In regard to the needs of the soldiers, which you attribute to their not having, and the impossibility of providing them with, encomiendas for a long time; and as it concerns the temporary employments which you give them instead of the servants, and even these employments are not sufficient for all—­you shall observe the instructions, laws, and ordinances which you possess.  You shall see that the distribution of what is available be made among worthy men who have served in that land.

As to the remedy which you propose in the marriage of elderly women, and encomenderas of the land, you shall introduce no innovation.  But you shall enable marriages freely to take their proper course.  At Denia, August 16, 1599.

I The King

By order of the king our sovereign: 

Juan de Ybarra

The King:  To my governor and captain-general of the Philippinas Islands, and the president and auditors of my royal Audiencia thereof.  I have understood that the Chinese Indians who trade in that country bring thither each year eight hundred thousand pesos’ worth of merchandise, and often more than a million; and that in the ten days which they spend in that country they make more than a hundred per cent, and that in the last year, ninety-eight, it was said that they secured two hundred per cent.  Since in their own country they pay increased duties, and since so great profit comes to them from the merchandise which they bring to those islands, while they pay me no more than three per cent in duties, which is the amount formerly imposed by Governor Don Gonzalo Ronquillo, it would be just that they should pay the said duties proportionately to the profits; and accordingly these might be increased by at least another three per cent.  As I wish to be informed more minutely concerning what is expedient in this matter, and whether an increase of the said duties would or could result in any inconvenience whatsoever, and for what reason; and, in case that there is no objection, to what extent the duty can be increased—­I command you to send a report thereof, with your opinion.  Done at Denia, on the sixteenth of August, of the year one thousand five hundred and ninety-nine.

I The King

Countersigned by Juan de Ybarra.

Signed by the Council.

I [the King:] to the archbishop of Manila.

[Endorsed: “To the governor and Audiencia of the Philippinas; let them give information concerning the report that the duties can be raised on the merchandise from China.”]

Documents of 1600

    The pacification of Mindanao. [Unsigned and undated; 1600?]
    Oliver van Noordt’s attack on Luzon.  Francisco Tello, and
    others; October-December.

Source:  These documents are obtained from MSS. in the Archivo general de Indias, Sevilla.

Translations:  The first document is translated by Robert W. Haight; in the second, the commission to Morga is translated by James A. Robertson; the instructions to him and to Alcega, by Jose M. and Clara M. Asensio; the account of the battle, by Arthur B. Myrick, of Harvard University, and James A. Robertson.