it happened

that, upon his Lordship's going forward for a moment to see what

enemy lay behind the stockade, four Moros set upon him with their

campilans; he very swiftly faced about, to fire at them his gun,

which a negro at his side always bore; and, not seeing the servant

(for he had fallen a little behind), his Lordship fell to with his

sword, with such spirit that the Moros, disheartened, soon fled. In

spite of this, one of the Moros--Borongon, Corralat's most valiant

captain--going out most courageously from the other side of the

stockade, tried to prevent our men (who were now ready to cross the

river for the second time) from attacking the fort, which had been

descried from this first stockade. He valiantly wounded two, and,

for a third, attacked Captain Lorenço de Ugalde who was leading half

the troops in this direction--the rest, under Captain Don Rodrigo,

marching along the right bank of the river, where a great number

of Moros was now gathering. Captain Ugalde parried with his shield

the first two blows of the campilan; and then, rushing in with his

sword, gave Borongon many wounds in the face, being unable to reach

his breast because of the arms that the Moro carried; but he forced

him to retire. His retreat, however, availed but little, because

of the furious musket-fire of our men; and finally Don Francisco

Olaceran's sword completed the work, and the Moro captain went into

the river. And now, after this man's death, our troops went on,

without further resistance, to the fort. It was furnished with a new

moat, and was full of arms; and it had eight pieces of artillery in

bronze, twenty-seven culverins [_versos_], many muskets with rests [?;

_de pinsote_], arquebuses, and other hand-arms. There was a garrison

of more than two thousand Moros for the fortress and the port, as we

were told by Sosocan (a Moro friendly to us, and very well informed in

regard to the equipment and strength of Corralat). All this profited

them little, however; for so pressing was our attack that very soon

we were masters of all, and Alférez Amesquita raised his flag above

the fort. Many Moros had been killed, and the rest fled badly wounded,

as we learned on the following day from our prisoners. At this place

we killed the commander of the fort, a grandson of Corralat--the son

of one of his daughters, who had married the lord of the lake [86]

[country]--a very spirited youth, of whom his grandfather was very

fond. He had that day vowed to Mahomet not to abandon the fort until

his death, and thus he fulfilled his promise.

Seeing now our flags on the enemy's stockade, we soon, with his

Lordship, crossed the river for the second time; and climbing up on the

other side, I also raised my standard, that of Christ and St. Francis

Xavier. We all sang the _Te Deum laudamus_; and, after his Lordship had

given the name of St. Francis Xavier to the fort and had left Alférez

Amesquita as its governor, with a garrison of soldiers, we advanced to

the rear of a stockade which Corralat defended with its one cannon,

and to the mosque. Here the Moros had rallied for the last time,

trusting in what their captain-general [_condestable_] had told them,

that they were not to retreat until they saw him fall. He believed,

by some witchcraft or other, that our bullets could not injure him;

and he had had proof of this, for once a ball had broken the bone

of his leg, crippling him, but without breaking the skin or drawing

blood. In this confidence, he came out with his men to defy us,

but Captain Zubire at once leveled his musket at him, and sent two

balls through his forehead; this was the only portion of his body

uncovered, the rest of it being protected by an English shield. The

wretched man fell dead on the spot, and instantly all the rest in

the stockade and the mosque lost courage, left their arms, and fled

with all possible speed to the woods. At this same time Don Rodrigo,

marching with his detachment between the slope of the hill and the

river, charged the enemy so valiantly that by force he compelled them

to abandon all their ships--which, for fear of us, they had hidden

two days before in a broad inlet to this same river. Here they thought

the ships would be safe, because they had brought them in so quietly,

and because the place was so far away from the mouth of the river.

Thus in a little more than half an hour we gained possession of all

below [the hill], and we would have captured the heights above on

the same day, had we had all our forces, for the Moros fled in so

great fright that Corralat himself had covered his face with mud

so as not to be recognized by our men. This was told us by one of

his servants, a Christian, who came to us the following morning,

reporting a great number of Moros wounded--especially the king of

the Lake, who was suffering with a bullet-wound in the breast; he

had come to celebrate some marriage, that of a cousin of his with a

daughter of Corralat. From this captive, and others, we learned that

Corralat had desired, in any event, to surrender to the governor,

but that the Christians had not consented to this, and had persuaded

him to make a defense, promising that they would fight in the front

rank. This promise they fulfilled, especially the day of the assault

upon the hill, for it was they who did us the most injury; but they

paid the penalty of this advice, not only with the property which we

took from their ships, but with their lives, which the Moros themselves

took in anger at their bad advice.

After the fight, the soldiers commenced to sack the houses; and

the governor, having seen all the ships as far as the river above,

retired with those who had accompanied him, to the mosque. Here the

first thing that was done was to take the great chair of Mahomet,

with his books and other paraphernalia, and burn them. What we saw

when we came to take out this throne certainly surprised us; for,

before we reached the fire, two most venomous serpents came out from

the feet of the chair, terrifying the soldiers greatly. And truly,

nothing other than serpents and poison ought to guard the chair of the

great devil of Mindanao. When the chair was burned, together with all

else that savored of superstition, we consecrated the mosque to our

Lady with the _Salve_; and early the next morning (which was Saturday,

the fourteenth of March), having dedicated the church to God with

the title of "Our Lady of Good Fortune," we commenced to say masses

in it, at a very beautiful altar, which served us during the twelve

days while we were there.

This same mosque, being very large and conveniently situated, served

for headquarters; his Lordship and the other captains lodged there,

the other houses round about being used for the soldiers--although

our being on the bank of the river, very near the woods, and

somewhat distant from the fort, brought it about that every night

the Moros attacked us. Because of the continual showers of rain that

fall at night, they might have given us a great deal of trouble

(since we cannot use firearms when it is wet), if his Lordship's

wise arrangements and planning had not provided for everything; for

after having fortified the road to the hill with a very strong ravelin

guarded by soldiers, etc., great fires burned every night around the

camp. The sentinels continually called out the watchword; and all

the sargentos-mayor and captains, and often his Lordship himself,

made the rounds. The Moros, therefore, seeing us always vigilant,

dared not attack us openly, but a few of the bravest tried their

fortune in attacking us, and these were often at the mouth of the

river, when our men were going to or from the fleet. One night,

returning from visiting the sick, I was there in a small champan,

with only Captain Rodrigo and four Sangleys--who, in their fear, not

seeing the way ran the boat on a shoal. It certainly was a miracle

of God that the Moros did not notice this; for, if they had, they

would surely have killed us. I escaped at that place another great

danger, for, not knowing that by day the Moros lay continually in

ambuscade in some little huts quite a distance from the fort, I went

each day among them; and it pleased God that they never saw me. When

his Lordship learned of these ambuscades, he ordered the huts burned.

The vessels which were in the river the first day could not be taken to

the fort until the next day, the tide being low. There were more than

thirty of these ships--large, medium-sized, and small--the greater

part of them laden with a thousand things, especially five or six

very large vessels from Java, full of wax, oil, rice, and other

articles of merchandise. All our people had the benefit of these

things, except of a certain quantity of wax, which was kept for the

king, together with a great number of arms. There were eight cannon

of bronze, with ladles; twenty-seven versos, a cast-iron pedrero,

a great many chambers for versos, and more than a hundred muskets and

arquebuses; and an infinite quantity of bullets, iron, powder, arrows,

and _sompites_, a kind of little arrow which they shoot by means of

blowpipes [87]--so poisonous that, unless very powerful remedies are

soon applied, it kills in a few hours. Other implements of warfare were

found in the powder-house, which we used as barracks for the Pampangos.

The next day the rest of the champans and caracoas of our fleet began

to arrive, and the governor at once appointed Captain Mena as head

of the fleet for all the time while we should be at Mindanao. For

governor of Fort St. Francis Xavier, he chose Sargento-mayor Palomino,

who fortified it and put it in order, fencing it in on all sides, with

its port-holes and defenses, and adding around it a hidden rampart

with embrasures, so that it could contain two ranks of artillery

and musketry. On this enterprise Don Pedro Hurtado de Corcuera

worked very hard, for he is especially skilled in the Flemish mode of

fortification; and the governor himself gave the plan for the building

and his hands for the work, turning the first earth with the spade.

