[Two and a Half Centuries of the Galleon Trade

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philippine studiesAteneo de Manila University Loyola Heights, Quezon City 1108 Philippines

Two and a Half Centuries of the Galleon Trade

Benito Legarda, Jr.

Philippine Studiesvol. 3, no. 4 (1955): 345372Copyright Ateneo de Manila University

Philippine Studies is published by the Ateneo de Manila

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Two and a Half Centuriesof the Qalleon Trade"BENlTO LSGARDA, JR.

T E recorded history of the commerce of the Philippinesas a Spanish colony can be dated from Legaspi's settle-ment in 1565. But firm though his foothold in Cebu 'might be, i t could be of little value to Spain unless afeasible return route across the Pacific to Mexico was found.His was the fifth expedition to reach the East Indies from theside of the Americas; not a single return voyage had yet beenmade.On the first of June 1565, the San Pahlo, under the com-mand of Legaspi's grandson, Felipe de Salcedo, sailed from

Cebu. The guiding spirit on this voyage was the navigator-friar, Andds de Urdaneta, who had been a sailor in Loaysa'sill-fated venture four decades previously. The Sun Pabloclimbed north, and between thirty-seven and thirty-nine de-grees encountered the westerlies that carried her to the Amer-ican coast. She arrived the eighth of September a t Acapulco,which Urdaneta had picked as the eastern terminus of thevoyage because of its magnificent harbor. The route pioneeredby Urdaneta came to be the approximate route followed by theManila-Acapulco vessels jn the next two centuries and a half.The main objective of the voyage had been accomplished. Al-

* This article is a condensation of a chapter in Mr. Legarda'sPh.D. dissertation, submitted to the Department of Economics of Har-vard University.


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346 PHILIPPINE STUDIES

most as important from a commercial standpoint was the factthat the Sun Pablo carried a small cargo of cinnamon pur-chased in Mindanao for the royal account. This was the be-ginning of Philippine trade with New Spain.'

Beginnings of the China TradeDuring their early years in the PhiIippines, the Spaniards

expended no little effort in investigating its trading possibili-ties, bvt they seem to have been disappointed. Cloves, thewealth of the Moluccas, did not grow there, although they didfind cinnamon in Mindanao, and it made up their first cargoesto the New World. In 1568 the San Pablo, on her secondvoyage, carried 15,000 pounds of cinnamon for the King, be-sides 25,000 pounds for private individuals; unfortunately, shewas lost in the Ladrones-the first disaster in the annals of thePhilippine-Mexican trade. In 1569, Legaspi lamented to theviceroy in Mexico that the only article of profit which couldbe gotten from the Philippines was cinnamon.?

However, Moro vessels had appeared a t Cebu laden withporcelain and silks from the north which were obviously not ofnative origin. This may have been the Spaniards' first intima-tion of the possibility of trade with China. The Moro tradersseem to have been the initial trading intermediaries with thenewcomers and provided them with their first export cargoes.

In 1570 the Spaniards conquered Manila, and the follow-ing year Legaspi transferred his headquarters there. In 1572the old udelantado died, but by this time the foundations ofSpanish power had been solidly established in the Philippines.

In the course of consolidating Spain's hold on the country,some of Legaspi's men under Admiral Juan Pablo Carri6n hadoccasion to succor the crew of a Chinese junk which was foundsinking in the waters off Mindoro. To this incident is at-tributed the opening of a new page in the history of Philippinecommerce, the beginning of direct trading connections withChina. The Chinese told their countrymen about their rescueby the Spaniards, and they returned to Manila in 1572 in com-pany with other traders irom the Celestial Ern~ire.~


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G A LL E ON T R A D E 347Whether this relation of cause and effect is strictly ac-curate is open to some doubt, since the Chinese had been trad-

ing with the Philippines long before the arrival of the Span-i a r d ~ . ~ owever, it is not incorrect to say that this was thefirst direct trading contact of the Spaniards with the Chinesein the Philippines. It was a trading relationship that was mu-tually profitable to both the Spaniards and the Chinese. Itwas also to fix the course of the colony's economic life forthe nest two centuries, and to leave its legacy down to thepresent in the form of a large Chlnese community of traderswhich has a virtual monopoly of the country's retail and muchof its wholesale business.

Three junks came to Manila in 1572 and five to otherparts of the country. A half dozen called a t Manila in 1574and twelve to fifteen in 1575. By the following year the tradewas firmly established and by 1580 forty or fifty junks cameannually. Merchants from Mexico, attracted by the commer-'cia1 prospects, began to establish themselves in the Philippinesand to provide some of the professional direction that wasneeded in the conduct of the busines~.~

Ships from other countries of Asia also came, and a Fran-ciscan friar in the seventeenth century mentions the diversityof nationalities which was to be found in Manila. Althoughthe ports of the Spanish colonies were not open to foreign ships,commerce with neighboring Asian countries was countenancedby the early governors of the Philippines and later confirmedby royal decree. European vessels sometimes entered Manilaflying the flag of some Asian nation."

The goods brought by these traders formed the eastwardcargoes of the galleons. They included a wide assortment: Per-sian rugs; fine cottons from India; objects made of ivory, jasper,jade, copper and brass; spices, musk, borax, lead and camphor;porcelain and earthenware; pearls and precious stones; japannedboxes and inlaid escritoires and furniture. Sometimes slaveswere carried despite official restrictions on this sort of traffic.Philippine products that figured in the trade were gold dust,wax, cordage, blankets and sail cloth from Ilocos, lampotes or


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348 P H I L I P P I N E S T U D I E Sgauze from Cebu, cotton stockings from Manila, bed coverletsfrom Lubang and Ilocos, petticoats and hammocks from Ilocos,linen sheets, tablecloths and bed can~pies.~

Most important of all, however, were silk goods fromChina. "Silks in every stage of manufacture and of every va-riety of weave and pattern formed the most valuable part oftheir cargoes," writes S c h ~ r z . ~ he Chinese were therefore themost important among all the foreigners whose ships convergedon sixteenth-century Manila. They were, at least in the be-ginning, welcomed by the Spanish authorities, who seemed an-xious to maintain friendly relations with the Chinese empire.There was no lack of schemes for invading and conquering Chi-na among the more impetuous Spanish officials like GovernorSande, schemes which called for ridiculously small militaryforces ranging from sixty to six thousand men. Philip I1 putan end to these in 1586 by ordering the governor to desistfrom such projects and to cultivate the friendship of the Chinesei n ~ t e a d . ~

Pancada and FeriaIn the early years, trade between the Chinese and Mani-lans was virtually unrestricted. However, the Spaniards musthave discovered that their soldierly abilities and religious fer-vor were no match for the commercial astuteness of the Chi-nese, and in 1586 a committee of citizens petitioned the Coun-cil of the Indies that purchase from Chinese and other foreign

vessels should take some form of wholesale agreement. By1589, when Philip I1 promulgated a royal decree sanctioningthe arra~gement, he pancada, a system of wholesale bargain-ning, had already been adopted a t Manila. The governor andthe ayuntamiento (municipal government) appointed two orthree suitable persons, who negotiated with representatives ofthe Chinese importers the prices to be paid for the cargo ofeach incoming junk. To prevent corruption, the members ofthis committee could not hold their position a second year, anda rigid inspection of incoming junks was designed to makeevasion difficult.


