They were tried by the judges of Toulouse on the 18th of February. Rochette was condemned to be hung in his shirt, his head and feet uncovered, with a paper pinned on his shirt before and behind, with the words written thereon—"Ministre de la religion pretendue reformee." The three brothers Grenier, who interfered on behalf of Rochette, were ordered to have their heads taken off for resisting the secular power; and the two guides, who were bearing the sick Rochette to St. Antonin for the benefit of the waters, were sent to the galleys for life.

Barbarous punishments such as these were so common when Protestants were the offenders, that the decision, of the judges did not excite any particular sensation. It was only when Jean Calas was shortly after executed at Toulouse that an extraordinary sensation was produced—and that not because Calas was a Protestant, but because his punishment came under the notice of Voltaire, who exposed the inhuman cruelty to France, Europe, and the world at large.

The reason why Protestant executions terminated with the death of Calas was as follows:—The family of Jean Calas resided at Toulouse, then one of the most bigoted cities in France. Toulouse swarmed with priests and monks, more Spanish than French in their leanings. They were great in relics, processions, and confraternities. While "mealy-mouthed" Catholics in other quarters were becoming somewhat ashamed of the murders perpetrated during the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, and were even disposed to deny them, the more outspoken Catholics of Toulouse were even proud of the feat, and publicly celebrated the great southern Massacre of St. Bartholomew which took place in 1572. The procession then held was one of the finest church commemorations in the south; it was followed by bishops, clergy, and the people of the neighbourhood, in immense numbers.

Calas was an old man of sixty-four, and reduced to great weakness by a paralytic complaint. He and his family were all Protestants excepting one son, who had become a Catholic. Another of the sons, however, a man of ill-regulated life, dissolute, and involved in pecuniary difficulties, committed suicide by hanging himself in an outhouse.

On this, the brotherhood of White Penitents stirred up a great fury against the Protestant family in the minds of the populace. The monks alleged that Jean Calas had murdered his son because he wished to become a Catholic. They gave out that it was a practice of the Protestants to keep an executioner to murder their children who wished to abjure the reformed faith, and that one of the objects of the meetings which they held in the Desert, was to elect this executioner. The White Penitents celebrated mass for the suicide's soul; they exhibited his figure with a palm branch in his hand, and treated him as a martyr.

The public mind became inflamed. A fanatical judge, called David, took up the case, and ordered Calas and his whole family to be sent to prison. Calas was tried by the court of Toulouse. They tortured the whole family to compel them to confess the murder;[73] but they did not confess. The court wished to burn the mother, but they ended by condemning the paralytic father to be broken alive on the wheel.[74] The parliament of Toulouse confirmed the atrocious sentence, and the old man perished in torments, declaring to the last his entire innocence. The rest of the family were discharged, although if there had been any truth in the charge for which Jean Calas was racked to death, they must necessarily have been his accomplices, and equally liable to punishment.

[Footnote 73: Sismondi, xx. 328.]

[Footnote 74: To be broken alive on the wheel was one of the most horrible of tortures, a bequest from ages of violence and barbarism. It was preserved in France mainly for the punishment of Protestants. The prisoner was extended on a St. Andrew's cross, with eight notches cut on it—one below each arm between the elbow and wrist, another between each elbow and the shoulders, one under each thigh, and one under each leg. The executioner, armed with a heavy triangular bar of iron, gave a heavy blow on each of these eight places, and broke the bone. Another blow was given in the pit of the stomach. The mangled victim was lifted from the cross and stretched on a small wheel placed vertically at one of the ends of the cross, his back on the upper part of the wheel, his head and feet hanging down. There the tortured creature hung until he died. Some lingered five or six hours, others much longer. This horrible method of torture was only abolished at the French Revolution in 1790.]

The ruined family left Toulouse and made for Geneva, then the head-quarters of Protestants from the South of France. And here it was that the murder of Jean Calas and the misfortunes of the Calas family came under the notice of Voltaire, then living at Ferney, near Geneva.

In the midst of the persecutions of the Protestants a great many changes had been going on in France. Although the clergy had for more than a century the sole control of the religious education of the people, the people had not become religious. They had become very ignorant and very fanatical. The upper classes were anything but religious; they were given up for the most part to frivolity and libertinage. The examples of their kings had been freely followed. Though ready to do honour to the court religion, the higher classes did not believe in it. The press was very free for the publication of licentious and immoral books, but not for Protestant Bibles. A great work was, however, in course of publication, under the editorship of D'Alembert and Diderot, to which Voltaire, Rousseau, and others contributed, entitled "The Encyclopaedia." It was a description of the entire circle of human knowledge; but the dominant idea which pervaded it was the utter subversion of religion.

The abuses of the Church, its tyranny and cruelty, the ignorance and helplessness in which it kept the people, the frivolity and unbelief of the clergy themselves, had already condemned it in the minds of the nation. The writers in "The Encyclopaedia" merely gave expression to their views, and the publication of its successive numbers was received with rapture. In the midst of the free publication of obscene books, there had also appeared, before the execution of Calas, the Marquis de Mirabeau's "Ami des Hommes," Rousseau's "Emile," the "Contrat Social," with other works, denying religion of all kinds, and pointing to the general downfall, which was now fast approaching.

When the Calas family took refuge in Geneva, Voltaire soon heard of their story. It was communicated to him by M. de Vegobre, a French refugee. After he had related it, Voltaire said, "This is a horrible story. What has become of the family?" "They arrived in Geneva only three days ago." "In Geneva!" said Voltaire; "then let me see them at once." Madame Calas soon arrived, told him the whole facts of the case, and convinced Voltaire of the entire innocence of the family.

Voltaire was no friend of the Huguenots. He believed the Huguenot spirit to be a republican spirit. In his "Siecle de Louis XIV.," when treating of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, he affirmed that the Reformed were the enemies of the State; and though he depicted feelingly the cruelties they had suffered, he also stated clearly that he thought they had deserved them. Voltaire probably owed his hatred of the Protestants to the Jesuits, by whom he was educated. He was brought up at the Jesuit College of Louis le Grand, the chief persecutor of the Huguenots. Voltaire also owed much of the looseness of his principles to his godfather, the Abbe Chateauneuf, grand-prior of Vendome, the Abbe de Chalieu, and others, who educated him in an utter contempt for the doctrines they were appointed and paid to teach. It was when but a mere youth that Father Lejay, one of Voltaire's instructors, predicted that he would yet be the Coryphaeus of Deism in France.

