d accordingly it was resolved
to despatch father Fray Luis de San Joseph overland to Masingloc
under the pretext that he was going on affairs connected with the
spiritual administration, but his real purpose was to deliver the
messages to the minister of the said village, in order that the
latter might despatch them. The religious exposed himself to evident
danger of death; for the village of Agno, through which he could not
avoid passing, was almost entirely in insurrection, and because in
the stretch extending from the territory of Agno to that of Balcac,
it was necessary to take the rough sea in a small fishing boat which
carried no sail and only one oar with the religious himself at the
helm. At last he reached Masingloc, after conquering so great an
obstacle. Thence, not without the most serious dangers, the minister
sent the messages to Manila, arranging to have them carried by father
Fray Bernardino de la Concepcion, accompanied by three of the most
faithful chiefs. One of those chiefs was appointed master-of-camp
by the governor as a reward for so excellent a service, another,
sargento-mayor, and the third, captain of the militia of his village;
and they were exempted for life from paying tribute. And since the
father vicar of Lingayen despatched a second mail to Bolinao in
case that the first should fail, the father prior, Fray Juan de la
Madre de Dios, despatched the letters in a Chinese vessel which made
a way-station there, and was on its way from the island of Hermosa
to Manila. But while the army and naval fleet are being prepared in
that city, in order to take relief to Pangasinan, let us return to
our villages of Zambales, in order to see what is happening there,
and the dangers by which our religious were afflicted.

Sec. II

Continuation of the foregoing matter, with the declaration of what
happened to our religious in Masingloc, Cagayan, Agno, and Bolinao.

10. With the absence of the three said chiefs in Masingloc, the prior
found himself greatly troubled and persecuted, for those who favored
the rebellion, who had thitherto not dared to show their faces in
public, showed openly the most foul face of treason on the day of
St. Stephen. They threw the village into such consternation that
if God had not aided it, it would have been impossible to restore
it to its former quiet. It happened that, as some Indians had not
been at mass on either the eve or day of the nativity, the prior
meeting one