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G A LL E ON T R A D E 349Among the reasons advanced for this system were that it

would facilitate the problem of interpretation; that i t wouldmake it easier to oversee and regulate the trade; that it wouldcut down haggling and enable the Manilans to buy from theChinese on more favorable terms; that it would lessen the out-flow of silver from the country; and that it would shorten theduration of the stay of the numerous Chinese who came yearlywith the junks and added to the already considerable Chinesepopulation in the city.

There were of course evasions of the system by privatemerchants, either by smuggling, transshipments a t sea, pur-chasing before the official prices were fixed (generally a lengthyprocess), or after the conclusion of the pancada and the com-pletion of the galleon's cargo for that year, which meant awillingness to store the goods and ship them the followingyear.

The pancada proved unfeasible in the long run. As theSpaniards gained more experience their self-confidence in deal-ing with the Chinese returned. A relaxation of the system wasnoted early in the seventeenth century and it probably ceasedby the third quarter of the same century. The feria or faircame to replace the pancada as the common mode of transact-ing business between the Chinese and the Manila traders. Itis to be noted that the Japanese, who traded by barter andtherefore did not take any silver away, and the Portuguese,who resented the restrictions of the system, were not subjectedto it.lo

The silver received by the Chinese in such large amountswas taken back to China, and so wide was its fame and cir-culation that until the beginning of the present century "dol-lars mex" or Mexican silver pesos were the most acceptablestandard of value and medium of exchange in the Far East.

The Chinese came not only as traders but also as work-men and artisans, and by their skill and industry soon madethemselves indispensable to the Spanish authorities. Manila


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350 PHILIPPINE STUDIESwas not only a trading center but also a military outpost, themost distant one in the far-flung Spanish empire, being a thirdof the way around the world and about three months' sail fromthe nearest point of succor, Mexico. Fortifications had to beconstructed, ships built, metal worked and supplies for troopsprovided. Chinese artisans and laborers played a part in allthese activities. The clergy were also desirous of seeing theChinese come in, hoping to make many conversions amongthem. I t was said of the Chinese that "they were abused bythe natives and were protected by the authorities to whom theyrendered services and whom thby attempted to please in everyway."ll

In order to keep the Chinese in a place where they couldbe observed and controlled, Governor Ronquillo in the 1580'sbuilt the Parian across the river from old Manila. This wasthe Chinatown of those times; Chinese retailers and artisansresided arid kept their shops there. When the number of Chi-nese kept increasing, the Parian was transferred to what is nowthe general vicinity of Plaza Lawton.12

Economic convenience and religious hopes were probablynot the sole reasons that prompted the Spanish officials in thePhilippines to permit the large-scale immigration of Chinese.Official venality was also partly responsible. And despite theexistence of laws designed to safeguard their rights, the Chi-nese were often subjected to the exactions of mulcting bureau-crats. Those who wished to remain in the Philippines afterthe junk.: had gone home were required to pay eight pesos fora license, besides twelve ~ e a l e s s house tax and five reales astribute (there were eight reales to the peso). This presenteda fine opportunity to line private pockets with public money,and functionaries delegated to collect these taxes often de-manded payment of the license fee several times in one yearon the pretext that renewal of the license was necessary. TheChinese countered by resorting to wholesale bribery, and thisaggravated the atmosphere of deceit and suspicion that wasgrowing in Manila.I3

For the Spanish authorities now began to be alarmed atthe situation that confronted them. One of the consequences


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GALLEON TRADE 351of the genius of men like Legaspi, Salcedo and Urdaneta wasthat the country had been subjugated with a minimum of mili-tary force. The Spanish military establishment in the Phil-ippines was therefore not very large. In 1590, for example,the standing army organized for the colony's defence added upto the ludicrously low total of four hundred men. On theother hand, there were ten thousand Chinese in Manila in1586, and ten years later twelve thousand remained in the cityafter a like number had been deported to the land of theirbirth by Morga. In 1602, the number of Chinese in Manilareached thirty thousand. And despite the fact that most ofthem perished in a sanguinary uprising in 1603, trade withChina flourished the following year, and in 1605 there wereagain six thousand Chinese in the Parian.14

The Apogee of the TradeIn the meantime, however, in the approximately three

decades since Sino-Spanish trade had begun in Manila, thegalleon trade had attained its height and the city was seeingits most glorious days. This is the period of Philippine his-tory that has been called its Golden Age by an eminenthistorian.15

Manila had discovered that its geographical position wasthe best possible one for drawing together Chinese and Japanesesilk from the north, Moluccan spices from the south, and Indiancottons and Cambodian ivory from the west, and channelingthem toward the seemingly limitless markets of the argenti-ferous Spanish colonies in the New World. The profits of thegalleon trade were fantastic, and not only merchants but manyother p e op l ~ f f i c i a l s , oldiers, clergymen-took part in thetrade. "If the Manileiios lived dangerously in the midst of somany perils, they also lived luxuriously and recklessly, and itwas the bountiful returns from the annual voyage of the ManilaGalleon that provided the means for their lavish way of life."16

Some idea of the value of shipments on the galleon can behad from that of the Santa Ana, captured by the Englishprivateer Thomas Cavendish off the Mexican coast in 1587.


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352 IJHILZPPINE STUDIESThe total sale value of this ship's cargo, it is estimated, wouldhave been over two million pesos in the Mexican market, andrepresented an original investment a t Manila of over one mil-lion pesos. The cargo included gold, silks, cotton goods, muskand civet, and pearls.17

The profits of the galleon trade made possible the firstobras pias, or bequests to pious congregations, which in turnfinanced much of the later galleon trade. They made possiblethe expeditious construction of the city walls and buildings.They also made possible the establishment of educational andcharitable institutions.

Restrictions on the TradeBut even as Manila was enjoying this golden age of the

Galleon trade, the forces were set in motion which were toreduce it and to inaugurate a new era in so doing.No duties were levied on foreign trade in the Philippinesduring the first few years of Spanish rule, although in theorythe medieval almojarifazgo, an ad valorem tax on imports andexports extended by the Laws of the Indies to the colonies,should have been applied from the start. This was evidentlyin order to encourage the growth of foreign trade, especiallythat with China. However, in 1582, during the term of Gover-nor Gonzalo Ronquillo de Peiialosa, a three-percent duty waslevied on merchandise imports and exports by both Spanishand Chinese. Total collections from this tax ranged from fortythousand to sixty thousand pesos annually. In 1591 a two-percent export tax was imposed on the galleon trade by Gover-nor G6mez P6rez Dasmariiias to finance the construction ofManila's walls. Upon completion of the walls six years latera royal decree forbade the continuation of this impost.