Nor was Voltaire better pleased with the Swiss Calvinists. He encountered some of the most pedantic of them while residing at Lausanne and Geneva.[75] At the latter place, he covered with sarcasm the "twenty-four periwigs"—the Protestant council of the city. They would not allow him to set up a theatre in Geneva, so he determined to set up one himself at La Chatelaine, about a mile off, but beyond the Genevese frontier. His object, he professed, was "to corrupt the pedantic city." The theatre is still standing, though it is now used only as a hayloft. The box is preserved from which Voltaire cheered the performance of his own and other plays.

[Footnote 75: While Voltaire lived at Lausanne, one of the baillies (the chief magistrates of the city) said to him: "Monsieur de Voltaire, they say that you have written against the good God: it is very wrong, but I hope He will pardon you.... But, Monsieur de Voltaire, take very good care not to write against their excellencies of Berne, our sovereign lords, for be assured that they will never forgive you."]

But though Voltaire hated Protestantism like every other religion, he also hated injustice. It was because of this that he took up the case of the Calas family, so soon as he had become satisfied of their innocence. But what a difficulty he had to encounter in endeavouring to upset the decision of the judges, and the condemnation of Calas by the parliament of Toulouse. Moreover, he had to reverse their decision against a dead man, and that man a detested Huguenot.

Nevertheless Voltaire took up the case. He wrote letters to his friends in all parts of France. He wrote to the sovereigns of Europe. He published letters in the newspapers. He addressed the Duke de Choiseul, the King's Secretary of State. He appealed to philosophers, to men of letters, to ladies of the court, and even to priests and bishops, denouncing the sentence pronounced against Calas,—the most iniquitous, he said, that any court professing to act in the name of justice had ever pronounced. Ferney was visited by many foreigners, from Germany, America, England, and Russia; as well as by numerous persons of influence in France. To all these he spoke vehemently of Calas and his sentence. He gave himself no rest until he had inflamed the minds of all men against the horrible injustice.

At length, the case of Calas became known all over France, and in fact all over Europe. The press of Paris rang with it. In the boudoirs and salons, Calas was the subject of conversation. In the streets, men meeting each other would ask, "Have you heard of Calas?" The dead man had already become a hero and a martyr!

An important point was next reached. It was decided that the case of Calas should be remitted to a special court of judges appointed to consider the whole matter. Voltaire himself proceeded to get up the case. He prepared and revised the memorials, he revised all the pleadings of the advocates, transforming them into brief, conclusive arguments, sparkling with wit, reason, and eloquence. The revision of the process commenced. The people held their breaths while it proceeded.

At length, in the spring of 1766—four years after Calas had been broken to death on the wheel—four years after Voltaire had undertaken to have the unjust decision of the Toulouse magistrates and parliament reversed, the court of judges, after going completely over the evidence, pronounced the judgment to have been entirely unfounded!

The decree was accordingly reversed. Jean Calas was declared to have been innocent. The man was, however, dead. But in order to compensate his family, the ministry granted 36,000 francs to Calas's widow, on the express recommendation of the court which reversed the abominable sentence.[76]

[Footnote 76: It may be added that, after the reversal of the sentence, David, the judge who had first condemned Calas, went insane, and died in a madhouse.]

The French people never forgot Voltaire's efforts in this cause. Notwithstanding all his offences against morals and religion, Voltaire on this occasion acted on his best impulses. Many years after, in 1778, he visited Paris, where he was received with immense enthusiasm. He was followed in the streets wherever he went. One day when passing along the Pont Royal, some person asked, "Who is that man the crowd is following?" "Ne savez vous pas," answered a common woman, "que c'est le sauveur de Calas!" Voltaire was more touched with this simple tribute to his fame than with all the adoration of the Parisians.

It was soon found, however, that there were many persons still suffering in France from the cruelty of priests and judges; and one of these occurred shortly after the death of Calas. One of the ordinary practices of the Catholics was to seize the children of Protestants and carry them off to some nunnery to be educated at the expense of their parents. The priests of Toulouse had obtained a lettre de cachet to take away the daughter of a Protestant named Sirven, to compel her to change her religion. She was accordingly seized and carried off to a nunnery. She manifested such reluctance to embrace Catholicism, and she was treated with such cruelty, that she fled from the convent in the night, and fell into a well, where she was found drowned.

The prejudices of the Catholic bigots being very much excited about this time by the case of Calas, blamed the family of Sirven (in the same manner as they had done that of Calas) with murdering their daughter. Foreseeing that they would be apprehended if they remained, the whole family left the city, and set out for Geneva. After they left, Sirven was in fact sentenced to death par contumace. It was about the middle of winter when they set out, and Sirven's wife died of cold on the way, amidst the snows of the Jura.

On his arrival at Geneva, Sirven stated his case to Voltaire, who took it up as he had done that of Calas. He exerted himself as before. Advocates of the highest rank offered to conduct Sirven's case; for public opinion had already made considerable progress. Sirven was advised to return to Toulouse, and offer himself as a prisoner. He did so. The case was tried with the same results as before; the advocates, acting under Voltaire's instructions and with his help, succeeded in obtaining the judges' unanimous decision that Sirven was innocent of the crime for which he had already been sentenced to death.

After this, there were no further executions of Protestants in France. But what became of the Huguenots at the galleys, who still continued to endure a punishment from day to day, even worse than death itself?[77] Although, they were often cut off by fever, starvation, and exposure, many of them contrived to live on to a considerable age. After the trials of Calas and Sirven, the punishment of the galleys was evidently drawing to an end. Only two persons were sent to the galleys during the year in which Pastor Rochette was hanged. But a circumstance came to light respecting one of the galley-slaves who had been liberated in that very year (1762), which had the effect of eventually putting an end to the cruelty.

[Footnote 77: The Huguenots sometimes owed their release from the galleys to money payments made by Protestants (but this was done secretly), the price of a galley-slave being about a thousand crowns; sometimes they owed it to the influence of Protestant princes; but never to the voluntary mercy of the Catholics. In 1742, while France was at war with England, and Prussia was quietly looking on, Antoine Court made an appeal to Frederick the Great, and at his intervention with Louis XV. thirty galley-slaves were liberated. The Margrave of Bayreuth, Culmbach and his wife, the sister of the Great Frederick, afterwards visited the galleys at Toulon, and succeeded in obtaining the liberation of several galley-slaves.]

The punishment was not, however, abolished by Christian feeling, or by greater humanity on the part of the Catholics; nor was it abolished through the ministers of justice, and still less by the order of the King. It was put an end to by the Stage! As Voltaire, the Deist, terminated the hanging of Protestants, so did Fenouillot, the player, put an end to their serving as galley-slaves. The termination of this latter punishment has a curious history attached to it.

