e ladder, and looking from
the door into the interior of the house beheld a man stretched upon
the floor. Upon approaching he found him motionless and almost dead,
but with enough consciousness to answer "No" to the father's query
if he desired baptism. The father remained with him a long time,
seeking to convince him. Finally, seeing how little this availed,
and that the hour was late, he concluded to leave him. But grief
at seeing that soul lost, and the secret strength which our Lord
gave him, constrained him to wait, and to persist in urging the sick
man--an action so opportune that the latter at last said "Yes," and
listened to the short instruction which is wont to be given upon such
occasions. Thus, in sorrow for his sins he expired immediately after
baptism, with an "Oh, God!" on his lips, torn from his very heart.

One of the islands adjacent to Ibabao is Maripipi, whose inhabitants
were all baptized in one day in the following fashion. This island
is three leguas distant by sea from Ibabao, for which reason our
fathers could not visit it as often as the people desired. Seeing
this, its inhabitants all resolved to embark in their boats and come
themselves to seek holy baptism. The chiefs disembarked at Tinagon,
and, after them, all their followers with their wives and children,
all of them eagerly seeking the sacrament; but the father told them,
through a chief who acted as spokesman, that they must first learn
the doctrine, and that when they understood it he would baptize
them. The chief's only answer was to recite the doctrine, after which
he said that he had learned it from the others. With the evidence of
such faith and good disposition, the father baptized them all; and,
satisfied and joyful, they embarked again for their island.

Some months later, Father Miguel Gomez was sent from the college of
Sebu in order to ascertain the disposition of the inhabitants of the
eastern part of the island for receiving our holy faith; he found them
so well inclined that, erecting a church in a village called Catubig,
not far from the cape of Espiritu Santo, he converted many of that
district to Christianity; indeed, whole villages of that island came
to him, and even many from islands lying adjacent to it in that broad
sea. He was particularly astonished at one of the chiefs of Catubig,
a man who lived, under the natural law, without blame and had good
principles, one of which was to abominate polygamy. This chief was