Most of the duties on the galleon trade, however, werecollected a t the Mexican terminus, due to the unpopularity ofduties of any sort a t Manila. At first a specific duty of twelvepesos per Spanish ton was levied on cargoes that arrived atAcapulco. In 1556 by an ordinance of Viceroy Villamanriquethis was raised to forty-five pesos. In 1591 the duty waschanged by royal decree to an ad valorem rate of ten percent.I8


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GALLEON TRAD E 355However unpopular these imposts may have been, they

do not seem to have infringed seriously on the galleon trade,and it would be inaccurate to classify them as restrictions ofthe same order as those provided by later dispositions, sincethey represented what might be termed merely a normalizationof customs procedure. Of a different and more serious ten-dency was the series of restrictive decrees that began in 1582and culminated in the momentous decree of 1593.

In the beginning, Peru bade fair to surpass Mexico asan outlet for the goods of the Orient. The luxury, extrava-gance and ostentation of the Limeiios of that period wereproverbial. A decree of April 14, 1579 gave royal sanction tothe Chinese-Philippine trade with Mexico, Peru, Guatemala andthe Spanish Main. The first ships were sent to Callao inGovernor Ronquillo's time, one in 1581 and a second the fol-lowing year. Both turned out to be very lucrative specula-tions, anc! both the Manilans and the Peruvians looked for-ward to a bright future for their trade.

However, a royal order of 1582 cut this commerce off a t itsvery inception and caused the suspension of direct voyagesfrom Manila to Callao. The reason was that the goods broughtby the Manila ships competed with those coming from Spainvia Porto Rello. Laws protecting the Spanish silk industry,among them a decree of Charles V in 1523, had been passedprior t o the occupation of the Philippines. This protection wasone of the cardinal principles of Spain's commercial policy.Silks from Asia introduced into the American market wereunderselling the Andalusian silks which had theretofore en-joyed a monopoly in the Spanish possessions in the New World.The flow of Oriental silks, therefcre, had to be contained inorder to safeguard the interests of the domestic manufacturers.The royal government was also perturbed by the heavy drain ofsilver from its American col~nies.'~

A series of laws passed in 1591, 1592, 1593, 1595 and 1604prohibited trade between Peru, Guatemala, Tierra Firme, orany other part of the Spanish West Indies, and China or thePhilippines; Mexico was the sole exception to this rule. Gover-nor Luis Pdrez Dasmariiias attempted to send a ship to Panama


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354 PHILIPPINE' S T U D I E Sto make contact with Peruvian traders, but without success.The penalties for infraction of these regulations were extremelysevere, which showed how deeply concerned the Spanish govern-ment was about protecting its domestic industry and keepingits precious metals within the empire.

There was, however. a temporary legal loophole. It wasstill possible for the Peruvians to procure the silks from Aca-pulco, and the Manila merchants welcomed their presence therebecause they always came well supplied with silver, and theirbidding in competition with the Mexicans contributed to raisethe price of the galleons' cargoes. In 1585, however, ViceroyVillamanrique levied export duties on shipments to Peru; in1587 Philip I1 issued a ban on trade in foreign goods betweenthe two viceroyalties; in 1589 Villamanrique suspended the traf-fic temporarily, alleging local reasons. Philip 11's order wasrepeated in 1593 and twice in 1599; this definitely closed thisparticular legal loophole that permitted Oriental imports intoPeru.

However, permission was given for two ships to carry toPeru 200.000 ducats' worth of purely Mexican products. Thisprovided still another means for circumventing the law, for thelimitation proved impossible of enforcement. The only otherway that occurred to the Spaniards of carrying out the objec-tives of the original decree was the rather drastic one of com-pletely suppressing all trade between Mexico and Peru. Thiswas decreed in 1604. Sonle index of the fidelity with whichthis decree was observed may be gleaned from the fact that ithad to be reissued in 1609, 1620, 1634, 1636 and 1706. I t waseven necessary to prohibit imports of Chinese goods into Peruunder any pretext whatever, whether religious or charitable.Thus was a lucrative market shut off by law to the commerce ofthe Manila galleons.'"

There remained, however, the Viceroyalty of New Spain(Mexico), also a flourishir~g utlet for silks, manufactured goodsand other products of the East. The merchants of Cddiz andSeville could not regard with equanimity the inroads made intotheir market there, formerly an exclusive preserve, any morethan they had in the case of Peru. But to protect their inter-


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G A L L E O N T R A D E 355ests the Crown could not resort to sweeping prohibitions, asi t had in the case of the southern Viceroyalty. The Philippineswas ruled from Mexico and could not be cut off from it adminis-tratively. Furthermore it was the most remote of Spain's colo-nial outposts, being separated from the court of Madrid by thewhole width of the Atlantic, the North American continent, andthe Pacific. It was difficult t,o send out administrators, officials,soldiers and colonists; and the profits from the galleon trade,in which the entire Spanish community in the Philippines couldparticipate, was thc cnly lure which could induce a sufficientnumber of Spaniards to go to the distant archipelago and helpto carry out the policies of the Crown.

Philip 11, therefore, mas fzced with two alternatives: pro-hibit the galleon trade and relinquish the Philippines, or retain*the Philippines but keep the galleon trade within certain limits.The Andalusian interests, of course, would have been only tooglad to see the king adopt the first alternative, and all through-out the history of the galleon trade there were intermittentproposals in Spain to a badon the Philippines, as in 1586, 1604,1621 and in the later 1760's.

Reasons of state, however, precluded such an alternative.First, the Philippines in the heyday of Spanish power was Spain'sbridgehead in the Orient, the base from which her great cap-tains could sally forth on their various expeditions about theFar East. When Spain's power declined, it became a beleaguer-ed bastion and a defensive outpost for the western shores ofSpanish America against adversaries who might issue forthfrom Far Eastern waters. Secondly, Spain's national pridecould not brook the idea of abandoning the far-off colony topossible capture by her enemies, the Dutch and the English.Thirdly, the religious motive was a strong factor in Spanishcolonial policy. The Church always supported the retentionof the colony not only to protect the predominantly Catholicpopulation but also because the Philippines was the almac6nde la f6 - he storehouse and shcwcase of the Faith - romwhich issued forth missionaries bent on the conversion ofneighboring lands. Fourthly, the Crown enunciated in regardof the Philippines the quixotic principle, characteristically Span-


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356 PHI1,IPPINE STUDIESish, that "a king holds some states because he needs them, andothers because they need h h . " Finally, i t was said that themonarchs had a weakness for the city which they styled lainsigne, muy noble y siempre leal ciudad de Manila- he illus-trious, most noble and ever loyal city of Manila.2'

