Another powerful influence, which was specially exerted at this time in favour of Hus, was that of the Queen Sophia. She had been greatly impressed by the preacher, and had taken him as her chief adviser, some say her confessor; and, though it may be true of Wenceslaus that he hated Zbynĕk more than he loved Hus, the reverse is true of his wife. Yet in spite of all this force of opposition, Zbynĕk showed very little sign of yielding. He consented, indeed, to postpone any final act until the Margrave of Moravia could be consulted. But, whether Jodok delayed beyond the time proposed, or whether the Archbishop simply grew tired of waiting, he resolved, on June 10, 1410, publicly to burn two hundred of Wyclif’s books; and accordingly they were burnt in great state, in the court of the archiepiscopal palace, the bells of the churches being tolled during the performance. As if to mark the man against whom this proceeding was specially aimed, the Archbishop followed it up by commanding the closing of all private chapels, a command understood by everybody to be intended especially against the chapel in which Hus preached. Hus and his friends indignantly appealed to the Pope against these proceedings; and they did not fail to point out that many of the works which were burnt were not theological at all, but simply dealt with abstract philosophy. Indeed, the traditions of learning and culture, which the German scholars had hoped to secure to their side, in their first struggle against the Bohemian language, were now appealed to by the opposite party with much more force. Zbynĕk was ridiculed in satirical songs for having burnt books which he had never read; and the University of Bologna, when consulted by the Pope, denounced the burning of the books as an insult to the University of Oxford. Zbynĕk, indeed, would have fought to the last; but Pope Alexander was shaken by the opposition which these proceedings had called forth, and he checked the inquiry into Wyclif’s books, and continued to delay matters, till the decision was taken out of his hands by death. Both parties made haste to approach the new Pope, John XXIII.; and he demanded that Hus should come to Rome. The danger of the way made a good excuse for refusal; and John, having received rich presents from Zbynĕk, consented to excommunicate Hus for contumacy. This, however, did not affect Wenceslaus’s attitude; for, irritated by Zbynĕk’s opposition, and impressed by the queen’s partiality for Hus, the king had become a zealous champion of the Reformers. He demanded that Zbynĕk should compensate those whose books he had burnt; and, on his refusal, he confiscated his property for the benefit of the owners of the books. At the same time the king and his friends wrote to the Pope to assure him that he had been ill-informed about the circumstances of the case. The Pope being thus politely set on one side, and riot and disorder continuing, there seemed an opportunity for some outsider to step in.