The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 17 of 55: 1609-1616; 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
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 17 of 55: 1609-1616; 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
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
us greatly by their shouting, when they invoke the devil.
From Cochin we went to Goa on April three of this year, one thousand
six hundred and fifteen, in a galley of the fleet. We coasted along
the shore and visited the fortresses of Malabar. We spent Holy Week
in Mangalor. We lodged in the convent of St. Francis, and helped
confess the soldiers. We spent forty days in the voyage, until we
reached Goa, where Father Francisco Vergara, rector of the college,
and all the others received us with great charity. Four of them
took me to visit the viceroy, who showed us great courtesy. After I
had been talking with him for almost an hour, the chief chancellor
entered, who is at the same time auditor for the reports in causes,
and is a knight of the habit. Having given him a seat of honor, such
as we were occupying, the viceroy said to him: "I am surprised, sir,
that all the fathers of the Society are all so much alike; for the
father rector of Manila, whom we have here, is just like the fathers
here, even in speech." He determined immediately what could be done in
accordance with the present state of India, in respect to the aid that
I was come to request--namely, to give four well-equipped galleons,
with as many as four hundred soldiers and ninety pieces of artillery
among them all. As commander of this fleet, he assigned Francisco de
Miranda Enriquez, a gentleman who has had good fortune in war; and,
as admiral, Alfonso Vaez Coutino.
We left Goa on the twelfth of May. We were one hundred and two days
on the voyage for the lack of good weather, and on account of the
poor route chosen by the pilot, who took us to the land of Achan; and
as its inhabitants are hostile to the Portuguese, the latter did not
dare land there. The men were dying with thirst, and had it not been
for some showers, and the final resolution to get water on a desert
island, we would have suffered even death. We had many _samatras_,
or hurricanes, on the coast of that great land, which broke topmasts,
tore sails, and broke moorings, causing us to lose anchors and other
necessary articles.
On July thirty, on the eve of our Father St. Ignatius, in the district
of Pulu Parcelar, our capitana galleon fought two Dutch vessels,
without the other galleons being able to render aid, as they were to
leeward. Our galleon made two vain attempts to grapple--one because
of too much wind, and the other for lack of wind--for the one was
a samatra or hurricane, and the other so great a calm, that neither
we nor the Dutch could manage our ships. But inasmuch as we remained
within cannon-shot of one another, we fought until night deepened,
and they fled battered to pieces; for our balls had gone clear through
them, while theirs made scarcely any impression on us. Accordingly
we only lost two men in the fight.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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