Chapter V: The Canaries.258 (2)

Cases grow more frequent with time and, with their increasing frequency, the penalties seem to grow less. In 1694 Fray Domingo Mireles was accused by four women, with details of foul obscenity. He was sentenced to deprivation of confession and reclusion for four years, but was allowed to choose his place of retreat. He served out the term, went to Spain, and returned with a rehabilitation charitably granted by the inquisitor-general. In 1698 Fray Cipriano de Armas was prosecuted on the evidence of two women; the case was carried to the end and remitted for decision to the Suprema, which ordered its suspension. In two cases in 1742 the sentence was merely deprivation of confessing, six months’ reclusion and five years’ exile from certain places. In 1747 Fray Bartolomé Bello had not only seduced Maria Cabral González, but had strangled in his cell a child born to them, after piously baptizing it, but when the case reached the Suprema it was suspended. In 1750 Francisco Rodriguez del Castillo was prosecuted on very serious charges but was only suspended for two years from confessing and given some spiritual exercises. In 1755 there were nine complainants against Fray Francisco García Encinoso, who was deprived of confessing and sentenced to six months’ reclusion, when he was sent to the convent of N. Señora de Miraflor, with instructions to the superior to keep the matter profoundly secret and to treat him well. In 1769 Fray Domingo Matos was sentenced only to six months’ reclusion and the denial of certain privileges, which was subsequently remitted. The sympathy of the tribunal apparently was exhaustless and frequently resulted in practical immunity. In 1785, Fray Joseph Estrada, Franciscan difinidor, was accused by several women with full details, but the tribunal, on December 7, 1793, suspended the case. Then, in 1804, he was again accused by a nun in the convent of la Purisima Concepcion of Garachico. Finally, after twelve years’ delay, on February 28, 1805, the tribunal ordered its commissioner to give him _audiencias de cargos_, or private examinations, on report of which the case would be voted on, bearing in mind the advanced age of the accused and the difficulty of communicating with the Suprema, in consequence of the war. This was the last of the matter for, on April 9, 1806, the commissioner at Ycod reported the death of the culprit.[320] When so serious an offence was visited so lightly, we can scarce be surprised that its subjection to inquisitorial jurisdiction failed to check it. There naturally was much difficulty in inducing women to come forward as accusers, yet the number of denunciations was large and steady. Thus, from July 26, 1706, to February 15, 1708, the total denunciations of all kinds to the tribunal was 75; of these only 22 were of men, out of which 7, or practically one-third, were for solicitation.[321]

* * * * *

The bulk of the business of the tribunal consisted in trials for sorcery, under which term were included all the superstitions, more or less innocent, employed to cure or to inflict disease, to provoke love or hatred, to discover theft and to pry into the future, for theological ingenuity inferred pact, express or implicit, with the demon in everything which could be construed as transcending the powers of nature, except the ministrations of the priest or exorcist. Such a community as that of the Canaries, in which the primitive magic arts of the natives were added to those of their conquerors, and on these were superimposed the beliefs of Moorish and negro slaves, could not fail to accumulate an incongruous mass of superstitions affecting all the acts of daily life, and the summaries of cases printed by Mr. Birch afford to the student of folk-lore an inexhaustible treasury of curious details. No matter what might be the industry of the tribunal in prosecuting and punishing the practitioners of these arts, it could effect nothing in repressing them, or in disabusing popular credulity, for its very jurisdiction was based on the assumption that the powers attributed to the sorcerer were real, and he was punished not as an impostor but as an ally or instrument of the demon.

It would carry us too far to attempt even a summary of the multitudinous superstitions embalmed in the records, but a couple of cases may be mentioned which illustrate the popular tendency to ascribe to sorcery whatever excited wonder, and also the good sense which sometimes intervened to protect the innocent. In 1624, Diego de Santa Marta of Garachico was denounced as a sorcerer to the tribunal in consequence of his performance of some tricks with cards. The accusation was entertained and Fray Juan de Saavedra was ordered to investigate and report. He invited Diego to exhibit his skill and the performance took place in the cell of the Provincial, Fray Bernardo de Herrera, who was a consultor of the Inquisition, with whom were associated Padre Luzena, regent of the schools, several theological professors and Don Francisco Sarmiento, alguazil of the tribunal. Diego was not aware that he was practically on trial before this imposing assemblage, and he performed some surprising card tricks as well as sundry other juggleries. Fortunately for him the spectators were clear-sighted and Fray Saavedra reported that it was all a matter of sleight of hand, which could be detected by careful observation.[322] More serious was the denunciation, in 1803, of any one of four women named (apparently the individual was not identified) who had, twelve years before, administered to María Salome some snuff which caused her to bark like a dog. Luckily Doctor Elchantor, the inquisitor-fiscal, had a touch of the rationalism of the age. He reported that the vomiting and extraordinary movements alleged might have been produced by natural causes; that among timid and ignorant women there was a habit of attributing all disease to sorcery; that it could not be said that the snuff had been prepared with diabolic arts and that there were no other suspicions against the parties accused. He therefore advised that the papers be simply filed away, and in this Inquisitor Borbujo concurred.[323]

