The Chinese Mandarins Look for Cavite

In March 1603, a ship from China came to Manila with 3 great mandarins in the service of their king.

In very curious chairs of ivory and fine gilded woods, borne on the shoulders of men, they went straight to the royal houses of the Audiencia, where the governor was awaiting them.

The mandarins went into a large, finely-decorated hall, where the governor received them standing, they making many bows and compliments to him after their fashion, and he replying to them after his.

They told him through the interpreters that their king had sent them, with a Chinaman whom they had with them in chains.

They wanted to see an island of gold, called Cabit, which he said belonged to no one. [162]

They said that this man had asked for ships to take this gold.

• If it were a lie, then they could punish him with his life.

The governor replied briefly, saying only that they were welcome, and appointed them quarters in 2 houses within the city which had been prepared for them, in which they and their men could lodge.

He said that the business would be discussed afterwards.

Thereupon they left the royal houses again, and at the doors mounted in their chairs on the shoulders of their servants, who were dressed in red, and were carried to their lodgings, where the governor ordered them to be supplied fully with whatever they needed during the days of their stay.

The coming of these mandarins seemed suspicious. Their purpose to be different from what they said, because it seemed a fiction for people, of so much understanding as the Chinese, to say that their king was sending them on this business.

They were told by local Chinese that these mandarins were coming to see the land and study its nature because the king of China wanted to attack with 100,000 men before the end of the year, to take the country.

The governor and the Audiencia thought that:

• they should be very careful in guarding the city
• these mandarins should be well treated, but they should not go out of the city

These mandarins were beginning to administer justice among the Sangleys. They were told not to do it.

• This made the mandarins were somewhat angry.

He asked them to treat of their business, and then to return to China quickly.

He warned the Spaniards not to show that they understood or were suspicious of anything other than what the mandarins had said.

The mandarins had another interview with the governor, and he told them more clearly,

The governer told the mandarins that:

• their coming was some joke
• he was astonished that their king would believe that Chinaman
• the country belonged to his Majesty.

The governor, to cut short the business, sent the mandarins, with their servants and the prisoner, to Cabit, which is the port, 2 leguas from the city.

There they were received with a great artillery salute, which was fired suddenly as they landed, at which they were very frightened and fearful.

When they had landed, they asked the prisoner if that was the island of which he had spoken to the king, and he replied that it was.

They asked him where the gold was, and he replied that everything there was gold and that he would make his statement good with the king. They asked him other questions and he always replied the same thing.

Everything was written down in the presence of some Spanish captains who were there with some confidential interpreters.

The mandarins ordered a basketful of earth to be taken from the ground, to take to the king of China, and then, having eaten and rested, they returned to Manila the same day, with the prisoner.

The interpreters said that the prisoner, when hard pressed by the mandarins to answer their questions.

He had said that there was much gold and wealth in the hands of the natives and Spaniards of Manila.

If they gave him a fleet with men, he offered, as a man who had been in Luzon and knew the country, to capture it and bring the ships back laden with gold and riches.

This, together with what some Chinamen had said at the beginning, seemed very much to have more meaning than the mandarins had implied, especially to Don Fray Miguel de Benavides, archbishop-elect of Manila, who knew the language.

Thereupon the archbishop and other religious warned the governor and the city, publicly and privately, to look to its defense, because they felt sure of the coming of the Chinese fleet against it shortly.

Then the governor dismissed the mandarins and embarked them on their ship, with their prisoner, after giving them some pieces of silver and other things with which they were pleased.

The people thought unreasonable that the Chinese would attack.

Yet the governor began covertly to:

• prepare ships and other things suitable for defense
• completed extensive repairs on:
  • the fort of Sanctiago at the point of the river
  • the fort he built on the inside a wall of great strength, with its wings, facing toward the parade ground.