latter half of the sixteenth century, to try to shake off their power, they instituted a fierce persecution against the Christians, many of whom suffered martyrdom, and others recanted, so that Christianity lost all the ground it had gained, [1265] and from this time onwards, the opposition to the political domination of the Christians secured a readier welcome for the Muslim teachers who came in increasing numbers from the west. [1266] The Dutch completed the destruction of Christianity in the Moluccas by driving out the Spanish and Portuguese from these islands in the seventeenth century, whereupon the Jesuit fathers carried off the few remaining Christians of Ternate with them to the Philippines. [1267] From these islands Islam spread into the rest of the Moluccas; though for some time the conversions were confined to the inhabitants of the coast. [1268] Most of the converts came from among the Malays, who compose the whole population of the smaller islands, but inhabit the coast-lands only of the larger ones, the interior being inhabited by Alfurs. But converts in later times were drawn from among the latter also. [1269] Even so early as 1521, there was a Muhammadan king of Gilolo, a kingdom on the western side of the northern limb of the island of Halemahera. [1270] In modern times the existence of certain regulations, devised for the benefit of the state-religion, has facilitated to some extent the progress of the Muhammadan religion among the Alfurs of the mainland, e.g. if any one of them is discovered to have had illicit intercourse with a Muhammadan girl, he must marry her and become a Muslim; any of the Alfur women who marry Muhammadans must embrace the faith of their husbands; offences against the law may be atoned for by conversion to Islam; and in filling up any vacancy that may happen to occur among the chiefs, less regard is paid to the lawful claims of a candidate than to his readiness to become a Musalman. [1271]