Although the term _bruja_, or witch, occasionally appears in the records, there would not appear to be any cases of specific witchcraft. The nearest allusions to the Sabbat occur in 1674, when Doña Isabel Ybarra testified that, a year before, Doña Ana de Ascanio told her that Don Juan de Vargas, now dead, told her that once, in returning home about midnight; he encountered a dance of women with timbrels and lighted candles. In the same year Fray Pablo Guillen deposed that at midnight he saw Guillerma Peré naked; she anointed herself and flew through the air with another woman. Connected with this was the statement that a son of Juan Hernandez, at midnight, found in the street Doña Ana María, widow of Captain Juan de Molina, entirely naked. He took her to her house, when she gave him a garment and begged him to keep silence.[324]

* * * * *

For a comparatively brief period the most important work of the tribunal concerned the foreign heretics--mostly Englishmen and Flemings, or rather Hollanders--who frequented the islands, whether for peaceful commerce or for piracy. As the port of call in the trade with America, the islands were the favorite resort of the sea-rovers of all the nations at enmity with Spain, that is of nearly all Europe, in hopes of capturing some rich galleon or of ravaging some unprotected spot. In 1570, a Norman Huguenot, cruising off Gomera, seized a vessel starting for Brazil with forty Jesuit missionaries; he put them all to death and landed his other prisoners at San Sebastian, a port of Gomera, which next year was sacked by another French corsair.[325] To some extent, doubtless, the Inquisition was regarded as a safeguard against such marauders. In 1589, an Englishman, captured at Garachico from the ship of Vincent Pieter the Fleming, was said to have been a pirate who had pillaged in company with other Englishmen, and was brought before the tribunal, although nothing else was alleged against him. About the same time certain French “pirates,” taken on the islet of Graciosa, off Lanzarote, were delivered to the tribunal, when they proved themselves to be good Catholics by their familiarity with the prayers and other observances.[326]

Much more serious was the interference of the Inquisition with those who came to trade, and it is difficult to understand how Spain could carry on any commerce with foreign nations under the impediments which it interposed. The earliest case in the records is one to which allusion has already been made, that of John Sanders who, in 1565, came as a sailor in a vessel from Plymouth, of which the master was James Anthony, the cargo consisting of 28 casks of sardines, 20 dozen of calf-skins and a lot of woollen goods, the property of the master and his brother Thomas. On arrival at Las Isletas, as Sanders could speak and write Spanish, Anthony got him to enter the goods as his own and installed him in a shop to sell them. After two or three months, one day the public scrivener, Melchor de Solis, came and demanded three reales, which Sanders refused. While they were talking he placed his hand on the wall, where there was hanging a paper print of Christ, which he had not recognized, as its face was turned to the wall and it was partly torn. Passing his hand over it, a piece fell off, when Solis charged him with tearing an image of Christ; he picked it up, reverently kissed it and replaced it. The story spread and caused scandal; in the abeyance of the tribunal, the provisor took up the matter, arresting Sanders March 29th and sequestrating the property, which consisted of 2492 reales in money, 3-1/2 casks of sardines and 2-1/2 dozen of calf-skins, all of which was duly placed in the hands of the secrestador, and, in addition, Leónez Alvarez testified that he had bought and paid for goods to the amount of 340 ducats. Under examination Sanders professed himself a Catholic; he could recite the Pater Noster and Credo and the Ave Maria without the final clause imploring the prayers of the Virgin, which he said he had never been taught; he could cross himself but did not know the peculiar Spanish form; he reverenced images of saints although the Queen of England had banished from the churches all but those of Christ and the Virgin, and he had attended mass since he came. Then James Anthony came forward and claimed the property, confirming the story of Sanders, and it was delivered to him, but not until he had furnished satisfactory security to abide the result. What was the outcome we have no means of knowing, as the papers were sent to the tribunal of Seville for its action, but the least that could happen to Sanders and Anthony was interminable delay.[327]

Trading with the Canaries evidently was a hazardous business and the danger increased as time went on, for it sufficed that the crew were heretics to justify their trial and punishment, with the accompaniment of sequestration and confiscation. Thus on April 24, 1593, a single vote ordered the arrest with sequestration of the pilot and other officers, the sailors and boys and passengers of the ship named El Leon Colorado and of all who came in the ship named San Lorenzo, both now at anchor in the port of Las Isletas.[328] The case of the Leon Colorado is suggestive. She was an English ship which, until 1587, had been employed in the Lisbon trade under a licence from the Marquis of Santa Cruz, but after his death she seems to have been transferred to Flanders. On this voyage she had sailed from Antwerp, a Spanish port, under a licence from Alexander of Parma, the nephew of Philip II and the governor of the Low Countries. The _escrivano_ or purser of the ship, Franz Vandenbosch, while on trial, procured a certificate from the municipal authorities of Antwerp setting forth that his parents were good Catholics and so were their children, and that Franz had sailed for the Canaries with the licence and passport of the Duke of Parma. The only effect of this was a vote to torture him, on learning which he confessed that in Mecklenburg he had embraced Calvinism, and his sentence was reconciliation and confiscation, prison and sanbenito for three years and perpetual prohibition to visit heretic lands or to approach within ten leagues of the sea, for which reason he was to be sent to Spain. Another member of the crew Georg Van Hoflaquen asserted his Catholicism and adhered to it through four successive inflictions, each of three turns of the _cordeles_. Then he was ordered to be placed on the _burro_ or rack, when he declared that he could no longer endure the agony and that he was a heretic. He was sentenced to reconciliation and confiscation, and three years of prison and sanbenito, with the corresponding disabilities.[329]

