its own vassals, namely the Barons of Belmont, the Barons of Vaz, the Barons of Sax, the Barons of Rhäzüns, the Counts of Werdenberg, the Barons of Matsch, the abbots of Disentis Abbey and others. Both leagues became part of the Three Leagues that later formed the Swiss canton of Graubünden. The Three Leagues, in fact a republic ruled by local aristocrats, remained part of the Holy Roman Empire until 1798, but has been allied to the Old Swiss Confederacy since 1497. Both, league and alliance, limited the power of the prince-bishops further. The struggles of Switzerland for liberty in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and, later, the secret preaching of Zwingli and Calvin, did great harm to the diocese, especially as the Catholic clergy neglected the instruction of the people. The bishop lost much of his power through the Reformation in 1526, after several nobles and towns had become Protestant. The Reformation was publicly proclaimed at Chur in 1524, and the two Catholic churches of St. Martin and St. Regula were given over to the Protestants, who retain possession of them to this day. The bishop fled, and his administrator, Abbot Theodore Schlegel, was publicly beheaded (1 January 1529). Bishop Thomas Planta, a friend of St. Charles Borromeo, tried, but without success, to suppress Protestantism. He died, probably poisoned, 5 May 1565. (See Camenisch, "Carlo Borromeo und die Gegenreform im Veltlin", 1901.) Twenty years later St. Charles sent the Capuchins into the endangered region, but Bishop Peter II (de Rascher) refused to admit them. His successor, Bishop John V (Flugi d'Aspermont, 1601–27), a saintly and courageous man, endeavoured to restore the Catholic religion, but was compelled to flee three times (1607, 1612, and 1617), and for several years a bloody war was waged between the Catholics and the Protestants. Finally, the newly erected Congregation of Propaganda commissioned the Capuchins to 'save the Catholic faith' among the people (1621). The first Capuchin superior of the mission was St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen, who, on his way from Sewis to Grüsch, a little north of Chur, was slain (24 April 1622) by peasants whom the sermons of the Protestant preachers had wrought up to a fury. Some relics of this martyr are preserved in the cathedral at Chur. A second mission, that of Misocco and Calanca, in the southern part of the diocese, was entrusted to the Capuchins in 1635. These two