The people of the Philippines, their religious progress and preparation for spiritual leadership in the Far East,

62 THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES

Princess Fatimah, who had been in prison with her father,
the Sultan, was sent to Jolo to arrange for peace with Datu
Bantilan. An interview was arranged with Bantilan, and
there the bungling Spaniards discovered that "the Sultan was
not a traitor at all, but a man of good intentions, who was
simply unable to carry out some of his plans and promises,
because of the determined resistance of many of the principal
datus." And so finding the Sultan wholly innocent, they
were willing to set him free, providing the Sulus would return
all ornaments and property that had been looted from cargoes.
It was an impossible request, and was not carried out; so the
innocent Sultan lay in prison eight years more, living as a
Christian, having put away all but one wife. He never would
have gotten home at all, had not the English captured Manila
in 1763 and reinstated Alimud Din as Sultan of Sulu.
Thus ended an episode which might have led to the Christianizing of the entire Sulu archipelago, if the Spanish officers
had themselves been Christians. History must place the chief,
but by no means the only, blame for their failure upon the
blind racial prejudice of Governor Zacharias of Zamboanga.
It was Spain's first and last opportunity in Moroland. The
irony of the situation, from a religious point of view, is that
the name of Alimud Din I now stands above that of all others
in Sulu history, partly because of his ability as an administrator, and partly because he is the ancestor of the principal
datus of the Sulus.
MORO PIRACY
When England once more handed over to Spain the control
of the Islands, the disillusioned Sultan made no efforts to
prevent Moro piracy. The Moros became so bold that they
carried captives from the wharves of Manila, and once even
appeared at the Plaza de Palacio of the Governor-General
before they were detected and repulsed. Piracy grew worse
until, for ten or more years, "traffic between Luzon and the
southern islands was paralyzed. About five hundred Spanish
and native Christians were every year carried into captivity