In these cases the adverse evidence is almost wholly derived from other members of the crews, who had no hesitation in testifying to their comrades’ Protestantism. There was usually no concealment attempted but, when orthodoxy was asserted, torture was unsparingly employed. Conversion did not obtain much alleviation of punishment. Another of the crew of the Leon Colorado was Jacob Banqueresme, a Hollander, who freely admitted his Calvinism. He knew nothing of Catholicism but was ready to embrace it if it seemed to him good. Theologians were set to work and, in due time, he announced his conversion and was formally admitted to the Church, but he was sentenced to be sent to Spain and confined in a convent for two years, in order to be thoroughly instructed, and he was prohibited to go to heretic lands or to approach the sea within ten leagues.[330]

The result of these labors was seen in the auto of 1597, in which there were seventeen Englishmen and Flemings reconciled, with imprisonment ranging from two to eight years, and twenty-six penanced, with from one to four years of prison, the ships to which they belonged being La Rosa, San Pedro, La Posta, San Lorenzo, Leon Colorado, Margarita and María Fortuna.[331] There were no obstinate heretics and no martyrs. When this active proselytism was carried on for twenty years or more with its consequent confiscation of ships and cargoes, it is easy to understand the financial ease of the tribunal and to conjecture its influence on the commerce and prosperity of the islands.

This flourishing industry was interfered with by the treaty with England ratified by James I on August 29/19, 1604, and by Philip III on June 16, 1605. It provided that English subjects visiting or resident in the Spanish dominions were not to be molested on account of their religion, so long as they gave no occasion for scandal, and this was extended to the United Provinces in the twelve years’ truce, concluded in 1609.[332] The caution induced by the treaty, even before its ratification by Spain, is exemplified in the case of Edward Monox, an English captain and merchant, charged September 10, 1604, with offences in the matter of images and with following the doctrines of Luther and Calvin. The consulta de fe, September 11th, unanimously voted his arrest with sequestration but that, before action, the papers be sent to the Suprema for its decision, in view of the considerations of state arising from the peace with England, and from the fact that he was a rich merchant who, since the death of Queen Elizabeth, had twice come with highly commendatory passports from the Spanish ambassador in London.[333]

While thus some wholesome restraint was imposed on the Inquisition and the vexations inflicted on merchants and seamen became much less frequent, they did not wholly cease, for the Suprema construed the treaties arbitrarily in such wise as to limit the privileges of foreign heretics as far as possible. How it still continued to throw obstacles in the way of trade may be seen in the petition of Jacob and Conrad de Brier and Pieter Nansen, merchants of Tenerife, presented May 3, 1611. The ship Los Tres Reyes arrived at Las Isletas with some goods for them; for some reason, not stated, it had been seized by the tribunal and its cargo had been sequestrated and they sought release of their property. Their prayer was granted and, on May 25th, an order was given to deliver to their agent the packages specified and their letters, subject however to the payment of the cost of disembarking the goods, the carriage to Las Palmas, the fees of the secrestador for keeping them, 24 reales to the interpreter of the tribunal for his trouble, 18 ducats 4 reales for the freight and 10 reales average to the ship, at the rate of one real per package.[334]

When war broke out with England, lasting from 1624 to 1630, of course the treaty of 1604-5 became dormant, but it was not until April 22, 1626, that a royal proclamation of non-intercourse with England appeared, confiscating all English goods imported in contravention of it, and this was followed, May 29th, by a _carta acordada_ of the Suprema ordering the prosecution, in the regular way, of all Englishmen who had been delinquent as regards the faith.[335] This led to a discussion between the three inquisitors. Francisco de Santalis presented a long opinion to the effect that in Tenerife there were very many of them who, in spite of the war, remained, in place of departing as enemies. The orders of the Suprema were therefore applicable to them; Catholics incurred the risk of excommunication in supplying them with food and were exposed to the danger of infection; they were delinquents in not hearing mass or confessing and communing, and in eating meat on fast days. This was not only a great scandal, but it afforded opportunity of flight and of concealing their property, which was large. He therefore voted that secret information be taken as to their delinquencies and, when this was sufficient, that they should all be arrested and their property be sequestrated, after which the orders of the Suprema could be awaited as to their prosecution. The other two inquisitors, Alonso Rincon and Gabriel Martínez, referred to a consultation had on September 2d with the Ordinary, the consultors, and the calificadores, when it was resolved that the matter be referred to the Suprema and no action be taken till its orders were received; the royal proclamation had said nothing about residents; to seize them and their property would be a great hardship; the commissioners at La Laguna, Orotava and Garachico had been instructed to be vigilant and no denunciations had been received. It is creditable to the tribunal that it resisted the temptation of seizing the large amount of property involved, and the English appear not to have been molested.[336]

