Page:The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 (Volume 06).djvu/251



Sacred Royal Catholic Majesty:

It is five or six years since the Society, at your Majesty's orders, sent me to these Philippinas Islands, together with some fathers and brethren. In these islands we have endeavored, during all this time, to attend to the needs and welfare of the country, in the service of God, and, with especial care and effect, in that of your Majesty. Besides ordinary occasions, two noteworthy cases have arisen in the course of these years, beyond these islands and in China, in which we have lent our aid by order of your Majesty's governors, the bishop, and the chief personages of these islands, by sending Father Alonso Sanchez—of whom your Majesty has notice already—the first time to reduce to your obedience the Portuguese of those regions. This he accomplished with the success and skill of which your Majesty will have heard, and with many hardships—both in China, and Macan, and in his voyaging—as your Majesty will have learned by his relations. On the second occasion he was sent, by the same order, to reduce a vessel, which had mutinied in China, which he accomplished also so well, that the factor, who