It happened that a Huguenot meeting for worship was held in the neighbourhood of Nismes, on the first day of January, 1756. The place of meeting was called the Lecque,[78] situated immediately north of the Tour Magne, from which the greater part of the city has been built. It was a favourable place for holding meetings; but it was not so favourable for those who wished to escape. The assembly had scarcely been constituted by prayer, when the alarm was given that the soldiers were upon them! The people fled on all sides. The youngest and most agile made their escape by climbing the surrounding rocks.

[Footnote 78: This secret meeting-place of the Huguenots is well known from the engraved picture of Boze.]

Amongst these, Jean Fabre, a young silk merchant of Nismes, was already beyond reach of danger, when he heard that his father had been made a prisoner. The old man, who was seventy-eight, could not climb as the others had done, and the soldiers had taken him and were leading him away. The son, who knew that his father would be sentenced to the galleys for life, immediately determined, if possible, to rescue him from this horrible fate. He returned to the group of soldiers who had his father in charge, and asked them to take him prisoner in his place. On their refusal, he seized his father and drew him from their grasp, insisting upon them taking himself instead. The sergeant in command at first refused to adopt this strange substitution; but, conquered at last by the tears and prayers of the son, he liberated the aged man and accepted Jean Fabre as his prisoner.

Jean Fabre was first imprisoned at Nismes, where he was prevented seeing any of his friends, including a certain young lady to whom he was about shortly to be married. He was then transferred to Montpellier to be judged; where, of course, he was condemned, as he expected, to be sent to the galleys for life. With this dreadful prospect before him, of separation from all that he loved—from his father, for whom he was about to suffer so much; from his betrothed, who gave up all hope of ever seeing him again—and having no prospect of being relieved from his horrible destiny, his spirits failed, and he became seriously ill. But his youth and Christian resignation came to his aid, and he finally recovered.

The Protestants of Nismes, and indeed of all Languedoc, were greatly moved by the fate of Jean Fabre. The heroism of his devotion to his parent soon became known, and the name of the volunteer convict was in every mouth. The Duc de Mirepoix, then governor of the province, endeavoured to turn the popular feeling to some account. He offered pardon to Fabre and Turgis (who had been taken prisoner with him) provided Paul Rabaut, the chief pastor of the Desert, a hard-working and indefatigable man, would leave France and reside abroad. But neither Fabre, nor Rabaut, nor the Huguenots generally, had any confidence in the mercy of the Catholics, and the proposal was coldly declined.

Fabre was next sent to Toulon under a strong escort of cavalry. He was there registered in the class of convicts; his hair was cut close; he was clothed in the ignominious dress of the galley-slave, and placed in a galley among murderers and criminals, where he was chained to one of the worst. The dinner consisted of a porridge of cooked beans and black bread. At first he could not touch it, and preferred to suffer hunger. A friend of Fabre, who was informed of his starvation, sent him some food more savoury and digestible; but his stomach was in such a state that he could not eat even that. At length he became accustomed to the situation, though the place was a sort of hell, in which he was surrounded by criminals in rags, dirt, and vermin, and, worst of all, distinguished for their abominable vileness of speech. He was shortly after seized with a serious illness, when he was sent to the hospital, where he found many Huguenot convicts imprisoned, like himself, because of their religion.[79]

[Footnote 79: Letter of Jean Fabre, in Athanase Coquerel's "Forcats pour la Foi," 201-3.]

Repeated applications were made to Saint-Florentin, the Secretary of State, by Fabre's relatives, friends, and fellow Protestants for his liberation, but without result. After he had been imprisoned for some years, a circumstance happened which more than anything else exasperated his sufferings. The young lady to whom he was engaged had an offer of marriage made to her by a desirable person, which her friends were anxious that she should accept. Her father had been struck by paralysis, and was poor and unable to maintain himself as well as his daughter. He urged that she should give up Fabre, now hopelessly imprisoned for life, and accept her new lover.

Fabre himself was consulted on the subject; his conscience was appealed to, and how did he decide? It was only after the bitterest struggle, that he determined on liberating his betrothed. He saw no prospect of his release, and why should he sacrifice her? Let her no longer be bound up with his fearful fate, but be happy with another if she could.

The young lady yielded, though not without great misgivings. The day for her marriage with her new lover was fixed; but, at the last moment, she relented. Her faithfulness and love for the heroic galley-slave had never been shaken, and she resolved to remain constant to him, to remain unmarried if need be, or to wait for his liberation until death!

It is probable that her noble decision determined Fabre and Fabre's friends to make a renewed effort for his liberation. At last, after having been more than six years a galley-slave, he bethought him of a method of obtaining at least a temporary liberty. He proposed—without appealing to Saint-Florentin, who was the bitter enemy of the Protestants—to get his case made known to the Duc de Choiseul, Minister of Marine. This nobleman was a just man, and it had been in a great measure through his influence that the judgment of Calas had been reconsidered and reversed.

Fabre, while on the rowers' bench, had often met with a M. Johannot, a French Protestant, settled at Frankfort-on-Maine, to whom he stated his case. It may be mentioned that Huguenot refugees, on their visits to France, often visited the Protestant prisoners at the galleys, relieved their wants, and made intercession for them with the outside world. It may also be incidentally mentioned that this M. Johannot was the ancestor of two well-known painters and designers, Alfred and Tony, who have been the illustrators of some of our finest artistic works.

Johannot made the case of Fabre known to some French officers whom he met at Frankfort, interested them greatly in his noble character and self-sacrifice, and the result was that before long Fabre obtained, directly from the Duc de Choiseul, leave of absence from the position of galley-slave. The annoyance of Saint-Florentin, Minister of State, was so well-known, that Fabre, on his liberation, was induced to conceal himself. Nor could he yet marry his promised wife, as he had not been discharged, but was only on leave of absence; and Saint-Florentin obstinately refused to reverse the sentence that had been pronounced against him.

In the meantime, Fabre's name was becoming celebrated. He had no idea, while privately settled at Ganges as a silk stocking maker, that great people in France were interesting themselves about his fate. The Duchesse de Grammont, sister of the Duc de Choiseul, had heard about him from her brother; and the Prince de Beauvau, governor of Languedoc, the Duchesse de Villeroy, and many other distinguished personages, were celebrating his heroism.

Inquiry was made of the sergeant who had originally apprehended Fabre, upon his offering himself in exchange for his father (long since dead), and the sergeant confirmed the truth of the noble and generous act. At the same time, M. Alison, first consul at Nismes, confirmed the statement by three witnesses, in presence of the secretary of the Prince de Beauvau. The result was, that Jean Fabre was completely exonerated from the charge on account of which he had been sent to the galleys. He was now a free man, and at last married the young lady who had loved him so long and so devotedly.

