end the words that follow:  “As vicar provincial of the Indias, we nominate the venerable father, Fray Joannis de Sancto Hieronymo, and assign to him fourteen religious, who shall always be subject to this provincial of this province of Hispania.”  This arrangement having been made (which was made by the intervention of the royal decrees that were despatched at Valladolid, April three of that year, and which contained, in fact, the permission for such, and general authority to found as many convents there as the new Augustinian Recollect missionaries were able and desired; to which were added other messages touching spiritual matters which the pontiff’s legate generously conceded), the father provincial, Fray Joan Baptista, decreed the issue of his warrant, on May two.  In this document, after mentioning that he was ordered and commanded by the king, and also by the said legate, to send the said father as superior of the religious, who were about to set out for the help of those who were occupied in the vineyard of the Lord, in the cultivation of those islands, the father provincial entrusted to him all his authority, without reserving anything whatever; but with the conditions that we mention, in the records and other minutes which are generally made on such occasions, the permissions that are despatched.

The father vicar-provincial had already chosen his workers, men like himself.  They were among the choicest and best men that the Reform then had in their convents.  They were as follows:  Fathers Fray Andres de San Nicolas, who was called de Canovas, an apostolic man, and a great preacher in word and deed; Fray Miguel de Santa Maria, a most exemplary man, and devoted to the rigorous life; Fray Geronimo de Christo, [27] very austere and observant; Fray Pedro de San Fulgencio, a capable and very clever man for all things; Fray Diego de la Anunciacion, [28] adorned with very singular virtues, and regarded as a saint; Fray Rodrigo de San Miguel, [29] most keen-witted and erudite in all learning; Fray Francisco Baptista, a penitent to excess, and regulated by conscience; Fray Francisco de la Madre de Dios, most zealous for the discalced, and for the welfare of his brethren; Fray Andres del Espiritu Santo, a religious, although very young, very modest and retiring. [30] The father superintendent also chose four other religious, lay brethren, who were of use and a great credit to the Reform, on the voyage, and at the time when they came, whose names are as follows:  Fray Simon de San Joseph; Fray Joan de San Geronimo; Fray Geronimo de la Madre de Dios; and Fray Joan de San Guillermo.  They all assembled in Madrid on the fifteenth or sixteenth of May.  Thence they left for Sevilla, and from there went later to San Lucar.  They were detained there until they could embark in one of the ships of the Nueva Espana trading-fleet, which set sail from the great bay of Cadiz, July twelve, and commenced its voyage happily.  The zealous missionaries were going, very full of God, and consequently did