Now, stating the case, I declare that on October 9 of this present year at one o'clock at night the palace was entered by the father commissary of the Holy Office, Fray Jose Paternina, with the two alcaldes-in-ordinary, General Sebastian Rayo and Don Nicolas de Pamplona, Sargento-mayor Diego de Morales, and Captains Don Gonzalo Samaniego (a nephew of the commissary) and Don Juan de Vargas--both citizens who hold that office in this royal camp, each commanding a company; also Don Juan de Robles, and three or four others. Twenty other men remained in various offices of the palace, and eighteen or twenty friars of St. Francis all armed. These visitors seized Don Diego immediately placing on him a pair of fetters; he was in his shirt just as he was sleeping, and without giving him time to put on his white drawers they thrust his Lordship into a hammock, and carried him a prisoner to the convent of San Francisco. There they shut him within a cell with soldiers as guards to secure his person. The company who were on guard in the palace, on hearing the noise, were ready to spring to their arms; but the master-of-camp--who was Don Agustin de Zepeda, whom I have already mentioned, went to make the guard-room safe, and gave orders that no one should stir, because the Inquisition had been performing its duty.
By morning the news of this unheard-of occurrence had spread around; and by the time the city gates were opened the people were in amazement, which could only be understood by one who should know by experience the greatness and power of a governor of these islands. I was alcalde-mayor of the province of Tondo, and it gave me no little anxiety to notice the mutterings of the Indians who seemed to be rising out of a deep lethargy.
[As for the question] whether the Holy Office could act without the coöperation of the supreme authority here, since [the governor is] a personage who represents in these islands the royal person, there is not a learned person in the two religious orders of St. Dominic and the Society who will not answer it in the negative. And as the loyal vassal has no greater obligation than to obey the commands of his king and natural lord, and in regard to the faith, that which is taught by our mother the Roman Catholic Church, without [giving it] any other interpretation than that given by the holy doctors of the Church, I know not what to say, since I will not withdraw from this or retract one jot. The disputes which Don Diego, when he came from Nueva España to govern these islands, had with the father commissary Fray Jose Paternina over some differences and grievances were public and notorious; and those whom the father commissary carried with him [for this arrest] were nearly all enemies of Don Diego. It is not a rash assumption by those who are more inclined to reflect that this affair was thus hurried through more through passion than through virtuous zeal. I base my opinion on the following reasons, not to mention many others which I reserve for their proper time, as I have not leisure at present for writing more at length--submitting myself to the correction of the Holy Office; for I am, and am proud of being, a Christian Catholic and a descendant of the Catholic knights.