Page:The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803 (Volume 11).djvu/157

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1599–1602]

ATTACK ON LUZON

153

the very purpose and object for which they had resolved upon their navigation, as is evident from the aforesaid. However they abandoned that purpose, upon being told by the negroes whom they had brought with them that Don Luis de Velazco, viceroy of Piru, had left Lima in person for the port of Callao to superintend the preparation of a large fleet, as he had been informed that pirates had passed and were along the coast. The enemy, fearful of this, and recalling the fact that, five years previously, Arricharse de Aquines,^[1] an Englishman, was defeated and captured by our men, after the greater part of his force was killed, decided to abandon their voyage to the Californias, and to head for these islands, with the intention of awaiting at the Ladrones the shipments of silver from Nueva España to Manila. With the said intent, they put to sea, but after sailing for several days, they encountered a storm, which brought them all nearly to the verge of destruction. One very dark and stormy night they lost sight of the almiranta, and never saw it again. Seeing himself without this vessel, the general chose as almiranta the fly-boat which he had remaining. This was a vessel of perhaps fifty toneladas burden, called "La Concordia," under command of a captain called Esias Delende. Then they resumed their course, with the

↑ A corrupt phonetic rendering of the name of Sir Richard Hawkins, son of the noted English freebooter Sir John Hawkins. The reference in the text is to the fight between Richard Hawkins and the Spanish admiral Beltran de Castro, off the coast of Peru, June 20-22, 1594; after a long and desperate contest, the English were forced to surrender. Hawkins was taken a prisoner to Spain, but afterward sent back to England; he died soon after 1620. See his work, Observations . . . in his Voyage into the South Sea (London, 1622; reprinted by Hakluyt Society, 1847, and again in 1877), pp. 182-225.

[1] A corrupt phonetic rendering of the name of Sir Richard Hawkins, son of the noted English freebooter Sir John Hawkins. The reference in the text is to the fight between Richard Hawkins and the Spanish admiral Beltran de Castro, off the coast of Peru, June 20-22, 1594; after a long and desperate contest, the English were forced to surrender. Hawkins was taken a prisoner to Spain, but afterward sent back to England; he died soon after 1620. See his work, Observations . . . in his Voyage into the South Sea (London, 1622; reprinted by Hakluyt Society, 1847, and again in 1877), pp. 182-225.

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