[27] Translated: "I greet you, well-beloved and blessed brethren, yearning also myself for the joy of seeing you, if only the conditions of place would allow me to reach you. For what could be more to my wish and my joy than to be with you now? ... But because no opportunity now offers for this happiness of being present myself to your eyes and ears, I am sending this letter instead; whereby I equally felicitate and exhort you to stand strong and firm in your confession of the heavenly glory: and, having entered upon the way that the Lord has honored, to go forward in spiritual strength to receive the crown." This is the "Letter of St. Cyprian to Sergius and Rogatianus, and other confessors in the Lord"--no. vi in Tauchnitz ed. (Lipsiae, 1838).--_T.C. Middleton, O.S.A._ [28] "Let them be of a considered and chaste eloquence, that they may be a cause for edification." [29] _Bancon_: "A boat with three oars to the side, which is used in China."--_Dic. Nacional ... de la lengua Espanola_ (Madrid, 1878). [30] The language of this sentence is somewhat obscure and elliptical, but would seem to indicate that the Portuguese fear the diminution of their trade in China with its natives, and the loss of their prestige in the carrying trade outside that country. [31] Gaspar de San Agustin, the author of the first part of the Augustinian history of the Philippines (Madrid, 1698), was one of the most prominent Augustinians who have ever been in the islands. He was born in Madrid in 1650, and professed in the convent of San Felipe el Real in 1667. On going to the islands he ministered at Lipa (1689-1692), Paranaque (1693, 1708, and 1719), Pasig (1695 and 1716), Malate (1698 and 1714), Tambobong (1702 and 1707), Tondo (1699, 1701, and 1710); and exercised the duties of procurator-general (1677 and 1686), provincial secretary (1686), definitor (1689 and 1711), visitor (1701), and commissary of the Holy Office. He died after a long and painful sickness, which deprived him of his sight, at the convent of San Pablo at Manila, in 1724. He was a graceful poet, and, besides his history and the materials for the present work, he left various writings, among them his famous _Compendio de la arte de la lengua tagala_ (Manila, 1703). His letter on the nature of the Indians will be published later in this series. His history is said to be the most interesting of those on the Philippines. See Perez's _Catalogo_, pp. 134-136.