Yet the position of the foreign merchants was exceedingly precarious, as is shown by the case of John Tanner, prior to these deliberations. He was arrested and brought to the prison, November 12, 1624. On examination he stated his age as 22; he was a baptized Christian, who kept feast-days and Sundays, but did not hear mass or confess, for in his country there was no mass or confession; he knew nothing of the Catholic faith and had never been instructed in it. When asked as usual if he knew the cause of his arrest he said that he did not, unless it was because Juan Jánez, the commissioner at Garachico, had asked him for some linens and a pair of wool stockings which he refused, when Jánez called him a heretic dog and they came to blows, and then he was thrown into the public gaol. On being told, as usual, to search his memory, he added that once he went with some other Englishmen to La Laguna to see Don Rodrigo de Bohórquez, then governor of Tenerife; he asked Bohórquez to pay him 400 pesos owing to him and 2800 reales due to Robert Spencer for goods taken, when Bohórquez grew angry and said that Henry Ysan was the cause of all the English making demands upon him; if he had hanged him while in his power there would be none of this and he was a heretic dog, for no one could be a Christian who was not a Roman. Tanner replied that one could be a Christian without being a Roman, when Bohórquez called for witnesses and swore that he should suffer for it. Tanner was then asked what he meant by saying that one could be a Christian without being a Roman, when he fell on his knees and begged mercy if he had erred. He was a poor youth and had a ship lying at Garachico, on which he had to pay demurrage of 120 reales a day, while the embargo on his property prevented his despatching her. At a second audience on November 19th he again begged mercy on his knees; his credit was being ruined by the demurrage on his ship, and the loss fell on his principal. Then, on the 23d, he asked for an audience in which he represented that the ships were loading and preparing to sail, while his was idle; his whole career was being wrecked; he begged them for the love of God to have mercy on him and tell him what he had done; he had lived in the religion of his fathers and must continue to do so, or he could not return to England; he had engaged to serve his master for seven years and his parents were under bonds for him. The pleadings of the poor wretch were fruitless; the case dragged on through the customary formalities and, on February 11, 1625, the consulta de fe voted that he be absolved _ad cautelam_ and be recluded for two years in a convent for instruction, at the expiration of which he must bring a certificate of improvement. In accordance with this, on February 18th, he was placed in the Franciscan convent, his maintenance being paid for as a pauper.[337] Proselytism after this fashion can scarce have conduced to the salvation of souls, however much it may have replenished the treasury of the Holy Office.

With the peace of 1630 the provisions of 1604 were revived but hardly a year passed in which some Englishman was not thrown in prison and prosecuted on one pretext or another, as Roderick Jones, in 1640, for saying that God alone is to be prayed to, and Edward Bland, in 1642, for having a Bible in his house.[338] In spite of this the flourishing wine-trade of the islands brought many English and Hollanders as residents, and there was even an English company established at Tenerife, where, in 1654, the tribunal reported that there were more than fifteen hundred Protestants domiciled, who were prevented from infecting the people by its incessant vigilance. The captains-general usually sought to protect them, and the influence of their ambassadors in Madrid was invoked on occasion, but, when one fell sick, the Inquisition sought to isolate him from his family and friends and put him in charge of theologians to convert him, giving rise to unseemly contests in which it was not always successful. To remedy this the tribunal, September 18, 1654, asked of the Suprema power to insist that when one of the rich Protestant residents fell sick, his compatriots should be excluded and entrance should alone be permitted to learned Catholics who might wean him from his errors.[339] We should probably do no injustice to the motives of the tribunal in assuming that this was dictated rather by the expectation of pious bequests than by zeal for death-bed conversions.

Foreigners sometimes sought to avert trouble by pretending Catholicism and thus placed themselves in the power of the tribunal, which was constantly on the watch for them. In 1654, for instance, Fray Luis de Betancor was summoned and interrogated as to his knowledge of such cases, to which he replied that, some twelve years before, Evan Pugh, an English surgeon, had come to Adeje to cure Doña Isabel de Ponte, and sometimes went out to hunt with her brother Juan Bautista de Ponte. He remembered that one day, when he had finished celebrating mass, he was told that Pugh had stood at the church-door with his hat in his hand, and it was currently said that he confessed to Fray Juan de Medina. Similarly, in 1674, we find the Hollander Pieter Groney testifying that when he sailed from the Texel in 1671 Juan de Rada was a fellow-passenger, who told him he was a Protestant and as such joined in the services during the voyage, but, when the ship was visited on arrival he swore that he was a Catholic and had since then acted exteriorly as a Catholic, though, when they lived together for a couple of months, he ate meat freely on fast days and he regarded him as a Protestant rather than as a Catholic.[340] What was the outcome in these cases cannot be told, but the investigations illustrate the careful watchfulness of the tribunal and the dangers incurred by residence within its jurisdiction. Even his official position did not protect from prosecution Edmund Smith, the British consul at Tenerife, when he was accused, in 1699, of maltreating converts to Catholicism and of persuading and threatening those inclined to it, even, it was said, shipping them away when other measures failed.[341]

In the 18th century, while foreign vessels were closely watched and a vigilant eye was kept on resident Protestants, they were no longer molested with investigations and denunciations. If, in 1728, Philip V ordered the expulsion of all foreigners, it was not on religious grounds, but to put an end to frauds on the revenue. None, however, were expelled, although some professed conversion to save themselves from annoyance.[342] A similar impulse seems to have impelled Dr. James Brown, a physician of Tenerife, who wrote, in March, 1770, to the tribunal, from the Augustinian convent of La Laguna, in which he had sought asylum from the captain-general, who was seeking to seize him and send him to England. To secure its protection he asserted his desire to abjure his errors and to be received into the Catholic Church, but in this he failed for, on July 14, he was ordered to leave the islands within forty days.[343]