For these reasons it was decided to protect the Andalusianinterests not by an absolute prohibition on Oriental importsbut by a limitation of the trade. This gave rise to one of themost important decrees in the history of the Manila galleontrade, tkat of January 11, 1593. By this decree a permiso, or akind of export quota, was established. The annual value of thocargo which could be sent from Manila to Acapulco was limitedto 250,000 pesos; the upper limit on the return remittance fromMexico was set at 500,000 pesos. The number of vessels thatmight cross yearly was limited to two, not to exceed 300 tonseach. A third vessel was to be kept a t Acapulco as a reserveship. No subject in the Spanish-American colonies was per-mitted to trade with the Orient. This was a privilege reservedto the citizens of Manila, who, however, could not undertaketrading voyages to other Asian countries themselves but hadto await the coming of ships of those nations to Manila Bay.The reason for this was apparently a military one; the Spanishauthorities had no desire to see the few Spaniards then stationedin the Philippines scattering themselves all over the East a t atime when their services might be momentarily required to repelinvasions or to quell uprisings. Manilans also could not consigntheir cargoes to merchants in Mexico, in order not to contra-vene the royal prohibition forbidding trade between residentsin Spanish America and the East; this necessitated the send-ing of supercargoes on the galleons and the holding of an an-nual fair a t Acapulco during which the goods might be disposedof to Spanish-American buyer^.^'

The allowance of 500,000 pesos for the return remittancedid not quite represent an officially permissible profit marginof one hundred percent, as the situado or subsidy sent to Ma-nila from Mexico to meet the operating expenses of the insularadministration was included in the figure. The tribute exact-ed from the Filipinos was, especially in the early days, collected


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GALLEON TRADE 357in kind and stored in government warehouses in Manila.These were then exchanged for Oriental goods when foreigntraders put into port, and the merchandise thus acquired wasshipped for the royal account to Acapulco, where the returnson the sale of these goods and the proceeds of the almojarifazgoa t Acapulco made up part of the situado. When these returnsdid not suffice to cover the administrative expenses of thePhilippine establishment, a sum equal to the deficiency wasadded to complete the situado. This did not constitute an actof special generosity on the part of the viceregal treasury, butwas a common practice in the fiscal system of the Spanishcolonial empire. There was no uniformity in the value of thesituado, although it was fixed a t 140,000 pesos in 1700; theactual amount responded to the needs of the moment.23

Had the decree of 1593 been scrupulously observed whenit was promulgated, consternation and disorder would haveseized the commerce of Manila. However, historians seem tobe agreed that this was not the case, and the decree was ig-nored for years. The available testimony points to the year1605 as the start of the period of restrictions.

The Boleta Sys t emIn view of the limits established by the permiso it becamenecessary to regulate and assign cargo space in the galleons,

and to allot rights to such space to those who wished to make' shipments to Acapulco. For this purpose an elaborate systemwhich might be labelled the boleta system was instituted. A

committee appointed for the purpose measured the ship's holdand divided the volume of space into equal parts correspond-ing to a bale, or fardo, of definite and uniform size. Eachbale was in turn subdivided into four packages, or piezas. Onthe earlier galleons these packages averaged 2% feet in length,2 feet in width and 10 inches in depth; but uniformity in thesedimensions was of course not absolute. The cargo space wasofficially divided into four thousand shares, each correspondingto a pieza, although in practice this was seldom adhered to.

The right to ship on the galleon was represented by aboleta or ticket - n modem usage tantamount to an export


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358 PHILIP PINE STUD IESlicense- hich corresponded to one pieza. A person's rightto lading space was therefore represented in terms of boletus.On the basis of the officially permitted return of 500,000 pesosand of the officially prescribed division into four thousandpiezas (and therefore four thousand bole tas ) , the value repres-ented by a boleta should have been 125 pesos a t Manila. Al-though this was, again, seldom the case, the figure of 135pesos provided a convegient criterion for the assessment ofduties and the making up of statistical returns. In practice,the value of a boleta was much greater - t one time as highas 1500 or 2000 pesos - nd it was sometimes further sub-divided into thirds, sixths or other fractions if the value of theentire boleta was especially high.

The decree of 1593 provided that "all the citizens ofthose islands, in proportion to their wealth, in order thateveryone may share in the advantage and profit of this traf-fic," were eligible to be boleteros. This was based on the theo-ry that the merchant class and the body of citizens were iden-tical, hence the references to the ciudad y comercio - ity andcommerce - s if they were synonymous; it assumed, as aconsequence, that every boletero was a galleon trader whomade actual use of his license to ship. In the early days ofthe trade this was not far from the truth; later on, however,it ceased to correspond to the facts.

The distribution of boletas in the early days of the tradeseems to have been the exclusive prerogative of the governorwithout the intervention of any other element in the colony.A decree of Philip I11 in 1604, however, directed him to sharehis power with an ex-officio committee representing the prin-cipal interests of the community: the royal government, theChurch and the "city and commerce." This junta de reparti-miento, or board of distribution, included the governor, thesenior judge of the audiencia (supreme court), the fiscal orattorney-general, two regidores or members of the city coun-cil, and the archbishop of Manila.

When the identity between city and commerce began tobreak down, it was found that the merchants were being allot-


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G A LL EO N T R A D Eted too little space on the galleon, whereas others who couldnot trade on their own account continued to be boleteros.Trading in boletus, therefore, arose between the merchants,or those who could trade on their own account but did nothave sufficient lading space, and other boleteros, who hadlading space but not the lnezns with which to trade. A law of1620 reproached the governor for granting boletas to the latterkind of people, and a decree of 1638 prohibited the transferof boletas without the sanction of the junta. Those unableto make use of their boletas were required to turn them in tothe junta which would make them available to some shipperin need of more cargo space and indemnify the original holdera t the assessed value of the boletas for that year. The regula-tions of 1734 confirmed the principle of the decree of 1638,but made an exception in favor of "the poor and widows,"who might sell their boletas outright to merchants.

The distinction between "city" and "commerce" was givenlegal form in 1769 when the consulado, composed of merchants,was instituted as the governing body of the trade a t Manila,including among its functions that of assigning boletas, sub-ject to the control of the governor. Its membership consistedof a prior, two consules and four deputies.**

Viana'a Cri t ique of the Sys temFrancisco Leandro de Viana, former attorney-general for

the Philippines, singled out the boleta system as the root ofall evil in the galleon trade, in a report which he made in 1780to the Council of the in die^.'^ Viana was strongly in favorof putting the trade in the hands of merchants and lookedwith a jaundiced eye on all other boleteros. He contendedthat the system of distributing bolctas was founded on conflict-ing principles. On the one hand the encouragement of tradewas aimed at by trying to facilitate the issuance of boletas tomerchants; on the other hand, the issuance of boletas to theneedy opened a loophole by which merchants were deprivedof what should rightfully have been theirs, forcing them toacquire boletas from other boleteros at a premium. He advo-cated the assignment of boletas only to bona fide merchants


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360 PHILIPPINE STUDIESand deplored the despotism, corruption and greed of the gov-ernors, the intnisions of the clergy, the military and the bur-eaucracy, and the inclusion of widows, orphans and the pooramong the boleteros.

