Audiencia
to govern, and as governor and captain-general its president, one
Santiago de Vera." On the latter's arrival he finds Diego Ronquillo
governing because of Gonzalo's death. An Indian, in snuffing the
candles on the latter's catafalque, accidentally sets fire to some
rich draperies. The fire remains unnoticed and smoulders until, the
friars in attendance having left the church, it bursts into flame,
and the city is entirely burned, and the site of the fort, Santiago,
becomes a lake. Tomas Vimble (Candish), who captures the Santa Ana near
California in 1587, sets all its crew ashore, with the exception of
a priest whom he hangs. Alonso Sanchez's voyage to Spain and Rome as
procurator-general is influential in the suppression of the Audiencia
and the election of Gomez Perez Dasmarinas as governor. Sanchez
"wrote some treatises about the justification of the kings of Espana,
and their right of title to the Filipinas, which merit that time do
not bury them, although they exist in the archives of the Council
of the Indias. He seems a prophet in many of his statements in those
treatises." [35]

In Chapter II some of the leading events of the term of Gomez Perez
Dasmarinas are noted, and his unfortunate death. Such is his activity
and care "that he alone aggrandized that city more than had all
his predecessors, or his successors to this time." Negotiations
are opened with Japan, and the embassy from Camboja begging for
aid against Siam is received at Manila. "I believe," says Los Rios,
"that if he had done it, it would have been a great stroke of fortune,
and your Majesty would justly be lord of that kingdom and of Sian,
which is very wealthy. That is the only thing in which I believe that
Gomez Perez erred."

The succession of Luis Perez Dasmarinas to the government of the
Philippines, and the designs of the Chinese to capture the islands,
form the subject matter of Chapter III. By virtue of his father's
will and a royal decree empowering the latter to name his successor in
case of absence or death, Luis Perez takes over the command from Pedro
de Rojas, who has been elected by the city, with which "all the city
received great happiness, both because of what they owed the father,
and the love that they bore the son, of whose heroic virtues much
might be said." The Chinese send a vast fleet to Manila in charge of a
number of mandarins, in order to conquer Luzon, because they fear the
Spaniards, and "would much rather