Two days more, Sunday and Monday, were spent in making many sorties

and in burning many neighboring places, Captain Rodrigo with his men

traveling by land, and Captain Ugalde with his, by sea, until they

reached the former dwelling of Corralat, which is called Puerto de

las Savanillas. [88] They burned all the houses, together with many

other villages and some large ships which they found concealed in a

river. The other soldiers who remained in the camp busied themselves

in launching all the sunken caracoas (which were many) with which

the Moros were wont to make raids; and in searching out whatever

was buried. This included many chambers for versos; also iron, wax,

and three bells--besides the large one which stood at the door of the

mosque, mouth upward, full of water in which the Moros washed their

feet before entering the mosque.

On this Sunday morning, his Lordship sent also to Samboanga a Moro

caracoa full of our Christian prisoners and Sangleys, who had been

coming in great numbers to the camp since the first day, especially

on Saturday morning. At the same time, a boat came by way of the

river with the Indian who had been our prisoner for many years,

accompanied by twelve others of his household--his wife, his son,

his father-in-law, etc., most of them Moros. At the stern of the boat

was a large cross with a white flag suspended from it. This sight,

you may be sure, drew tears of joy from us all, at seeing the spoils so

valiantly snatched away from the great devil of Mindanao. I was caused

some anxiety by the coming that Saturday morning of a certain Moro,

who appeared, his whole body covered with mud, and came up the river

in a small boat with two fowls, asking to be taken to the señor Aria

(for thus they call the governor of these islands, this word meaning

"king" in their language), for he wished to present the fowls to

him with his own hand. Questioned as to the cause and motive for his

coming, he said he was driven by hunger and necessity, because they

had nothing to eat up on the hill; so would all have to come [to us]

in a few days. Events showed this to be false, for a great quantity of

provisions was found there later, confirming my suspicions and those

of others. It must have been a trick contrived by the devil and his

ministers against our captain-general, who, conducting himself on this

occasion (as on others) with great prudence and diplomacy, commanded

without seeing the man, that he should be handed over to Sosozan--a

Moro who was friendly to us, and had come with us from Samboanga--who

was to hand him over to the governor of the fort. This was done,

and thus, without knowing it, we were saved from a great danger.

When matters at the fort and the port below were settled, and all the

ships burned except three or four, which were kept to take back to

Samboanga, Nicolas Gonçalez arrived, on Monday evening, the sixteenth,

with the rest of our fleet. A great tempest had detained them after

they passed La Silanga, in which one caracoa was lost, under Captain

Sisneros, but only a boy was killed.

At once his Lordship arranged affairs for marching upon the hill

the next day. He ordered that biscuit and cheese for four days be

given to the soldiers; and Sargento-mayor Don Pedro, with Adjutant Don

Francisco Olazaran, spent the whole night in making them confess--which

confessions I received--not being content with their confessions

at Samboanga.

At three o'clock in the morning masses began to be said, and at

the end of the first his Lordship made an address to the soldiers,

in which he manifested his great zeal for the honor of God and his

military experience. We had agreed that afterward I was to display

[the images of] the blessed Christ and St. Francis Xavier; but,

to confess the truth to your Reverence, I had no heart for it; and

therefore I decided not to do so--as it were, a presage of what was

to happen to us that day.

When his talk was finished, his Lordship sent Sargento-mayor Nicolas

Gonçalez with Father Melchor de Vera (who had come with him from

Samboanga), with a hundred and twenty Spaniards, thirty Pampangos,

and eighty Indians to carry the packs, to cut off the enemy's

retreat from the hill, and to descend by the same path to attack

them. He assigned Captain Castelo to the advance-guard, and Captain

Bererra with two famous spies (one a Moro, the other a Christian)

to the rear-guard--ordering them to sound their trumpets beforehand,

so that his Lordship might attack at the same time from the other

direction, and thus they could surround the Moros. After Nicolas

Gonçalez had gone, the governor drew up his troops, putting Captain

Rodrigo at the head of the rest, and giving to each of the half-pay

captains a troop of soldiers. The flags, a piece of artillery, the

ammunition, and the provisions were with the body of the troops,

and in the rear-guard were the Pampangos; Sargento-mayor Don Pedro

was in the advance-guard, with Captain Don Rodrigo; Sargento-mayor

Palomino remained in the camp with a goodly number of soldiers,

and with the father rector of Othon as chaplain.

The troops were drawn up, and at six in the morning we commenced

our march very gayly. After going a legua and a half, we came upon

a large town at the foot of the hill, very beautiful and quiet, full

of fruit groves, bananas, and sugar-cane--but deserted by the Moros

on the previous night, as far as we could infer from the houses,

and from the fire which was still consuming the king's fortified

house; they had fired it, doubtless, for fear that his Lordship would

entrench himself in it, it being very well fitted for that. However,

he ordered the adjutant, Don Martin, to fortify another house on

the bank of the river with a good barrier, [89] a cannon, and a

garrison of Pampangos, to guard the packs and cover the retreat of

the soldiers. Then the rest of us crossed the river to reconnoiter

the enemy's position; the water was breast-high. A little later, we

crossed another creek, and commenced to climb a ravine full of coarse

grass. Here his Lordship halted, and, seeing another road farther down,

asked the guide whether that road also led to the hill. He said "yes;"

but, upon being asked which was better, replied that both were very

bad. Then his Lordship (a special light from heaven illuminating him)

said: "If, in the opinion of this Moro who is guiding us, both roads

are bad, I prefer going by the other rather than by this one by which

he is taking us." So he commanded the advance-guard to turn back

and go by the other road. Your Reverence will soon see the special

providence of God, and the protection of my glorious saint. At the

other road (by which the Moro was leading us) there were aimed three

pieces of artillery, which could not be seen; and one of them might

at least have destroyed the whole vanguard. When our chief gunner

discharged the bronze cannon, which stood between two large iron ones,

he found that it contained two great cannon balls, two crowbars, and

three hundred musket-balls, with a double charge [of powder]. Having

escaped this danger we proceeded by the other road, by which, having

crossed the river and the creek for the second time, we arrived at

the foot of a hill. Here we halted, and his Lordship sent some of

the advance-guard ahead to inspect the road, since from what could

be seen at the beginning of the ascent it seemed very bad. They went

to examine it, and soon word came back that after the first turn the

road was better, so we all went up. The truth is that the overflowing

courage, spirit, and desire for fighting which possessed the soldiers,

those of the vanguard especially, made the road seem good to them;

as a matter of fact, it was narrow, rough, and very dangerous on

account of terrible precipices on each side. We had made two or three

turns, up the hill, thinking to find some place where we could halt,

when from two stockades on the right side of the mountain the Moros

commenced to fire upon us. A cannon ball came toward me, grazing me;

but it was prevented by divine Providence from inflicting any further

injury than leaving its mark in the shape of a hole in my cassock. May

God grant that by this wonderful escape I am reserved for some other

and more glorious death!

We all felt sure that there was no other stockade besides these two

which we saw, when, at the third turn of the hill, the advance-guard

came upon another, which we had not been able to see. They commenced

to fight bravely from below it, but because the position of the

stockade was very strong, and that of our men very cramped--hemmed

in by formidable precipices, and exposed to all the guns and other

weapons of the enemy (especially sompites, bacacayes, and stones)--no

sooner would some of our men gain the little open place before the

stockade than they would fall dead or wounded. For this reason,

after having fought a good two hours, the fort could not be taken.

During this time the four priests who went up the hill--Father Juan

de Barrios, the Augustinian friar, the chaplain of the fleet, and

I--remained at this place, confessing the wounded and encouraging the

others. On the whole march, so far, I had not chosen to unfurl the

standard of the holy Christ and St. Francis Xavier; but at the time of

the battle, my fervor and zeal being aroused, I did what the Holy Ghost

bade me, and was thus constrained to give the banner to a soldier--who

at my order went on ahead, further up the hill, to guard the person

of his Lordship, who had left me in order to reconnoiter the stockade

from a nearer point. A ball came, which pierced the canvas of both

the sacred pictures, but without touching the figures; at that time

the saint was facing the stockade, and it has been positively learned

(how, I know not) that that ball was intended by the evil one to kill a

great personage, and the saint who stood before him saved him from it.