One day, to his extreme surprise, Fabre received from the Duc de Choiseul a packet containing a drama, in which he found his own history related in verse, by Fenouillot de Falbaire. It was entitled "The Honest Criminal." Fabre had never been a criminal, except in worshipping God according to his conscience, though that had for nearly a hundred years been pronounced a crime by the law of France.

The piece, which was of no great merit as a tragedy, was at first played before the Duchesse de Villeroy and her friends, with great applause, Mdlle. Clairon playing the principal female part. Saint-Florentin prohibited the playing of the piece in public, protesting to the last against the work and the author. Voltaire played it at Ferney, and Queen Marie Antoinette had it played in her presence at Versailles. It was not until 1789 that the piece was played in the theatres of Paris, when it had a considerable success.

We do not find that any Protestants were sent to be galley-slaves after 1762, the year that Calas was executed. A reaction against this barbarous method of treating men for differences of opinion seems to have set in; or, perhaps, it was because most men were ceasing to believe in the miraculous powers of the priests, for which the Protestants had so long been hanged and made galley-slaves.

After the liberation of Fabre in 1762, other galley-slaves were liberated from time to time. Thus, in the same year, Jean Albiges and Jean Barran were liberated after eight years of convict life. They had been condemned for assisting at Protestant assemblies. Next year, Maurice was liberated; he had been condemned for life for the same reason.

While Voltaire had been engaged in the case of Calas he asked the Duc de Choiseul for the liberation of a galley-slave. The man for whom he interceded, had been a convict twenty years for attending a Protestant meeting. Of course, Voltaire cared nothing for his religion, believing Catholicism and Protestantism to be only two forms of the same superstition. The name of this galley-slave was Claude Chaumont. Like nearly all the other convicts he was a working man—a little dark-faced shoemaker. Some Protestant friends he had at Geneva interceded with Voltaire for his liberation.

On Chaumont's release in 1764, he waited upon his deliverer to thank him. "What!" said Voltaire, on first seeing him, "my poor little bit of a man, have they put you in the galleys? What could they have done with you? The idea of sending a little creature to the galley-chain, for no other crime than that of praying to God in bad French!"[80] Voltaire ended by handing the impoverished fellow a sum of money to set him up in the world again, when he left the house the happiest of men.

[Footnote 80: "Voltaire et les Genevois," par J. Gaberel, 74-5.]

We may briefly mention a few of the last of the galley-slaves. Daniel Bic and Jean Cabdie, liberated in 1764, for attending religious meetings. Both were condemned for life, and had been at the galley-chain for ten years.

Jean Pierre Espinas, an attorney, of St. Felix de Chateauneuf, in Viverais, who had been condemned for life for having given shelter to a pastor, was released in 1765, at the age of sixty-seven, after being chained at the galleys for twenty-five years.

Jean Raymond, of Fangeres, the father of six children, who had been a galley-slave for thirteen years, was liberated in 1767. Alexandre Chambon, a labourer, more than eighty years old, condemned for life in 1741, for attending a religious meeting, was released in 1769, on the entreaty of Voltaire, after being a galley-slave for twenty-eight years. His friends had forgotten him, and on his release he was utterly destitute and miserable.[81]

[Footnote 81: "Lettres inedites des Voltaire," publiees par Athanase Coquerel fils, 247.]

In 1772, three galley-slaves were liberated from their chains. Andre Guisard, a labourer, aged eighty-two, Jean Roque, and Louis Tregon, of the same class, all condemned for life for attending religious meetings. They had all been confined at the chain for twenty years.

The two last galley-slaves were liberated in 1775, during the first year of the reign of Louis XVI., and close upon the outbreak of the French Revolution. They had been quite forgotten, until Court de Gebelin, son of Antoine Court, discovered them. When he applied for their release to M. de Boyne, Minister of Marine, he answered that there were no more Protestant convicts at the galleys; at least, he believed so. Shortly after, Turgot succeeded Boyne, and application was made to him. He answered that there was no need to recommend such objects to him for liberation, as they were liberated already.

On the two old men being told they were released, they burst into tears; but were almost afraid of returning to the world which no longer knew them. One of them was Antoine Rialle, a tailor of Aoste, in Dauphiny, who had been condemned by the parliament of Grenoble to the galleys for life "for contravening the edicts of the King concerning religion." He was seventy-eight years old, and had been a galley-slave for thirty years.

The other, Paul Achard, had been a shoemaker of Chatillon, also in Dauphiny. He was condemned to be a galley-slave for life by the parliament of Grenoble, for having given shelter to a pastor. Achard had also been confined at the galleys for thirty years.

It is not known when the last Huguenot women were liberated from the Tour de Constance, at Aiguesmortes. It would probably be about the time when the last Huguenots were liberated from the galleys. An affecting picture has been left by an officer who visited the prison at the release of the last prisoners. "I accompanied," he says, "the Prince de Beauvau (the intendant of Languedoc under Louis XVI.) in a survey which he made of the coast. Arriving at Aiguesmortes, at the gate of the Tour de Constance, we found at the entrance the principal keeper, who conducted us by dark steps through a great gate, which opened with an ominous noise, and over which was inscribed a motto from Dante—'Lasciate ogni speranza voi che'ntrate.'

"Words fail me to describe the horror with which we regarded a scene to which we were so unaccustomed—a frightful and affecting picture, in which the interest was heightened by disgust. We beheld a large circular apartment, deprived of air and of light, in which fourteen females still languished in misery. It was with difficulty that the Prince smothered his emotion; and doubtless it was the first time that these unfortunate creatures had there witnessed compassion depicted upon a human countenance; I still seem to behold the affecting apparition. They fell at our feet, bathed in tears, and speechless, until, emboldened by our expressions of sympathy, they recounted to us their sufferings. Alas! all their crime consisted in having been attached to the same religion as Henry IV. The youngest of these martyrs was more than fifty years old. She was but eight when first imprisoned for having accompanied her mother to hear a religious service, and her punishment had continued until now!"[82]

[Footnote 82: Froissard, "Nismes et ses Environs," ii. 217.]

After the liberation of the last of the galley-slaves there were no further apprehensions nor punishments of Protestants. The priests had lost their power; and the secular authority no longer obeyed their behests. The nation had ceased to believe in them; in some places they were laughed at; in others they were detested. They owed this partly to their cruelty and intolerance, partly to their luxury and self-indulgence amidst the poverty of the people, and partly to the sarcasms of the philosophers, who had become more powerful in France than themselves. "It is not enough," said Voltaire, "that we prove intolerance to be horrible; we must also prove to the French that it is ridiculous."

