I did the same in regard to the posts that I found filled for the ships which I am despatching now to Nueva Espana, as those appointments were not made to suitable persons. Such were holding them with their followers by illegal means and had no services or qualifications, although there are persons of excellent abilities, as are those who now hold them. The ships are the best and most suitable that have sailed hence for a number of years past, and are of five hundred or six hundred tons burden apiece. They are well equipped with artillery and other necessities. They are heavily laden, for, although the enemy was along the coasts in smaller craft than other years, this year the Chinese came and have brought the Portuguese from Macan. Regarding the danger that might be feared on the coast of Nueba Espana from a Dutch fleet which we heard would pass through the strait of Magallanes, I left the viceroy warned, so that when those ships can reach that coast, he will have a sentinel and lookout at the island of Cedros, in front of the gulf of California--where they are ordered to reconnoiter the enemy's condition, and where the foe never expect them--and with a port to windward of the cape of Corrientes, which is the place where they may be awaited; with that I trust, God helping, that they will be secure. Eleven of the fourteen Dutch ships that passed [the strait] this year went to Capulco; they were those which the pirate took from Olanda. Seven of them were large ships, and four small; three of them were captured in Piru. They reached Terrenate with all of them, and with eight hundred men aboard. Accordingly I believe that they will come here in a few months; and as this state and its conservation depends on maritime forces (as does that of all the islands of the world); and as the building of three ships of the size of these two (which, as it could not be avoided, are going to Nueva Espana) resulted, I hope from the willingness with which the fathers of the Society offer to make two ships for me in the province of Leyte (where they have their missions), and the Franciscans another in those of Camarines, that they will be provided for me. The condition of the royal treasury and your Majesty's heavy expenses on the point of Cavite require that very urgently. Having found the magazines so empty of everything needed (which supplies, it seems, have been stolen from them), I was accordingly forced to send a ship to Japon with products that are esteemed there, in order to exchange them for things needed here. [_In the margin_: "Seen."]