nce in so serious
an affair he, being on the spot, should not have done so for a simple
command. The case having been continued, and he having presented the
original order which they thought had been lost, and having given other
explanations, he was even by them acquitted of that charge. All this
appears sufficiently by the record of the case, which remains in these
islands. Your Majesty having been made aware of the abandonment of
the said islands during the last year, there arrived here your royal
decree directing the investigation and punishment of whomsoever was
responsible. As they were to blame in the affair, as can be seen by
this relation, they remained silent, and have taken no action. From
the abandonment of what was already gained, through the said order,
it has followed that the Indians who are natives of the said islands of
Ufanos, which the Spaniards had left, considering that this was due to
fear, assembled, with others from other neighboring kingdoms, to come
to work havoc in the lands of your Majesty. Accordingly, in the past
year of 1600 they came with a fleet of many vessels to the Pintados
provinces, which are subject to your Majesty; and in the region known
as Bantayan they burned the village and the church, killed many, and
took captive more than eight hundred persons. Thence they came to the
river of Panay, an encomienda assigned to the royal crown, and killed
a great many more, taking six hundred more prisoners from the said
encomiendas. They burned the church and the image of our Lady which
was in it, which a few days before that had for a considerable time
miraculously sweated out many drops of water, as if in premonition of
the impending event. They drank out of the chalice in their feasts,
scoffing at the consecration of it, after the fashion of Mahometan
people, whereby the natives and Spaniards of those regions were
greatly afflicted and terrorized, as may be imagined.

As has already been said, the reason for the coming of these
Indians to inflict the said damage was the command to take away your
Majesty's camp from the said land of Mindanao. But the cause for
their having wrought those injuries after they arrived was, as was
said at the beginning, that the order and decree of your Majesty
was not obeyed. For your Majesty had in this camp four captains
of infantry with the four hundred soldiers which your Majesty had
commanded to be left there as a garrison, and the said captains were
sat