In looking back at the sufferings of the Huguenots remaining in France since the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes; at the purity, self-denial, honesty, and industry of their lives; at the devotion with which they adhered to religious duty and the worship of God; we cannot fail to regard them—labourers and peasants though they were—as amongst the truest, greatest, and worthiest heroes of their age. When society in France was falling to pieces; when its men and women were ceasing to believe in themselves and in each other; when the religion of the State had become a mass of abuse, consistent only in its cruelty; when the debauchery of its kings[83] had descended through the aristocracy to the people, until the whole mass was becoming thoroughly corrupt; these poor Huguenots seem to have been the only constant and true men, the only men holding to a great idea, for which they were willing to die—for they were always ready for martyrdom by the rack, the gibbet, or the galleys, rather than forsake the worship of God freely and according to conscience.

[Footnote 83: Such was the dissoluteness of the manners of the court, that no less than 500,000,000 francs of the public debt, or L20,000,000 sterling, had been incurred for expenses too ignominious to bear the light, or even to be named in the public accounts. It appears from an authentic document, quoted in Soulavie's history, that in the sixteen months immediately preceding the death of Louis XV., Madame du Barry (originally a courtesan,) had drawn from the royal treasury no less than 2,450,000 francs, or equal to about L200,000 of our present money. ["Histoire de la Decadence de la Monarchie Francaise," par Soulavie l'Aine, iii. 330.] "La corruption," says Lacretelle, "entrait dans les plus paisibles menages, dans les familles les plus obscures. Elle [Madame du Barri] etait savamment et longtemps combinee par ceux qui servaient les debauches de Louis. Des emissaires etaient employees a seduire des filles qui n'etaient point encore nubiles, a combattre dans de jeunes femmes des principes de pudeur et de fidelite. Amant de grade, il livrait a la prostitution publique celles de ses sujettes qu'il avait prematurement corrompues. Il souffrait que les enfans de ses infames plaisirs partageassent la destinee obscure et dangereuse de ceux qu'un pere n'avoue point." LACRETELLE, Histoire de France pendant le xviii Siecle, iii. 171-173.]

But their persecution was now in a great measure at an end. It is true the Protestants were not recognised, but they nevertheless held their worship openly, and were not interfered with. When Louis XVI. succeeded to the throne in 1774, on the administration of the oath for the extermination of heretics denounced by the Church, the Archbishop of Toulouse said to him: "It is reserved for you to strike the final blow against Calvinism in your dominions. Command the dispersion of the schismatic assemblies of the Protestants, exclude the sectarians, without distinction, from all offices of the public administration, and you will insure among your subjects the unity of the true Christian religion."

No attention was paid to this and similar appeals for the restoration of intolerance. On the contrary, an Edict of Toleration was issued by Louis XVI. in 1787, which, though granting a legal existence to the Protestants, nevertheless set forth that "The Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion alone shall continue to enjoy the right of public worship in our realm."

Opinion, however, moved very fast in those days. The Declaration of Rights of 1789 overthrew the barriers which debarred the admission of Protestants to public offices. On the question of tolerance, Rabaut Saint-Etienne, son of Paul Rabaut, who sat in the National Assembly for Nismes, insisted on the freedom of the Protestants to worship God after their accustomed forms. He said he represented a constituency of 360,000, of whom 120,000 were Protestants. The penal laws against the worship of the Reformed, he said, had never been formally abolished. He claimed the rights of Frenchmen for two millions of useful citizens. It was not toleration he asked for, it was liberty.

"Toleration!" he exclaimed; "sufferance! pardon! clemency! ideas supremely unjust towards the Protestants, so long as it is true that difference of religion, that difference of opinion, is not a crime! Toleration! I demand that toleration should be proscribed in its turn, and deemed an iniquitous word, dealing with us as citizens worthy of pity, as criminals to whom pardon is to be granted!"[84]

[Footnote 84: "History of the Protestants of France," by G. de Felice, book v. sect. i.]

The motion before the House was adopted with a modification, and all Frenchmen, without distinction of religious opinions, were declared admissible to all offices and employments. Four months later, on the 15th March, 1790, Rabaut Saint-Etienne himself, son of the long proscribed pastor of the Desert, was nominated President of the Constituent Assembly, succeeding to the chair of the Abbe Montesquieu.

He did not, however, occupy the position long. In the struggles of the Convention he took part with the Girondists, and refused to vote for the death of Louis XVI. He maintained an obstinate struggle against the violence of the Mountain. His arrest was decreed; he was dragged before the revolutionary tribunal, and condemned to be executed within twenty-four hours.

The horrors of the French Revolution hide the doings of Protestantism and Catholicism alike for several years, until Buonaparte came into power. He recognised Catholicism as the established religion, and paid for the maintenance of the bishops and priests. He also protected Protestantism, the members of which were entitled to all the benefits secured to the other Christian communions, "with the exception of pecuniary subvention."

The comparative liberty which the Protestants of France had enjoyed under the Republic and the Empire seemed to be in some peril at the restoration of the Bourbons. The more bigoted Roman Catholics of the South hailed their return as the precursors of renewed persecution: and they raised the cry of "Un Dieu, un Roi, une Foi."

The Protestant mayor of Nismes was publicly insulted, and compelled to resign his office. The mob assembled in the streets and sang ferocious songs, threatening to "make black puddings of the blood of the Calvinists' children."[85] Another St. Bartholomew was even threatened; the Protestants began to conceal themselves, and many fled for refuge to the Upper Cevennes. Houses were sacked, their inmates outraged, and in many cases murdered.

[Footnote 85: See the Rev. Mark Wilks's "History of the Persecutions endured by the Protestants of the South of France, 1814, 1815, 1816." Longmans, 1821.]

The same scenes occurred in most of the towns and villages of the department of Gard; and the authorities seemed to be powerless to prevent them. The Protestants at length began to take up arms for their defence; the peasantry of the Cevennes brought from their secret places the rusty arms which their fathers had wielded more than a century before; and another Camisard war seemed imminent.

In the meantime, the subject of the renewed Protestant persecutions in the South of France was, in May, 1816, brought under the notice of the British House of Commons by Sir Samuel Romilly—himself the descendant of a Languedoc Huguenot—in a powerful speech; and although the motion was opposed by the Government, there can be little doubt that the discussion produced its due effect; for the Bourbon Government, itself becoming alarmed, shortly after adopted vigorous measures, and the persecution was brought to an end.

