ize and furnishing,
a tree holds them easily. The ladder by which they ascend is a log,
some grooves that they cut in it serving as steps. On the coming of
night they draw this ladder up and thus sleep secure. They teach us
the little with which life is satisfied, and the fatigues which our
ambition and pride give us; for in order to satisfy our ambition
and pride we take upon us so many cares, which, so far as life is
concerned, are superfluous, and are not the least of the accidents
which our life suffers. This nation is almost wholly in vassalage to
the Lutaos, and every village recognizes some chief [36] of the latter
nation to whom they pay tribute; and that chief bears himself as a
king among them, and makes and unmakes at his will. In the beginning,
this authority entered under color of protection and support against
the king of Mindanao, and remained in enthroned tyranny, so that today
most of this nation are slaves of the Lutaos--their want of intellect
subjecting them to a thousand cheats, and their want of protection
to a thousand outrages. For since the Lutaos are so alert a nation,
and so sharp in their affairs, they have gradually bought the Subanos
by trading with them, becoming masters of their entire freedom.

CHAPTER X

Of the noble and brave nation of the Dapitans

Of this island, which has given empires to so many kings, without doubt
the crown is the village of Dapitan; and, although it is so small at
present, it has been one of the most densely populated in the past,
the one most respected for its power, and in our times the whole,
both of these conquests and of their Christian churches. In a small
number, reduced to one single village, there is inclosed a nation
[37] apart from all the others, and superior to all those discovered
in nobility, valor, fidelity, and Catholicism. They are descended
from the island of Bool, where they anciently occupied the strait
made by that island and the island of Panglao, which remains dry at
low tide, but at high tide allows a galliot to pass. Therefore many
brazas in the sea stand, even today, certain columns of upright wood,
as honorable witnesses of the location so gloriously occupied by
this nation, and today the venerable ruins of poor although adequate
buildings which they sustained. They occupied both shores and the
entire island of Panglao. There they conquered the famous people
of Bohol; for as their nation was the less numerous in that is