I, seeing that our affairs were in such straits, offered on my

part an earnest prayer to the saint; and afterward I said aloud

to his Lordship that he ought to make a vow to the saint that he

would build him a chapel at San Miguel. To this he replied with much

spirit and generosity, "Yes, Father, and it shall be made very rich

and very beautiful." I thought it best to designate that church,

because it was that of the saint to whom St. Francis Xavier, when

he was living, felt most devotion and love. I cannot deny that my

heart was much troubled at this time, although not for fear of the

bullets, which flew about us like mosquitoes, and made a terrifying

noise in the trees; for I can truthfully assert to your Reverence

that I felt no trace of fear during this whole campaign, thanks

to God, although I found myself in the greatest straits and perils

of my whole life; and His grace comforted and aided me greatly in

this emergency. Forever blessed and hallowed be His holy name, _que

attingit a fine, usque ad finem fortiter, et disponit omnia suaviter_,

[90] who hath brought me by so many circuitous ways to a position

so in accord with my life-long desires. Thus, what distressed me on

that day was not fear, but the sight of the bravest and most gallant

soldiers either dead or wounded; nevertheless, it consoled me much to

see them enter the battle with the names of Christ and St. Francis

Xavier on their lips, and die uttering the same words. Over many

was laid the standard containing these two images, which even bore

some spots of blood. Some were praying with their reliquaries and

kissing them, others beseeching me for general absolution to prepare

them for so glorious a death--obtained in avenging the injuries

done to the holy Christ (this was the common formula, as it were,

of all)--and others at last, whom I could not reach, declared their

sins publicly giving tokens of the great grief and contrition which

they felt. There was one of these, in particular, who said three

times: "Sirs, tell such-a-one to pardon me; for money was given me

in Manila to induce me to murder him in time of battle, and I should

have murdered him had not God brought me to this condition." Truly,

the depth of his contrition touched me greatly--only this one thing

he had not confessed the night before; then I confessed nearly all

the rest, and they received the sacrament with the utmost devotion.

Among the first wounded was Captain Ugalde, who had two bullet-wounds

in his arms, and Sargento-mayor Don Pedro Hurtado de Corcuera, with

a musket ball which went through his right leg; so that this valiant

cavalier, being no longer able to be upon his feet, remained for a long

time upon his knees, encouraging the soldiers, although he was in great

danger of being killed. He was in the very spot where they had wounded

Don Rodrigo de Guillestigui, who was a most distinguished soldier;

for he fought continually, and remained all the time in the ditch

of the stockade without coming out, even when he had a considerable

wound. Alférez Amesquita succeeded in hoisting our flag over the fort,

but with the utmost danger; for they nearly hurled him down, with a

spear-wound in his head and several sompites in his throat. Our men

were fasting, and, besides that, laden with provisions and arms, and

wearied by the march (which had been more difficult than long); but,

like lions, they caused the Moros much more fear in their death than if

the port had been taken without bloodshed. The Moros were terrified,

too, by seeing our soldiers thus obstinately keep up the battle in

a slaughter-house--for this place deserves no other name. And your

Reverence may be well assured that a million of Spaniards could never

have gained the height; for I believe that no one can possibly picture

or imagine the strength of that place unless he were present at the

attack. The truth is, that they passed from courage to rashness;

for, by not ceasing to fight, they changed his Lordship's orders

(or else they heard them backwards) [as if he were] commanding the

leaders to rally instead of ordering a retreat. Then they counted on

gaining the victory through the soldiers who were coming up behind

(though most of them paid for this over-confidence with their lives),

and were for a long time deceived with this hope. However, the real

reason why the governor did not sooner order the retreat was that

he was waiting for the instant when Nicolas Gonçalez should attack

from above on the other side, for the latter had no more than three

leguas to go; but, having found the road very bad, and being himself

far from well, he could not get there till night. With these hopes,

and with very many false tidings of victory, which were very often

given, his Lordship waited, and urged on the soldiers for full two

hours in a very dangerous place, exposed to all the weapons of the

enemy; but, seeing many dead and wounded, he pushed his way forward,

and, with great danger to himself (and to all of us, if any mishap

had befallen him), reached the little open space in full sight

of the stockade. There he stood, in a furious storm of bullets,

stones, bacacayes, and sompites, which killed and wounded many at his

side--especially his armor-bearer, through whose helmet and skull they

sent a bullet. Now, having reconnoitered the place for more than half

an hour, and seeing that it could not be taken by storm from this

road (as a half-pay officer had told him a little while before),

he expressed his annoyance at those who sought with lies to detain

him and involve him more deeply, and ordered the retreat to be sounded.

The enemy might, indeed, have done us much injury when we commenced

the retreat; for the dead numbered eighteen, the wounded more than

eighty, and the few who remained were very weary, and hampered by

the aforesaid wounded men. Besides this, the road was precipitous,

and more difficult to descend than to climb. But God our Lord, by

the intercession of my glorious saint, blinded the enemy wholly;

and the courage and prudent management of his Lordship gave them

no time to attack us. With the utmost courage, he went along as if

nothing had happened, brandishing his naked sword--encouraging all;

holding back the soldiers, so that they should retreat gradually;

with his face always to the enemy, sending the men down; and having

our drums and trumpets sounded, until we reached the house which

Adjutant Don Martin had fortified. When all were there, we saw on

one side a great number of Moros coming down a defile to prevent our

retreat to the camp. A few cannon-shots were fired at them, and they

quickly hurried back to the hill. His Lordship wished to halt here and

await the attack by Nicolas Gonçalez, but the smallness of his forces

compelled him to retire, which he did, the drums beating, as before,

until we reached the camp. The wounded were placed, for that night,

in a cabin in front of the mosque; and in the morning we transferred

them to the champans, burying three who had died. Many were of the

opinion that his Lordship ought to retire that evening to the fort--a

safer place, in case of attack--but he was not willing to display any

weakness before the enemy, and so that night passed in great anxiety;

for, if the Moros were to come down, it would at least endanger the

wounded. We learned from some of the captives that they really intended

to attack us; but that, thinking the governor (for whom they mistook

Captain Martin Monte, [91] on account of his distinguished presence)

had fallen on that day, they felt it necessary to give thanks first to

Mahoma for so great a victory, with many ceremonies and revels which

they held that night, with the heads of our dead--as we ourselves

guessed from the great number of lights which we saw at the same time

on the hill. After this assault, when we retired at nightfall to the

camp, the governor wrote to Nicolas Gonçalez, telling him of what had

happened; and ordering him that if, by his position and the state

of his troops, he thought he could take the hill, he should attack

vigorously alone; but, if he thought that he could not succeed, he

should contrive an honorable retreat to the camp, where they would

arrange everything. He gave the letter to Sosocan to send, but no

one dared to take it, so it came back to the secretary.

Very early the next morning, I was saying mass, when cannon-shots and

volleys of musketry commenced to be heard from the hill--a sign that

our men were fighting. The whole camp was in a tumult, and his Lordship

ordered Don Pedro to march with all the able-bodied men by the same

road that they had followed the previous day, in order to divide the

enemy's forces, assuming that Nicolas Gonçalez was already engaged. I

kept on with the mass, although with much difficulty, because of the

many tears which the noise of the cannon called forth; and since the

mass that I was saying was for our dead soldiers, I implored their

blessed souls to obtain from God for us the victory for which they

had spent their blood the day before. After mass, we said the full

litany, and all engaged in prayer; it was an impressive thing to see

the governor on his knees with tears in his eyes, his hands raised

to heaven like Moses of old, praying for aid, and that the victory

might come to his troops. Less than an hour had passed when two

soldiers came with the news of the victory, and soon Father Melchor

arrived with the enemy's flags. I will not write of the embraces,

the merrymaking, and the joy in our camp, for your Reverence can

imagine it better than I can describe it. His Lordship at once gave

a banner to the soldiers who had brought the news, and by him he sent

[the promise of] an encomienda to Nicolas Gonçalez.

