As usual these proceedings against the dead and absent were productive of abundant confiscations and the fears of descendants were thoroughly aroused lest some aberration of an ancestor should be discovered which would sweep away their fortunes. This gave rise to the expedient of compositions, of which we shall see more hereafter, as a sort of insurance against confiscation. In the present case a letter from Ferdinand, January 28, 1498, to the inquisitor and the receiver announces that these people are coming forward with offers and he orders the officials to make just and reasonable bargains with them and report to him, when he will decide what is most to his advantage. In this and other ways the operations of the tribunal were beginning to bring in more than its expenses, for, February 2, 1499, there is an order given on the receiver Matheo de Morrano to pay to the receiver of Valencia two hundred gold ducats to cancel some debts that were pressing on the royal conscience, followed soon after by other orders to pay four hundred and fifty ducats to the royal treasury and fifty florins to the nunnery of Santa Clara of Calatayud. The confiscating zeal of the officials was stimulated, February 21, 1498, by an allowance to Morrano of three thousand sueldos, in addition to his salary, in reward of his eminent services and another, March 2d, of a hundred libras mallorquines to the notary Pere Prest. It was not always easy to trace the property which the unfortunates naturally sought to conceal and a liberal offer of fifty per cent. was made to informers who should reveal or discover it.[700] [Sidenote: _DISCONTENT_]