While the useful foundation of that convent was being directed in Philippinas, father Fray Rodrigo de San Miguel was in España, working carefully and diligently in order to get the necessary despatches to conduct helpers suitable for the prosecution of the spiritual conquest that had been happily commenced among the Zambàles. The vigilance employed by two commissaries to get the so desired subsidy for his brothers was disappointed by death, and by the opposition we have already related. Consequently, the few who were fighting the devil in the enclosure did not desist, and sent the above-named father—since he was the most fitting person that could be found for the attainment of such an enterprise—to whom they consigned papers of great moment, as a testimonial of the work and of the fruit which they were gathering with the gain of souls. Our calced fathers themselves affirmed it, to the confusion of those who here opposed father Fray Francisco de la Madre de Dios, and their ministries and desires. The father embarked with great haste, but as he was coming on an affair of heaven, misfortunes were not wanting in the world, and he endured very heavy ones. He himself mentioned them in a relation that he made to Pope Urban Eighth at the latter’s command, when he reached his feet, as the ambassador of certain schismatic princes of the Orient (as we shall relate in detail when we come to the year of that event). The father declares, then, that having suffered a severe storm amid the islands—during which the vessels anchored at Manila were wrecked—he sailed immediately toward Japòn. Thence, after suffering other tempests, they finally sighted Cape Mendocino in forty-four degrees of latitude. Then coasting along the shores of Nueva España (which was composed of inaccessible mountains), and through unknown seas (in which he saw great monsters), for the distance of one thousand leguas, he sighted the cape of San Lucas. There the gulf of the Californias begins. The father anchored in Acapulco, the best of the ports known to the pilots, after having spent more than seven months on the voyage. He went to Mexico and to Vera Cruz; and, continuing his journey and encountering a new storm on the ocean, was driven to the coasts of Terranova [i.e., Newfoundland] and of Labrador. As a consequence so much shortness of food was experienced that only two onzas of biscuit were given to each man, and about the same amount of water. The ship began to leak, so that it was as if by a miracle that it was able to put in at the Terceras. There they refitted, and the father finished his navigation, by coming to Cadiz, after having made to that point from Manila seven thousand one hundred and sixty leguas, in the manner that we have seen. Thence he went to Madrid, and was given favorable audience; and everything that he petitioned was conceded to him. But when twenty religious had been assembled, although they were even about ready to sail in the fleet that was being sent with reenforcements to the Malucas, the father’s luck turned against him with the order that was received, for the boats that were ready not to sail. Consequently, he was accommodated on the fleet of Nueva España, but with very few religious. However they proved to be many, because of the lack of religious in the ministries and convents of the Indias....
[1] Following is a translation of the title page of this work, a facsimile of which is here presented:
“General history of the discalced religious of the Order of the hermits of the great father and doctor of the Church, St. Augustine, of the congregation of España and of the Indias. To his Catholic Majesty our sovereign Felipe Fourth. By father Fray Andres de San Nicolas, son of the same congregation, its chronicler, and rector of the college of Alcalá de Henàres. Volume first. From the year M.D.LXXXVIII. to that of M.DC.XX. Divided into three decades. With privilege. In Madrid. Printed by Andres de la Iglesia. Year M.DC.LXIV.”
[2] Fray Juan de San Jerónimo was born at Malagón, Spain; he became a priest, and when already in middle life entered the discalced Augustinian order at Talavera, in 1593, making his profession in the following year. He soon attained high standing in this new order, and was the envoy sent to Rome to negotiate its separation from the regular Augustinians and secure approval for its constitution. In 1602 he was elected its first provincial, and under his rule the order flourished and spread in Spain. He was nominated to the bishopric of Chiapa, in Nueva España, but declined this honor that he might devote himself to foreign missions. Arriving at the Philippines in 1606, he organized there his mission, built a convent at Bagunbayan, and undertook the conversion of the natives in the province of Zambales. The convent expanded into a college, but its buildings were demolished in 1644. Being soon afterward rebuilt, it lasted until the eighteenth century, when it was again torn down. San Jerónimo had charge of it during two years; but, his health being much enfeebled, he set out on the return to Spain. When in sight of Ormuz, he died, in 1610. See account of his life in San Nicolás’s Historia, pp. 469, 470; and in Provincia de S. Nicolás de Tolentino (Manila, 1879), pp. 20–23.
[3] This and various other accents which are grave instead of acute follow the text of the original work.
[4] Andrés de San Nicolás died at sea, when the ship was in sight of the Ladrone Islands.
Miguel de Santa María, after reaching Manila, was assigned to the settlement of Mariveles; but the natives were angered at his preaching, and stoned him so severely that he died from the effects of this attack, in the Manila convent.
Jerónimo de Christo was an old man when he departed for the Philippine mission, but was noted for his learning and ability. He was elected prior of the Manila convent, and afterward vicar-provincial in San Jerónimo’s absence; and died while in active service in the missions, in 1608.
[5] Pedro de San Fulgencio soon afterward returned to Europe, to obtain more missionaries; having made arrangements for their voyage, he died on reaching Milan.