The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 10 of 55 / 1597-1599 / 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

158. The ships return loaded with the investments of the officers of the ships. Besides their own goods, they have been entrusted with large commissions and trusts in Mexico, which they execute and fulfil to the great deprivation of this country. They receive excessive salaries all the time until their return to España, which might be dispensed with if they were officials of these islands.

159. After they depart for Nueva España with their vessels, then for greater comfort and the better stowing of their merchandise, they throw overboard the goods of our citizens, without any necessity. This they do without any feeling of compassion for the many whom they ruin. It makes no difference to them, for they are going where they cannot be proceeded against, and where it is impossible to follow them.

160. Usually those who come in those positions are relatives and servants of the viceroy of Nueva España. They are mere youths and have no experience in their duties. Innumerable frauds and injuries are perpetrated in the despatch of the vessels at Acapulco, of which I shall not speak in detail, for that one point alone would require a great deal of paper. Manila, June 8, 1598.

Don Antonio de Morga Page 94

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[1] The salambao is a raft of reeds or bamboo; on which is erected an apparatus not unlike the mast and yard of a square-rigged ship. To one end of the yard is attached a net which may be raised from and lowered into the water. This contrivance is called by the natives timba. See full description of the salambao, and of other native modes of fishing, in Zúñiga's Estadismo (Retana's ed.), i, pp. 199, 200; and illustration of this apparatus in F. Jagor's Travels in the Philippines (London, 1875), p. 47.

[2] “The black people or Caffares of the land of Mozambique, and all the coast of Ethiopia and within the land to the Cape de Bona Speranza.” ... “The Portingales do make a living by buying and selling of them” (Linschoten's Voyage (Hakluyt Soc. trans., London, 1885), vol. i, pp. 269, 277).

Recommendations as to Reforms Needed in the Islands

The inspection, as will be related