Since that time the Protestants of France have remained comparatively unmolested. Evidences have not been wanting to show that the persecuting spirit of the priest-party has not become extinct. While the author was in France in 1870, to visit the scenes of the wars of the Camisards, he observed from the papers that a French deputy had recently brought a case before the Assembly, in which a Catholic cure of Ville-d'Avray refused burial in the public cemetery to the corpse of a young English lady, because she was a Protestant, and remitted it to the place allotted for criminals and suicides. The body accordingly lay for eighteen days in the cabin of the gravedigger, until it could be transported to the cemetery of Sevres, where it was finally interred.

But the people of France, as well as the government, have become too indifferent about religion generally, to persecute any one on its account. The nation is probably even now suffering for its indifference, and the spectacle is a sad one. It is only the old, old story. The sins of the fathers are being visited on the children. Louis XIV. and the French nation of his time sowed the wind, and their descendants at the Revolution reaped the whirlwind. And who knows how much of the sufferings of France during the last few years may have been due to the ferocious intolerance, the abandonment to vicious pleasures, the thirst for dominion, and the hunger for "glory," which above all others characterized the reign of that monarch who is in history miscalled "the Great?"

It will have been noted that the chief scenes of the revival of Protestantism described in the preceding pages occurred in Languedoc and the South of France, where the chief strength of the Huguenots always lay. The Camisard civil war which happened there, was not without its influence. The resolute spirit which it had evoked survived. The people were purified by suffering, and though they did not conquer civil liberty, they continued to live strong, hardy, virtuous lives. When Protestantism was at length able to lift up its head after so long a period of persecution, it was found that, during its long submergence, it had lost neither in numbers, in moral or intellectual vigour, nor in industrial power.

To this day the Protestants of Languedoc cherish the memory of their wanderings and worshippings in the Desert; and they still occasionally hold their meetings in the old frequented places. Not far from Nismes are several of these ancient meeting-places of the persecuted, to which we have above referred. One of them is about two miles from the city, in the bed of a mountain torrent. The worshippers arranged themselves along the slopes of the narrow valley, the pastor preaching to them from the grassy level in the hollow, while sentinels posted on the adjoining heights gave warning of the approach of the enemy. Another favourite place of meeting was the hollow of an ancient quarry called the Echo, from which the Romans had excavated much of the stone used in the building of the city. The congregation seated themselves around the craggy sides, the preacher's pulpit being placed in the narrow pass leading into the quarry. Notwithstanding all the vigilance of the sentinels, many persons of both sexes and various ages were often dragged from the Echo to imprisonment or death. Even after the persecutions had ceased, these meeting-places continued to be frequented by the Protestants of Nismes, and they were sometimes attended by five or six thousand persons, and on sacrament days by even double that number.

Although the Protestants of Languedoc for the most part belong to the National Reformed Church, the independent character of the people has led them to embrace Protestantism in other forms. Thus, the Evangelical Church is especially strong in the South, whilst the Evangelical Methodists number more congregations and worshippers in Languedoc than in all the rest of France. There are also in the Cevennes several congregations of Moravian Brethren. But perhaps one of the most curious and interesting issues of the Camisard war is the branch of the Society of Friends still existing in Languedoc—the only representatives of that body in France, or indeed on the European continent.

When the Protestant peasants of the Cevennes took up arms and determined to resist force by force, there were several influential men amongst them who kept back and refused to join them. They held that the Gospel they professed did not warrant them in taking up arms and fighting, even against the enemies who plundered and persecuted them. And when they saw the excesses into which the Camisards were led by the war of retaliation on which they had entered, they were the more confirmed in their view that the attitude which the rebels had assumed, was inconsistent with the Christian religion.

After the war had ceased, these people continued to associate together, maintaining a faithful testimony against war, refusing to take oaths, and recognising silent worship, without dependence on human acquirements. They were not aware of the existence of a similar body in England and America until the period of the French Revolution, when some intercourse began to take place between them.

In 1807, Stephen Grellet, an American Friend, of French origin, visited Languedoc, and held many religious meetings in the towns and villages of the Lower Cevennes, which were not only attended by the Friends of Congenies, St. Hypolite, Granges, St. Grilles, Fontane's, Vauvert, Quissac, and other places in the neighbourhood of Nismes, but by the inhabitants at large, Roman Catholics as well as Protestants. At that time, as now, Congenies was regarded as the centre of the district principally inhabited by the Friends, and there they possess a large and commodious meeting-house, built for the purpose of worship.

At the time of Stephen Grellet's visit, he especially mentioned Louis Majolier as "a father and a pillar" amongst the little flock.[86] And it may not be unworthy to note that the daughter of the same Louis Majolier is at the present time one of the most acceptable female preachers of the Society of Friends in England.

[Footnote 86: "Life of Stephen Grellet," third edition. London, 1870.]

It may also be mentioned, in passing, that there still exist amongst the Vosges mountains the remnants of an ancient sect—the Anabaptists of Munster—who hold views in many respects similar to those of the Friends. Amongst other things, they testify against war as unchristian, and refuse under any circumstances to carry arms. Rather than do so, they have at different times suffered imprisonment, persecution, and even death. The republic of 1793 respected their scruples, and did not require the Anabaptists to fight in the ranks, but employed them as pioneers and drivers, while Napoleon made them look after the wounded on the field of battle, and attend to the waggon train and ambulances.[87] And we understand that they continue to be similarly employed down to the present time.

[Footnote 87: Michel, "Les Anabaptistes des Vosges." Paris, 1862.]

* * * * *

It forms no part of our subject to discuss the present state of the French Protestant Church. It has lost no part of its activity during the recent political changes. Although its clergy had for some time been supported by the State, they had not met in public synod until June, 1872, after an interval of more than two hundred years. During that period many things had become changed. Rationalism had invaded Evangelicalism. Without a synod, or a settled faith, the Protestant churches were only so many separate congregations, often representing merely individual interests. In fact, the old Huguenot Church required reorganization; and great results are expected from the proceedings adopted at the recently held synod of the French Protestant Church.[88]

[Footnote 88: The best account of the proceedings at this synod is given in Blackwood's Magazine for January, 1873.]

With respect to the French Catholic Church, its relative position to the Protestants remains the same as before. But it has no longer the power to persecute. The Gallican Church has been replaced by the Ultramontane Church, but its impulses are no kindlier, though it has become "Infallible."

The principal movement of the Catholic priests of late years has been to get up appearances of the Virgin. The Virgin appears, usually, to a child or two, and pilgrimages are immediately got up to the scene of her visit. By getting up religious movements of this kind, the priests and their followers believe that France will yet be helped towards the Revanche, which she is said to long for.

But pilgrimages will not make men; and if France wishes to be free, she will have to adopt some other methods. Bismarck will never be put down by pilgrimages. It was a sad saying of Father Hyacinthe at Geneva, that "France is bound to two influences—Superstition and Irreligion."



