Note 2 — LETTER TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE INDIA COUNCIL

The Dutch, not discomfited by this repulse, or by the loss of 50,000 pardaos2 (which are 37,500 pesos)—which as they write from Batavia, the above-mentioned ambassador expended—made an agreement with an English corsair who was at Batavia, with a ship of fifty-two guns and another of thirty, to the effect that under his own flag he should escort four Dutch ships, which they despatched to Acapulco last year with merchandise. And in order to hinder the galleon from leaving this port they deceived a Frenchman,3 who was very well known here, hinting to him that the squadron of Barenet [sic] and the corsair were going to attack Manila; and they hastened his embarkation, at the cost of 4,000 pesos, in order that he might notify us here. Then they gave orders to the corsair, with two other ships of their own, to let themselves be seen at the entrance of Mariveles, in order to throw Manila into alarm and hinder the sailing of the galleon. By [causing] this fright they succeeded in their purpose to prevent the sailing of the ship, which was lightened of its cargo as soon as the information which the Frenchman gave reached us; and the 4,000 pesos were paid [to him] for the cost of this warning. The said four ships sailed to leeward, and sighted the coast of Ylocos, whence we had news of this. But they could not attain their principal object; for when the six ships had come together in China, and were laden with [goods worth] 900,000 pardaos (each containing six silver reals), they expected the vessel which, after having given that warning here, was to cross over to China4 and carry to the Dutch a pilot for the navigation to Nueva España; but it could not reach China, and was obliged to go to Batavia. The four Dutch ships and the two [English] corsairs, resolved to carry out their project, sailed from Canton on the fourteenth of September, bound for the coast of Nueva España and Perú to carry on illicit trade,5 and the English to make reprisals. But God, who chose to punish so mischievous a design, permitted that a hurricane should attack them, when they were four days out from Canton; and as a result the two corsairs were driven back to China—the larger vessel dismasted and battered, and the smaller one badly damaged. The four Dutch ships, badly leaking, spent twelve days in searching for an anchorage on the coast of Ylocos, in order to make repairs; but not finding one, they went back to Batavia, with their goods damaged. According to what is written to us in a despatch that is just received from Batavia—from a person who was sent there from here to make observations on the condition of the English piratical squadron—the Dutch lost on their merchandise half of its value; and the corsair sold for 17,000 pardaos his ship of fifty-two guns, with all its military supplies, since it was no longer fit for navigation, while he went with the other and smaller ship—it is said without [stopping for] food—to another port to repair it. [It is also reported] that the squadron of Barenet had departed for Bombain, toward the Persian Gulf, to cruise against the French, from whom he seized at the Straits [of Malacca] nearly a million pesos. The person who was sent from here to Batavia (who is a Malabar) with a balandra was detained there under the pretext that the governor had gone away, and orders were given that he should not be permitted to depart until the governor’s return. But he informed us of everything, by a vessel which he despatched with six men and a French pilot; and he reported that three Dutch fragatas were being equipped and laden with merchandise in order to carry on illicit trade at the entrance of [the Gulf of] Californias, carrying [respectively] forty, thirty, and twenty-five cannon. In his opinion, this was the cause of his detention, in order that, by news [from him] not reaching Manila, the galleon should not sail for Nueva España, and their intention not be known here.