2.-J2 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [VOL. 5° 



quest, ordered that the property of all Chinese be plundered, which the 

 soldiers did sincerely, knowing that treasures had been hoarded up by them. 

 The Spaniards sent a letter to the governor of Fuhkien, saying that the 

 Chinese had plotted a rebellion, but had failed in their plan, and that they had 

 already requested the relatives of the dead to depart with their children. The 

 governor, Hsu Hsio-ch'ii, promptly informed the Emperor of the revolt, who, 

 in dismay and affliction, issued a decree that justice be administered to the 

 instigators. 



In 1604 (second month) the Emperor held a council, and said, "Yi and his 

 accomplices have deceived the Imperial Court and bred quarrel beyond the 

 sea, in which they caused the death by sword of twenty thousand wealthy 

 merchants. This is a terrible disgrace to our country, and he must atone for 

 this crime with his life. His head, hung on a pole, shall be sent over the 

 sea to the chieftain of Luzon who dared kill the merchants." Accordingly 

 the officials passed sentence on the criminal and made known the Imperial 

 will to the governor, Hsio-ch'ii, who, in response, transmitted an official dis- 

 patch to Manila, censuring the perpetrators of the great slaughter and order- 

 ing the burial of the dead and the return of their wives and children. After 

 that time the Chinese gradually flocked back to Manila ; and the savages, 

 seeing profit in the commerce with China, did not oppose them. For a long 

 time they continued to gather again in the city. 



So runs the account of the "Ming shih." We notice that not the 

 slightest mention is made in it of an intended invasion of the Philip- 

 pines, which existed merely in the imaginations of the frightened 

 Spaniards. Even enlightened Spanish writers admit that the insur- 

 rection of the Chinese must be attributed to a panic on the part of 

 the Spaniards which drove the Chinese into revolt. Several other 

 Chinese books speak of this tremendous massacre. The local Chron- 

 icle of Hai-ch'eng states that eighty per cent of the Chinese slaugh- 

 tered at Manila on the occasion were natives of that city, and the 

 year in which it took place was one of dark foreboding, for in the 

 same month a hurricane swept over Hai-ch'eng, which caused the 

 river to rise so high that it flooded the country around and carried 

 away part of the wall and fortifications of the city and drowned 

 thousands of people, with their cattle and property. The Annals of 

 T'ung-an, a city not far from Amoy, likewise mention this hurri- 

 cane, and attribute it to the machinations of foreign priests at 

 Manila. As we find that the principal instigator of the massacre was, 

 to all appearances, the archbishop of Manila, Don Fray Miguel de 

 Benavides, the historian of T'ung-an certainly comes very near the 

 truth when he "smells a clergyman at the bottom of the affair." 1 



The history of the Chinese on the Philippines up to modern times 



1 G. Phillips, Early Spanish Trade with Chin Cheo {China Review, vol. xix, 

 P- 254)- 



