The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 — Volume 21 of 55 / 1624 / 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.

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[19] “In general it may be said that the Philippines politically speaking, and the Philippines zoologically speaking, are not identical areas, for Balabac, Palawan, and the Calamianes Islands are strongly characterized by the presence of numerous Bornean forms which are conspicuously absent throughout the remaining islands of the archipelago. Although the Philippines are commonly held to form an eastern extension of the Indo-Malayan subregion, it should not be forgotten that at least among the birds and mammals there is a large amount of specialization in the islands to the eastward of the Balabac-Palawan-Calamianes group.... The Philippines are very poor in mammals.... They are undoubtedly well adapted to a large and diversified mammalian fauna, and the only plausible explanation of the scarcity of forms is to suppose either that they have never been connected with Borneo and the Asiatic continent or that, if at one time connected, they have since been subjected to such subsidence as to wipe out the greater part of their mammalian fauna.” (U.S. Philippine Commission’s Report, 1900, iii, p. 307.)

[20] This is an error on the part of La Concepción; Fray Rodrigo went to Europe in 1622, but died there in 1626. The missions of Mindanao and Paragua were begun by Recollects who arrived at Manila in 1620 and 1622, and continued by missionaries who came in 1627 and 1637.

Bibliographical Data

The principal document in this volume, “Early Recollect missions in the Philippines,” is compiled from the following works:

1. Historia general de los religiosos descalzos del orden de San Avgvstin, by Fray Andrés de San Nicolas (Madrid, 1664), pp. 396–510.

2. Historia general de los religiosos descalzos del orden de S. Augustin, by Fray Luis de Jesús (Madrid, 1681), pp. 1–61. (This work is a continuation of the preceding one.)

3. Historia general de Philipinas, by Fray Juan de la Concepción (Manila, 1788), tomo iv, pp. 189–265, and v, pp. 32–100.

The following documents are obtained from MSS. in the Archivo general de Indias, Sevilla: