10 THE SUBANU. 
Subanu settlements, as well as the much larger island of Olutanga at 
the entrance to Dumankilas Bay, also in the possession of the Subanu. 
But Pigafetta did not tarry long at these places, as he was anxious to 
reach the Moluccas to obtain treasure and food. 
After leaving Maingdanao, where they laid hold of the brother of 
the king of that place, because he could pilot the ships of the fleet to 
the Moluccas, the captains changed their course to the southeast and 
arrived at Tidor in the Moluccas on Friday, November 8, 1521. None 
of the fleet returned to the Philippines. The voyage through the archi- 
pelagos of Sulu, Basilan, and Mindanao, governed as it was by the 
ever-present desire to reach the Moluccas, afforded little opportunity 
to study the islands or their inhabitants. The information is indefinite 
and subject to much corruption by the transcriptions of many authors 
from the original manuscripts of Pigafetta. Blair and Robertson have 
exhibited rare skill and the utmost patience and fidelity in present- 
ing an English translation and the original Italian, publishing them 
together and rigidly preserving the peculiarities of the original text. 
Pigafetta may have met some of the Subanu on the north coast of 
Mindanao when the fleet stopped near Dapitan, and again on the south 
coast, as the ships passed through Sibugay Bay, but the details will 
always remain a matter of conjecture whereby the value of the infor- 
mation is obscured. 
Professor Hirth, the Chinese scholar, thinks that the first observa- 
tions upon the Philippines are to be found in the work of Chao-Jukua, 
inspector of foreign shipping at Fu-Kien, between the years of 1210 and 
1240. In this work, the Chu-Fanchi or ‘Description of outside bar- 
barians,’’ he speaks of the islands of Po-ni (Borneo), Ma-i (Mindanao 
or Panay), and of the Pi-Sho-ye of Taiwan (Formosa). ‘This latter 
name sounds something like “Bisaya,’’ the native designation for 
Visaya. ‘The book mentions also the San-su or ‘Three Islands.’’ Book 
325 of the History of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1634) of China, as 
abstracted by Groeneveldt, refers to the kings (sultans) of Sulu as 
attacking Puni (Borneo) in 1638, and of the King of Sulu, Paduka 
(Japanese ‘‘lord’’) Pahala, as dying while on a visit to the Emperor of 
China at Te-Chou on the Grand Canal (Shantung Province). The 
Emperor then recognized his eldest son, Tumohan, as Sultan of Sulu, in 
1417. The brother of King Pahala, whowas named Suli, madea visit to 
China in 1421. From this and other extracts it appears that the Chinese 
knew of the Mohammedan settlements at Manila and Tondo prior to 
the arrival of the Spaniards, and must have carried on a lucrative trade 
with them; otherwise the pirate Li-Ma-Hong would not havemadesuch 
a desperate attempt to take Manila so soon after its foundation in 1571. 
Saleeby quotes Captain Forrest (English navigator, 1774-1775) as 
authority for the statement that the first Mohammedan priest arrived 
in Mindanao (Kutabatu valley) in a.p. 1475. Father Combes in 1645 
