n from so good news, have praised
not a little the zeal and piety of your Reverences. They also exhort
you to continue in the future with the same fervor, especially in the
care of the mission destined for Japon. In the same manner they have
ordered that an urgent message be sent to the papal legate [_nuncio_]
of Espana to try to procure prompt despatches for the multiplication
of the ecclesiastical workers in those regions. His Holiness, in
particular, has willingly offered them his consolation with eight
thousand benedictions, etc.

_Cardinal Borxa_
_Francisco Ingoli_, secretary."

In order to conclude all this with the destruction of the calumny
that their opponents invented, in regard to the presence of Ours in
Philippinas being without fruit, we might quote certain authors who
have spoken in no uncertain voice in their praise. But we forbear,
except in the case of master Fray Thomas de Herrera, whom, as he
is worth a thousand men, it will be well to cite. In regard to the
aforesaid, he speaks in the following manner in his _Alphabeto_:

"These fathers, who were not slothful laborers, kindled with zeal
for the Catholic faith, and desirous for the salvation of souls,
crossed the seas in the year 1605, to remote regions of this world,
although at the eleventh hour." (Folio 181, volume i.)

"The discalced fathers of Hispania crossed the seas in the year 1605,
kindled by their zeal for the salvation of souls (and at times by
the shedding of their blood in the kingdoms of Japonia) to those
remote islands, as planters of the Church or as spreaders of its
tents." (Folio 127, volume ii.)

"The congregation of the discalced of Hispania, which extends its
vineyards even to the seas and to the Philippinas Islands, sent
laborers about the year 1588 to remote colonies, who preached the
gospel to the Japanese; and with their own blood, shed most profusely,
they either planted or watered the Church in various kingdoms,
and illumined the Augustinian order with a great number of glorious
martyrs." (Folio 485, _ibidem_.)

[A section devoted to the founding of the convent of Calatayud in
Aragon follows, and the narration of the work in the Philippines is
taken up again in the succeeding section, entitled:]

_Foundation of the convent of Bolinao_

The missionary religious in the Philippinas Islands had complete and
quiet peace, although those who were living in Espana, opposed by
miseries and misfortunes, were trying wit