Mercader neutralized the efforts of Ferdinand's agents, for six months passed away without the request being granted and, in January, 1486, the king ventured the experiment of sending two appointees of Torquemada, the Dominicans Juan Franco and Guillen Casells, with an _Executoria pro Inquisitoribus apud Cataloniam_, addressed to all the officials, who were ordered under pain of five thousand gold florins to receive and convey them safely, to aid them in their work, to arrest and imprison in chains whomsoever they might designate and to inflict due punishment on all whom they might abandon to the secular arm.[685] This energetic movement was as fruitless as its predecessors and some weeks later an order was issued to the inquisitors at Saragossa to reimburse, from the pecuniary penances in their hands, the expenses of the cleric who had been sent to Barcelona and also to pay fifty libras each to Esteban Gago, sent there as alguazil and Jaime Millan as notary, in order to provide for their support.[686] At the same time Ferdinand expressed the hope that the Barcelonese tribunal would soon be in working order, and in this he was not wholly disappointed. [Sidenote: _BARCELONA SUBMITS_] Innocent VIII yielded at last and, by a brief of February 6, 1486, under pretext that they had been too zealous, he removed all inquisitors holding papal commissions--in Aragon Juan Colivera, Juan de Epila, Juan Franco and Guillen Casells, in Valencia Juan Orts and Mateo Mercader and in Barcelona Juan Comte; he appointed Torquemada as special inquisitor for Barcelona, with power of subdelegation and, apparently to prepare for expected resistance, he authorized the Bishops of Córdova and Leon and the Abbot of St. Emelian of Burgos to suppress all opposition, especially on the part of Juan Comte, while he expressly set aside the privileges of the city.[687] In spite of this formidable missive nearly eighteen months elapsed before Barcelona was reduced to submission, and Torquemada's final appointee, Alonso de Espina, was able to enter the city. When at last he succeeded, July 5, 1487, we are told that the Lieutenant-general of the Principality, the Bishops of Urgel, Tortosa and Gerona and many gentlemen and citizens sallied forth to greet him, but there is no mention made of the Diputados, or the local magistracy, or the canons joining in the reception, and it was not until July 30th that the municipal officials took the oath of obedience to him.[688]