Father Vera related to us the story of the taking of the hill,

as follows: They marched all day Tuesday the seventeenth, the day

of our attack, not because the way was so long, but so bad, as I

have already said, and because Nicolas Gonçalez had to travel in

a hammock. He was actually so weak and ill that, as he afterward

admitted to me, his sword served him for a cane the day of the fight;

and a boy had to support his arm, which he could not lift for the

weight of his shield. They had various encounters with Moros, but,

in order to avoid noise, the order was given not to fight; and so on

the way they killed only the cachice [_i.e._, kasis] of Corralat,

whom they found hidden in a thicket. They halted that night and

fortified themselves in a height which overlooked the hill; and early

on the morning of Wednesday (the day of St Joseph's vigil and of the

glorious angel Gabriel) Nicolas Gonçalez had urged on the soldiers,

and told them that since there was no avenue of retreat open to them,

there was nothing for it but to gain either the hill or heaven. They

made a valiant attack upon the enemy, who were awaiting them behind

a huge tree lying across the middle of the road--having no other

stockades or ditches on this part of the hill, for they could not

imagine that we would attack them there. They held their ground,

fighting, for a time; but Captain Castelo, who was leading the

vanguard, having crossed with some soldiers to the other side of the

log, forced them to abandon their position. Then he followed them

with his troops, without difficulty or danger, on the rear as far

as the stockades and forts, till he remained master of two of these

with four pieces of artillery and the king's strong-house where he

kept his treasure. Many Moros were killed, not only by our shots,

but by rushing down in a furious and headlong flight through a very

narrow ravine which was at the entrance of this very stockade where

they expected us--falling, by a just judgment of God, into the very

snares which they had laid for us. At the same time Captain Castelo

met some Moros who were coming to join the others--the garrison of

the third stockade, which we had attacked the day before with our

vanguard; and, with the same ease, he compelled them to flee and fling

themselves down, he remaining master of the fort and its arms, which

were muskets with rests, arquebuses, campilans, etc. The relatives

and the men and maid-servants of Corralat, with many of his people,

who were taken prisoners on that day, said that the night before he

had put under his feet a monstrance containing the blessed sacrament,

which he had stolen, saying to all that there was nothing to fear,

for he had the God of the Christians already under his feet; and that,

considering the great strength of his fortified hills and stockades,

and the large quantity of provisions that they had, they would be quite

safe, unless it rained men from heaven. But when, the next morning,

they brought him word that our men were attacking from the rear,

he said to his wife: "The Spaniards have chosen a bad place for me"

(reflecting that, as I have said, he had no defense for guarding the

rear of the hill); "however, be of good courage, and wait here for me,

for I am going to do to these what I did yesterday to the others." He

went, and his wife, seeing that we were coming in, urged her women

to fling themselves down with her, so as not to be captured. They,

being more sensible, refused to do this, [92] and so they became our

slaves; while the poor queen, with a child which she was holding in

her arms, flung herself down and remained hanging from a tree. This

was a cause of regret to us all, on account of the kind disposition

which she possessed, according to the report given us by the father

rector of Dapitan, who knew her to be very friendly to our Christian

captives--sending them food secretly (especially to the religious),

and reproaching her husband when he maltreated and abused them. After

the queen had flung herself down, Corralat, with a bullet-wound in one

arm, came in search of her; and, seeing her already dead, he fled by

one of those declivities, without being recognized, to some hamlets

four leguas from the hill, where they say he is now recovering.

None of our men died, thanks be to God; only seven or eight were

wounded, and they are now well. Don Rodrigo--who had set out that

morning, as I have said, with the other troops--learning en route of

the victory, sent the soldiers to Nicolas Gonçalez as reënforcements,

and himself returned to the camp.

Now your Reverence will see whether we could ever have taken the camp

by starvation, as they said we could; it contained grain-fields, banana

patches, a brook of very pure water, and six or seven thousand baskets

of rice--which for them was very extensive provision. Nicolas Gonçalez

fortified himself with his troops in two places: Captain Bezerra, with

fifty soldiers, occupied the king's house which had been set aside for

his Majesty [the king of Spain], and Nicolas Gonçalez remained with

the rest of the forces in the principal stockade where the artillery

was; while they burned all the other stockades, and the houses, rice,

and grain-fields, and brought down the four pieces of artillery. This

they did in two days, to the admiration of all--even of the gunners,

who held it to be impossible. Those men would have abandoned them,

if his Lordship had not remained firm in his intention of not going

until the cannon came down--not wishing Corralat to say that the

Spaniards could not bring down what he had taken up, although he did

it with two thousand Indians, in six months, and our men did it in

two days with four rowers [_barrigas_].

I cannot deny that the joy of that day was very great, but the death

of the two Recollect fathers distressed us greatly--his Lordship

having tried to the utmost of his power to deliver them from the

Moros. Although they had captured three at Pintados, one of them was

killed by our own men [93] under Nicolas Gonçalez, on the day when he

surprised the enemy's fleet at Punta de San Sebastian, formerly Punta

de Flechas. One the Moros killed on the day when we gained the lower

port, because, when they were fleeing with their wives and captives to

the upper fort, this good servant of God being unable to travel very

fast on account of having been ill, they killed him with a shower of

blows; and then hanged him, dead, from a tree so that we should see

him from the camp. But, because we were at a distance, we could not,

although we saw him, get possession of his body--especially as they

took it away early the next day; and we were unable to find out what

they did with it. The other father they killed on the hill, through

rage, on the day that Nicolas Gonçalez won the hill--although he did

not die until the following day, in the mosque below the hill, before

the altar. It comforted him greatly to see already blessed, with the

title of Nuestra Señora de la Buen Succeso ["Our Lady of Success"],

the building which a little while before had stood there dedicated

to Mahoma. Five fathers whom we found at the camp were present at

his death; and the next morning we buried him in the sea, not being

willing to leave his sacred body to the hands of the barbarians. When

I was washing him to prepare him for burial, I was astounded at the

great number of wounds and cruel campilan blows with which they had

mutilated his whole body; and then I wondered at his patience and

endurance. The soldiers too admired the great zeal of this holy man,

because, when they found him thus wounded in a corner of the fort,

he did not complain, but immediately asked if there were any wounded

soldier for him to confess. When he was told that he must not fatigue

himself, and that we had brought a Jesuit father for that very purpose,

he was greatly rejoiced, and asked to have him brought so that he

might confess to him; Father Melchor de Vera came up at once.

When, they brought him down to the camp, I was with the sick on the

fleet; they told me (but not till evening, when I returned) that his

Lordship had performed acts of kindness for the father, in keeping

with his devotion--helping to bring him in and place him in the bed,

giving him food with his own hands, washing the blood from his wounds,

and comforting him with tender and loving words, especially when the

surgeon commenced to treat him. Inasmuch as his clothing adhered to

his wounds by reason of his having passed a day and a half without

attention, the pain of pulling the garments away was very great; and,

when he winced a little, his Lordship was at once at hand with the

story of the passion of our Lord, and found it so efficacious that, as

he afterward declared to me, the father did not utter another word, nor

offer any other resistance, but exhibited the patience of a glorious

martyr. I confess that I washed his wounds after his death more with

tears from my eyes than with water from the river, in holy envy of the

glorious way in which he had ended his pilgrimage. Before he died,

I begged him to beseech God for a like death for me, or even a more

painful one, in defense of His holy law. The holy man promised it,

and I hope by his intercession to obtain it--although not because

I deserve it, unless in return for the relief I gave his glorious

wounds in the last four absolutions which I gave him with my special

consolation. Surely those are fortunate fathers who have been able

to show to the world, by their blood, the zeal and divine love which

they bear in their bosoms.

