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]

NATIVE RACES

95

one-fourth part slave. For if the father or the
mother were free, and had an only son, he was half
free and half slave. If they had more than one child,
these were so divided that the first followed the condition of the father, whether free or slave, and the
second that of the mother. So did it happen with
successive pairs. But if there were an odd number
of children, the last was half free and half slave.
Those who descended from them, if they were
children of a free father or mother, were slaves
only in the fourth part, as they were the children of a
free father or mother, and of one half slave. Sometimes, because it happened that two people had
agreed to marry and the man had no wealth for the
dowry-or rather, nothing with which to buy his
wife-he became her slave. In such case the children were divided in the said manner, and the first,
third, and fifth, and the remaining ones in the same
way were slaves, inasmuch as they belonged to the
father, who was also a slave of the mother - and not
only slaves to her, but also to her brothers and sisters
and relatives, in case of her death and the division of
her property. On the contrary the second, fourth,
and others in the same way, were according to their
custom free, inasmuch as they belonged to their
mother who was free; and they were masters and
rulers over their own father and brothers and sisters.
The same thing happened in the case of interest, a
thing of so great importance among them that, as
already remarked, the father would not pardon the
debt and interest even to the son, nor the son the
father, even in case of necessity, until the one had
made a slave of the other for it. Consequently, if
one brother ransomed another brother, or a son his