That the islands maintained relations with neighboring countries and
even with distant ones is proven by the ships from Siam, laden with
gold and slaves, that Magellan found in Cebu. These ships paid certain
duties to the King of the island. In the same year, 1521, the survivors
of Magellan's expedition met the son of the Rajah of Luzon, who,
as captain-general of the Sultan of Borneo and admiral of his fleet,
had conquered for him the great city of Lave (Sarawak?). Might this
captain, who was greatly feared by all his foes, have been the Rajah
Matanda whom the Spaniards afterwards encountered in Tondo in 1570?

In 1539 the warriors of Luzon took part in the formidable contests
of Sumatra, and under the orders of Angi Siry Timor, Rajah of Batta,
conquered and overthrew the terrible Alzadin, Sultan of Atchin,
renowned in the historical annals of the Far East. (Marsden, Hist. of
Sumatra, Chap. XX.) (7)

At that time, that sea where float the islands like a set of emeralds
on a paten of bright glass, that sea was everywhere traversed by junks,
paraus, barangays, vintas, vessels swift as shuttles, so large that
they could maintain a hundred rowers on a side (Morga;) that sea
bore everywhere commerce, industry, agriculture, by the force of the
oars moved to the sound of warlike songs (8) of the genealogies and
achievements of the Philippine divinities. (Colin, Chap. XV.) (9)

Wealth abounded in the islands. Pigafetta tells us of the abundance
of foodstuffs in Paragua and of its inhabitants, who nearly all
tilled their own fields. At this island the survivors of Magellan's
expedition were well received and provisioned. A little later, these
same survivors captured a vessel, plundered and sacked it, add took
prisoner in it the chief of the Island of Paragua (!) with his son