Note 5 — Moro Pirates and their Raids in the Seventeenth Century

[In 1653 Don Sabiniano Manrique de Lara succeeded to the government of the Philippines.] One of his first undertakings was to establish peace with the ruler of Mindanao, Cachil Corralat, whom it was expedient to assure for the sake of the tranquillity of the Pintados Islands—which were more exposed than the others to the incursions of their armed fleets, since Manila had not enough soldiers and vessels with which our people could go forth to hinder the operations of the Moros. The governor sent as his ambassador Captain Don Diego de Lemus, and Father Francisco Lado of the Society of Jesus, who were very kindly received by the Moros; and he gave them to understand that no one desired peace more than he did, since the warning was still fresh that had been given him by the war which was waged against him by Governor Don Sebastian Hurtado de Corcuera in person—which had obliged Corralat to wander as a fugitive through the lands of his enemy the king of Buhayen, exposed to many perils. It seems as if the desire which Corralat showed to maintain the peace might be regarded as sincere; for if he had chosen to avail himself of the opportunity afforded by the past years, when all our forces and power were fully occupied in resisting the cruel invasions of the Dutch, without doubt he could have made great ravages in the villages of the Pintados Islands; and therefore this must be attributed to an especial providence of the divine mercy. All [these dealings with the envoys] were cunning measures of the shrewd Moro to lull5 our vigilance with feigned appearances of peace, for never was he further from pursuing it—partly through greed for the booty of slaves, a great part of which belonged to him; partly because his captains and other persons interested in these piratical raids persuaded him to avail himself of the opportunity furnished by the weakness of our forces. Corralat determined to renew his former hostile acts, and began by preparing vessels and supplies; and in order to cover up better his damnable intention, he sent to the governor of Manila an ambassador to confirm the peace. This man was called Banua, and was no less fraudulent than Simon the Greek. On the route he left many tokens of this; for in the village of Tunganan, among the Subanos, he treated very contemptuously6 the father minister, Miguel Pareja of the Society of Jesus—who, as the pious religious that he was, turned the other cheek, as the gospel commands. Banua arrived at Manila in the year of 1655, where he discharged very well his office as ambassador, and even better that of spy—and well he knew his double trade; for among other things he demanded that restitution be made to Corralat of some Mindanao slaves, and of the pieces of artillery which Don Sebastian Hurtado de Corcuera had taken from him in war; but this and other petitions of the ambassador had no satisfactory issue. Banua returned [to Mindanao], and Don Sabiniano Manrique de Lara despatched to accompany him Captain Don Claudio de Rivera, and Father Alejandro Lopez of the Society of Jesus, who went with holy zeal for establishing in Mindanao the preaching of the true faith. They arrived at Zamboanga, where they had sufficient warnings of the danger to which they were going; but with fearless courage they continued their journey until they reached Corralat. He received them without any of the ostentation usual for an embassy, but rather with frowns and displeasure; and when he read the letters from the governor of Manila—which were excellent for an occasion in which our strength might be greater, but the present time demanded shrewder dissimulation—the Moro king was much disturbed, and displayed extreme anger. The end of this embassy (of which an excellent account is given by Father Francisco Combés in his Historia de Mindanao, book viii, chap. 3) was that Corralat ordered his nephew Balatamay to slay Father Alejandro Lopez and his associate, Father Juan de Montiel, and Captain Claudio de Rivera.7 Corralat sent the letters of the governor to the kings of Joló and of Ternate, to incite them to make common cause in defense of their profession as Mahometans, but they did not choose to risk breaking the peace; on the contrary, the king of Ternate handed over the letters to the governor of our forts there, Francisco de Esteybar, who restored them to the governor of Manila. (Diaz, Conquistas, pp. 549–551.)