The first years after the cessation of the Hungarian protectorate were again disturbed by a quarrel with the Venetians. Some of the grain ships bringing foodstuffs to Ragusa were captured by Venetian cruisers in the Adriatic, as the Government of the great Republic accused its small but enterprising rival of playing a double game. The Ragusans, wishing to retaliate, thought that they could not do better than by tampering with the Venetian despatches. The Senate did not exactly authorise these proceedings, but the Archbishop Trivulzio, a Milanese,[458] who was very friendly to France and therefore hostile to Venice and Spain, had the messenger carrying letters to the Venetian Provveditore at Cattaro seized. The papers, which contained the announcement of an alliance against the Sultan, were at once forwarded to the French ambassador at Constantinople.[459] The Venetians were furious, and threatened vengeance on the Ragusans, in spite of the Senate’s protestations that the Archbishop had acted entirely on his own responsibility. They were partially appeased by the arrest and punishment of one Pozza, who had actually executed the Archbishop’s orders, but Venetian ships continued to harry the Ragusan coast for some time, inflicting much damage.[460] This same year (1538) the Pope Paul III., as head of the Christian League against the Turks, issued a decree, probably inspired by the Venetians, hostile to the Ragusans, forbidding all Christians to sell them arms, gunpowder, cables, ship-timber, iron, &c., because they were supposed to sell these articles to the Turks. He also ordered the Republic to shake off all allegiance to the Sultan, to cease to pay him tribute, and to join the League against the Infidel at once, contributing five galleys and 10,000 ducats to the common war chest. The citizens were filled with consternation at these peremptory commands, but the Senate sent one of its cleverest diplomatists, Clemente Ragnina, to Rome, and he proved equal to the emergency. Ragusa, he informed His Holiness, was situated between the Turks and the sea, and would, if she joined the League, be the first to fall a victim to the wrath of the Infidel. Owing, moreover, to the small extent of her territory, she was dependent for three-quarters of the year on foreign grain, which came mostly from the Turkish provinces; she could not, therefore, exist without intercourse with her neighbours. The only result of Ragusa’s joining the alliance would be the destruction of the city, with her churches, her convents and monasteries, and all her precious sacred relics would fall into the hands of the Infidel, without any advantage accruing to Christendom thereby. The astute Ragnina hinted that the Venetians were merely urging the Pope to take measures against Ragusa out of jealousy. These arguments had the desired effect, the Pope relenting towards the Republic and exempting it from joining the League, to the