As a remedy Viana proposed that the churches, piousfoundations, widows, orphans, soldiers and city councilorsshould not be deprived of the distribution quota "with whichit has been customary t o help them," but that they be givenin money the same amount they would have received by thesale or conveyance of their boletas. This payment would beguaranteed by the cuerpo de comercio - he body merchant-who could then assign all boletas to qualified individuals. Thisfinancial aid, however, was not to be perpetual, but was to lastonly until such time as the beneficiaries could amass a suffi-cient endowment; this time limit he placed a t ten years, afterwhich the merchants could ship in their own vessels or buyboletas directly from the government. The individuals consi-dered as qualified boleteros were natives of the Philippines 25years of age or over who were heads of families or households,who were engaged in some branch of commerce, and who hadeight or ten thousand pesos of their own capital; and Spaniardsof equal wealth with a t least ten years' residence in the Phil-i p p i n e ~ . ~ ~

Viana adds the following recommendation, which strikesa new note amid the maneuvering and jockeying that charac-terized the galleon trade:

The division [of the lading space] of the vessel among enrolledmerchants should be made in proportion to the wealth of each one,to the length of residence, to the occupations they may have exer-cised or still exercise, to the merit of the aid which they may havegiven to Your Majesty, and principally to those who may distinguishthemselvas in developing with their cam.tal agriculture, manufac-tures and industry; observing anbong these their respective meritsso that they may be rewarded with boletas according to the greateror less capital invested in said fields.27 [Italics supplied]Here he seems to be proposing a scheme of what would

nowadays be called export certificates as a prize to those whoinvested in productive enterprise and economic development.


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GALLEONTRADE 361It is noteworthy as one of the few instances in which someonethought of linking the galleon trade with the development ofthe country's internal resources. There is no record, however,that Viana's proposed reforms on this point were ever adopted,and the boleta system seems to have persisted to the end inabout the same state as it was with the establishment of theconsulado.

Irregzclarities and EvasionsIt is clear enough from the Laws of the Indies what the

galleon trade should have been; but it should be noted thatits history is made up in large measure of the various ways inwhich the laws were evaded. The restrictions on the numberof piezas that might be carried, the value of the cargoes thatmight be loaded, and the tonnage of the galleons that mightbe used. were ignored with cynical consistency.

Although the officially permissible number of piezas wasfour thousand, there were galleons that carried six or seventhousand, and one, the Sun Josb, sank with twelve thousandin her hold. The Rosario of the mid-eighteenth century hadspace for 18,667 piezas. The tonnage limits were also not en-forced. Although the decree of 1593 prescribed the maximumtonnage of a Manila galleon as 300 tons, there wen ships of700 tons in the service and even thousand-tonners before 1614.In 1718 the galleons used in the trade were of 612, 900, and1000 tons. The Rosario, in service from 1746 to 1761, was of1710 tons, and the Santkima Trinidad, captured by the Eng-lish in 1762 and taken as a war prize to Plymouth, had a ton-nage of 2000.28

The most flagrant evasions, however, and those whichwere most provoking to the mercantile interests of CBdiz andSeville, came in the matter of limitations on the value of thecargo. As has been seen, the original permiso of 1593, reaffirm-ed in 1604 and 1619, prescribed an outward cargo of no morethan 250,000 pesos and a return of no more than 500,000.What the values of the actual cargoes were is of course noteasy to determine from official figures due to the universal


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362 PIIILIPP1,VE STUDIESinterest a t Manila to keep the truth from the prying eyes ofthe Andalusian merchants. However, estimates are availablefrom officials conversant with the trade, and from the valueof the cargo on vessels captured by the English. I t was calcu-lated that in 1601 the Santo Tomcis carried two million pesosover the permiso. In 1688 the attorney-general at Manila de-clared that the galleons usually returned a t least two millionpesos. The San Francisco Xavier was said to have brought2,070,000 pesos ten years later, and the Rosario an equalamount the following year. The permiso was raised to 300,000pesos outward (600,000 inward) in 1702; and again in 1734to 500,000 outward and 1,000,000 inward; but mercantile prac-tice continued to run ahead of official theory. When Ansoncaptured the Nuestra Seiiora de Covadonga off Samar in 1743as it was coming in from Mexico, the prize was worth abouta million and a halfThe profits from a trade which was rife with illegal prac-tices must have been quite high. Although not as high as thefive hundred percent that Manila's enemies alleged, nor as lowas the five or ten percent which the Manilans would admit to,nor even as low as the arbitrary eighty-three percent permittedby the central governmznt, they probably ranged from onehundred to three hundred percent."O

As a consequence, the Manila merchants paid good prices,"like gentlemen" as Schurz puts it, for the goods that werebrought them from elsewhere in the Orient. And they led alife of ease and luxury. for their business activities were con-fined to the active trading season and consisted simply oftaking over part of the merchandise brought to Manila by Chi-nese and other Eastern traders, supervising their packing, go-ing through the official formalities necessary for registeringtheir consignments for the galleon a t the treasury and makingout the invoices for the galleon's manifests, and seeing to itthat the goods were embarked a t Cavite, where the galleonsusually loaded. This whole process consumed three monthsin the latter part of the eighteenth century, which left theManila merchant with nine or ten months of every year during


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G A L LE O N T R A D E 363which he might do as he pleased. On the galleon's return hesimply collected the proceeds from his shipment.31

T h e Obrns PiasIf he did not have sufficient funds he could always bor-row some from the obras pias. These were pious foundationswhich had been built up with money bequeathed by wealthypersons and entru~tcd o the management of a lay brotherhoodaffiliated with some religious order or chapter; for instance,the Hermandad de la Misericordia endowed, according to onesource, in 1596. Toward the end of the galleon era, the termsof these hequeets usually provided that the original endow-ment be divlded into three parts: one-third to be lent on theAcapulco trade, one-third on ventures to China and India, andone-third to be retained as reserve fund. The money thus al-

located to commercial purposes had the character of both bankloans and marine insurance. The premium on advances forthe Acapulco trade fluctuated between twenty and fifty per-cent; in Comyn's time (1810) it was between twenty-sevenand forty-five percent. Not all such bequests were earmarkedfor foreign trade; some endowments were allocated to invest-ments in land and buildings, but the frequency of earthquakesand the official legal limit of five percent on such mortgagesmade them unattractive. Sometimes interest-free loans weremade to the government in times of need, as when the situadofailed to arrive, or when the country was threatened with for-eign invasion, as happened in the 1790's during the term ofGovernor Rafael Maria de Aguilar. When the original endow-ment had been built up to a certain sum, specified in the termsof the bequest, the income was earmarked for pious and char-itable works.32

Th e End of the LineAn institution that had survived as long as the Manilagalleon trade was bound to be overtaken by events. In thelast decades of the Line, new forces came into play in worldtrade and world politics. The Pacific Ocean, long virtually

a Spanish lake, was broken into more and more by other po-


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364 PHZLIPPIhTE ST UDZESwers. Spanish public polfcy began to revise the acts and prac-tices of previous years of lassitude. Other objectives loomedlarger than the mere maintenance of the galleon trade. Com-petition was encountered in the Mexican market from goodsbrought in by foreigners and by the Royal Philippine Company.