After burying the father the next morning, Friday, March twentieth,

two days after the victory, we went up the hill with his Lordship;

but so great was the stench from the dead Moros in the ravines

(although many still lived, judging by the cries and groans of many

persons which were heard) that, almost as soon as we had reached

the top and had looked at the king's house, we returned to the

camp. His Lordship then commanded that with the exception of the

church ornaments, and the arms kept for his Majesty, everything

should be divided among the soldiers. His Lordship did not reserve

for himself or his friends even one blanca's worth--surely an action

very justly applauded, certainly, and admired because it is not now

practiced among the captains-general, and because it was, I believe,

the first [of its kind] in these Filipinas Islands; and it confirmed

the opinion that all held of the governor, as a wholly disinterested

gentleman. An enormous amount was found and divided; they say that

there were many cabinets full, and very heavy; what is certain is,

that the whole of Corralat's treasure was here, and whatever he had

plundered during so many years. Your Reverence does not need to be told

that the soldiers came back well satisfied, and many very rich. The

campaign brought them great profit; and truly they deserved it all,

for they all fought most valiantly. A great chest was filled with the

ornaments of the churches--sacred vessels, such as chalices, patens,

monstrances, censers, chrismatories, etc.--which we have now most

carefully returned to their owners; so that your Reverence was enabled

to fill four floats with these ornaments, in the solemn procession

which his Lordship held in Manila on Trinity Sunday, in thanksgiving

to God for the victory. It troubled me, however, on the day when we

climbed the hill, that I had not time to search for my beads, which I

had lost on the day of the assault--when, to placate the wrath of God,

I tore my cassock hastily down the middle. But the next day God chose

to console me; for, on my return from visiting the sick at the camp,

his Lordship gave me my beads. He had recognized them in the hand of a

soldier who had found them on his way down the hill, and had given the

man I know not how many pesos for them. They certainly were worth it,

because they were made from the stake at which the martyrs in Japan

were burned; and because they had touched the whole body of my most

glorious patron saint Francis Xavier, at Goa; these are the reasons

why I prize them so highly.

Six whole days were spent in distributing, or burning and destroying,

everything in Mindanao; and thus on the twenty-fifth of March, the

day of the blessed Annunciation, we started on the return trip to

Samboanga. But the governor would not set sail before returning thanks

at that very place to His Divine Majesty for so great a victory. He

therefore arranged a solemn procession with the blessed sacrament,

from the mosque to the fort--himself at the head, carrying the image of

the holy Christ and of St. Francis Xavier, patron of the expedition,

and wearing the white robe of his order, in which he had received

communion. The soldiers with their muskets, and the artillery at

the fort, gave eight royal salutes with ball--which aside from doing

honor to the procession, served to clear the two little hills of the

ambuscade, which, without our knowledge, the Moros had laid to prevent

our embarkation. We found this out by means of the large number of

dead bodies which Captain Juan Nicolas discovered a little while

after, when, returning from the Bugayen River, he wished to see the

place where we had attacked Corralat. When the procession was over,

we set fire to the mosque and the fort; and the troops commenced

to embark in good order, in the small champans of the fleet. Then

Sargento-mayor Palomino was sent with five caracoas and a hundred

Spaniards, with Father Melchor de Vera, who knew the language very

well, to search for Moncay, king of Bagaien [_i.e._, Buhayen] [94]

and the real lord of the island of Mindanao; this Corralat, though his

relative, was but the tyrant. Bagaien is twelve leguas from the fort of

Mindanao. [Palomino went] to make a treaty of peace with him whereby

he should become a tributary and vassal to his Majesty. While we were

setting sail, one of our Indian captives appeared on the shore. The

falua brought him off to our champan, and he told us how he had fled

from the enemy's grain-fields where they had kept him during those

days; and that, passing through one of the ravines of the hill,

he had found a vast number of dead Moros. [95]

Two or three hours after leaving Mindanao, we met Captain Juan Nicolas

and Father Gutierrez, [96] father rector of Dapitan, who with forty

ships and order for Sargento-mayor Palomino, in which he commanded

that officer that, notwithstanding his previous instructions,

he should make use of all the troops sent him to capture Moncay,

or at least disarm him. After this we continued our course, and on

Passion Sunday we reached Samboanga. The fleet and the army received

their captain-general, returning victorious, with a royal salute; and

Father Gregorio Belin, in his cope, with the _Te Deum laudamus_. I,

after accompanying them as far as the official buildings, went to

arrange the hospital for the sick; for although I had attended them

at Mindanao and on the journey, and assisted them with all that his

Lordship provided, yet, on account of the discomforts of the ships in

which they had had to be shut up, and because of the lack of fowls,

they arrived in a very weak condition. I set out at once in search

of beds--even taking those in the [Jesuit] house. I collected in one

room as many dainties as I could find, for the refreshment of the

sick; and I shut up in our corral all the fowls which had come to

Samboanga from Othon, which private persons had given his Lordship,

and he had turned over to me for the use of the wounded. With these

provisions I remained in the hospital, to minister by night and by

day to the bodies and souls of the sick, encouraged by his Lordship's

visits. By means of all this care, and by the confession and general

communion in which all took part on Palm Sunday, the majority of

the men, thanks to God, were quite well by Saturday in Holy Week,

at which time we left Samboanga.

Truly anyone who saw the number and grievous nature of the wounds could

not deny that it was a miraculous thing that out of eighty wounded

only two died, aside from the three who succumbed on the night of

the attack; for all the wounds contained poison, and many of them,

moreover, were very deep and serious. Thus we saw the effects upon our

sick of the sompites, bacacayes, and bullets--which, although they

were all deadly weapons, we found on the hill [that we attacked],

placed in a jar filled with poison. It is true that I availed myself

of some very effective antidotes which they gave me at Manila; but the

true remedy was to mix with them a little of a relic of St. Francis

Xavier--which, in conjunction with the faith of those who were ill,

worked wonders. Captain Maroto tested their virtues well, for he was

already black in the face, and in his death-agony, when he called

me to confess him and to administer the sacraments. Better still was

Alférez Amesquita, who ejected through his mouth three sompites which

had pierced his throat three days before, during the attack. But best

of all was the case of a sargento in the same company, to whom I gave

extreme unction in great haste, because he had a bullet-wound in his

stomach and most of his food passed out through the wound. There are

many others too, who, grievously injured at Mindanao, are now going

about Manila. Only Alférez Romero and Menchaca died at Samboanga,

and that was because they would not let themselves be cured.

During this time, the governor was awaiting the return of

Sargento-mayor Palomino and of Captain Juan Nicolas from Bugayen. In

place of resting on those days, he went in person among the soldiers,

working in a ditch which he had ordered to be dug to bring to the

fort a stream of fresh water, which it lacked; and now they send

word from Samboanga that, by the grace of God, the water has reached

them. Before putting his hand to any other work he desired, like

the devout gentleman that he is, to thank God a second time for the

victory, with a fiesta in honor of the blessed sacrament. And because

he lacked neither the valor nor the piety of that great captain, Judas

Macabeus, he ordered that the next day the funeral honors should be

solemnized for his dead soldiers--although, unfortunately for these

festivals, it devolved upon me to preach at both. He also published

a long bulletin of gifts, offices, and rewards for those who were

wounded in the campaign; and in this way so attached all the soldiery

to himself that now they talk of and concern themselves with nothing

else but their captain-general--even the very seamen declaring that

they do not wish to avail themselves of the privilege of crossing to

Nueva España, because they would miss next year's campaign.

