examine the record closely, it is hoped that this sketch will do
something to make their task easier. An attempt is made here to
picture the man as he was, full of fortitude, yet not exempt from
human weakness. I trust that I have avoided the temptation to go to
the opposite extreme, and lay the blame--as has been done--for the
irregularities of the trial at Luis de Leon's own door.

In dealing with his Spanish poems, I have tried not to put his claims
to consideration too high. Laboulaye, in _La Liberte religieuse_,
calls Luis de Leon 'le premier lyrique de l'Europe moderne'. This
phrase dates from 1859, and was addressed to a generation which
delighted in arranging authors in something like the order of a class
list. Though I have the highest opinion of Luis de Leon's genius, I
have not felt tempted to follow Laboulaye's example; I have by
preference discussed, so far as space allows, such points as the
probable chronology of Luis de Leon's poems. Once more I repeat that
this is a chapter of a book that will now never be written.

It may be as well to add at this point a few explanatory words
concerning the plan of accentuation adopted here. There seems to be no
valid reason for applying, in a book primarily intended for English
readers, the modern Academic system to proper names borne in the
sixteenth century by men who lived more than three hundred years
before the current system was ever invented. Except of course in the
case of quotations, that system is applied rigidly only to the names
of those who have adopted it formally (as on pp. 114 _n._ and 191
_n._). I have gone on the theory that accents should be sparingly used
in a work of this kind, and that, as accents are almost needless for
Spaniards they should be employed only when the needs of foreigners
compel their use. It is a fundamental rule in Spanish that nearly all
words ending in a consonant should be stressed on the last syllable.
But since nobody, however slightly acquainted with Spanish, is tempted
to pronounce such words as Velazquez (p. 79) or Gomez (p. 250)
incorrectly, no graphic accent is employed in such cases. Names ending
in _s_--such as Valbas--are accentuated, however, when the stress
falls on the last syllable: this prevents all possibility of
confusion with the pronunciation of ordinary plural forms.
Place-names--such as Bejar (p. 58) and Cordoba (p. 184)--are
accentuated; so are trisyllables and polysyllables such as Gongora (p.
209)