vessel, and, in the meantime, the two sailors were taken back to the boat, and there killed with daggers in the presence of all.  The schooner’s sails were next hoisted, and she was brought into Jolo, where the cargo and crew were sold in sight of, and with the knowledge and consent of the sultan; an atrocity for which he has always refused to give any satisfaction to a nation, thus openly and barbarously outraged by his own relatives, and in defiance of the existing treaties of peace.  Such is the cruel character, and such the execrable policy of the Moros generally inhabiting the Islands situated in the Philippine seas.

[Growth of Moro power.] The most lamentable circumstance is, that these infidel races, at all times to be dreaded, owing to their numbers and savage ferocity, after the lapse of a century of almost uninterrupted prosperity, and encouraged also by our inattention, have at length gradually attained so formidable a degree of power, that their reduction now must be considered an extremely arduous and expensive enterprise, although an object urgently requisite, and worthy of the greatness of a nation like ours.  In order, however, that the difficulties of so important an undertaking may be justly appreciated, it may be proper to observe that the Island of Mindanao alone, at the present moment, contains a population equal, if not larger, than that of Luzon, and the margins of the immense lake, situated in its center, are covered with well-built towns, filled with conveniences, the fruits of their annual privateering, and of the traffic they carry on with the inhabitants of the Island of Jolo.  True it is, and it may be said, equally fortunate, that they are greatly divided into parties, subject to a variety of “datus,” or independent chiefs, in name only inferior to the one who styles himself the sultan of the whole Island.  As, however, the fortresses and districts of Caraga, Misamis, and Zamboanga occupy nearly three parts of the circumference of the Island, these Moros freely possess no more than the southern part, commencing at about twenty-five leagues from Cape San Augustin, and ending in the vicinity of Zamboanga; so that the largest number of their naval armaments are fitted out and issued to sea, either by the great river of Mindanao, or from some of the many bays and inlets situated on the above extent of coast.

[Jolo.] The Island of Jolo, although small compared with that of Mindanao, is, nevertheless, in itself the most important, as well as the real hotbed of all the piracies committed.  Its inhabitants, according to the unanimous reports of captives and various merchants, in skill and valor greatly exceed the other Mahometans who infest these seas.  The sultan is absolute, and his subjects carry on trade with Borneo, Celebes, and the other Malayan tribes scattered about this great Archipelago.  In the port of Jolo, as already noticed, sales are made of Christians captured by the other Moros.  The Chinese