MEMOIRS OF DISTINGUISHED HUGUENOT REFUGEES.



I.

STORY OF SAMUEL DE PECHELS.

When Louis XIV. revoked the Edict of Nantes, he issued a number of decrees or edicts for the purpose of stamping out Protestantism in France. Each decree had the effect of an Act of Parliament. Louis combined in himself the entire powers of the State. The King's word was law. "L'etat c'est Moi" was his maxim.

The Decrees which Louis issued were tyrannical, brutal, and cowardly. Some were even ludicrous in their inhumanity. Thus Protestant grooms were forbidden to give riding-lessons; Protestant barbers were forbidden to cut hair; Protestant washerwomen were forbidden to wash clothes; Protestant servants were forbidden to serve either Roman Catholic or Protestant mistresses. They must all be "converted." A profession of the Roman Catholic faith was required from simple artisans—from shoemakers, tailors, masons, carpenters, and such-like—before they were permitted to labour at their respective callings.

The cruelty went further. Protestants were forbidden to be employed as librarians and printers. They could not even be employed as labourers upon the King's highway. They could not serve in any public office whatever. They were excluded from the collection of the taxes, and from all government departments. Protestant apothecaries must shut up their shops. Protestant advocates were forbidden to plead before the courts. Protestant doctors were forbidden to practise medicine and surgery. The sages-femmes must necessarily be of the Roman Catholic religion.

The cruelty was extended to the family. Protestant parents were forbidden to instruct their children in their own faith. They were enjoined, under a heavy penalty, to have their children baptized by the Roman Catholic priest, and brought up in the Roman Catholic religion. When the law was disobeyed, the priests were empowered to seize and carry off the children, and educate them, at the expense of the parents, in monasteries and nunneries.

Then, as regards the profession of the Protestant religion:—It was decreed by the King, that all the Protestant temples in France should be demolished, or converted to other uses. Protestant pastors were ordered to quit the country within fifteen days after the date of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. If found in the country after that period, they were condemned to death. A reward of five thousand five hundred livres was offered for the apprehension of any Protestant pastor. When apprehended he was hung. Protestant worship was altogether prohibited. If any Protestants were found singing psalms, or engaged in prayer, in their own houses, they were liable to have their entire property confiscated, and to be sent to the galleys for life.

These monstrous decrees were carried into effect—at a time when France reigned supreme in the domain of intellect, poetry, and the arts—in the days of Racine, Corneille, Moliere—of Bossuet, Bourdaloue, and Fenelon. Louis XIV. had the soldier, the hangman, and the priest at his command; but they all failed him. They could imprison, they could torture, they could kill, they could make the Protestants galley-slaves; they could burn their Bibles, and deprive them of everything that they valued; but the impregnable rights of conscience defied them.

The only thing left for the Protestants was to fly from France in all directions. They took refuge in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, and England. The flight from France had begun before the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, but after that act the flight rapidly increased. Not less than a million of persons are supposed to have escaped from France in consequence of the Revocation.

Steps were, however, taken by the King to stop the emigration. He issued a decree ordering that the property and goods of all those Protestants who had already escaped should be confiscated to the Crown, unless they returned within three months from the date of the Revocation. Then, with respect to the Protestants who remained in France, he decreed that all Frenchmen found attempting to escape were to be sent to the galleys for life; and that all Frenchwomen found attempting to escape were to be imprisoned for life. The spies who denounced the fugitive Protestants were rewarded by the apportionment of half their goods.

This decree was not, however, considered sufficiently severe, and it was shortly after followed by another, proclaiming that any captured fugitives, as well as any person found acting as their guide, should be condemned to death. Another royal decree was issued respecting those fugitives who attempted to escape by sea. It was to the effect, that before any ship was allowed to set sail for a foreign port, the hold should be fumigated with a deadly gas, so that any hidden Huguenot who could not otherwise be detected, might be suffocated to death.

These measures, however, did not seem to have the effect of "converting" the French Protestants. The Dragonnades were next resorted to. Louis XIV. was pleased to call the dragoons his Booted Missionaries, ses missionnaires bottes. The dragonnades are said to have been the invention of Michel de Marillac, whose name will doubtless descend to infamous notoriety, like those of Catherine de Medicis, the Guises, and the authors of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew.

Yet there was not much genius displayed in the invention of the Dragonnades. It merely consisted in this: whenever it was found that a town abounded with Huguenots, the dragoons, hussars, and troops of various kinds were poured into it, and quartered on the inhabitants. Twenty, thirty, or forty were quartered together, according to the size of the house. They occupied every room; they beat their drums and blew their trumpets; they smoked, drank, and swore, without any regard to the infirm, the sick, or the dying, until the inmates were "converted."

The whole army of France was let loose upon the Huguenots. They had been beaten out of Holland by the Dutch Calvinists; and they could now fearlessly take their revenge out of their unarmed Huguenot fellow-countrymen. Whenever they quartered themselves in a dwelling, it was, for the time being, their own. They rummaged the cellars, drank the wines, ordered the best of everything, pillaged the house, and treated everybody who belonged to it as a slave. The Huguenots were not only compelled to provide for the entertainment of their guests, but to pay them their wages. The superior officers were paid fifteen francs a day, the lieutenants nine francs, and the common soldiers three francs. If the money was not paid, the household furniture, the horses and cows, and all the other articles that could be seized, were publicly sold.

No wonder that so many Huguenots were "converted" by the dragoons. Forty thousand persons were converted in Poitou. The regiment of Asfeld was the instrument of their conversion. A company and a half of dragoons occupied the house of a single lady at Poitiers until she was converted to the Roman Catholic faith. What bravery!

The Huguenots of Languedoc were amongst the most obstinate of all. They refused to be converted by the priests; and then Louis XIV. determined to dragonnade them. About sixty thousand troops were concentrated on the province. Noailles, the governor, shortly after wrote to the King that he had converted the city of Nismes in twenty-four hours. Twenty thousand converts had been made in Montauban; and he promised that by the end of the month there would be no more Huguenots left in Languedoc.

Many persons were doubtless converted by force, or by the fear of being dragonnaded; but there were also many more who were ready to run all risks rather than abjure their faith. Of those who abjured, the greater number took the first opportunity of flying from France, by land or by sea, and taking refuge in Switzerland, Germany, Holland, or England. Many instances might be given of the heroic fortitude with which the Huguenots bore the brutality of their enemies; but, for the present, it may be sufficient to mention the case of the De Pechels of Montauban.