* * * * *

The intellectual activity of the Canaries was not such as to call for much vigilance of censorship, at least during the earlier period. The _visitas de navíos_, or examination of ships arriving, for heretics and heretic books, was performed after a fashion, but the tribunal was inadequately equipped for the duty. One of the charges against Inquisitor Fúnez, in 1577, was his sending the gaoler to perform it, to which he replied that he had done so but once and that on occasions he had sent the fiscal or the secretary; it was not his business and he had no one to whom to depute it.[344]

Towards the middle of the seventeenth century there was some little activity with regard to the foreign Protestants, who were assumed to be subject to the rules of the Index. The prosecution of Edward Bland, in 1642, for possessing a Bible, seems to have attracted attention to this and, on July 5, 1645, the tribunal ordered its commissioner at Orotava to take the alguazil, notary and two familiars and visit the houses of the English heretics, secretly, without disturbance and with much discretion, asking them to exhibit all the books they possessed, examining all their chests and packages, making an inventory of all books and their authors, and making them swear before the notary as to their having licences to hold them; also whether they had been examined by the Inquisition and, if so, at what time and by what officials. If there were works by prohibited authors, or such as had not been seen by the Inquisition, they were to be deposited with a suitable person, sending a report to the tribunal, with lists of the books, and awaiting its action. If portraits or busts of heresiarchs were found they were to be seized and deposited with the books.

Under these elaborate instructions the search was duly made and the reports, if truthful, would indicate that literature and art were not extensively cultivated by the English traders. Nothing dangerous was found, though of course, as regards English books, the investigators had to accept the word of the owners. In one house they describe, as hanging on the walls of a room, very ugly half-length portraits of a strange collection of worthies--Homer, Apelles, Philo Judæus, Aristotle, Seneca, Pliny, two of Gustavus Adolphus and one without a name. It is perhaps significant that nowhere was there a Bible, a prayer-book or a work of devotion. The houses of two Portuguese traders were similarly inspected, where were found pictures of saints and of damsels with exuberant charms; also of Barbarossa and of some other pirates.[345] Possibly supervision of this kind may have continued for, on June 7, 1663, Richard Guild was summoned to the tribunal to describe six English books and four pamphlets, found in possession of Edward Baker, when among them there proved to be several controversial works as to Presbyterianism and the Independents. So, in 1670, Captain Joseph Pinero, a Portuguese, who was building a ship, was denounced for the more dangerous offence of having some Jewish books, but diligent search failed to discover them.[346]

Books, however, were not the only objects of censorial animadversion. In 1671 some plates and jars with figures of Christ, the Virgin and the saints, sold by Juan Martin Salazar of Ycod, were apparently deemed irreverent, as subordinating the divine to the commonplace of daily life, and Fray Lucas Estebes was ordered to go to his shop, with alguazil and notary, and break the stock on hand, at the same time ascertaining the name of the seller and of all purchasers. Soon after this, in 1677, an edict was issued ordering the surrender of some snuff-boxes, brought by an English vessel, which were adorned with two heads--one with a tiara and the legend _Æcclesia perversa tenet jaciem diaboli_, and the other of a philosopher and the motto _Stulti sapientes aliquando_.[347]

In the latter half of the eighteenth century there seems to be more intellectual activity and desire to seek forbidden sources of knowledge, for we begin to hear of licences to read prohibited books. A register of them, commencing in 1766, shows that when obtained from the inquisitor-general they had to be submitted to the tribunal for its endorsement, but it could exercise the discretion of suspending and protesting, as in the case of one granted, in 1786, by Pius VI and endorsed by Inquisitor-general Rubin de Cevallos, to Fray Antonio Ramond, on which the tribunal reports that he ought not to have it, as he is of a turbulent spirit and disorderly life. Licences generally made exception of certain specified books and authors, but sometimes they were granted without limitation. When the holder of a licence died, it was, as a rule, to be returned to the tribunal.[348]

At this period the main activity of the tribunal was in its function of censorship. It did not content itself with awaiting orders but assumed to investigate for itself; nothing escaped its vigilance, and we are told that the monthly lists which it forwarded to the Suprema of the books denounced or suppressed are surprising as coming from a province so small and so uncultured. In fact, in 1781 it expressed its grief that great and small, men and women, were abandoning themselves to reading, especially French books.[349] To do it justice it labored strenuously to discourage culture and to perpetuate obscurantism.

