Note 1 — Letter from Fray Diego de Herrera to Felipe II
Reading edition
In the fleet that your Majesty had sent from this Nueva España to the islands of the West, there were among the people some religious of St. Augustine who were in your Majesty's service. By your order, I was one of them. We had a prosperous voyage as your Majesty will already have been fully informed. The fleet effected a landing, and founded a colony (in accordance with the instructions brought from this Nueva España) in the island of Çubu—as that place abounds in food, has a very good port and is a healthful region, as has been since found by experience; and it is very strong for defense, in any casualty that might befall us. From that place a ship was sent to discover the return route [to New Spain]. It succeeded well, although it appears that some of its men died. The people who remained there have all this time endured very great privations, notwithstanding the richness of the region, because they could make no settlement so peacefully that it was not against the will of the natives. Therefore they were disquieted, and many fled, deserting their towns; and those who remained determined not to cultivate their fields, or to sow, believing that by this Page 54stratagem they could drive us from their land. Consequently they and ours have endured very great extremities, because the same thing was done in other islands where the Spaniards went to find food—so much so that many times the natives have taken the food more than four leagues inland, carrying it upon their shoulders, and crossing creeks and rivers with it, with great risk of their lives. Then too another cause of so great distress has been the lack there of boats with oars; and the fact that, up to the present, no one has ventured to seek richer and more abundant lands—which are very near, as Lequios, Japan, and Jaba [Java], therein fulfilling your Majesty's commands. After all that, came the Portuguese fleet, arriving about the end of September of last year (1569), under command of Gonzalo Pereira. That man, although we made every possible effort for peace with him, would agree to nothing except that, in any case, we must leave these islands, or else go with him. The first could not be done, because we had no ships; nor the second, because that was very ignominious for us. Therefore as we came to no agreement, he determined to begin hostilities, and make war on us, trusting to his numerous ships—although afterward it did not turn out as happily as he thought, as your Majesty will see by the relation which the viceroy sends from this Nueva España.1 The blockade being so long and rations so scant, the poor soldiers were in such distress that they took to hunting rats, of which there are great numbers in that land, and which are much larger than those of Page 55España. With all this privation, and the allurements and abundance in the Portuguese fleet, they served your Majesty with as great loyalty and cheerfulness in this war, and in all the rest, as I believe any men in the world have ever displayed in their king's service. There was nothing which gave them so great pleasure as being ordered to do things wherein they risked their lives. Therefore it seems to me that your Majesty ought to reward their services, because until this present assistance ordered to be sent them by your Majesty (which is very helpful), they have had nothing but two almudes2 of uncleaned rice every Saturday (after cleaning which there remained but one), without receiving any other gratification.