[1] This was Fray Martin de León, according to Santa Inés (Crónica, ii, p. 270).

Documents of 1598

Source: All these documents are obtained from original MSS. in the Archivo general de Indias, Sevilla.

Translations: The first, fourth, fifth, and most of the sixth, are translated by Robert W. Haight; the second, by Rachel King; the third, and part of the sixth and seventh, by James A. Robertson; most of the seventh, by José M. and Clara M. Asensio; the eighth, by Helen E. Thomas. Page 44

Letter from Juan Ronquillo to Antonio de Morga

In my last letter, which I sent you by Captain Luys de Villafaña, who left this island on the first of August, I described the need that we were in, and the investigations on account of the failure of the arms to arrive. Although he was wrecked on the way, I have understood that the papers reached there, having been wet, but in such shape as to be legible. Thus far I have seen no answer, either to this despatch, or to those sent on the thirteenth of May and the first of July, from the lord governor, or from your Grace. It leaves me quite undecided and uncertain as to what I am to do. While the aid awaited was being sent on, our need was becoming more pressing, to such an extent that I even abandoned the work, dropped the pacification, and ran the whole fleet aground, so that all the men could busy themselves with gathering landan for food. It seemed to me more important not to abandon the foothold that we had gained in the country, than to get more land, and risk losing it all. Further, it was impossible to provide the men from so few rations; and with so small provision and less support, and large appetites, it looked to me as if they would be Page 45forced to leave. I finally resolved to tell them not to be impatient to turn their prows about, or to hope for Manila; for here we should live or die. Thereupon I embarked the next day and went up the river to cut landan;[1] for I felt myself fortunate if I could get plenty of this even. We passed several days in this way, and when it appeared to me that the men were settled, and less anxious about the proposed movement, I had a few vessels launched; and in them I sent two captains with fifty men to the villages of Lumaguan, who is the most friendly to us, that they might be fed there, and together with the natives reconnoiter some of the enemies' villages in the neighborhood. When they were setting out against the latter one night, they attacked the very friends who were guiding them, and killed several. They had thought that they were being deceived, and betrayed to the enemy. The mistake made much trouble, and it would have been worse if they had not taken the utmost pains to remedy it, giving satisfaction to the injured, making them presents, and giving them whatever they had with them. As they were truly friendly to us, this sufficed to put them on the former footing, as they have since demonstrated in all earnestness. So I persevered in the undertaking, changing, however, the leader whom I had sent; and it pleased God that this expedition should be the beginning of so much good fortune as we have had since then, for back from the fort of Buyahen, on a large lagoon, were found a number of the hostile villages, with excellent fields of rice, although it was not the season to harvest it. I ordered them to take the stronghold of a chief named Dato Minduc, Page 46which was close to Buyahen. Its site was such that the natives themselves say that, unless men were to come down from heaven to take it, it would be impossible to do so. We captured it with all the artillery in it, a number of men being lost on their side, and none on ours. After this the enemies began to lose spirit, and the friendly natives to take heart, and to hold us in greater esteem. This was on the twenty-ninth of August. On the very next day I brought the men down to the fort, and encouraged them all, and bade them be of good hope that the work would soon be done; and I cheered them to it, and straightway followed up the undertaking, without giving the men's ardor a chance to cool. I got aboard ship, and made my way along the coast. On the eighteenth of September, I entered a river called Picon, in a well-peopled country, there being, besides the natives, a large number of the enemy, who had been scattered abroad, and had joined them. At daybreak we arrived at the first village, close to the sea. It was one of the finest places I have seen, with excellent houses, and a very elaborate mosque; there was a good supply of swine, fowls, goats, and fruit. The enemy made a stand, but at the first encounter we overpowered them, and killed or captured more than two hundred persons; the troops stopped for food, and then I had the village burned. I would have liked to attack another village, which lay a day's march inland, and which has two thousand houses. I left it, because I could have done nothing at that time; for the fugitives from the first village had warned them, and they had all gone to the mountains. This stroke had terrorized the whole coast, and not a vessel appeared over its whole extent; for, as there Page 47were Indians in many places, they had all received news of it without delay.

I could remain no longer, nor pass on to other encounters which I might have had there, on account of the crops which I had discovered at Buyahen, which were urgently demanding my presence for the harvest, before their owners should gather them. Accordingly I came back to the fort, whence, in less than four days, I again sent the same captains who had been there before, for the crops, with eighty soldiers and all the boats, besides five hundred friendly Indians, to gather the harvest, and to take another fort in the same neighborhood, of which the Indians informed them. On the twenty-second of October they attacked it, and took it with all the artillery, killing more than a hundred and seventy of them, besides taking a number captive. I did not come out so cheaply as the last time; for it was an extremely strong place, having, besides the usual defenses, inventions of which a barbarous people are incapable. Furthermore, they had fastened on the very curtains some large spars bent like a bow, so that when anyone attacked it, by cutting one end loose from the inside a hundred men would be thrown down—namely, all who were climbing upon the rampart platform. It was intrenched at intervals in such wise that it was necessary to win it step by step, and from below, if one undertook to take it by storm. There were a great many pikemen to receive the stormers, and they felt so safe that they put their women and goods on the inside to guard them better. Thus they lost everything, and the booty was very rich, although the Indians obtained the most—more than did the soldiers, of whom eighteen came Page 48out wounded (including the two captains, Guerrero and Grabiel Gonzalez), most being wounded by bullets and arrows. They had fortified this fort strongly; and since they had lost it first, having considered it so long as a last hope for their safety, they thought of nothing more after losing it but being left in peace in the one which they at present hold; for already they have hardly a hand's breadth of land left, and there they are fortifying themselves as much as possible. This will not succeed, for without my going there they will come to ask peace from me—in a few days I hope, because the grain is growing up all over. In this way the whole country becomes ours and the crops are left ready to be gathered. They lie so near to Buyahen that the sentinel bells can be heard from one place to the other.