Chapter iii

consists of accounts of the lives of various Recollect fathers. Those who labored in the Philippines are the following. Miguel de Santa Maria was a native of Cadiz and a son of Rodrigo Lopez de Almansa. He professed in the Manila convent June 26, 1618, at the age of 28. Later he became prior of the Caraga mission, and founded the convent of Tándag. In 1624 he was elected procuratol-general of the Philippine province. He attempted in 1629 and 1630 to go to Japan; but in the first year the vessel was wrecked, and in the second the governor forbade the journey. He was sent finally to the mission at Cuyo, but the troubles with the Moros compelled him to flee. Reaching Manila, he refused the offer of the secretaryship to the visitor-general, and the remainder of his life was spent in that city, his death occurring in the year 1644 or 1651. Gaspar de Santa Monica was a native of the city of Orihuela, in Valencia, his family name being Padrós. He took the habit in the convent at Valencia, November 1, 1613. He joined the mission organized by Andrés del Espíritu Santo, and arrived at Manila in 1622. The following year he was appointed prior of the convent of Marivelez; and in 1624, when the first provincial chapter of the order was held in the Philippines, he was elected prior of the convent of Cuyo, where he suffered many hardships. He became secretary to Andrés del Espíritu Santo upon the election of the latter to the provincialate in 1626; but, falling ill, he was unable to perform the duties of that office and was made prior of the convent of Calumpán, in 1627. In 1629 he was one of the religious shipwrecked in the endeavor to reach Japan surreptitiously. He became definitor of the province in 1632, and in 1638 prior of the convent at Lináo. On the completion of that office in 1642 it does not appear that he filled other posts. He died in the city of Manila in 1651.]

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