Yet the _visitas de navíos_, as described in a letter of August 23, 1787, were less obstructive to commerce than the practice in Spain. When a vessel cast anchor, after the visit of the health officer, the captain landed and, in company with the consul of his nation, went to the military governor, and then to the Inquisition where, under oath, he declared his nationality, his port of departure and what passengers and cargo he brought. When the vessel was discharging, the secretary of the tribunal superintended the process and noted whatever he deemed objectionable, whence it often happened that matters adverse to religion were seized.[350]

Notwithstanding all vigilance, however, the dangerous stuff found entrance. The works of Voltaire and Rousseau were widely read among the educated class and the hands of the tribunal were practically tied. It would laboriously gather testimony and compile a _sumaria_ against one who read prohibited books, only to be told, when submitting it to the Suprema, to suspend action for the present. In a letter of May 24, 1788, it complained bitterly of this and of the consequent diminution of respect for the Inquisition. Chief among the offenders were the Commandant-general and the Regent of the Audiencia, whose cases had been sent on April 26th. Their openly expressed contempt for the tribunal perverted the whole people, who laughed at censures and read prohibited books. An object of especial aversion was the distinguished historian of the Canaries, José de Viera y Clavijo, Archdeacon of Fuerteventura. His sermons had caused him to be reprimanded repeatedly and, when his history appeared with its explanation of the apparition of the Virgen de Candelaria and other miracles of the Conquest, and its account of the controversies between the chapter and the tribunal, the indignation of the latter was unbounded. A virulent report was made to the Suprema, September 18, 1784, which remained unanswered. Another was sent, February 7, 1792, complaining of the evil effect of allowing the circulation of such writings, but this failed to elicit action, for the work was never placed on the Index.[351]

* * * * *

Whatever may have been its deficiencies in other respects, the tribunal seems never to have lost sight of its functions in fomenting discord with the authorities, secular and ecclesiastical. In 1521 we hear of Inquisitor Ximenes excommunicating some of the canons, in consequence of which the chapter withdrew the revenue of his prebend and sent a special envoy to the court, but he appealed to Rome and a royal cédula of July 8, 1523, ordered the chapter to make the payments.[352] Even during the inertness of Padilla’s later inquisitorship, he had sufficient energy to carry on a desperate quarrel with the Audiencia. He ordered the deputy governor, Juan Arias de la Mota, to arrest Alonso de Lemos, who had been denounced to the tribunal and, on his obeying, the Audiencia arrested and prosecuted him, which led to an envenomed controversy in which excommunications and interdict were freely employed, until Philip II, February 16, 1562, ordered the liberation of Arias, adding an emphatic command in future to give to the inquisitor and his officials all the favor and aid that they might require in the discharge of their duties and to honor them as was done everywhere throughout his dominions. It was doubtless in the hope of putting an end to these unseemly disturbances that Philip, by a cédula of October 10, 1567, prescribed rules for settling competencias, or conflicts over jurisdiction. The inquisitor and the Regent of the Audiencia were required to confer, when, if they could not come to an agreement, the bishop was to be called in, when the majority should decide.[353]

No regulations were of avail to prevent the dissensions for which all parties were eager and which were rendered especially bitter by the domineering assumption of superiority by the Inquisition. It was not long after Fúnez had reorganized the tribunal that he became involved in an angry controversy with Bishop Cristóbal Vera. Alonso de Valdés, a canon, incurred the episcopal displeasure by removing his name from an order addressed to the chapter for the reason that he was not present. Vera thereupon imprisoned him _incomunicado_ so strictly that his food was handed in to him through a window. It chanced that Valdés was also notary of the tribunal and Fúnez claimed jurisdiction, but the bishop refused to surrender him, in spite of the fact that the absence of its notary impeded the Inquisition. The tribunal complained to the Suprema which came to its aid in a fashion showing how complete was the ascendancy claimed over the episcopal order, and how little chance a bishop had in a contest with such an antagonist. Inquisitor-general Quiroga wrote to Vera that, if the fault of Valdés was such that he should punish it, this should have been done in such wise as not to impede the operation of the tribunal. He hoped that already the case would have been handed over to the tribunal to which it belonged and that in future Vera would not give occasion for such troubles. This was enclosed in a letter of instructions from the Suprema prescribing the utmost courtesy and the most vigorous action. Fúnez is to call, with a witness, on the bishop and demand the person of Valdés and the papers in the case, as being his rightful judge, at the same time promising his punishment to the bishop’s satisfaction. If Vera refuses, Quiróga’s letter is to be handed to him, and if he still refuses he is to be told that he obliges the tribunal to proceed according to law.

This so-called law is that the fiscal shall commence prosecution against the bishop and his officials for impeding the Inquisition. Then the inquisitor is to issue his formal mandate against the provisor, officials, gaolers, etc., ordering them, under pain of major excommunication and 200 ducats without further-notice, to surrender Valdés within three days to the tribunal for punishment, so that he can resume his office of notary. If this does not suffice, a similar mandate is to be issued against the bishop, under pain of privation of entering his church. If the provisor and officials persist in disobedience through three _rebeldias_ (contumacies of ten days each), the inquisitor shall proclaim them excommunicated. If the bishop is stubborn he is to be prohibited from entering his church and to be admonished that if he does not comply he will be suspended from his orders and fined. If he perseveres through three _rebeldias_, letters shall be issued declaring him to have incurred these penalties and admonishing him to obey within three days under pain of major excommunication. If still contumacious, letters shall be issued declaring him publicly excommunicated and subject to the fine, which shall be collected by levy and execution. In all this he is not to be inhibited from cognizance of the case, but only that he must not impede the Inquisition by detaining its notary, and, as it is very possible that he may seek the aid of the Audiencia, if it intervenes it is to be notified of the royal cédula (of 1553) prohibiting all interference in cases concerning the Inquisition.[354]

