Note 62 — Appendixes to Part II

All these facts then will convince your Excellency that the expectations based by my acting predecessor upon the latest treaties referred to are too sanguine. They would produce no illusions on my part, in view of the experience of the past, neither does it seem to me that their results, looked at with calmness and in the light of the most exact data, could be of any great advantage to our commerce. Allowing that the treaties should be religiously complied with, never would they be of any value, in themselves, to improve the brutal condition of those islanders. This condition will always constitute, not only for the Spaniards but also for all civilized nations, a great drawback to mercantile relations, which, although founded on principles of utility and mutual advantage, cannot continue nor be developed except under the most favorable guaranties. How would our merchants, or the foreign merchants of Sulu obtain them, where there is neither good faith nor justice, and where cunning fraud makes even the Chinese dangerous traders? Commerce is the movement and circulation of wealth. The latter results from production, and production from the full and unrestricted utilization of property. Moreover, when property is insecure, when the laws do not protect it, when the agents of the Government are the first to disregard it, the mercantile spirit is the first to become alarmed and, when defrauded, to flee as far as possible from the place where it does not find that safe haven it requires to expand and to pursue with skill and perseverance the objects of its calling. Thus it is that during the period elapsed since the year cited, 1646, up to the present time, no Spanish merchant has himself had direct dealings with the inhabitants of Sulu, the Chinese alone being engaged in this trade, they being the only charterers of our vessels, so that we do not obtain from said commerce more than interest on the capital invested, subject to great exposure and risk, which has made and always will make, this commerce uncertain and of little value. While lack of security still sets a limit to the extent of our speculation in commerce with Sulu, lack of advantageous reciprocity adds another factor no less appreciable. At the time the Spaniards came to the Philippines, Sulu seems to have been rich in her own natural and industrial products, and richer still through the large commerce which their exchange enabled her to carry on with the Chinese vessels which in large numbers frequented her coasts. Situated almost midway between the Philippines and the Moluccas, close to two rich islands so fertile and densely populated as Mindanao and Borneo, it seemed destined by nature to be the emporium of the commerce of the south. Converted to Islamism by the Arab Sayed Ali,62 who landed there from Mecca, how much ought this principle of civilization in the midst of barbarous nations have tended to their advancement! But times have changed greatly since then, and brought their always accompanying vicissitudes. As Spanish dominion was extended in the Philippines and the Portuguese penetrated into the Moluccas, they began attracting to their capitals the wealth and traffic that was accumulating in Sulu, and here begins a new era. War and desolation, which for a period of eighty years we inflicted on them, followed, and put in our power this island and its dependencies, and though independence was later restored, it could not divert this rich commerce from the trend it had taken. Meanwhile, their wars and internal dissensions resulted in corrupting their customs, and there only remained for them the habit of piracy, which ever since our appearance, they had embraced for the purpose of harassing us.