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. 40]

I690-I69I] NATIVES OF SOUTHERN ISLANDS

I63

he comes." He departed without a word, and all of
the people remained motionless, staring with fright.
When they recovered their equanimity, their whole
attempt was to excuse their negligence by empty excuses, which I accepted in order to calm their minds.
Inside of an hour I found in my presence him whom
I desired so much. He, seeing the love with which
I received him, and how differently my purpose was
declared from that which his fears gave him to understand, recovered his courage in full, and immediately offered himself for baptism - a matter which
I was unwilling to defer, in order that I might leave
him with his salvation assured. Consequently, after
instructing him briefly, I baptized him, and called
him Martin, as that happy lot came to him on that
saint's day.72 He satisfied my hopes and hastened
to me every time when I afterward visited his village of Malande, very punctually, and always with
some special refreshment both for me and for him
who in my company had acted as his sponsor.
The other lavia whom I saw was in one of the Joloan islands, called Pangutara.73 Him I found to
be already a Christian, whom Father Alexandro
Lopez, a great apostle of the Joloans, had reduced
and baptized in Samboangan, and called Santiago.
This man is naturally very well dispositioned and has
no moral defects, and he is a man of a celestial peace
and serenity. He is always bubbling with laughter,
which is the effect of the security of his soul; for,
72 Either the eleventh or twelfth of November. The first date
is the day of St. Martin, the blessed confessor; and the second
that of St. Martin, pope and martyr, who was martyred in 655.
73 The island of Pafigutarang, of the Sulu group. It is about
II x 9 miles in extent, and is low, but is densely inhabited and
has considerable trade with Jo16. It has some settlements of the
Samals, the descendants of the Samal Lauit or "sea gypsies." See
U. S. Philippine Gazetteer, and Census of the Philippine Islands,
i, p. 464.