31.  By the ship “Spiritu Santo,” now about to sail, I am sending to your Majesty’s officials in Mexico eighty quintals of cinnamon and forty-six quintals of wax.  For lack of room we have a quantity of cinnamon left over.  May our Lord preserve the sacred Catholic royal person of your Majesty with an increase of greater kingdoms and seigniories, according to the desire of your Majesty’s faithful subjects.  Manila, July 30, 1574.

Sacred Catholic Royal Majesty.  His loyal subject and faithful servant kisses the royal feet and hands of Your Majesty.

Guido de Lavezaris

[Addressed: “To his Majesty—­from the Islands of Lucon.”]

[Endorsed: “Guido de Lavezaris.  July 30, 1574.  Received August 15, 1575.  D.”]

Slavery Among the Natives

Sacred Royal Catholic Majesty: 

By one of your royal decrees, dated Madrid, May 18, 1572, your Majesty commands me to send you an account of the slaves that exist in these parts; and how, and with what justification, they are slaves.  What has been ascertained about them, to the present time, in this island is as follows: 

Some are slaves from their birth.  Their origin is not known, because their fathers, grandfathers, and ancestors were also slaves.  But although the reason for their slavery is not known, we may believe that it was for some one of the causes here named.  Some are captives in wars that different villages wage against each other, for certain injuries and acts of injustice, committed either recently or in ancient times.

Some are made captives in wars waged by villages that have neither treaty or commerce with them, but go only to rob, without any cause.  This is because a chief of any village, when he dies, imposes upon it a sort of mourning or grief; all his near relatives promise to eat no bread (which is rice), millet, or borona, and to wear no gold or any holiday dress, until they take some booty, or kill or capture men.  They would go to do this, wherever they could, and where there were no friends or powerful towns who could easily avenge themselves.  Some, especially those who pride themselves on valor, have a custom, after gathering their harvests, of going to rob, without any cause, towns with which they have no commerce or relationship; or whomsoever they meet on the sea, where—­a thing that causes wonder—­they exempt not even their relatives, if the latter are less powerful than they.  Some are enslaved by those who rob them for a very small matter—­as, for instance, a knife, a few sugar-canes, or a little rice.  Some are slaves because they bore testimony, or made statements about some one, which they could not prove.  Some are thus punished for committing some crime; or transgressing rules regarding some of their rites or ceremonies, or things forbidden among them, [100] or not coming quickly enough at the summons of some chief, or any other like thing; and if they do not have the wherewithal to pay, they are made slaves for it.