Note 4 — Chapter XXXVII

Juan Ormaza de Santo Tomás was born at Medina del Campo, in September, 1548. His studies were pursued at Salamanca; after graduation he spent several years in teaching and was engaged in this occupation at Valladolid when Crisóstomo went thither to secure missionaries for Filipinas. Ormaza enlisted in this new field, and, after arriving at Manila, he was assigned to the district of Bataan. Here he “reduced to two villages, with some visitas annexed, the thirty-one hamlets among which the Indians were dispersed; made bridges over the rivers; hindered with palisades (which those people call tabones) the inroads of the sea, which had ruined their grain-fields; and adorned the churches with altars, sacred images, and paintings.” During 1610–14 he was engaged in the missions of Japan; the rest of his life, except 1619–21 and 1623–25, when he ministered to the Chinese in the Parián and in Binondoc respectively, was spent at the Manila convent—where he died on September 7, 1638. (Reseña biográfica, i, pp. 86–91.)

Pedro de Soto was a native of Burgos, and pursued his priestly studies at Valladolid; soon after his graduation he joined the Filipinas mission. His first charge was in Pangasinan, where he labored zealously, amid great opposition and hostility from the natives. A serious illness at last compelled him to return (1599) to Manila, where he died.