enjoy the honour long, for he died on August 23. Though most people who are interested in Luis de Leon at all are familiar with Pacheco's portrait of him, Pacheco's character-sketch is so apt to be overlooked that it may be briefly summarized here.[261] Pacheco reports Luis de Leon as having a special gift of silence, as being the most taciturn of men though one of the wittiest; as being a man most trustworthy, truthful and upright, precise in speech and in the keeping of promises, reserved, not given to smiling; in the gravity of his countenance his nobility of soul and, still more, his deep humility were obvious; most cleanly, chaste, and reflective, he was a great monk and a close observer of laws; so marked was his devotion to the Blessed Virgin that he fasted on the eve of feasts, dined at three, and ate no supper; in her honour he wrote the lovely hymn _Virgen que el Sol mas pura_, very spiritually-minded and greatly given to prayer, at the time of his severest trials God hearkened to him. Though by nature hasty, he was very long-suffering and gentle to those with whom he had to deal; he was most abstemious in matters of food, drink, and sleep; indeed with regard to sleep (as was stated to Pacheco by Fray Luis Moreno de Bohorquez, who had lived in the same monastery as Luis de Leon for four years) he carried mortification so far that he seldom lay down, and the monk who had to make his bed would often find that it had not been slept in. So great were his intellectual gifts that he seemed more meet to teach every one than to learn things from anybody. On matters concerning government his judgement was sound; he was highly esteemed by prominent men both in Spain and out of it; Philip II was wont to consult him in difficult cases, and would send messengers from Madrid to Salamanca; when he visited Madrid on University business he was admitted to private audience and received signal marks of royal favour; with respect to offers of bishoprics and the Archbishopric of Mexico he displayed his courage and magnanimous spirits not only by stripping himself of rank (a thing seldom done) but of all he had in the world; a man of truly evangelical temper. In those holy exercises, and in fitting sequel to his life, he piously ended his course as Provincial of Castile, leaving all in great affliction, but with a still greater certainty of his glory.