[2] The following royal decree taken from a MS. book of decrees entitled “Cedulas reales dirigidas à estas Yslas Filipinas, Copiadas fielmente de las originales ò authenticas que se guardan en el archivo de la real Audiencia de Manila” (a copy of the seventeenth or eighteenth century) and kindly loaned by Mr. E. E. Ayer of Chicago, is interesting. “The King. Leonardo Furriano, my engineer. Inasmuch as it is desirable for my service that you go to the Philipinas Islands with Gomez Perez Dasmariñas, knight of the Order of Santiago, whom I have appointed as my governor and captain-general of them, so that forts may be built according to your advice and design, which, in accordance with the contents of the instructions of the said Gomez Perez are to be built in the said islands: I order you to go with him, and that you embark very speedily in order not to tarry an instant for the sake of our cause. For that purpose, Don Luis de la Cueva, my governor and captain-general of those islands of Canaria shall aid you. Thus have I ordered him; and the officials of my royal treasury of the said Philipinas Islands shall give and pay you at the rate of one thousand ducados per year from the date when you shall show by signed notarial testimony that you have set sail from any port of the said islands of Canaria, and for so long as you are busied and engaged in the construction of the said forts. When the forts are completed, you shall return to these kingdoms with the design and plan of said forts. Given at San Lorenzo, September twelve, one thousand five hundred and eighty-nine.
I the King
“By order of the king our sovereign:
Juan de Ybarra” [↑]
[3] See the royal instructions given to Dasmariñas, in VOL. VII, pp. 141–172; and especially pp. 149–151. [↑]
[4] The opinions of the religious given January 19 and 20, 1592 upon the question of waging war on the Zambals (see VOL. III, pp. 199–233), prove this assertion of Dasmariñas to have been made too soon. [↑]
[5] The province of Pampanga is still an abundant source of supplies. Of its total area of 224,812 hectares, 105,677 or 47 per cent is agricultural, and of that 63,840 hectares (or 60.4 per cent) are cultivated. It is the second sugar producing province in the archipelago, producing 14,317,776 kilograms in 1902. [↑]
[6] Morga makes a statement somewhat at variance with this (see VOL. XV, p. 75). [↑]
ROYAL DECREE REGARDING THE HOSPITALS FOR THE NATIVES
The King. Reverend Father in Christ, bishop of the Philipinas, and member of my Council: I am writing to Gomez Perez Dasmariñas, my governor and captain-general of those islands, to immediately take possession of the hospital of the Indians of that city of Manila and of the hospitals that may be in the other villages of those islands, for me and in my name, as patron, which I am both by right and by apostolic bull of all the hospitals that may be instituted and founded in the Indias;[1] and to take the residencia of all those who shall have had charge of the incomes, alms, and other things touching the said hospitals. I have desired to advise you of this in order that you may not prevent it, since you will know it to be my orders, and also, so that if you wish to be present at the taking of the said accounts, you may do so. I am writing to this effect to the said governor. Madrid, January seventeen, one thousand five hundred and ninety-three.
I the King