oom. To this he gave a certain reply, and after considering
this, with the documents, another decree was made, in which it was
declared to the bishop that he was not the judge of the cause, which
the Audiencia ordered to be retained under its own jurisdiction. As I
was not present at this decision it was ordered that I be notified,
and that I should appear in the suit in defense of your royal
jurisdiction. Therefore, on the Monday next following, I presented
before the said bishop a petition requesting that he absolve the
persons excommunicated, and declare himself not to have jurisdiction
over that cause. To establish the fact that the recognition thereof
did not belong to him, I stated in the first argument of my petition
that it could not pertain to him as the royal officials were mere
laymen, and not subject to the ecclesiastical jurisdiction, but to
the royal. I alleged further reasons that the cause was secular and
temporal. Among other things, the bishop replied to the petition
that he was not satisfied with a proposition that I had offered,
in reference to the holy office of the Inquisition. This caused
exceeding disturbance and scandal in this city, because the bishop was
not content with saying what he did in reply to my petition; but to
every person who entered his house he said that I had been guilty of a
heresy, and unlettered persons who heard this gave it credit. Moreover,
as there is here a commissary of the Inquisition, he called together
many friars and certified this proposition, separating it from the
petition and paying no attention to my purpose therein, or to the
circumstances under which I made it. I am sending a report of all the
proceedings, in order that your Majesty may provide for the future,
as to whether the bishop is to be the judge, and have entrance and
privilege to cause the salaries to be paid from your royal treasury,
which your Majesty in kindness and mercy had ordered to be assigned to
the prebendaries and curates. The bishop, for the sake of peace, after
he had kept your royal officials excommunicated many days, refusing to
obey or fulfil the ordinances of your royal Audiencia, issued a decree
in which he gave up the decision of the cause to his Holiness and to
your Majesty. He protested that he would proceed with the case when he
saw fit. Although I stated in petition that the bishop had not complied
with the ordinances of the Audiencia, and that thereby he had incurred
the penalt