As to spiritual advantages, if we had preachers of the gospel to send thither, these regions all stand open to us, and we could gain good results from it, because Franciscan religious have gone to some of these places and have been well received, although on account of many wars and the lack of interpreters they were forced to return. It is not so certain that they would be received in China as they are elsewhere; but up to this time no one of those who went thither has been killed or thrown into prison. When I came, all the Sangleys were almost forgotten, and relegated to a corner. No thought was taken for their conversion, because no one knew their language or undertook to learn it on account of its great difficulty; and because the religious who lived here were too busy with the natives of these islands. Although the Augustinian religious had charge of the Sangleys of Tondo, they did not minister to or instruct them in their own language, but in that of the natives of this land; thus the Sangley Christians living here, were Christians only in name, knowing no more of Christianity than if they had never accepted it. I was much grieved that a nation of such renown should lack priests to teach and instruct them in their own language. This led me to make arrangements with Don Goncalo Ronquillo for a special location to be assigned to them for their own use, and priests were to be given them who should learn their language and teach them in it. When this had been all arranged, and a priest had been appointed, the whole thing was undone through obstacles which arose at that time. Then I appealed to all religious orders to appoint some one of their religious to learn the language and take charge of the Sangleys. Although all of them showed a desire to do so, and some even began to learn it, yet no one succeeded; and the Sangleys found themselves with no one to instruct them and take up their conversion with the necessary earnestness, until, in the year eighty-seven, God brought to these islands the religious of St. Dominic. Their coming was for the welfare of the Sangleys, as the result proved, and as I shall relate further on. God soon showed us that the religious had come by His will, to take charge of the Sangleys. This city, being built on a narrow site with the sea on one side and a river on the other, was all occupied, and there seemed to be no place where the Dominicans could settle; but there was soon discovered a site of which no one had thought until then, and which now is the best in the city. The site adjoins the Parian of the Sangleys, and that gave the religious of that order occasion to begin to hold intercourse with them, and for the religious and Sangleys to become mutually attached to one another. For, whenever the Sangleys come and go from the Parián, they pass by the church of Sancto Domingo, and, being a very inquisitive people, they often stop and watch what is taking place there. When the confraternities of the