Thanks to the fact that nowadays more and more books are digitized we are able to read books that are some times for decades no longer available for the public for several reasons. That’s quite a pity while these books contains useful information while the archives are destroyed, incomplete or nor accessible. He made his notes white on board of the HMS Samarang on a surveying cruise in 1843-1846. The Samarang left 25 January 1843 Portsmouth and went to Spithead where she departed the next day for her cruise.
P. 196: “Caviti was once a place of great importance, having been the capital of Luzon, from whence the galleons conveyed the treasure to Spain. The arsenal still remains, but in a very dilapidated state: we found the artificers busily employed completing some gunboats and small schooners, which were intended to accompany the Esperanza, Spanish frigate, in an expedition to an island off Borneo, where the Esperanza had latterly sustained a defeat from the pirates who inhabited the island.
At Caviti lie the remains of an old Spanish galleon, one of the few which had the good fortune to escape Commodore Anson. The whole of one side of the vessel is gone, and she is now fast falling to pieces, but the Spaniards look upon her with great reverence. She is a relic of their former grandeur; and I was informed by a Spanish gentleman that she never would be broken up. I looked upon her, if not with reverence, at least with sympathy ; and as I made a sketch of her my thoughts naturally turned to the rise and fall of empires, and I communed with myself as to what would be the date in which England would be in the same position as modern Spain, and fall back upon her former glories by way of consolation for her actual decay.”
Source
Frank S. Marryat. Borneo and the Indian Archipelago with drawings of costume and scenery. London, 1848.
P. 196: “Caviti was once a place of great importance, having been the capital of Luzon, from whence the galleons conveyed the treasure to Spain. The arsenal still remains, but in a very dilapidated state: we found the artificers busily employed completing some gunboats and small schooners, which were intended to accompany the Esperanza, Spanish frigate, in an expedition to an island off Borneo, where the Esperanza had latterly sustained a defeat from the pirates who inhabited the island.
At Caviti lie the remains of an old Spanish galleon, one of the few which had the good fortune to escape Commodore Anson. The whole of one side of the vessel is gone, and she is now fast falling to pieces, but the Spaniards look upon her with great reverence. She is a relic of their former grandeur; and I was informed by a Spanish gentleman that she never would be broken up. I looked upon her, if not with reverence, at least with sympathy ; and as I made a sketch of her my thoughts naturally turned to the rise and fall of empires, and I communed with myself as to what would be the date in which England would be in the same position as modern Spain, and fall back upon her former glories by way of consolation for her actual decay.”
Source
Frank S. Marryat. Borneo and the Indian Archipelago with drawings of costume and scenery. London, 1848.
