As the event proved, the prisoner's protests in this matter were thoroughly justified. It is easy to perceive this now. We cannot be sure that we should have taken the same view had we been contemporary spectators. If appearances were not actually against Luis de Leon, they combined to reveal him in his least attractive posture. His comparative promptitude in accepting Mancio as _patrono_, his unwillingness to abide by his choice, his sudden hostility to Mancio, his final acceptance of Mancio, are all explicable variations. Nevertheless they showed a disregard for superficial consistency which might easily be misinterpreted as caprice. The bias of the court had been veering away from the prisoner for some time. His series of actions with respect to Mancio lost him all judicial favour. His judges considered him as an unreasonable man, a gifted sophist fertile in inventing objections in and out of season, a hair-splitter perpetually arguing for argument's sake. Luis de Leon was, as a rule, so unaccommodating that some of his judges may have begun to think they understood why he was not universally popular with members of his own order. Nor did Luis de Leon's demeanour in court serve to dissipate the atmosphere of almost arrogant rectitude which enveloped him. He felt bound to criticize the machinery of the Inquisition. He may easily have seemed to be criticizing those engaged in working the machinery. At the best of times the procedure of the Court was not expeditious. For example, though Luis de Leon was arrested on March 27, 1572, the first hearing of his formal defence did not take place till April 14--more than a fortnight later. More than once Luis de Leon complained of the Court's delays without going into questions of motive.[152] In this he was clearly right, for, as we have seen, the Supreme Inquisition was not wholly satisfied with the progress made. At other times the prisoner stressed the fact that constant postponements were apt to do him injury, and he hinted rather plainly that there was an intention to wear him down by deliberately prolonging the proceedings.[153] In this conjecture he was almost certainly wrong. The Valladolid judges had no power to alter the system which they found in existence; possibly, becoming accustomed to it, they ended by thinking well of it. Its weak points were naturally more evident to Luis de Leon, and his torrent of critical remarks may have seemed to reflect on the intelligence and probity of the Court. Administrators, however exalted, are human, and even the lowliest of magistrates is prone to take offence, if given to understand that he is considered dull and dishonest. Luis de Leon never was betrayed into using disrespectful language; but his polite formulae could not conceal the fact that he had no very high opinion of those in whose hands his fate lay. Nor did the well-meant observance of established forms on the part of the Court do anything to modify his sentiments.