d
the general state of feeling at the time. There, when a company of
inquisitors presented themselves, conducted into the city by men and
horses which had been impressed for the purpose by royal order, the civil
authorities refused to help them, notwithstanding the injunctions of the
bull, the obligations of canon law, and a mandate from the Crown. The new
inquisitors found themselves unable to act for want of help; meanwhile
the objects of their mission forsook the city, and found shelter in the
neighboring districts; and Ferdinand had to issue specific orders to
overpower the hostility of all the classes of the people and to compel
the magistrates to assist the new set of officers ecclesiastic. These
orders were most reluctantly obeyed.

Thus fortified, the inquisitors took up their abode in the Dominican
convent of St. Paul, and issued their first mandate January 2, 1481.
They said that they were aware of the flight of the New Christians, and
commanded the Marquis of Cadiz, the Count of Arcos, and all the dukes,
marquises, counts, gentlemen, rich men, and others of the kingdom of
Castile to arrest the fugitives and send them to Seville within a
fortnight, sequestrating their property. All who failed to do this were
excommunicated as abettors of heresy, deposed from their dignities, and
deprived of their estates; and their subjects were to be absolved from
homage and obedience. Crowds of fugitives were driven back into Seville,
bound like felons; the dungeons and apartments of the convent overflowed
with prisoners; and the King assigned the castle of Triana, on the
opposite bank of the Guadalquiver, to the "New and Holy Tribunal," to be
a place of safe custody. There the inquisitors, elate with triumph over
the reluctant magistrates and panic-stricken people, shortly afterward
erected a tablet with an inscription in memory of the first establishment
of the modern Inquisition in Western Europe. The concluding sentences
of the inscription were: "God grant that, for the protection and
augmentation of the faith, it may abide unto the end of time!--Arise, O
Lord, judge thy cause!--Catch ye the foxes!"

Their second edict was one of "grace." It summoned all who had
apostatized to present themselves before the inquisitors within a term
appointed, promising that all who did so, with true contrition and
purpose of amendment, should be exempted from confiscation of their
property--it was understood that they should be punished