who is considered a reputable man, has gone to the king of China [16]
and told him that from this kingdom there could each year be taken for
the king of China a hundred thousand taes of gold and three hundred
thousand taes of silver at his expense, so that his vassals should
not pay tribute or be molested, the king has sent a eunuch who is
called Cochay to take charge of those who have said that there was
gold. This Tio Heng with five companions say that outside of the
boundaries of Hayten in a place called Lician there is a mountain
which is called Heyt Coavite, one lonely mountain in the midst of the
wide-spread sea; and that there is no realm to which it belongs or to
which the inhabitants pay tribute. In that place is collected much
gold and silver. The vassals of that mountain spend gold as freely
as if it were _garbanzos_ [17] and lentils. He has seen that the
vassals of that mountain of Cavite dig and gather it from the earth,
and in every house of Cavite he saw, if it were a poor one, a _medida_
(which is three gantas), and in those of the rich a hundred gantas of
this gold; and they store it up in order to trade with the Sangleys who
come there to trade, so that they may buy their property. And he said:
"At present you have no gold within your house to spend, and you have
no place whence to get it, and it would be much easier to go and get
it from that said place than to ask it from your vassals. It is true
that I have seen it; and now I have come to tell you this; and I do
not ask that you shall give me anything for going for it, but that
you should give me permission to go for it. I alone will find the
people, and spend what may be necessary to go and dig it. And this
year, when they have brought this gold, you can go to see the gold
which the captains and merchants have brought who come each year from
Luzon. In two years from now I will give you twice the gold and silver
that I have promised you, and with this you may be satisfied; and the
kingdom and the vassals will rejoice. This affair is serious and of