Now the Dutch make the voyage more quickly and more safely, going
and coming, by way of India, but not touching at its ports or coasts,
until they reach the islands of the Javas [39]--Java major and Java
minor--and Samatra, Amboino, and the Malucas. Since they know the
district so well, and have experienced the immense profits ensuing to
them therefrom, it will be difficult to drive them from the Orient,
where they have inflicted so many losses in both spiritual and
temporal affairs.



¶ _Relation of the Filipinas Islands and of their natives, antiquity,
customs, and government, both during the period of their paganism
and after their conquest by the Spaniards, and other details._

¶ _Chapter Eighth_

The islands of the eastern Ocean Sea, adjacent to farther Asia,
belonging to the crown of España, are generally called, by those who
navigate thither by way of the demarcation of Castilla and Castilla's
seas and lands of America, "the Western Islands;" for from the time
that one leaves España, he sails in the course of the sun from east
to west, until he reaches them. For the same reason they are called
"Eastern Islands" by those who sail from west to east by way of
Portuguese India, each of them circumscribing the world by voyaging
in opposite directions, until they meet at these islands, which are
numerous and of varying size; they are properly called Filipinas,
and are subject to the crown of Castilla. They lie within the tropic
of Cancer, and extend from twenty-four degrees north latitude to the