This portentous document was received in the tribunal, April 11, 1577. It was impossible to contend with adversaries armed with such weapons and Bishop Vera was obliged to submit. Not content with its triumph the tribunal undertook to humiliate him still further. Doña Ana de Sobranis was a mystic who believed herself illuminated and gifted with miraculous powers. In 1572 she had denounced herself because a Franciscan, Fray Antonio del Jesús, had given her, as he said by command of God, nine consecrated hosts, which she carried always with her and worshipped. The tribunal took the hosts and dismissed the case but, as the bishop was her warm admirer and extolled her virtues, to mortify him, in 1580, the fiscal presented a furious accusation against her, as a receiver and fautor of heretics and heresies. She was arrested and imprisoned, but the tribunal had overreached itself. She had friends who appealed to the Suprema and, in May, 1581, there came from it a decision ordering a public demonstration that she was innocent and that there had been no cause for her arrest.[355]

Undeterred by the fate of Bishop Vera, his successor Fernando de Figueroa, about 1590, had a lively struggle with the tribunal. He excommunicated Doctor Alonso Pacheco, regidor of the Grand Canary and deputy governor of Tenerife, because he would not abandon illicit relations with a married woman. The tribunal intervened and evoked the case, giving rise to a prolonged competencia, which remained undecided in consequence of the death of the culprit.[356] Causes of such strife were never lacking and the first half of the seventeenth century was largely occupied by them and by an endless struggle to compel the chapter to allow to the inquisitors cushioned chairs in the cathedral.[357] On one occasion, in 1619, the chapter offended the tribunal by obeying a royal cédula and disregarding a threat which enjoined disobedience. The canons were thereupon excommunicated and appealed to the king, who found himself obliged to withdraw the cédula.[358] The overbearing conduct of the tribunal produced a chronic feeling of exasperation and the veriest trifle was sufficient to cause an outbreak. One custom provocative of much bad blood was that of selecting in Lent a fishing-boat and ordering it to bring its catch to the Inquisition, when, after supplying the officials and prisoners, if there was anything left it might be sold to the people. In 1629 the municipality fruitlessly complained of this to the visitor Juan de Escobar, and in 1631 there was an explosion. The Audiencia rudely intervened by throwing in prison Bartolomé Alonso, the luckless master of a boat selected, and threatening to scourge him through the streets. He managed to convey word to the tribunal, which at once sent its secretary Aguilera to the Audiencia, with a message asking the release of Alonso, but the Audiencia refused to receive anything but a written communication and Aguilera came back with a mandate requiring obedience under pain of two hundred ducats, but he was received with insults and Alonso was publicly sentenced to a hundred lashes. Then the tribunal declared the judges excommunicate, displayed their names as such in the churches and had the bells rung. The Audiencia disregarded the censures and arrested Aguilera, while the Alcaide Salazar, who had accompanied him, hid himself, but the Audiencia ordered a female slave of his to be seized and his house to be torn down, in response to which the tribunal published heavier censures and fines, demanding the release of the prisoners. Then Bishop Murga intervened and asked the tribunal to accept an honorable compromise, but it refused; he returned to the charge, urging the affliction of the people, who dreaded an interdict at a time when there was so much need of rain and when Holy Week was approaching; if reference were made to the Suprema there would be a delay of six months and meanwhile the prisoners under trial by the Audiencia would languish in gaol, for the judges would be incapacitated by the excommunication. The inquisitors, in their report to the Suprema, explained that, seeing that the people were ready for a disastrous outbreak, and as the bishop promised that the prisoners should be released at once (as they were, after a confinement of five hours) they ordered the excommunicates to be absolved and abstained from proceeding against the guilty. Then, when peace seemed restored, the quarrel broke out fiercely again, for the inquisitors demanded the surrender of the warrant of arrest, which Bartolomé Ponce, the official charged with it, refused to give up. He was arrested and as, after two days, he appealed to the Audiencia, they manacled him and ordered the arrest of the advocate and procurator who had drawn up the appeal. This secured the surrender of the document and the inquisitors felicitated themselves to the Suprema on the vigor with which they had impressed on every one the power of the Inquisition. Whether the innocent cause of the disturbance, the fisherman Bartolomé Alonso, received his lashes, seems to have been an incident too unimportant to be recorded.[359]

Rodrigo Gutiérrez de la Rosa, who was bishop from 1652 to 1658, was a man of violent temper, not as easily subdued as Bishop Vera, and his episcopate was a prolonged quarrel with his chapter and with the tribunal. In 1654, Doctor Guirola, the commissioner at Santa Cruz de Tenerife, was denounced, for his oppression, to the bishop, who ordered an investigation and his arrest if cause were found. This proved to be the case and the arrest was made, against which the tribunal protested in terms so irritating that Gutiérrez excommunicated all its officials, ringing the bells and placing their names on the _tablillas_, besides imposing a fine of 2000 ducats on each of the inquisitors. They met this by calling on the civil and military authorities for forcible aid and summoned all the bishop’s dependents to assist them. Miguel de Collado, the secretary, went to the cathedral to serve these notices, on hearing which Gutiérrez hastened thither with his followers and, not finding Collado, proceeded to the house of Inquisitor José Badaran, which he searched from bottom to top for pledges to secure the payment of the fine. Word was carried to the tribunal, when the inquisitors, with a guard of soldiers, went to Badaran’s house, which they found barred against them, broke open the door and a stormy interview ensued. The bishop in the cathedral, published Badaran and the fiscal as excommunicates; the inquisitors ordered the notices of excommunication removed and fined the bishop in 4000 ducats. To collect this, they embargoed his revenues in Tenerife and he in turn embargoed the fruits of their prebends. They obtained guards of soldiers posted in their houses and in that of the fiscal, fearing attack from the satellites of the bishop, such as he had made in 1552 in the cathedral and in 1554 at the house of the dean. In reporting all this to the Suprema, they promise to send the fiscal with all the documents by the next vessel, for the authority and power of the Inquisition depend upon the result.[360]