In 1794 Viceroy Revilla Gigedo wrote of the decline ofthe galleon trade as an inevitable consequence of industrialprogress in Europe, the increased public demand for Englishand European cottons, and the decreased esteem in whichAsian silks and cottons came to be regarded. Only Orientalmuslins maintained a part of their market, and even this wasbeing cut into by European muslins, especially those fromCatalonia. He also reported that in the years 1790-1792 in-clusive the Royal Philippine Company had landed 450,000pesos worth of East Indian goods a t Veracruz, which furthercut into the market for the Acapulco ships. As a consequencecustomers with ready cash at the west Mexican port had beenscarc'l and the last two galleons had not been able to holdfairs. In 1804 the Manila consulado reported that three ships-Rey Carlos, Montafi4s, and Casualidad-had lain in Aca-pulco harbor without being able to dispose of their merchan-dise. In 1811 Mexican separatists seized the silver that wasto constitute the galleon's return cargo.

The end was not far off. On the recommendation of theCortes of Cddiz, Ferdinand VII on October 25, 1813 decreedthe extinction of the Line. The last voyage was made by theMagallanes, the galleon of 1811, which cleared Acapulco forManila in 1815.33

T h e P r o b l e m of Inzperial PolicyThe judgments passed on the Manila galleon trade at dif-

ferent epochs have been uniformly unfavorable, perhaps be-cause they were made from the point of view of purely Philip-pine interests, and because they were premised on the theore-tical and practical desirability of free trade. Comyn, for in-stance, characterized it as "a system unjust as i t is absurd.. .this singular system that has been the cause of so many disor-


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GALLEON TRADE 365

d e r ~ : " ~ ~inibaldo de Mas arrived at the following conclusion:"The profits, therefore, of that trade for which Manila wasonly a port of call or a port of exchange were,divided amongthe merchants who held a monopoly of the Galleon, but thewealth of the territory derived few advantages from it."35Azdrraga applied to it the adjectives absurd, irritating, tyran-nical, pr~hibitive.~~ourne, on the other hand, while notdenying the evil effects that flowed from the system, took amore sophisticated view of the matter:All the old travelers marvel a t the possibilities of the islandsand a t the blindness of Spain, but the policy absurd a s it m ay seemw as but a logical application of the protective system not essentiallydifferent from the forms which it assumes today in our olvn rela-tions to Porto Rico, Cuba and the Philippines.37

Given a somewhat more detached and critical approach topolitical institutions, it might be possible to explain the appar-ent blindness and hard-heartedness of the Spanish Crown with-out blinking at the historical facts. For the problem was oneof imperial policy, and politics is the art of the possible. , Evena powerful monarchy will ignore the representations of its sub-jects only a t the risk of its own existence. The Spanish Crownwas not willing to take that chance. It faced the task of re-conciling the desires of seemingly conflicting interests a t theopposite ends of a far-flung empire. To have pleased Andalu-sia, it would have been necessary to jeopardize the mainten-ance of Spanish power and prestige in the Orient; to havepleased Manila, it would have been necessary to ignore Anda-lusia and thus to provoke political discontent a t home. Eitheralternative was too extreme, and the scheme that was evolvedin practice was a compromise. As such i t was satisfactory toneither of the contending parties. But it was tolerable. Andfrom a strictly political point of view its best justification isthat the Spanish empire, by measures such as this, held to-gether for three centuries, although for the major part of thatepoch Spain was no more than a second-rate military power.Few empires have done better. And if the spectacle of wrang-ling interests a t the Spanish court is an unedifying one, it isno more so than that presented in modern democracies bythe antics of pressure groups and the political gyrations of con-


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366 PHZI,IPPZNE STUDIESgresses and parliaments. Moreover, the dazzling battery ofeconomic restrictions which has been unlimbered in the pres-ent day makes Spain's clumsy and heavy-handed efforts of thesixteenth and seventeenth centuries look like kindergartenexercises.

So far as the particular issue of restrictions on the Manilagalleon i s concerned, however much they might be deplored,it is difficult to see what else the Spanish Crown could havedone in view of the prevailing political circumstances and themercantilist ideas that under!ay imperial practice.

Effects of the Restrictive SystemThe restrictions imposed by policy on the galleon tradehad important consequences as far as the Philippines was con-

cerned. One was the concentration in Manila of most of theSpaniards in the Philippines, because of a natural desire toshare in the easy profits of the trade. A ready market existedin the wealthy viceroyalties of the New World for Chinese silksand other Oriental goods. The supply for this market was,however, restricted to the cargo that could be carried by oneor two galleons yearly. Hence, those who shared in the tradewere assured of monopoly gains with the expenditure of verylittle effort and time. Moreover, these beneficiaries of the sys-tem discovered after a while that it was not even necessaryto trade on their own account; for they could make a comfort-able living by selling their boletus to the class of professionalmerchants that was springing up. The concentration of Span-iards at Manila had further consequences which will be exam-ined later on.

The second effect of the restrictive system was that Ma-nila's commercial possibilities as an entrepi3t were never real-ized. Her geographical position was ideal for drawing togetherthe various strands of Far Eastern trade and channeling themtoward the rich and apparently insatiable markets of SpanishAmerica. The restriction on shipments across the Pacific, thelack of return cargoes, the prohibition on the entry of Euro-pean shipping, and the fact that the Filipinos did not work


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GALLEON TRAD Eany harder than they had to in order to pay their tributesand to have a comfortable living, operated to keep Manila ina state of mercantile and maritime apathy for two centuriesor more. Azcbrraga's lamentations on this subject, and hispointing to the great entrep6ts of his time such as Singaporeand Hongkong to show what Manila might have become, arerepresentative of what many writers, both Spanish and for-eign, were saying in the nineteenth century about Spain'searlier commercial policy.ss

The third consequence of restrictiveness was the growthof a monopolistic merchant class. The operations of the con-sulado and the small number of actual shippers on the galleonshave already been described. What should be noted here isthat the practices of the era of the galleons were carried overinto later years. After the end of the Acapulco trade, the portsof San Blas (Mexico), Guayaquil (Ecuador) and Callao (Peru)were opened to private traders from the Philippines. However,there seems to have been an export quota of 750,000 pesos,or the same amount as the last permiso decreed for the galleontrade. And the granting of licenses under this quota wasplaced, as before, in the hands of the consulado. This continueduntil the Spanish-American colonies declared their independ-ence of the mother country and closed their ports to Spanish

