The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898. Volume 27 of 55. Unknown

rendering the same service in the galleons which go to Castilla; they receive twelve pesos a month as pay, which has been assigned to them on account of the convenience of this service to your Majesty—although the said fathers would serve without pay, most willingly, in order to show better the affection with which they always engage in your Majesty’s service.

      The said religious order, to defend themselves from the flagrant injuries which the said archbishop was inflicting upon them—although they sought means, and those the mildest, for peace—could not avoid the appointment of a judge-conservator. He defended their rights, and compelled the archbishop to withdraw the acts [which he had issued against the Society], although the said judge-conservator allowed himself first to be excommunicated. Here there is occasion for making a long relation to your Majesty; but I will refrain from that, mindful that the said fathers will make a report to you. I made an offer to the archbishop to pay, out of my own purse, the four thousand ducados which the judge-conservator had sentenced him to pay for the crusade fund; and that I would take into my own charge his affairs, and the satisfactory settlement of them with the said judge-conservator. For this purpose I went to visit the archbishop at [the convent of] St. Francis, to which he had retired; and in the presence of the provincial and of another religious (an Augustinian, procurator for his order) I made him that offer—on the condition that he would detach himself from the religious orders, who, as I judged, were disturbing his mind with evil counsels. He would not accept my offer with that condition, preferring to remain [where he was] until affairs had gone through their proper course, and [thus] lowering himself from bad to worse. On the Friday before Christmas Eve, he came to my lodgings after evening prayer, and with much feeling asked that, since I would give a furlough the next day to the prisoners in the jail, I would also release him from the affliction that he was suffering, and adjust his affairs. He had been declared to be suspended [from his office] for four years. I was embarrassed at this, and doubted whether I could do him any service or accomplish anything for his aid. I called together the learned jurists and advocates of this royal Audiencia, that they might give me their opinions after having carefully studied the question whether I could demand that [relief for the archbishop] from the judge-conservator, and ask him to grant it for my sake. In this council were present the provincial and the rector of the Society of Jesus, the dean [of the cathedral] and other canonists, and the judge-conservator himself; and in it I asked this last, in virtue of the opinions rendered by the said lawyers, to restore the archbishop to his government, and to withdraw from him the pecuniary fines, which amounted to more than eight thousand pesos. I could not obtain a favorable answer then, nor indeed for more than a fortnight afterward—although I offered to the judge-conservator, and to his brothers and relatives, all the favors that I could show them not unworthily, in an official way. At this very time I am assigning a pension of two hundred pesos to a sister of his, a poor woman, the wife of Don Sebastian de Herbite—to whom your Majesty was pleased to grant, by one of your royal decrees, an encomienda of three hundred ducados. That decree has not yet been fulfilled, because he has not come from España; and this sum has been given to his wife to aid in her support until her husband shall return, and your Majesty’s command regarding him can be carried out. To another officer (a brother-in-law of the said judge-conservator), who has ability, and deserves reward for his own sake and for the services of his father, I gave the office of alcalde-mayor for Laguna de Vay. I assure your Majesty that the settlement [of this affair] cost me much care and effort, besides a thousand pesos in cash from my own purse which I spent for various matters. Peace having been concluded, and the archbishop having been absolved and freed from the penalties, he went to his own house in my coach; and I conveyed him to the holy church, and even to the choir—where I knelt, in order to set a good example to all, to recognize his authority; and I went to my own seat, to hear mass.

      We remained in entire harmony about a month and a half. But the royal chaplain of your Majesty for the seminary of Santa Potenciana rang the bell for the Gloria, on Holy Saturday, a quarter of an hour before the cathedral bells rang; and for this the archbishop—although he knew that that chaplain is in charge of your Majesty’s seminary, and only removable by you, and that he has no authority to wreak his anger on him, as he does on the others, his own clergy—commanded that two pairs of fetters should be placed on the chaplain, at the house of his fiscal. I was informed of this by a memorial from the directress of the said seminary, saying that it was left without chaplain and without mass. I sent by my secretary a message to the said archbishop, entreating that he would have the kindness to command that the chaplain be released, on account of the deficiency which his absence caused in the seminary; but he began to reprimand my secretary, as if the latter were the one to blame. For that reason, I sent by an adjutant an order to the said chaplain to come to me, to give his account of the affair; and within one hour he was sent back to his prison. Although the archbishop knew this, he left his house, going through the streets with a great disturbance, and attended with tapers, to consult with the religious orders whether he could excommunicate me; for he asserted that I had broken into his prison and taken away his prisoners. His fiscal hastened to tell him that the chaplain was already in his prison, at which the archbishop became quiet and returned to his house. He would not allow the chaplain to appeal to the bishop of Camarines; so the latter appealed for royal aid against fuerza—the archbishop having detained him six or eight days in prison because he would not pay the twelve pesos which he had been fined for having rung the bells for the Gloria too early. The fine was paid by a friend of his; and thereupon he was allowed to leave the prison.

      After that, the archdeacon, Don Francisco de Valdes (who had been presented for that dignity by Don Juan Cereso de Salamanca), finding that his health was impaired, and being offended at the abusive language that the archbishop used, whenever he felt so inclined, to him and the other members of the chapter, in the choir, handed to the prelate his resignation of the said dignity—as much because he could not fulfil its duties on account of his infirmities, as for the reason just stated. He also placed his resignation before the government. The archbishop replied that Don Francisco must aid in the church services until Holy Week and Easter were past. After that time had expired, the archdeacon again demanded that the archbishop accept his resignation, and allow him to go to his own house to recuperate; but the prelate refused to accept it. Don Francisco therefore memorialized the government, placing the said resignation in your Majesty’s hands; and it was accepted from him in your royal name, for the reasons that he alleged therein. For this cause he again became disquieted, and displayed his former bad temper. The juris-consults had affirmed that the said prebend was vacant, and that the government could present another person in Don Francisco’s place—as was done, by presenting Master Don Andres Arias Xiron, cura of La Hermitta (one of the best benefices outside the city walls), who was provisor of this archbishopric while the bishop of Cibú governed it, and has always given a good account of himself. The archbishop disliked Don Andres because he did hot resign his office as provisor before that prelate entered upon the government of his church, so that the latter might bestow that office on Don Pedro de Monroy—who caused so many disturbances in the time of Don Alfonso [sic] Faxardo, excommunicating the auditors, and constraining the Audiencia to exile him from the kingdoms. This man was made provisor when the archbishop began to govern, and he caused fresh disturbances when justice was executed on the artilleryman; and during the term of the judge-conservator the office of provisor was taken away from Don Pedro. As he left the city, through fear of the said judge-conservator—the ecclesiastical cabildo ruling [the archdiocese] and its dean being provisor—I gave orders at the city gates that the guards should not allow Don Pedro to enter them, to cause more commotions in the city. One day, at evening prayer, [his friends] brought him within the walls by a gate opening toward the sea, clad in the garb of a Franciscan, walking between two religious of that order; and the Dominicans received him into their house. The religious of both those orders, forcing their way through the guard and overpowering its commander, who was holding Don Pedro, smuggled in the latter through a little postern gate which the said Dominican fathers had.

      Through the hatred and ill-will which the said archbishop bears to the said Don Andres Xiron, he refused to accept the presentation of the latter [to the archdeanery]; and in regard to this subject he has had so many disputes with the Audiencia of your Majesty over the fuerza which he committed against the said Don Andres, that he went so far as to excommunicate Auditor Çapatta for having rendered the decision that it was fuerza. By this act he excommunicated the entire Audiencia, as Çapatta alone remained