In this way several days were spent, until our fleet from Bugayen

arrived--on Wednesday in Holy Week; and the next day, with three

caracoas came the brother of the king as ambassador, to treat with

his Lordship and confirm the peace negotiated by Sargento-mayor

Palomino. The latter had done so because he was not able to execute

the second order, which Juan Nicolas carried, who had come too late,

bringing it when Moncay had agreed to as many conditions as we could

desire--even to stating publicly to his followers that he wished to be

the friend and vassal of the king of España, and that whoever did not

desire the same must quit his villages. In accordance with this, the

ambassadors offered five things to the governor in the name of the king

his brother: to surrender all Christian captives; to pay tribute to

his Majesty; to receive the Jesuit fathers, so that they might publicly

teach his subjects the law of Jesus Christ; that if the governor wished

to maintain a fort with a garrison of Spaniards in Moncay's country,

he would treat them as brothers; and that he would be the friend of

their friends, the enemy of their enemies. Consequently, he would do

all in his power to put a stop to Corralat's doings, dead or alive,

and to deliver him into the governor's hands. His Lordship received

the envoy in great state, seated in a chair, surrounded by the most

brilliant of the army, in elegant and splendid array. The ambassador

sat on one end of the same carpet, astonished at the magnificence of

our captain-general and his soldiers. The captain-general commanded

the governor of the fort to entertain the envoy at his own house, and

sent later, for his delectation, some cocoanuts and chickens. He gave

him some very beautiful pieces of silk; but for a captured sargento

whom the ambassador gave back in the name of the king his brother,

he said that he would give nothing, because that soldier was a vassal

of the king of España. The ambassador was importunate that he should

send Moncay something, at least some of his own weapons. His Lordship

replied that up to this time Moncay had been an enemy, and that,

as such, nothing was due him; but that he must begin to give proofs

of his friendship, by immediately sending us his captives, etc.;

and then he would very soon experience the governor's liberality. He

offered him two thousand pesos if he delivered up Corralat dead,

and four thousand if alive. This news was received by the Moro with

great pleasure, on account of the greed for money which possesses those

people; so that I am sure, considering this, that Corralat's days are

few. On Saturday in Holy Week, his Lordship being ready to embark,

he came to dismiss the ambassador, and to receive the documents and

articles of peace, signing them in the envoy's presence. At the end,

while his Lordship, to do honor to him at the final farewell, was

embracing him, the Moro told him most gratefully that at the end of

four moons (they designate months thus) he would come to see him at

Manila--news which consoled me greatly, because of the facility that

it will afford your Reverence to send workers to so abundant a harvest.

Then all the artillery was discharged, the fleet responding; and,

when his Excellency the governor had embarked, we set sail for Manila,

and the ambassador for Bugayen. At the same time Captain Juan Nicolas

and Captain Juan de León departed with a company of a hundred Spaniards

and a thousand Indians, with the command that, after having accompanied

the ambassador of Bugaien to his own land, they should go on and make

the circuit of the island of Mindanao, as far as Dapitan, destroying

and burning all the villages that would not submit to our arms. The

father rector of Dapitan, and the Augustinian friar who had come as

confessor for the Pampangos, were chaplains for this fleet.

On the same day Father Gregory Belin with Captain Sisneros departed

from Samboanga for the island of Basilan, for a reason which I will

explain to your Reverence. This island--lying in front of our fort, and

two leguas away from it--has three or four thousand tributarios who pay

to the king of Jolo, although they have always desired to be tributary

to his Majesty. The chiefs of the islands came lately to render their

obedience to the governor; he thereupon commanded that the governor of

the fort should protect the aforesaid tributarios, and defend them from

Jolo, until the next year, when he would subject Jolo also by force

of arms to the same tribute. When this was proclaimed, two hundred

Joloan chiefs, with all their households, came to a near-by island,

intending to cross over and live in Samboanga and be our vassals. But

they wished to know his Lordship's pleasure; so the aforesaid captain

with Father Belin went to assure them of their safety and take them to

the fort, where, he trusted in God, they would now be well instructed

and become favorably inclined to holy baptism. Because his Lordship

had no fathers to send to Basilan, he wrote to Father Francisco Angel

that, by virtue of the very far-reaching grant which he has from

your Reverence, he should at once cross from the island of Negros

to Samboanga. Here the governor of the fort would give him soldiers

for his body-guard, and all else necessary for the promulgation of

the holy gospel in the aforesaid island--where, as I have said,

he had already gone most joyfully, as the father rector of Othon

informed me; for the principal motive of his coming from España to

these Filipinas Islands was the mission to Mindanao. But that father

could not minister alone to the whole island; besides, at Samboanga

there are but two fathers--Father Melchor de Vera, who on account of

his frequent attacks of illness can scarcely take care of everything

at the fort which his Lordship entrusted to him, as a person well

skilled in such matters; and Father Gregory Belin, [who is busy] in

caring for the whole garrison, of which he is chaplain. So the many

villages of Moros that are in the vicinity of the fort, such as La

Caldera, etc., have no one to instruct them. The king also of Sibuguey

(a river [whose valley is] much more fertile and abundant than La

Panpanga) himself came, while we were in Mindanao, to the governor

to ask for terms of peace and for priests. His son has come now,

with the [Spanish] galleons from Terrenate, to be educated in Manila;

and in like manner the other chiefs are coming every day, since the

miserable downfall of the principal king of these islands, Corralat,

who held almost all in tyrannical subjection, and as tributarios. Even

the king of Jolo sent Dato Achen (his especial favorite, and the

most gallant and valorous captain that we have seen among the Moros)

with letters to his Lordship, to confirm the terms of peace which

his wife herself had come with our captain, to negotiate the year

before--excusing himself for not having come in person by saying that

he was expecting a fleet with which the king of Burney was coming to

make war on him, being an ally of his enemies the Camucones.

May your Reverence's charity recognize what an abundant harvest

offers in Mindanao, and how destitute that field is in laborers;

for where, in my opinion, forty would be few, there are only two of

them. Certainly this is to be regretted, for it is one of the most

glorious missions that could be desired, lacking neither the evidence

of great fruitfulness nor promise of most noble martyrdom. And finally,

it is enough that St. Francis Xavier is its apostle, since it was

he who first preached in it the holy gospel, [97] as is stated in

the bull for his canonization. I trust that, through the divine

compassion, the news of this glorious and longed-for victory and

conquest of the great island of Mindanao will move the hearts of

those in his Majesty's court and his royal Council of the Indias,

to send many workers this year to this glorious harvest field.

This is all that concerns our expedition to Mindanao, except the return

journey to Manila--which, being long and dangerous, caused us much

suffering. For if we came across any island, we had perforce to sail

all the way around it; and if we wished to go in any given direction

the wind instantly put itself dead ahead, with three or four _baguios_

[_i.e._, hurricanes]--which are violent tempests. At the islands of

Negros, Mindoro, and Marinduque it was a divine miracle, through

the special protection of St. Francis Xavier, that we escaped all

the dangers, especially the one that we encountered at Mindoro. Our

mast broke, and a huge wave rushed over our stern so suddenly, so

unexpectedly to the pilots and sailors that they, seeing it coming

over the sea from a distance, hastily summoned me to exorcise it,

which I did. It can assuredly have been of no other than diabolic

origin, to declare as the author of so many attacks, hindrances,

and contrary circumstances the great devil of Mindanao, whom his

Lordship had just so valiantly wrested from his seat.

But if the work of the enemy was evident in our dangers, much more

manifest and clear was the divine protection and that of our saint in

these same perils--as when it saved us from some rocky shoals just

off Manila, where we would inevitably have run aground; and from a

champan which sprang a leak, from which, without knowing about the

leak, we shifted our quarters a day before. There are many other

instances which I will not mention, that your Reverence may not be

wearied. Twice we stopped on the way for provisions to refresh the

sick--once at Iloilo, where our fathers entertained us; the other

time at Panay, at the invitation of Captain and Alcalde-mayor Don

Francisco de Frias. At last, since the winds were wholly contrary

and his Lordship had suffered so much on the way, he resolved to

disembark in Tayabas, with Sargento-mayor Don Pedro, his nephew, and

Captain Lorenço Ugalde, both being ill and in need of a surgeon's

services. From this place we traveled by land for two days, as far

as the lake [_i.e._, Laguna de Bay]; going from there by the [Pásig]

River, we reached Manila on May nineteenth. I halted at San Miguel,

and the sick remained at Manila, while his Lordship went on the same

night to Cavite, where the armada had orders to await him. The whole

fleet, by God's protection, arrived safely within four days; and so on

Sunday the governor made his entry with the pomp and magnificence which

your Reverence saw. I know not whether many remarked on the events of

that day, but this is the fact, that of all the champans but one was

lacking--that of Captain Gabriel Niño de Tabora, which was carrying

some large cannon of the enemy's; and when his Lordship reached

Manila by one route, from Cavite, to make his entry, Don Gabriel Niño

arrived, by another, from Mariveles. In this it seems that God chose

to show His special providence by bringing all the fleet in without

the loss of anything, small or great, from the spoils. Blessed and

praised forever be His holy name, who through the valor, zeal, and

Christian devotion of this gallant knight, has glorified Himself by

granting at the same time relief to the islands, and punishment to

the arrogance of these Moros. Events showed plainly the truth of the

revelation which that holy servant of God received with regard to the

coming of this governor, for the complete deliverance and salvation

of this conquered land. May our Lord give him life and health, that

he may finish what he had undertaken with so much spirit and courage

for the glory of His Divine Majesty.

