Page:Vol 3 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/67

Rh This act of the viceroy was undoubtedly legal, but the archbishop immediately declared that he had incurred the censures mentioned in the bull called in cœna domini He therefore [sic]excommuicated him, ordering his name to be placed in the list of excommunicated persons affixed to the church door.

Gelves now called the oidores and the alcaldes together in order to get their opinion concerning the right of the archbishop to excommunicate him. Their answer was evasive, and he submitted the matter to a second assemblage, composed of ecclesiastics and laymen, who decided that the archbishop was clearly in the wrong. Fortified by this opinion the viceroy now retaliated on his antagonist by a decree condemning him to pay a fine of ten thousand ducados, to confiscation of his temporal property, and to banishment. The marquis finally sent the alguazil mayor, Luis de Tobar Godinez, to execute the decree and compel the archbishop to revoke his sentence. The viceroy had notified the archbishop three several times of his decree, but on none of these occasions had the audiencia taken part in the action as according to law they