The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803; explorations by early navigators, descriptions of the islands and their peoples, their history and records of the Catholic missions, as related in contemporaneous books and manuscripts, showing the political, economic, commericial and religious conditions of those islands from their earliest relations with European nations to the beginning of the nineteenth century; [Vol. 1, no. 36]

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THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS

[Vol. 36

These conferences, and the activities that necessarily followed from them were perfectly known by the
Sangleys (whose fear kept them very attentive to
everything), and the lack of secrecy in the members
of the council gave them exact knowledge [of its
proceedings]; consequently, they were fully assured
of a war and of their own danger. This fear was
increased by the haste with which the citizens who
had wealth in their possession undertook to hide it
away. Their desperation was completed by the interpretation which the common people gave to everything-irresponsible soldiers, with mestizos, mulattoes, and blacks, telling the Sangleys that they were
to have their heads cut off, as if they were men
already sentenced to death; and inflicting on them
many injuries and uttering a thousand insults. Such
circumstances as these concurring in the insurrection
of the year 1603 necessarily caused it, as Doctor
Morga observes; and on this occasion their fear of
the like proceedings led them to a similar desperation. They heard that the twenty-fifth day of May
was to be that of their destruction, because the cavalry
troops were to arrive on the day before. Some of
them - the most worthless class, as butchers and
vegetable-sellers - began to talk of extricating themselves from the danger; but those in the Parian displayed no courage for any measures, for, as their
Paquian Bactial, king of Jo16, as soon as he heard of the proposed abandonment, plotted to kill all the Spaniards in Zamboanga, and make it his own capital; he asked Corralat to aid in
this enterprise, but the latter refused to break his peace with the
Spaniards. Royal decrees at various times ordered that fort to be
again occupied; but this was not done until 1718, under the rule
of Governor Bustamente. (See Murillo Velarde's Hist. de Philipinas, fol. 275, 276.)