Non-Deve lopment of Phil ippine ResourcesThe attraction of Spaniards to Manila had effects of itsown which should be noticed. The most important was theneglect of the agricultural and industrial development of the

Philippines. When easy money was to be had simply by cur-rying favor with the governor and the junta de repartimientoand thus becoming a boktero, there seemed little point in let-ting oneself in for the unswerving attention and constant toilthat agriculture and industry demanded. As rulers of thecountry, the Spaniards were in a position to guide its agricul-ture and industry and to introduce improvements in methodsand processes. As a matter of fact there was some introduc-tion of plants from the New World, such as tobacco, corn and


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368 PHILIPPINE STUDIEScacao; some of these were later to attain an important placein the country's economy. But all these seem to have had lit-tle effect as long as private interest was drawn to the profitsof the galleon trade.40/ Perhaps this was not entirely to be deplored. For thislack of interest in economic development meant that the Phil-

ippines was sparbd the cruelties of the African slave trade andof the plantation system as practised in the more "developed"colonies of that time in the Caribbean and the American South.If the Spaniards had taken an intense interest in agricultura.1exploitation, who knows but that someone might not havecome forth with proposal to institute the plantation systemas the most modem form of scientific management, and plan-tation slavery as the latest advance in labor relations? Longafterwards, in the middle of the nineteenth century, Progressin the person of Dr. Feodor Jagor visited Manila and was dis-appointed to find that "the planter class . . . was entirelywanting, At the present day, however," he smugly adds, "theincreasing demand for the produce of the colony seems to bebringing about a pleasant chsnge in this respect."41 As it was,the humane legislation forbidding slavery in the Indies wasrelatively easy to carry out, and when violations were reportedin the early days of the Spanish conquest of the Philippines,Church and State united to put an end to them. A royal de-cree of 1589 ordered the emancipation of slaves held bySpaniards, and in 1591 a bull of Pope Gregory XIV forbadeslavery in the Philippines under pain of excomm~nication.~~

If Spanish laymen never acquired large estates or earlyrelinquished what they had, and if it was true that much ofthe land remained in thc hands of native owners," it is alsotrue that large tracts of land were acquired by two otherclasses of people, partly as a consequence of Spanish lack ofinterest in the matter. These were the religious orders andother ecclesiastical bodies, and the half-caste Chinese. Theformer seem to have been interested mainly in securing en-dowments with a stable income. Many of the lands classifiedas church property were acquired directly by the religious or-ders, but, as land was about the only investment outside the


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GALLEON TRA DE 369

Acapulco trade and was really the only secure one, some werealso used to endow educational and charitable institutions ad-ministered by the Church. Although there were sporadicagrarian disturbances in the lands owned by the religious or-ders, the friars seem to have been relatively easy landlordsuntil perhaps the middle of the nineteenth century.44 Theother class of people who acquired lands, the Chinese half-castes, seem to have done so by their control of internal tradeand small credit. This process has continued down to thepresent day and can be listed as one of the reasons behindpeasant di~content.~~

The ChineseThe final effect of the congregation of Spaniards in Ma-nila was the attraction thither of large numbers of Chinese.

This, in turn; had severel consequences. The most importantwas that the retail trade and much internal credit fell intotheir hands, where they have remained to the present day.This was due to their energy, skill, frugality and mercantilecapabilities, as well as to the fact that the Spaniards weretoo engrossed in the galleon trade t o notice that control ofthe internal trade had passed to alien hands, and that theFilipinos were unprepared by their previous history for thewhirligig of events into which Spain's conquest plunged them.

Another effect of the influx of the Chinese was the ruinof some branches of the Philippine textile industry. As earlyas the 1590's an investigation was ordered into the idlenessand decay into which Pampanga and the Manila area hadfallen. I t revealed that the coming of the Spaniards to Ma-nila and their disbursing sizable sums of silver in wages andsalaries for domestic and other services had attracted the ruralpopulation to the city, so that instead of planting their ownrice and weaving their own textiles as they used to they hadbegun buying food and clothing from the Chinese. Chinesetextiles were also circulated in the provinces, which discour-aged local weavers. Thus the native textile industry was indecay. This was all the more ironic, according to the elderDasmarifias, since the cotton from which the Chinese cloths


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370 PHILIPPINE STUDIES

were made came from the Philippines originally. The gov-ernor therefore passed an ordinance absolutely prohibiting thesale of cotton goods by Chinese to Filipinos, and forbiddingFilipinos to wear Chinese textiles. Dasmariiias was inter-ested in reviving the Philippine cotton industry for export pur-poses in the Acapulco trade, but his order does not seem tohave had much effect. The galleons continued to carry Phil-ippine textiles, mostly from Ilocos, as has been mentionedearlier, and Philippine textile exports continued into the nine-teenth cpntury, but they did not seem to have materially in-creased during the period of the galleon trade.46

ConclusionsA qualitative verdict on the galleon trade as a system offoreign commerce is not easy to arrive at, all the more so as

standards change from time to time; but one will be attemptedhere. Most of the strictures on the galleon trade have beenmade on the ground that it was restrictive. While this mayhave sufficed to condemn it in the eyes of the world before1914, it cannot do so by itself in the world of the present,which fairly bristles with trade restrictions. It is the effectsof the restrictive system, rather than the system itself, thatwill have to be weighed.The unfavorable consequences, direct and indirect, of thegalleon trade a n be listed as follows: the failure to take ad-vantage of Manila's commercial opportunities as an entrep6t;the neglect of the country's agricultural and industrial devel-opment; the creation of a monopolistically-minded merchantclass; the encouragement of widespread law evasion and gov-ernmental corruption; the ruin of some sectors of the nativetextile industry; a contribution to the breeding of agrariantrouble, in that , due to the restriction of trading opportuni-ties, religious entities looking for suitable endowments foundthem only in the acquisition of land (although it can very wellbe argued that this would have happened anyway regardlessof the existence of additional investment outlets); the fallingof the retail trade and some of the small credit business intothe hands of aliens; and the attraction of Chinese immigrants


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G.4I,I.EON T R A D Eto the Philippines, which to the present day constitutes a prob-lem to the immigration authorities. Against these must be setthe favorable consequences: the avoidance of the horrors ofthe colonial plantation system and of slavery; the public bene-fit derived from the good works of the obras pias; and the in-tangible advantages accruing to the Philippines from member-ship in a great political entity like the Spanish empire.

Not all of these, of course, can be debited against orcredited to the account of the galleon trade exclusively. Forinstance, the Spanish contempt for the mechanical arts andagriculture had as much to do with preventing the agricul-tural and industrial development of the country as the easyprofits of the trade. But the trade was, in all the instancescited, at least a contributory factor, greater in some cases thanin others, but present in all.

Economically speaking and from a Philippine point ofview the verdict must remain what it has been, namely, ad-verse; but heavy qualifications must be introduced due to thebeneficial effects enumerated above, and to the fact that thegalleon trade was the product of policies that have to be lookeda t from an over-all imperial point of view i f they are to beunderstood in their proper perspective.

