Ronquillo later reported the place indefensible and was authorized to retire to Caldera.
Ronquillo must have advanced as far as the settlement of Kalangnan or possibly Magindanao (Kotabato), the capital of Sultan Bwisan. The report he rendered relative to the country, its people and chiefs, is very interesting and an excerpt of the same is herewith quoted because of its bearing on conditions throughout Moroland:
The leading chiefs collect tribute from their vassals. * * * These Indians are not like those in Luzon, but are accustomed to power and sovereignty. Some collect five or six thousand tributes. * * *
Hitherto it has not been possible to tell your lordship anything certain of this country except that it will be of but little advantage to his Majesty, but a source of great expense. It has far fewer inhabitants than was reported, and all are very poor, so that their breakfast consists only in cleaning their arms, and their work in using them, and not in cultivating the land, which is low and swampy in this river. There is no chief who can raise 20 taes of gold. Rice is very scarce; in the hills is found a small amount, which is used for food by the chiefs only. There are some swine, and a few fowls that are very cunning, and less fruit.[45]
These early expeditions of the Spaniards against the Moros undoubtedly aroused in the latter a great desire for vengeance. The forces the Spaniards sent to conquer Mindanao and Sulu were very small. Such forces would have been strong enough to reduce any island of the Bisayan group, or even Luzon, but against the Moros they proved insufficient and inadequate. They however succeeded in provoking bitter hostilities and marked the beginning of a long period of terror and bloodshed.
Moro raids[46]
In 1599 combined Moro fleets invaded and plundered the coasts of the Bisayan Islands, Cebu, Negros, and Panay.
Captain Paches, who was in command of the fort of Caldera, attacked the northern coast of the Island of Sulu. After landing at some point, it was observed by the Sulus that his fuses were wet and that his guns could not fire well. They then rushed his position, killed him, and dispersed his forces.
The following year saw the return of a larger and still more dreadful expedition. The people of Panay abandoned their towns and fled into the mountains under the belief that these terrible attacks had been inspired by the Spaniards. To check these pirates, Juan Gallinato, with a force of 200 Spaniards, was sent against Sulu, but like so many expeditions that followed his, he accomplished nothing. * * * “From this time until the present day” (about the year 1800), wrote Zuñiga, “these Moros have not ceased to infest our colonies; innumerable are the Indians they have captured, the towns they have looted, the rancherias they have destroyed, and the vessels they have taken. It seems as if God has preserved them for vengeance on the Spaniards that they have not been able to subject them in two hundred years, in spite of the expeditions sent against them, the armaments sent almost every year to pursue them. In a very little while we conquered all the islands of the Philippines, but the little Island of Sulu, a part of Mindanao, and the other islands nearby, we have not been able to subjugate to this day.”[47]
Gallinatos’s expedition occurred in 1602.[48] After three months of protracted fighting at Jolo, he was unable to reduce the fortifications of the town and retired to Panay.