While this was pending a quarrel arose between the tribunal and the chapter, because the latter refused to pay to the fiscal the fruits of his prebend. Inquisitor-general Arce y Reynoso ordered the chapter to make the payment, which led the canon Matheo de Cassares and the racionero Cristóbal Vandama to commit certain acts of disrespect. To punish this the inquisitors, on November 16, 1655, arrested them, in conformity with the rules prescribed by the Suprema, in its letter of September 6, 1644, respecting the arrest of prebendaries, but, at the prayer of the chapter, they were released on the third day. They were friends of Bishop Gutiérrez, who nursed his wrath until December 26th, when there was a solemn celebration in the cathedral, at which Inquisitor Frias celebrated mass. When Inquisitor Badaran entered and took his seat in the choir, Gutiérrez in a loud voice commanded him to leave the church, as he was under excommunication for arresting clerics without jurisdiction. To avoid creating a tumult he did so; Frias celebrated mass and then joined him in the tribunal, where they drew up the necessary papers. The affair of course created an immense scandal and led to prolonged correspondence with the Suprema, which ordered it suspended April 12, 1657.[361] They were not much more successful in the outcome of the previous quarrel, although they succeeded, at the end of 1656, in procuring a royal order summoning Gutiérrez to the court. In communicating this to the bishop, December 13, 1656, the Licenciate Blas Canales advises him, if he has any money to spare, to invest it in a jewel for presentation to the king, through the hands of the minister Louis de Haro. He probably followed the judicious counsel, for the matter ended with a decree relieving him from the fine imposed on him by the inquisitors.[362]

The next encounter was with the Audiencia, in 1661. For eight years there had been no physician in the island, when the tribunal, needing one for the torture-chamber, induced, in 1659, Dr. Domingo Rodríguez Ramos to come. He became a frequent visitor at the house of Doña Beatriz de Herrera, the _amiga_ of the judge Alvaro Gil de la Sierpe, to whom she had borne several children. Sierpe became jealous and, on some pretext, Dr. Ramos was arrested, January 28, 1661, and imprisoned in chains. The tribunal asserted its jurisdiction by inhibiting the Audiencia from prosecuting the case and, on this being disregarded, the judges were excommunicated with all the solemnities. They impassively continued their functions; the tribunal then excommunicated the officials of the court, who were more easily frightened; for several months there was much popular excitement but, in October, the competencia was decided in favor of the Audiencia--doubtless because the physician was not an official of the tribunal--and a royal letter sharply rebuked the inquisitors.[363]

The tribunal was evidently losing its prestige and matters did not improve with the advent of the Bourbon dynasty. The enmity between it and the chapter continued undiminished and when, on the death of the Marquis of Celada, in 1707, his son, the Inquisitor Bartolomé Benítez de Lugo, asked that his exequies should be performed in the cathedral, the request was refused. This led to a violent rupture, in the course of which the tribunal voted the arrest of the canons, with sequestration. The chapter appealed to Philip V, who condemned the tribunal in a cédula of November 7, 1707. This did not arrive until the following year, when the chapter kept it secret until Easter; in the crowded solemnity of the feast-day, when Inquisitor Benítez was present, a secretary mounted the pulpit and read the royal decree, to his great mortification.[364] Even worse befell the tribunal in 1714, when its inexcusable violence, in another quarrel with the chapter, led Philip V to demand the recall of the inquisitors and to enforce his commands in spite of the repeated tergiversations of the Suprema.[365]

* * * * *

As the eighteenth century advanced, the hostility of ecclesiastics and laymen towards the tribunal continued unabated, while respect for it rapidly decreased and its functions dwindled, except in the matter of censorship. A curious manifestation of the feeling entertained for it is to be found in the attitude of the parish priests with regard to the sanbenitos of the heretics hung in their churches. A report on the subject called for by the Suprema, in 1788, elicited the statement that for many years there had been no culprits of the class requiring sanbenitos. In 1756, when the walls of the parish church of Los Remedios de La Laguna were whitened, the incumbents resisted the replacement of the sanbenitos, or at least wished to hang them where they should not be seen, but the tribunal ordered them to be renovated and hung conspicuously. In the Dominican church of Las Palmas, there used to be sanbenitos, but they had disappeared and the inquisitors could not explain the cause of their removal. Eight years ago the parish church of Telde was whitened and the incumbents would not replace them; Inquisitor Padilla was informed of this, but he took no action. The only ones then to be seen in Las Palmas were in the cathedral; the building was undergoing alterations and the walls would be whitened, which the inquisitors expected would be alleged as a reason for removing them.[366] Equally suggestive of the feeling of the laity is the fact that, when the position of alguazil mayor fell vacant, it was offered in vain to representatives of the principal families, who all declined under various pretexts.[367]