Note 17 — INSURRECTIONS BY FILIPINOS IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

The first region to declare against us was the province of Ibabao, which is in the island of Samar; it is the coast which faces the north, beaten by the sea of Nueva España. There the Society has a new residence, which is occupied by six fathers. All the villages connected with it revolted, following the audacious stand of the chief among them, which is Palapag. This was occasioned by the oppressions arising from our public works—which is a motive that should appeal to them, since they were the ones interested in the defense [of the coasts against their enemies]. But the Indians, as barbarians, do not heed future perils, but rather present fatigues; and to these their slothful nature opposes itself. The losses of galleons made it necessary to maintain in that province a shipyard. This drafted all the carpenters from Manila, and, in order to supply those that were needed on that shore, it was necessary to demand from each province a certain number—a quota of hardly one to each village, and this so equitably that to worldly prudence these allotments seemed advantageous, for which many would eagerly ask. But as the Indians have grown up in their wretchedness and in the life of brutes in their remote mountains, it seems to them that they are maintaining their liberty. They resented greatly this political compulsion to citizenship and the formation of a village, [so that they would live] as men. Those in the provinces that were most civilized and were nearest to Manila had obeyed the decree without opposition, but these [remote] provinces immediately made such demonstrations of displeasure that all of us perceived the difficulty [of enforcing the demand], and several undertook to represent it [to the authorities]. Don Diego de Faxardo was the governor, a man so harsh in his methods, and having so little pious regard for the [religious] ministers, that their intercessions only made him more cruel, on account of the dogmatic opinion which he followed, that the ministers are the ones who oppose the royal service. Accordingly they all gave up any active opposition, but moderated in a thousand ways the execution [of the decree] (which they saw could not be avoided), sometimes with gifts, sometimes with considerations of utility. The men of Ibabao, trusting in the ruggedness of their coast or the inaccessibility of their mountains, or in the succor which had been positively promised to them by the Dutch—who every year make port on their coasts, awaiting with their armed fleets the relief [sent us] from Nueva España—immediately declared themselves [against us]. At the outset, in their stubbornness and disobedience, until their affairs were settled and their retreat prevented, they talked of fleeing to the mountains. This was their first opinion; but a malicious Indian interfered in the discussion, and told them that they could not accomplish anything by that course, because the village would not be destroyed, nor would the promoters [of the rebellion] have the following that they desired, unless they ordered that all should rebel, and slay the father, and burn the church; for their guilt in such action would intimidate all of them. As their councils were held in the excitement of wine, all readily approved this extravagant proposal. Immediately the demon offered them, for its execution, the evilly-inclined mind of a vile Indian named Sumoroy, who, although he had been much favored by the fathers as being a skilful pilot on the sea, and on this account had always enjoyed immunity from tribute and personal services, and was actually the castellan of the fortified residence that they had there, yet desired—because they had removed an obstacle17 which for many years had kept him at variance with and separated from his lawful wife—to find an opportunity for vengeance. This man offered to kill the father; and, confirming his resolve with many draughts to his success, and loud shouts, they dreamed that they were already masters of the entire world, and had slain all the Spaniards. He had already prejudiced their minds against his enemy, telling each Indian in the village separately that he had been assigned by the father to go to the Manila shore; consequently, no one now repaired to mass or took notice of public affairs. The father rector—who was Father Miguel Ponce Barberan, a native of the kingdom of Aragon—saw plainly the hostile disposition of the people, but never could have imagined so insane a resolve; and if any one could most confidently throw aside anxiety it was this father, for he had been, without contradiction, the most beloved and cherished by the natives, of all the fathers who had itinerated there—and, as well, the one who had spent most years in ministering to those people. A Tuesday, then, the first day of June in the year 1649, the traitor selected for his sacrilegious parricide; and, as a thief in the house, who knew its avenues of entrance and egress very well, he took his stand within, awaiting the father at the top of the stairway, when he should ascend it after supper. While the father halted on the stairs to say a prayer for the souls in purgatory—for which, it happened, the bells were ringing—Sumoroy hurled a javelin at him from above, which pierced his breast and immediately brought him to the ground; nor did he breathe again, spending his last energy in pronouncing the sweet names of Jesus and Mary.