following: "A total of
105,503 souls."

[61] This law (which is contained in the book entitled, "Concerning
the universities, and general and private studies in the Indias") is as
follows: "Permission is conceded for the cities of Santo Domingo in the
island of Espanola, Santa Fe in the new kingdom of Granada, Santiago de
Guatemala, Santiago de Chile, and Manila in the Filipinas Islands, to
have halls for study, and universities where courses may be pursued and
degrees given, for the time that has appeared advisable. For that we
have obtained briefs and bulls from the holy apostolic see, and we have
conceded those universities certain privileges and preeminences. We
order that what has been ordained for the said halls of study and
universities be kept, obeyed, and executed, without violating it
in any manner. Those universities which shall be limited in time,
shall present themselves before our royal Council of the Indias to
petition for an extension of time, where the advisable measures will
be taken. If no extension is granted, the teaching of those studies
shall cease and end; for so is our will." A note to this law in the
_Recopilacion_ reads in part as follows: "It must be borne in mind
that the universities, seminaries, conciliars, and other schools of
learning erected by public authority in the Indias were declared to
be under the royal patronage by a circular letter of June 11, 1792."

[62] See this law in VOL. XX, pp. 260, 261.

[63] Notwithstanding that San Antonio states that the brothers of
the hospital Order of St. John of God arrived in Manila at this
comparatively late date, they had been often asked for by both the
ecclesiastical estates. The following letter from the bishop of Nueva
Segovia is such a request. The original of this letter is in Archivo
general de Indias, with the pressmark: "Simancas; ecclesiastico;
Audiencia de Filipinas; cartas y expedientes de los obispos sufraganeos
de Manila, a saber, Nueva Segovia, Nueva Caceres, Santisimo Nombre de
Jesus o Cebu; anos de 1597 a 1698; est. 68, caj. 1, leg. 34." It would
appear from the endorsement on this letter that some brothers were
sent at this early date; although this instruction probably remained
a dead letter. (Cf. VOL. XVIII of this series, p. 114, dated 1618.)

"Sire:

"Your Majesty has a royal hospital here, which is one of the
most necessary and useful things in this land for the health and
treatment of the poor soldiers and of the