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. 13]

I604-i605]

CHIRINO'S RELATION

Io09

shoulders to the church. One of the chiefs did this
several times for his slave woman, although, before
that occurrence, he had not been accustomed even to
approach her. The governor of that same village, an
Indian of very high rank and much esteemed by his
people, seeing that all refused to help a poor woman,
who was in a very loathsome condition, to go to the
church, placed her on his own shoulders and carried
her thither, heedless of the stench and sores, and
careless of staining a very elegant gown which he had
put on that same day. When some persons attempted
to restrain him, he responded that such was the obligation of a Christian.
The increase and fervor of Christianity in Tinagon.
Chapter LXIII.
When the first fruits had been paid with a thousand Christians, who, as we have said, died newlybaptized, in Tinagon and its district, there were left,
upon the arrival there of the fathers of the Society,
about eight thousand five hundred souls. Of this
number we baptized from the month of April of the
year one thousand five hundred and ninety-nine, to
the same month of the year one thousand six hundred,
more than nine hundred and seventy persons, almost
amounting to a thousand. For the rest of the catechumens, and for some Christians besides who are
scattered through various villages, the services of
three fathers and three brethren did not suffice, although they were constantly occupied in instructing
them. But our Lord provided us with some boys, so
well disposed and so intelligent in the things of our
holy faith, that they have, upon various occasions,
supplied the lack of priests and the need for cate