Note 49 — Chapter XVII

[“All the ten years’ term of the government of the prudent and magnanimous governor, Don Sabiniano Manrique de Lara, were a fatal period of troubles and disasters, such as these islands had never suffered, so great and continued were they.” A eulogy and partial sketch of the governor follows. Losses of ships, men, and money, and the scanty reënforcements sent from Nueva España—only a hundred soldiers having arrived, while as many have died on the way—are dwelt on. “In addition to that, four galleons had been wrecked, which buried more than five hundred men in these seas—a loss which was the final blow to the prosperity of these islands.... One million pesos was all the aid that Don Sabiniano received in ten years, although in years when there were fewer demands on the treasury five hundred thousand were sent from Nueva España annually. And the least cost of the construction of a galleon is sixty thousand, and they are very frequently wrecked because of the turbulence of the seas.” The author mentions a number of disastrous shipwrecks occurring at various times in the islands, describing especially that of the “Victoria” in 1660, which had been sent to Zamboanga and Ternate with reënforcements of men. That wreck occurs while sailing from Iloilo to Zamboanga, and all hands are lost—among them being three Jesuits, Father Francisco Roa,49 the provincial of the Society, Father José Pimentel,50 and the lay-brother, Lorenzo de Alba.51 The chapter closes with the beginning of the insurrection of the Pampangos in 1660, “the most warlike and noble people in these islands, and near Manila.”]