For these and other reasons, Don Juan de Silva, governor and president of Manila, called various meetings of commanders, and experienced captains, in which it was determined to make energetic war on those barbarians.  Charge of the war was given to General Don Juan de Vega, son of Doctor Don Juan de Vega, auditor of Manila.  He with a fine fleet of four hundred Spaniards and other Indians sailed to humble the pride of those barbarians.  The latter were not unprepared for resistance; for, joining their forces, they entrenched themselves so that there was considerable doubt as to the undertaking.  Both sides fought with great valor, and there were many killed and wounded.  But at last our troops were victorious, as their zeal was to the service of God and the increase of His worship.  More than one thousand five hundred Christian captives were liberated, and a presidio and fort [48] was erected as a warning for the future.  That effort was not sufficient to quiet those Caraghas islanders; for within four years three thousand of them assembled and, surrounding the redoubt, placed it in great straits.  They were repulsed by our men with so great valor that, having retired to the sea, they vented their fury by inflicting severe injuries on some villages friendly to us.  And, our men also getting a good reenforcement that was sent us from Manila, those men returned to their homes—­where, treating afterward for articles of peace, they were pardoned for their past boldness, and their subjection was arranged with the mildness of the gospel yoke.

Affairs were in that condition, when the most illustrious Don Fray Pedro de Arce, bishop of Zibu, most worthy son of our Augustinian order, with his great zeal of gaining souls for God conceded to our Reform the office of catching them with the net of the gospel preaching.  When the reenforcement of missionaries had arrived from Espana that year [i.e., 1622], as is said in volume i, last chapter, eight of our religious were appointed for that purpose.  Stimulated by the pity that they had at learning that so many souls were being lost in the blindness of their idolatry, these missionaries set out in great fervor from Manila, after having received the blessing of their superior, and not without the holy envy of the other religious, who would have liked to spend their lives in that holy employment.  These apostolic men landed at Zibu, where they received the blessings of the most zealous bishop and many kindnesses with which he wished to load them.  He despatched them with promptness, and in a short time they reached the redoubt of Tanda, which was the name of the fort that had been erected there by our Spaniards.