Note 13 — EVENTS IN FILIPINAS, 1668

[Complaint was made by] the ambassador of the king of Siam and his factor—who came to take care of the goods which he carried on account of his king, in order to dispose of them profitably in this city—and another Moro, a citizen of the said kingdom, named Juan Guaroni, who came with the ambassador as administrator of the property which the ruler of the said kingdom had surrendered to Don Diego de Salcedo. It was demanded from him for purchase, [and comprised] thirty-two cates and nine onzas of musk; thirty-two onzas of ambergris; ten bezoar stones, and one of porcupine; six pieces of sarasas;13 six [word omitted?] of cocoanuts; and eight pieces of chintz—altogether worth 3,500 pesos, for which they had not been paid. For, a few days before the imprisonment of Don Diego, these goods had been handed over, and the contract had not even been solemnized; and then, as the said arrest occurred, they proceeded to the presence of the commissary of the Holy Office asking that the said goods be returned to them or else that they receive satisfaction for their just value. He commanded that a copy [of this demand] be given to the party [concerned], who immediately acknowledged the entire amount; besides, they proved by a great number of sworn witnesses that the said goods had been handed over to Don Diego, and no payment had been made for them. The affair being so thoroughly verified—as will appear by the said acts, to which I refer—the said commissary refused to give any orders until the ambassador and the others understood the road [to be taken] and availed themselves of the expelled Carmelite, the usurper’s chaplain; and an agreement was reached with him, and they purchased justice for seven hundred pesos—five hundred pesos for the usurper, and the remaining two hundred for his intimate friend, the commissary of the Holy Office. They handed over the silver by the hands of the said Don Juan Guaroni, the said ambassador and all being scandalized at seeing persons of so high position committing so shameless acts—especially the commissary. As a proof of his lack of sense, he went out one day through the public streets with his badge exposed, hanging from a bunch of little gold chains; and during a period of more than two months continuously all the officials of the holy tribunal went about wearing their badges displayed, to the offense and general dread of all the people. As for the condition in which these islands are, I leave it to the most moderate person to consider [what it must be] when they are governed by an usurper—[and that] through his chaplain, a man expelled from a religious order so austere as is that of the Carmelites of the City of Mexico; he is also a friend of Father Paternina, a revengeful man, who for his own private purposes accused, by writing, before his provincial a religious of his own province named Fray Cristobal de Leon, a native of Monforte de Lemos. [This Fray Cristobal] had attained in his order all the most honorable positions save that of provincial; [but Father Paternina accused him] of practicing usury and being a Jew, [pursuing him] with such persistency and hatred that he did not halt until he had caused Fray Cristobal’s death by a rigorous imprisonment. For this religious, in view of the unjust treatment inflicted on him, taxed the said commissary with being disqualified for being his own relator,14 since he had been a galley-slave sentenced by the general of his order at the convent of Burgos. Witnesses were brought forward, men who had served on that very galley—in particular, a religious named Fray Diego Gutierrez, a son of the convent of San Felipe el Real at Madrid, who related the affair with abundant proofs and affirmed that it was true; indeed, I had several times before heard it from witnesses worthy of confidence.