and it is feared that thereupon they would lay an embargo on the three
galliots. However, as yet we do not know with certainty or assurance,
except that a suit was pending in the court of the king of Japon,
the Portuguese claiming that they could not in justice be forced to
repay the damage which the Castilians had done. Thereupon the city of
Macan earnestly begged me to make satisfaction, and send the value
of the cargo burned and lost in the said junk, in order to silence
the Japanese. Being desirous of gratifying the people of Macan,
and settling the matter, I called an assembly of theologians and
jurists, in which I broached the subject. All agreed that so long as
the Japanese persevered in locking the door to commerce with these
islands, contrary to justice and reason, there should be no talk of
giving satisfaction for the damage inflicted, until advice could
be given to your Majesty--even though it should follow from this,
by a casualty not intended, that the Portuguese with whom the said
Japanese trade should have to pay for the loss. This will be seen more
in detail in the authentic copy of the said council's proceedings,
which I enclose herewith, so that if perchance the city of Macan should
petition your Majesty through the Council of Portugal to have these
damages paid, no decision may be made in the matter until you shall
have seen the motives which we have here for failing to settle it. In
such case, I petition your Majesty also to be pleased to examine,
with this section of this letter, that of another which I wrote in the
past year of 628 in regard to the same matter. It will be considered
that if the damage inflicted has to be paid for, it will fall upon
those who did it. That would be the soldiers of this camp and the
leader under whom they were, namely, the said commander, Don Joan de
Alcarasso, who distinguished themselves greatly in your Majesty's
service in the said expedition of the galleons. [_In the margin_:
"File, and have the fiscal examine it all." "It was all filed and