The first thing which I shall attempt to relate herein will be an expedition which was made by Captain Juan de Salzedo when he was governor in the island of Panai.  As has been already related in other accounts, written in the year sixty-nine, the Portuguese raised the blockade established by them on the island of Cubu against the camp of his Majesty, because of certain difficulties which arose; and the governor determined to cross to the island of Panay with his captains in order to levy tribute upon the people of certain provinces.  His nephew, recently made captain of the company which his brother Felipe de Sauzedo had brought to these islands, was sent with forty soldiers to certain islands.  This captain embarked in fourteen or fifteen small native boats, and set out for an islet which is called Elem, [41] and when we had reached this island we did not find any resistance whatever, for all the natives came to us in peace.  From there, led by a guide, he crossed to the island of Mindoro, and made an attack one night just about dawn upon a very rich native village called Mamburau, and plundered it.  Many of the natives were captured, some of whom afterward bought their liberty, and others were allowed to go free.  Thence he took a guide for a little islet, Loban by name, which is fifteen leagues farther.  When the captain was departed, the natives, who had fled from the village, returned and saw the havoc and destruction caused by the Spaniards, and were unwilling to return to rebuild it; accordingly they themselves set fire to it, and totally destroyed it.  The captain, having arrived at his destination at midnight, with all possible secrecy leaped ashore, and arranged his men and the Pintados [42] Indians whom he had with him in ambuscade near the villages, in order to make the attack upon them at daybreak.  However, the natives of this island having been informed of the hostile incursion of the Spaniards, withdrew with their children and wives and all their belongings that they could take with them, to three forts which they had constructed.  Now since these were the first natives whom we found with forts and means of defense, I shall describe here the forts and weapons which they possessed.  The two principal forts were square in form, with ten or twelve culverins on each side, some of them moderately large and others very small.  Each fort had a wall two estados high, and was surrounded by a ditch two and one-half brazas in depth, filled with water.  The small weapons used by these natives are badly tempered iron lances, which become blunt upon striking a fairly good coat of mail, a kind of broad dagger, and arrows—­which are weapons of little value.  Other lances are also used which are made of fire-hardened palm-wood and are harder than the iron ones.  There is an abundance of a certain very poisonous herb which they apply to their arrows.  Such are the weapons which the natives of these islands possess and employ.  Now as the captain approached the villages at daybreak,