h was made with many
and competent witnesses, and was brought to Rome for the honor and
glory of God our Lord, and of his saints. In the latter part of
April in that year, 1601, when the galleon from Nueva Espana [15]
(in which came the ten fathers of our Society) reached the region of
those islands, bad weather shut them in with heavy fogs and rains,
so that, although in front and on both sides the land was not far
away, it could hardly be descried or recognized as such. As soon
as the weather cleared somewhat, they found themselves in a bay
hemmed in by shoals and rocks, with a rugged shore, upon which the
wind was driving them. In spite of their efforts they were unable to
gain the open sea, for the force of the wind was driving them out of
their course and upon the shoals. They then resolved to cast anchor,
hoping in this way to gain some safety for the vessel, and thus they
remained during an entire night in twenty-six brazas of water, exposed
to great danger, and in fear of being lost. On the next morning,
the auditor Don Antonio de Ribera (who went as commander and chief
of the vessel), seeing the great danger to which they were exposed,
and considering all human means weak and useless, hastened to entreat
the Divine favor; and, recalling those which our Lord had recently
bestowed upon certain persons through the mediation of our blessed
Father Ignatius, resolved upon this occasion to implore his favor and
assistance, and to beseech our Lord, through the merits of His servant,
to give them at ten o'clock that day a propitious wind whereby the
vessel might reach a place of safety. He added that he did not set
that time as a limitation to the divine Majesty, but because such
answer to their prayer would show that the mercy bestowed upon them
had come through the intercession of the blessed Father Ignatius,
to whom they made an offering of the vessel and its deliverance. This
petition and its conditions he called those to witness who were then
present in the stern-cabin.

The shallop was launched, to seek some refuge within the shelter of
the shore where the ship might be anchored, and the men were ordered
to give signals when they should find it. But while the shallop was
reconnoitering the shore, the galleon began to drift from its moorings
toward the shoals and the rocky coast, whither the force of the wind
was bearing it. Accordingly a cannon was fired, to call back the crew
of the shallop, so that it might acc