This is all that has suggested itself to me to write to your

Reverence of this campaign of ours in Mindanao, as glorious as it

was wonderful--except to urge that your Reverence at once send many

laborers [98] to sow the seed of the holy gospel and even to gather the

harvest in many parts of the island, judging by the great readiness

[to receive the faith] that I observed when I came away. Only the

great lack of workers which I perceived in this province of Filipinas

troubles me, for they are very few in proportion to the many missions

and Christian settlements which are in their charge--and much more

now than ever, since so wide a door is opening. Certainly, if God had

not called me to another empire, [99] I should consider myself most

fortunate if I might be employed, in accordance with my obedience, in

the spiritual conquest of the kingdoms of Mindanao. In spite of this,

I trust in the intercession of my glorious saint, Francis Xavier, that

since he was the first to labor in this island, and, although wounded,

was the protector and patron of this expedition, he will not cease to

prosecute the work in which he has so earnestly engaged, as we know;

and that he will dispose matters in such a manner that many will come

from Europe in these years to employ their labors in so glorious a

mission. Therefore, since, as I have already said, I do not deserve

to be chosen, I beseech your Reverence to obtain from that saint,

with your holy sacrifices and prayers, this boon for me--that for the

part which I have taken in the conquest of this island, he will admit

me into the number of the workers in some other island, and into its

spiritual conquest; so that, all of us thus working in missions near

to that of this great apostle to the East, we may together enjoy his

special protection and support in this life, and be admitted among his

devoted and beloved ones in the life to come, which may God through

His infinite mercy grant us! Taytay, June 2, 1637.

The humble servant and obedient son of your Reverence:

[Marcelo Francisco Mastrilli] [100]

EVENTS IN FILIPINAS, 1636-37

_Pax Christi, etc._

Father Diego de Bobadilla:

I shall give your Reverence an account in this letter, although very

briefly, of what happened in these islands after your Reverence left

them; for many are writing long relations of special matters.

The father rector of the college of Manila, Francisco Colin, [101]

arrived at Manila at the end of July, and was received with great

rejoicing by all in general, both by the inmates of the house and by

outsiders and by the orders; and throughout the year he has had the

same acceptance. He has aided the governor by his counsel; but he

who has shown the greatest joy and happiness is the archbishop, who

is receiving much help from him. His Excellency has been notably won

over, and has shown us extraordinary favors. He gave us the mission

of Quiapo, which we had so much desired because of its nearness to

Santa Cruz. He continued the Tuesday sermons during Lent in our house,

and honored our church on the day when the indulgence of the seven

altars was published. On that day he dined in our refectory, and on

all occasions has shown himself truly a father to us. On account of

the said indulgence, the number of people who come to our church has

greatly increased.

Father Marcelo Mastril, he of the miracle of our father St. Francis

Xavier, arrived here with four other Italian fathers, on the day

of our father St. Ignatius, 1636, in a galliot, aboard which was a

knight of the Order of Christ, who came as captain-general of Macan; he

brought, as his auditor, another knight of the same habit. The matter

occurred as I shall relate. Two galleons left Goa for Macan. In the

second was that Polish father, the relative of the king of Polonia

[_i.e._, Poland]. While passing through the strait of Sincapura,

they met three Dutch vessels. The ship of the captain-general of

Macan took to the sea, and taking the best direction, escaped the

Dutch vessels; and the first land that they struck was the mouth of

this bay. The other ship was captured by the Dutch. Two days later

another galliot arrived from Cochin, carrying a Portuguese father

named Figueredo, [102] en route to Maluco. When that ship passed,

the Dutch had already left. One would not believe the joy with which

Father Marcelo was received; for the miracle had already become known,

as I had brought many of the pamphlets from Madrid. [103] All looked at

him as at a man brought back to life; all were eager to learn of the

miraculous occurrence from his own mouth; and in order to satisfy the

whole city, he preached on the day of our father St. Francis Xavier,

in our church at Manila. Many people were there. He preached very

eloquently, and called forth tears from the audience at the narration

of the miracle. The devotion of the people toward the saint has been

greatly increased. They have all copied his pictures from a painting

which the father had painted in Portugal, and which he says greatly

resembles the pilgrim figure in which he saw the saint. The Portuguese

found here a patache from Macan; and consequently, their people went

[thither] by the last of October, in the patache. In their galliot

went the captain-general. Father Marcelo tried to proceed on his

trip to Macan; but, when he came to embark, Don Sebastian [Hurtado

de Corcuera] pressed him strongly to remain this year, for ends that

he said were very important for the service of God and of the king;

and accordingly the father did so. The four Italian fathers who had

accompanied Father Marçelo embarked in the patache, and with them

Father Juan de Barrios, who took as his companion Brother Alonso

Bernal. Father Juan de Barrios was going to negotiate matters of

importance on behalf of the governor with that city. They left this

port, and scarcely had they coasted along for forty leguas from this

island, when so furious a storm struck them from the north, in which

direction they were sailing, that they had to return. The galliot was

saved, but the patache was driven ashore twelve leguas from here, on

All Saints' day, suffering about twenty-five drowned. Among them were

two priests--one a secular, and the other a friar. The rest escaped,

although they suffered considerably. None of the money which they

were taking to Macan was lost. The captain-general went to Macan

later in his galliot, taking three fathers with him. Father Marcelo

was in Mindanao at that time, and another father in Marinduque, and

accordingly they remained here. It has been learned from Chinese ships

that they arrived safely. This month of July Father Marçelo embarked

in a Chinese ship, whose owner gave bonds that he would land him in a

place where he could get to Macan. May God grant him a safe voyage. He

has left these islands greatly edified by the shining examples of

admirable virtues that he has given, and all have universally regretted

his departure. Don Fray Diego Aduarte came from Nueva Segobia to

endeavor once more to unite the new congregation of San Pablo with the

ancient province of Rosario. He returned without concluding anything,

and died shortly after his arrival at his bishopric.

A pilot and three other sailors--all Dutch--escaped from this port

The Indians of Yndan killed the three sailors, and captured the pilot,

who confessed and was awaiting the gallows. But Don Sebastian pardoned

him, and promised to send him to Terrenate or the island of Hermosa,

if he wished; or, if he preferred to serve the king again, to give him

employment. He chose to serve the king, and was very grateful. The

three Dutchmen whom your Reverence left in our house were converted

to the Catholic faith. They came to this port, and were given places

as sailors. One of them was one of those who ran away and was killed;

the other two remain quiet. Two pilots and sixteen Spanish sailors fled

in a champan; and another champan, with twenty soldiers, was sent in

their pursuit. The latter encountered a large champan at Playa Honda,

and tried to reconnoiter it, believing that it was the one in which the

men had fled. The other champan, which was full of Chinese, prepared

for defense, and fought; they wounded the [Spanish] commander and other

soldiers with clubs, stones, and fragments of crockery ware. Six of the

Sangleys were killed, and others wounded, whereupon they surrendered,

and were brought to this port, where liberty was given to those left

alive. Nothing was heard of the other champan. But it is already known,

by way of China, that they arrived at Macan.

Another large gang of sailors were afterward discovered, who had a

champan in the river of Cañas [104] in order to flee. They were caught,

and some of them were punished, although mercifully; as a result, those

flights have ceased. A friar came here, clad as a secular priest, who

had been punished and exiled by the Inquisition at Goa. He attempted

here to flee to Cochinchina with a number of negroes--one of whom was

the one whom your Reverence left in the office of the procurator for

the province, and a good interpreter. They were caught, although by

chance, while within the river, and are in prison.

