This instance of inconsiderateness is not unique.  As time went on the bias of the court against the accused waxed rather than waned.  Luis de Leon’s ill-health was notorious and, in fact, so obvious that it is recorded by the court in an official minute.[75] His state did not improve in jail.  Suffering from fever—­’como a sus mercedes les consta’—­so he says plaintively—­he had nobody to look after him in his secret cell save a sleepy-headed boy, a fellow-prisoner who was half a simpleton.  Luis de Leon had fainted from lack of food, and, in the circumstances, it is not surprising that he should have asked to be allowed the companionship of a monk of his order—­preferably Fray Alonso Siluente—­or anybody else whom the court should think fit to name.[76] Somewhat later, while still suffering from fever, Luis de Leon begged that, on his providing satisfactory bail, he might be transferred from his prison-cell to some neighbouring monastery, where he could be detained till the end of his trial.  So depressed was he at this moment that he even welcomed the idea of being placed in a Dominican monastery; it was true that the Dominicans were hostile to him, yet if he died among them, he should be dying like a Christian, surrounded by religious—­not like a heathen with a blackamoor at his bedside.[77] The first of these two requests was made to the Valladolid judges, who passed it on to the Supreme Inquisition at Madrid; the reply of this body was discouraging, for, though the request was granted in principle, impossible conditions, tantamount to a refusal, were imposed.[78] Luis de Leon’s second request was addressed direct to the Inquisitor-General:  this petition was disregarded.  In other matters, less urgent but not less important from an orthodox point of view, the Inquisitionary judges at Valladolid made no concession to the prisoner.  He asked to be allowed to go to confession, and to say Mass once a fortnight in the hall where his case was heard.[79] Apparently a deaf ear was turned to his entreaties.  A hostile critic might be tempted to say that a vindictive spirit prevailed in the deliberations of the Valladolid tribunal.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that, as the case developed, the attitude of the Valladolid judges became less and less favourable to Luis de Leon.  Judges are mortals and liable to error.  The very pertinacity of the prisoner may have impressed them badly.[80] It is in the highest degree improbable that they attached any importance to his few slips.  He speaks of having a naturally weak memory which, so he declares, had grown worse while he was in prison,[81] and he was frankly sceptical as to the possibility of any man’s recalling every incident in squabbles that happened years before.[82] As it happens, his memory seems to have been excellent.  No doubt it failed him now and then; but seldom did it mislead him on any essential point.[83] It is conceivable that Luis de Leon’s judges at Valladolid thought