The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 — Volume 02 of 55: 1521-1569; 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 Beginning of the Nineteenth Century
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 — Volume 02 of 55: 1521-1569; 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 Beginning of the Nineteenth Century
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
without cause, inasmuch as, having learned that alien people had
a considerable time previous entered into this our territory, and
had made a settlement and erected a fort therein, knowing withal
but little of his grace, and much of the compact, good faith, and
sincerity of his royal majesty the king Don Felipe, it seemed proper
to lay the blame upon the captain rather than on the king--of which,
in the judgment of many, his grace was not so ill-deserving. God
forbid that I should reply to what is said concerning the words of the
soldiers, for I should be very much ashamed to have to give account,
in so sorry a business, for my actions in entering and remaining
in this port; and to make proof of the great zeal which I have for
the service of God and of the kings our sovereigns, and of my great
desire to preserve peace and amity between us--suffering, as I have,
whatever wrong is done me in this camp. Let his grace judge me only
upon sure grounds, and not on chimerical accusations of the past,
the falsity of which I prove by good deeds in the present. With regard
to his claim of not having ships in which to depart from these waters
of ours into his own, during the three or four years in which he has
been settled in this our port of Cebu, I maintain that he had more
than sufficient time and ships in which to leave; for I know that the
flagship could carry two hundred men, or as many as his grace may then
have had in his camp quite easily (for the return passage had already
been discovered), inasmuch as his grace intimated to me in a letter
which he wrote me at Maluco that the flagship held even more. And of
his own accord he ordered the _patache_ "San Joan," the other small
_patache_, and some frigates to be run ashore; for as soon as one came
from Nova Spanha the others could easily go thither--a large fleet,
certainly, since it contained more than a thousand men, together with
a camp much larger. He lacked, therefore, neither supplies, ships, a
known route home, nor time in which to depart from our demarcation,
when he entered there, as is plain; the small _patache_ and the
flagship, also, were not lacking to him. We offered him everything
that he needed from the fortress and fleet of his highness.
Therefore, from the above and from other things previously written, it
remains proved, not by the Portuguese, but by the Spaniards themselves,
and not by camp-followers but by his chief men, that his grace is not
here through necessity, but with a very definite aim, awaiting more
men and a fleet, in order forcibly to wrest Maluco, China, and Japan,
from the king our sovereign. This is clearly shown by the words of
the foremost men of his company, and by the many questions they put
to us concerning our knowledge of these regions; as well as by the
letters from Nova Espanha which have fallen into my hands.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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