I The King By order of the king, our sovereign:  Don Fernando Ruiz De Contreras

INADVISABILITY OF A SPANISH POST ON THE ISLAND OF FORMOSA

I would consider it a very important fact that the Spaniards of Filipinas have seized and fortified a site on the island of Hermosa, if that would be the efficacious means of driving out the Dutch from their fort and from that island by force of arms, but otherwise not.

In order to discuss this proposition reasonably, it will be necessary first to investigate the objects that the Dutch may have had in order to have fortified, as they have done for the last three or four years, the island of Hermosa.

Some have thought that the purpose of the Dutch must be to destroy commerce between China and Filipinas, by plundering more at their ease the Chinese ships, because they are there near China, and in a place where the fleets from Manila which have sometimes defeated them, cannot attack them.  But in my judgment, this is not their purpose, although it is a fact that they are very near the coasts of China in the island of Hermosa.  For that reason, even the Chinese, before they set sail, ascertain by means of oared craft whether Dutch vessels are waiting in that place.  Consequently, they either do not leave their ports, or if they leave, accomplish their voyage, since they can do so easily by sailing so as not to go within sight of the island.  But it is impossible to escape the Dutch ships when they await the Chinese on the coasts of Filipinas, as they have done since the year 609, when they began that practice, until that of 625.  During that time scarcely any ship escaped them; for the Dutch generally go to the coasts of Filipinas when there is no time to advise the Chinese not to leave their country.  The latter, having sailed, necessarily fall into the hands of the Dutch.  However, it is true that when the Dutch await the Chinese on the coasts of Manila, they need a larger fleet; and that they risk its loss by fighting with that of Manila.  Here the capture of the Chinese is assured, while for the above reasons (of which the Dutch are not ignorant) that is almost impossible in the island of Hermosa.

In my opinion, then, the purpose of the Dutch is to establish a factory in the island of Hermosa, in order to trade with the Chinese by buying silks from them, and to sail with these to Japon (although taking some of them to Europa also, as well as other goods), just as the Portuguese of Macan do.  I am persuaded of this, for, while I was sailing from Filipinas to Nueva Espana as captain and master of the ship “San Francisco,” which was wrecked in Japon in the year 609—­the first time when the Dutch went to that kingdom—­the Dutch petitioned for a factory from him whom we style emperor of Japon, offering to take him silks from China.  Thereupon it was given to them, notwithstanding that the emperor