e regarding the Portuguese expedition against
Cebu. Miguel Lopez de Legazpi; October 21.

_Sources_: MSS. in the Archivo general de Indias, Sevilla.

_Translations_: The second and third documents are translated by
Alfonso de Salvio; the others, by Arthur B. Myrick.

Letter from Fray Diego de Herrera to Felipe II

Sacred Royal Catholic Majesty:

In the fleet that your Majesty had sent from this Nueva Espana to
the islands of the West, there were among the people some religious
of St. Augustine who were in your Majesty's service. By your order,
I was one of them. We had a prosperous voyage as your Majesty will
already have been fully informed. The fleet effected a landing, and
founded a colony (in accordance with the instructions brought from
this Nueva Espana) in the island of Cubu--as that place abounds in
food, has a very good port and is a healthful region, as has been
since found by experience; and it is very strong for defense, in
any casualty that might befall us. From that place a ship was sent
to discover the return route [to New Spain]. It succeeded well,
although it appears that some of its men died. The people who
remained there have all this time endured very great privations,
notwithstanding the richness of the region, because they could make
no settlement so peacefully that it was not against the will of the
natives. Therefore they were disquieted, and many fled, deserting
their towns; and those who remained determined not to cultivate their
fields, or to sow, believing that by this stratagem they could drive
us from their land. Consequently they and ours have endured very
great extremities, because the same thing was done in other islands
where the Spaniards went to find food--so much so that many times the
natives have taken the food more than four leagues inland, carrying
it upon their shoulders, and crossing creeks and rivers with it,
with great risk of their lives. Then too another cause of so great
distress has been the lack there of boats with oars; and the fact
that, up to the present, no one has ventured to seek richer and more
abundant lands--which are very near, as Lequios, Japan, and Jaba
[Java], therein fulfilling your Majesty's commands. After all that,
came the Portuguese fleet, arriving about the end of September of last
year (1569), under command of Gonzalo Pereira. That man, although we
made every possible effort for peace with him, would agree to nothing
except that, in