1 William Lytle Schurz, The Mani la Gal leon (New York: E . P.Dutton, 1939), pp. 220-221, 371, 24.2 Zbid., pp. 23, 25. Ibid. , pp. 27, 69.Z b i d . p. 69; Berthold Laufer, "The Relations of the Chinese to thePhilippine Islands," Sm ithson ian In sti tu t io n Miscellaneous Collections, L(September 13, 1907), 251-252; Census of the Phi l ippine Is lands fort h e Y e a r 1903 (Washington: Bureau of the Census, 1905), I, 481-482.5 Schurz, op. ci t . , pp. 27, 71.6 E. H. Blair & J. A. Robertson, eds., The Phil ippine Islands, 1495-1898 (55 v., Cleveland: The Arthur H. Clark Co., 1903-1909), X.XXVI,205; Census of 1905, 1, 347; Manuel AzcPrraga y PBlmero, L a l zbertadd e c o m e ~ c b n l as i sl as F il ip in a s (Madrid: Imprenta de J o d Nogue-ra, 1871), pp. 75-77.7 Schurz, op. cit . , pp. 32-33; Azcirrraga, op. cit . , pp. 41-42.8 Op. cit . , p. 32.SZbid., pp. 68, 70; C m u s of 1903, I, 347.10 Schurz, op . cit. , pp. 74-78. l1 Census of 1903, I, 319, 333, 484.12 Zbid., p. 318. 13 Schurz, op. Cit., p. 82.


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PHILIPPIN E S T l J DIESl4Edw ard Gay lord Bourn e , Di scovery , Conques t and E ar ly H i s -to ry of t h e Ph il ip p in e I s la n d s ( C l e v e la n d : T h e Ar t h u r H . Clark Com-pany, 19 07 ), p. 4 1 ; Sc hu rz, op. cit., pp. 81, 85-89; L a u fe r, op cit., pp.266-272; C en su s of 1903, I, 485-487.15 Bourne, op. cit., p. 46. 16 S c hu rz , op. cit., p. 34.17 Zbid., p. 308.18 Blair and Robertson, op . cit., 111 , 214; IV , 88; V , 2 9 , XLI I , 1 1 919 Schurz, op. cit., pp. 366, 405. 20 Zbid., pp. 366-368.21 Zbid., pp. 40-41, 43-44, 51-52, 351, 405-406.ZZZbid., pp. 155, 193 , 381-384; B lair and Ro be rtso n, op. cit., X V I I ,32-33; Azclrraga, op. c i t . , pp. 48, 69-77.z3 C en su s of 1903, I, 34 8; Sch ur z, op. cit ., pp. 181-182.24 S c h u rz , o p . dt., pp. 155-161, 402-403.25 [Fra n c i sc o Le a n d ro d e V i a n a ] , " I n f o rm e qu e h izo el C on de d eT ep a del C onsejo de Ind ias sobre el comercio de Filipinas," ms. tra n-sc ri pt i n L i b ro de v d o s pa pe le s, T i c k n o r C o lle ctio n, Bo s to n Pub licL ibrary .26 Zbid., fol. 217-218v, 229. 27 Zbid., fol. 228v.28 Sc hu rz , op. cit., pp. 158, 194-195.z9 Zbid., pp. 155, 18 9; Richard W a l t e r , Ans on 's V oy ag e Round theW orld , ne w ed . (L on do n: M ar t in Hopk inson L td ., 1 928 ) , p. 358.3 O Sc hu rz , op. cit., p. 190. 3 l Zbid., pp. 38-39.s z To m a s d e C o m y n , S t a t e o f t h e Ph il ip p in e I s l a n d s, t ra n s. W i l -l ia m W a l t o n ( L o nd o n : T . and J . Al lm an , 1 82 1) , pp. 70-81; Lu i s Pru-denc io Alvare z y Te je ro , De las i s las Fi l ip inas (Va lend ia : Impren tadel Cabrerizo , 18 42 ) , pp. 60-62; Ra fae l Diaz A re na s, Memorias h is-tdricas y estadist icas de Fi l ip 'nas (M an i la : Imp ren ta del Diario deMani la , 1 85 0) , 11, bk . 1 3; Schu rz , op . c it., p p . 16, 167-172, 256.s3 Juan Vicente Gi iemez Pacheco de Padi l la Horcasi tas y Ag u a y o ,Conde de Revi l la Gigedo, Znstm ccidn res erva da que e l Conde de Re-v i l la Gi g i d o did a su suc esor e n e l ma n d o , M w q u k de Bra n c i fo r t e ,sobre .e l gobierno de e ste co nt inente e n el t iem po que fue' su vi rr ey(M ex ico : Im pr en ta de la Calle de las Esdaler il las , 1 83 1) , pp. 104-105; Schurz , op . cit., p. 60.S4 C o my n , o p . cit., pp. 72 , 73. T h e wor ds "and preposterous" ar efound be tween "s ingu lar" and "sys t em" on page 73 , bu t t h i s seems tobe a g ra t u it o u s e mb e l l ish me n t o n t h e p a r t o f t h e tra n s la t o r , as noth ingcorresponding to i t o c cu rs i n t h e o r ig in a l S p a n i sh ( c f . t h e M a n il ae d i t i o n o f 1 8 7 8 ) .35 [Sinibaldo de Mas] , Znforme sobre e l es tado de las i s las Fi l i -pinas e n 18.48 (M ad rid , 1 8 43 ), 11, "Com ercio esterior," p: 4.38 Azcbrraga , op . cit., pp. 49 , 69. 37 Bourne, op. czt., p. 81.3% Ibid., p. 6 8 ; A z c l r r a g a , o p . cit., pp. 30-35.39 Mas, op . cit., p. 2 ; Bo urne , op. i t . , p. 66 .40 Bourne , op . cit., p. 6 8; Ben i tez , H is to ry of the Phi l ippines (B os-to n: Gin n and Co., 1 92 6) , pp. 58-63.41 Feodor Jagor , "T ra ve l s in th e Philippines ," i n A us t in Cra ig .,ed., T he Fo rm er Philippines Th ro ug h Fore ign Ey es (M an i la : Ph ilip-pine Ed ucat ion C om pany , 19 16 ) , p. 24 .42 Bo urn e, op. ci t. , p. 7 0 ; Be nitez , op. cit., pp. 184-185.43 In 1903 , to ta l f a r m area w as 2 ,827 ,704 hec tares , o f wh ich2,137,776 were held b y own ers (Ce nsu s o f 1903, IV , 266 ) .44 Schurz, op. c i t . , p . 43; Bourne, op ci t . , p . 85; Census of 1903,I , 346.45 C o m y n , o p. cit., p. 76.46 Sc hur z, op. c it., p. 4 9 ; Blair and Rob ertson, op. c it., V I I I , 85, 273;Census o f 1903, I , 485.

Documents

[Two and a Half Centuries of the Galleon Trade