João wrote to Lippomano not to come, and he persisted in this against the entreaties of Charles V. Nevertheless the nuncio set out, and we hear of him in Aragon in August, where he encountered the Portuguese treasurer sent to detain him. The latter was fully aware of the payment of the thousand ducats and of the monthly stipend, as to all of which the nuncio professed the most innocent ignorance, and he further stated that the intercepted letters showed that Cardinal Silva was to receive two hundred and fifty crowns a month to act as "protector" of the Jews. Nevertheless the treasurer was finally persuaded to write favorably to his master, and Lippomano resumed his journey towards Valladolid.[697] João refused to be placated. On learning that the nuncio had reached Castile he wrote ordering him to advance no further until he should hear from the pope, to whom, on September 18th, he addressed a vigorous letter, demanding that no nuncio should be sent to interfere with the Inquisition; he was not actuated, he said, by greed, for there was no confiscation, and indeed, from another source we have the assertion that the maintenance of the Inquisition was costing him ten or eleven thousand ducats a year.[698] [Sidenote: _INQUISITION OF PORTUGAL_] Lippomano had assured the Portuguese treasurer that he did not come to interfere with the Inquisition; that his orders were only to see whether the inquisitors observed justice; if they did not, conscience would require the pope to make the necessary provisions. His secret instructions, however, were of a very different tenor. He was told that he need not hesitate to act with energy, though observing external courtesy, for Portugal was fatally weakened and approaching ruin; the king was completely impoverished, oppressed with debt, at home and abroad, hated by his people, and wholly under the influence of the friars, while his relations with France and with the emperor were unfriendly. As for the Infante Henrique, if he was not to be deprived of the inquisitor-generalship, he must at least seek a dispensation for lack of age, ask absolution for the past and ratify or annul all the preceding trials. As for the Inquisition, it would be a most holy thing to abolish it and commit the jurisdiction to the bishops; the nuncio was furnished with faculties to do this, or to suspend it, and these he was to show openly, that it might be known that this was at his discretion. Meanwhile he could issue letters to all who asked for them, on their making payment, and even if the price was small the aggregate would be large, as there were fifty thousand of them. The declaratory bull of November 13, (_sic_) 1539, suppressed by Capodiferro, was to be published without consulting the king; it need not be affixed to the church-doors, but copies could be given to all who asked, so that they could use it when on trial, and Henrique was to be notified that all procedure must conform to it; if he protested, he was to be told that