Page:The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 (Volume 03).djvu/157

This page has been validated.
1569–1576]
CONQUEST OF LUZON.
153

fluenced by the prayers and warnings of the said father, and because he saw that there was reason therefor, he decided to sail out of the said river of Panay with all his fleet and army, to settle the island of Luzón.

Accompanied by the ships necessary for such an expedition, the governor set sail in the year one thousand five hundred and seventy-one, on the day after Easter, taking with him the father provincial, Fray Diego de Herrera, the master-of-camp and all the other captains, and two hundred and thirty arquebusiers. It was on the twentieth of the month that he set sail, and with fair weather he arrived at the island of Mindoro with his whole fleet of twenty-six or twenty-seven ships, large and small, including both our own and those of the natives who came with us. He remained on that island fifteen or sixteen days, and from thence set out for the island of Luzón, where we arrived a week later, at the bay which I have before mentioned and on which Manilla is situated. When the natives knew that the governor had come with his entire force to settle upon their lands, and when they saw him entering the bay, they set fire to their village of Manilla (which they had rebuilt after its burning, a year before, by the master-of-camp); and this time many of the houses were consumed and many remained standing, while the natives crossed to the opposite shore, to the village of Alcandora. The governor having arrived at the port of Manylla one day in the middle of the month of May, at two o'clock in the afternoon, Alcandora came out in a little boat to welcome him in peace and friendship, and speak to him on behalf of Raxa Solimán and Laya, begging that he would treat them with