_The island of Hermosa_

Last year a champan left there for Manila with seventeen Spaniards

aboard. A Franciscan friar who had been for two or three years in

China was also coming, who was still wearing his hair long. His name

is Fray Antonio. [105] They suffered great storms and hardships, and

at the end of twenty days they found themselves before the fort owned

by the Dutch in that island. They were captured and sent to Jacatra,

and from thence to Maluco, with orders that they be set at liberty--but

only on condition of a signed statement from the governor of those

forts that a like number of Dutchmen would be returned to them when

opportunity offered, which was done. They came with the galleons that

carried the reënforcements. I saw here Fray Antonio, who is a native

of Balladolid and who was still wearing his hair long. I have lately

heard it said that he has returned to China with other friars. He

affirms that it is very easy to enter Ucheo, and that a hold has been

obtained among the people; and that it is openly known that they are

Europeans and priests, without anyone molesting them. He said in regard

to Jacatra that the Dutch have deeply offended the emperor of Java;

and that no Dutchman leaves their fort without the natives cutting

off his head. That prince has begged aid from the viceroy of India,

in order to drive the Dutch thence. He told, us also that while he

was there, a fleet sailed for Ambueno, where the natives had revolted,

with the intention to reduce them by force. The relief ship which went

last year to the island of Hermosa was, while returning, wrecked at

Ilocos by the strength of the currents. No one was drowned. There is

nothing else to narrate concerning that place.

_Maluco_

The relief ships for Terrenate sailed in January of this year. Their

commander is Hieronimo Enriques Sotelo, who sailed in the galleon

"San Luis." As admiral goes, in the "San Ambrosio," Don Pedro de

Almonte, who came from Acapulco as captain the year before. Don Alonso

de Acoçer was commander of the patache which came from Acapulco as

almiranta; and Rafael Ome was commander of a galley which had just

been finished on the stocks, named "San Francisco Xavier." Father

Marcelo Mastril said mass in it and blessed it, on the day of its

launching. A number of large champans went also. The Dutch were

awaiting them with two galleons; but seeing our fleet, they retired

under shelter of their fort of Malayo. The supplies having been

disembarked, a feat never before performed was accomplished--namely,

the galleons and galleys went out to fight with the Dutch ships

where they were stationed. Our ships did some damage to them, and

also to the fort of Malayo. Our almiranta also received some damage,

but only one sailor was killed. Considerable reputation was gained

by this attack. The Tidorans, our allies, were very proud and happy;

and their king sent presents to the commander and admiral, together

with his congratulations. The galleons and the patache returned; they

brought no cloves, for there had been no harvest. The galley remained

there, with another stationed at those forts. After the departure

of the galleons, the two Dutch ships left, and during a calm were

attacked by the two galleys. One of them came near being defeated;

but, a wind springing up, they escaped by the favorable opportunity

thus afforded. On that occasion, Don Agustin de Cepada was commander

of the old [106] galley. He has two brothers who are in Mexico, and

your Reverence will find another brother in our professed house at

Madrid. The above was learned from a champan which came after the

ships of the relief expedition. In another champan, the last to

leave those forts, came news regarding the king of Manados, forty

leguas from Terrenate. Manados is a point of Macasar. He had sent to

request help from the governor [of Terrenate], Don Pedro de Mendiola,

against some who had revolted against him. He also sent his son and

heir, some sixteen or seventeen years old, to be educated among the

Spaniards, and asked for fathers to baptize his vassals. The youth

is being instructed in our house, together with the prince of Siao,

who is of his own age. The aid [which he asked] was sent, and Father

Pantaleon, of our Society of Jesus. Another contingent of Dutchmen from

Malayo deserted to us, and were brought here by the relief galleons.

_Camucones_

Many caracoas sailed out from this enemy this year. Committing

depredations, they went in among these islands so far that they

reached and pillaged Palapag, outside the Embocadero, and passed the

cape of Espiritu Santo. They captured in Baco, in Ybabao, more than

one hundred Christians. There they separated into two divisions,

one of which went to Albay. The corregidor, who was Captain Mena,

of the Order of St. George, sailed from the island of Manila to

attack them, with some Spaniards and six Franciscan friars. They

pressed the Camucones so closely that they drove ashore seven of

their caracoas at Capul, where they freed many Christian captives,

and some Camucones were slain by the natives. The enemy abandoned

three other empty caracoas on the high sea, after their crews had

been transferred to other caracoas in order to get away faster. Of

our men, a musket-ball wounded only one friar, who died later. The

father provincial went to visit Pintados, and passed in sight of the

Camucones, as was learned afterward from a captive who escaped. But

they did not pursue him, as they thought that it was an armed war

caracoa of the Spaniards. The other division [of the Camucones]

returned to the channel, and, coasting the island of Ybabao, entered

Bangahun, where they captured more than one hundred Christians. Those

two things have left us very full of wrath, both on account of the

captives, and because we see that there is no place, however remote

it be, that is safe. A caracoa of soldiers from Zibu fought with

this division, and some damage was inflicted on them; and some of the

Camucones were killed, and some captured. On returning to their own

country, the Camucones suffered a great reverse from a furious gale,

while they were coasting along Panay. Three caracoas were driven

ashore; and of those pirates who escaped alive, many are in galleys

in this port. Having crossed over to the Calamyanes, while they were

sailing in much confusion some Spaniards captured two caracoas there,

and delivered twenty captives from our mission of Mindoro. Fifteen

caracoas were voyaging together, and while coasting along Paragua, two

days before arriving at Burney, they met thirty caracoas of Joloans,

who for some little time have been hostile to the Borneans. The thirty

caracoas from Jolo attacked the fifteen, and captured them all. They

took captive in them more than one hundred and fifty Camucones alive,

and more than one hundred Christians. The latter were ransomed at a

moderate price at Sanboangan. I have seen some of our missions, where

I heard all about the affair. It is feared, however, that the Camucones

will make a raid this year also. Accordingly, Don Sebastian is sending

twenty-five soldiers to our missions of Catbalogan, etc., so that,

aided by other Spaniards who are going there in some caracoas--which

the Indians have built at their own cost, and which are large and

good--the Camucones may be opposed and even chastised.

_Mindanao_

The captain-general of Cachil Corralat, one Tagal, left Mindanao

with eight good caracoas [107] to pillage these islands. He remained

among them for a matter of seven months, at full ease, committing

many depredations. At Cuyo he captured Don Diego de Alabes, who

was corregidor there. He also captured the father prior of Cuyo, an

Augustinian Recollect, and two other friars; and although they had

hidden themselves with all their ornaments and chalices, that did

not avail them, for the enemy knew not how to find them. Tagal went

to Mindoro, and everywhere he pillaged a great quantity of goods,

and took a great number of captives. He left Don Diego Alabes in

Mindoro, so that he might come [here] to get his ransom and that of the

three Recollect fathers. They demanded two thousand pesos and thirty

taes of gold--the latter amounting to more than three hundred pesos

in addition--for each person. Don Diego arrived exhausted with his

hardships, from which he died shortly after his arrival at Manila. He

narrated most insolent acts of Tagal, who blasphemed greatly, and

who threatened that he would enter this bay and pillage and burn its

coasts. Don Sebastian already bore in his breast the resolution to

go to Mindanao, and this occurrence increased further his desire to

humiliate that enemy. When the so great ransoms were proposed to him,

he answered that he would like to raise them, but that until he should

go, he would not discuss this point. Even before anything had been

ascertained, he sent Bartolome Dias de la Barrera as governor of San

Boangan, and Nicolas Gonsales as captain and sargento-mayor. They set

out at the beginning of November, and shortly after their arrival

[at Zamboanga] they learned that Tagal had passed on the inside

[108] of the island of Taguima with eight caracoas [109] laden with

captives and spoils. Although the pirates were one day in the lead, the

Spaniards made haste, and inside of two hours equipped six caracoas;

[110] and Nicolas Gonsales sailed in pursuit of the enemy, thinking

that, as they were so heavily laden with booty, he could overtake them.

The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 27 of 55 1636-37 Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century · 第 10 / 11 章

Book 7, folio 87. On those three sections the visitor based his charge