The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume 29 of 55, 1638–40 / 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

by Unknown

Compensation to nuns of St. Clare

The King. To Don Sebastian Hurtado de Corcuera, knight of the Order of Alcantara, my governor and captain-general of the Filipinas Islands, and president of my royal Audiencia therein: in a letter which the abbess and nuns of the convent of St. Clare in that city wrote me on the thirtieth of June, 636, they make the following statements: That the said convent was established so that they could live in it, with all decorum and humility, with certain alms from the citizens; and their house and church were built close to the wall of the said city that lies next the river—a place that seemed most separated from the business quarter, and so closely shut in that little save the sky could be seen. That in front, on the other side of the street, is the royal hospital for the Spaniards, which from the time of its foundation has been administered by the religious of St. Francis; and that in the hospital the religious who was vicar of the said convent [of St. Clare], and administered the holy sacraments to the nuns, had a cell, and they helped to support this religious out of the alms bestowed upon them. That you, without any occasion or just cause, drove out the religious from the said hospital by force and violence, with armed soldiers—saying that the hospital should be managed by a secular priest whom you took thither with you. That the said vicar was thereby compelled to find shelter in the convent of St. Francis, which is at a great distance from that of St. Clare; and consequently, with the inconveniences of the excessive heat and the violence of the rains in the wet season, he cannot go to hear confessions and administer the holy sacraments at St. Clare, especially at night. That their greatest annoyance is, that you are constructing in the hospital a ward for convalescents, on the side that faces the said convent; and that it is so high that it looks down upon the convent, notwithstanding the enclosure of the latter, and from the windows of that ward may be seen the beds of the nuns in their infirmary and dormitory—a matter which requires thorough reparation. They say that on the other side of their house is a space between the houses and the wall (which was formerly a street), which is a passage to the convent, and is useful to it; but that you have closed this way, and are building another house, which abuts upon their own ground-plot, for barracks and stables for the cavalry troops. They entreat me that I will be pleased to command that a check be placed upon this undertaking, and that, considering their poverty, I order you to pay them the amount of one hundred and twenty pesos in certified pay-warrants on the treasury there, which they hold, which sum will be a great benefit and charity to them. The complaint of these nuns has been considered in my royal Council of the Indias, and the damage which they say has been caused to them by closing up the street and by their being in sight of the ward that was built in the cells [at the hospital], and by the stables and barracks that have been placed so close to their house. I have therefore thought it best to ordain and command you, as I do, that you shall not in any way cause injury or inconvenience to the said nuns; and that the pay-warrants which they say they hold, you shall cause to be paid—provided they are duly certified—in their due value and at such time as the said nuns desire; for such is my will. [Madrid, October 2, 1638.]

I the King

By command of the king our sovereign:

Don Gabriel de Ocaña y Alarcon