The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 30 of 55, 1640: 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 centuryAduarte, Diego
History
The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 30 of 55, 1640: 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
Aduarte, Diego
Demarcation line of Alexander VI; Missions -- Philippines; Philippines -- Discovery and exploration; Philippines -- History -- Sources
to put back to port, this agreement shall hold good regarding those
which shall come in the following year, at whatever time therein;
and the ship which shall not sail this year may do so next year,
so that there will be two vessels; and they may land at the port of
Acapulco in this Nueva España the goods that they carry, paying to his
Majesty his customary royal dues, without those goods being seized;
nor can anything be confiscated thereon in case each person declares
what he shall carry, in conformity with the proclamation which will
be issued. [This goes] with declaration that if (which may God not
permit) the ship be wrecked at sea, or plundered by enemies, no other
shipment be allowed." It does not seem as if the persons who drew up
and signed this contract could state more contingencies regarding
the voyage of these ships, in order that these might be included
in the document, since they set down the following: sailing in the
year 1635; being obliged to put back to port, and being shipwrecked;
sailing not in that year, but in the following one, that of 1636;
arriving at Acapulco in that year, or in 1637 at whatever time therein;
one ship arriving, and the other being obliged to go back to port, or
not sailing at all; and finally, settling beforehand the account and
despatch of two ships which would arrive after the date of the contract
and agreement, up to the completion of the said year 1637. Moreover,
the necessary declarations were made as to the cargo of the ships:
that it must pay the customary dues, all goods being declared;
and that, if this alone were done, they could not be confiscated,
even though they should come outside of the registry, for this is
meant by declaring them. The facts of the case were, in all these
matters, that the ships did not sail in the year 1635, but in 1636,
and reached Acapulco at the beginning of 1637--a voyage included
and expressly stated in the [aforesaid] document. In this case,
conformably to the section which is here copied, it could not and
cannot be doubted that these two ships were the first to arrive after
the agreement, within the limit set therein, and with the permitted
amount of goods registered--not only as that amount had always come,
but with more rigorous and orderly [inspection]. As for the landing
of the goods, this was done as the above section directed; for Don
Pedro de Quiroga, when the ships cast anchor, caused proclamation
to be made that all should declare whatever goods they carried; with
this, and the severity which he exercised in permitting the goods to
be removed from the ships, not a bale was concealed, or considered as
such, nor was anything seized as contraband. [The king then mentions
Quiroga's rigorous and oppressive measures, almost in Grau's own words,
and continues:]
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