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. 24]

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THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS

[Vol. 24

what they could not finish. It was permitted by God,
so that the miany souls whom the fathers have baptized and hope to baptize there may not apostatize;
for thereabout are multitudes of heathen Indians,
among whom the worship of Mahomet has not yet
entered, and with the care of the fathers the harvest,
without doubt, will be very plentiful.
The Recollect fathers returned to visit, or rather,
to rebuild their house burned in Sugbu. They built
it better, and roofed it with tile, whereby it will be
safer than a roofing of nipa, which is so exposed to
fire and flames.
In August, 1629, the governor sent Captain Don
Sebastian de Libite - a very noble Navarrese knight,
who had been a very good soldier in Flandes - to the
Pintados as commander-in-chief. He went with his
wife and household to the city of Santisimo Nombre
de Jesus. The weather was very stormy, and they
were often menaced by death. This lady, Dofia
Catalina de Aguilar, and her whole household were
very devoted to the most Holy Child, and called
upon Him with great anxiety. Finally, in a disastrous storm that struck them, where death was facing
them, this lady said to her husband: " Listen, Don
Sebastian, promise something to the Holy Child, so
that He may help us, and may allow us to see Him."
He promised one hundred pesos. " What, no more
than that?" replied Doina Catalina; "If we are
drowning, for what do we love Him? " Finally, he
promised five hundred pesos. The most Holy Child
beheld their devotion, and miraculously saved them
from their danger and conveyed them safe to Sugbu,
where they fulfilled their vow. And it is a fact that
although they were persons of great wealth of spirit