The citizens of Montauban had been terribly treated before and after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The town had been one of the principal Huguenot places of refuge in France. Hence its population was principally Protestant. Its university had been shut up. Its churches had been levelled to the ground. Its professors and pastors had been banished from France. And now it was to be dragonnaded.

The town was filled with troops, who were quartered on the Protestants. One of the burgesses called upon the Intendant, threw himself at his feet, and prayed to be delivered from the dragoons. "On one condition only!" replied Dubois, "that you become a Catholic." "I cannot," said the townsman, "because, if the Sultan quartered twenty janissaries on me, I might, for the same reason, be forced to become a Turk."

Although many of the townsmen pretended to be converted, the Protestant chiefs held firm to their convictions, and resisted all persuasions, promises, and threats, to induce them to abjure their religion. Amongst them were Samuel de Pechels de la Boissonade and the Marquise de Sabonnieres, his wife, who, in the midst of many trials and sorrows, preferred to do their duty to every other consideration.

The family of De Pechels had long been settled at Montauban. Being regarded as among the heads of the Protestant party in Montauban, they were marked out by the King's ministers for the most vigorous treatment. When the troops entered the town on the 20th of August, 1685, they treated the inhabitants as if the town had been taken by assault. The officers and soldiers vied with each other in committing acts of violence. They were sanctioned by the magistrate, who authorised their excesses, in conformity with the King's will. Tumult and disorder prevailed everywhere. Houses were broken into. Persons of the reformed religion, without regard to age, sex, or condition, were treated with indignity. They were sworn at, threatened, and beaten. Their families were turned out of doors. Every room in the house was entered and ransacked of its plate, silk, linen, and clothes. When the furniture was too heavy to be carried away, it was demolished. The mirrors were slashed with swords, or shot at with pistols. In short, so far as regarded their household possessions, the greater number of the Protestants were completely ruined.

Samuel de Pechels de la Boissonade had no fewer than thirty-eight dragoons and fusiliers quartered upon him. It was intended at first to quarter these troopers on Roupeiroux, the King's adjutant; but having promptly changed his religion to avoid the horrors of the dragonnade, they were removed to the house of De Pechels, and he was ordered by Chevalier Duc, their commander, to pay down the money which he had failed to get from Roupeiroux, during the days that the troopers should have occupied his house. De Pechels has himself told the story of his sufferings, and we proceed to quote his own words:—

"Soon after," he says, "my house was filled with officers, troopers, and their horses, who took possession of every room with such unfeeling harshness that I could not reserve a single one for the use of my family; nor could I make these unfeeling wretches listen to my declaration that I was ready to give up all that I possessed without resistance. Doors were broken open, boxes and cupboards forced. They liked better to carry off what belonged to me in this violent manner than to take the keys which my wife and I, standing on either side, continued to offer. The granaries served for the reception of their horses among the grain and meal, which the wretches, with the greatest barbarity, made them trample underfoot. The very bread destined for my little children, like the rest, was contemptuously trodden down by the horses.

"Nothing could stop the brutality of these madmen. I was thrust out into the street with my wife, now very near her confinement, and four very young children, taking nothing with me but a little cradle and a small supply of linen, for the babe whose birth was almost momentarily expected. The street being full of people, diverted at seeing us thus exposed, we were delayed some moments near the door, during which we were pitilessly drenched by the troopers, who amused themselves at the windows with emptying upon our heads pitchers of water, to add to their enjoyment of our sad condition.

"From this moment I gave up both house and goods to be plundered, without having in view any place of refuge but the street, ill suited, it must be owned, for such a purpose, and especially so to a woman expecting her confinement hourly, and to little children of too tender an age to make their own way—some of them, indeed, being unable to walk or speak—and having no hope but in the mercy of God and His gracious protection."

De Pechels proceeded to the house of Marshal Boufflers, commander of the district, thinking it probable that a man of honour, such as he was supposed to be, would discourage such barbarities, and place the dragoons under some sort of military control. But no! The Marshal could not be found. He carefully kept out of the way of all Protestant complainants. De Pechels, however, met Chevalier Duc, who commanded the soldiers that had turned him out of his house. In answer to the expostulations of De Pechels, the Chevalier gave him to understand that the same treatment would be continued unless he "changed his religion." "Then," answered De Pechels, "by God's help I never will."

At length, when De Pechels' house had been thoroughly stripped, and the dragoons had decamped elsewhere, he received an order to return, in order to entertain another detachment of soldiers. The criminal judge, who had possession of the keys, entered the house, and found it in extreme disorder. "I was obliged to remain in it," says De Pechels, "amidst dirt and vermin, in obedience to the Intendant's orders, reiterated in the strictest manner by the criminal judge, that I should await the arrival of a fresh party of lodgers, who accordingly came on the day following."

The new party consisted of six soldiers of the regiment of fusiliers, who called themselves simply "missionaries," as distinct from the "booted missionaries" who had just left. They were savage at not finding anything to plunder, their predecessors having removed everything in the shape of booty. The fusiliers were shortly followed by six soldiers of Dampier's regiment, who were still more ferocious. They gave De Pechels and his wife no peace day or night; they kept the house in a constant uproar; swore and sang obscene songs, and carried their insolence to the utmost pitch. At length De Pechels was forced to quit the house, on account of his wife, who was near the time of her confinement. These are his own words:—

"For a long time we were wandering through the streets, no one daring to offer us an asylum, as the ordinance of the Intendant imposed a fine of four or five hundred livres[89] upon any one who should receive Protestants into their houses. My mother's house had long been filled with soldiers, as well as that of my sister De Darassus; and not knowing where to go, I suffered great agony of mind for fear my poor wife should give birth to her infant in the street. In this lamentable plight, the good providence of God led us to the house of Mdlle. de Guarrison, my wife's sister, from whence, most fortunately, a large number of soldiers, with their officers, were issuing. They had occupied it for some time, and had allowed the family no rest. Now they were changing their quarters, to continue their lawless mission in some country town. The stillness of the house after their departure induced us to enter it at once, and hardly had my wife accepted the bed Mdlle. de Guarrison offered her, than she was happily delivered of a daughter, blessed be God, who never leaves Himself without a witness to those who fear His name.

[Footnote 89: The French livre was worth three francs, or about two shillings and sixpence English money.]

"That same evening a great number of soldiers arrived, and took up their quarters in M. de Guarrison's house, and two days after, this burden was augmented by the addition of a colonel, a captain, and two lieutenants, with a large company of soldiers and several servants, all of whom conducted themselves with a degree of violence scarcely to be described. They had no regard for the owners of the house, but robbed them with impunity. They had no pity for my poor wife, weak and ill as she was; nor for the helpless children, who suffered much under these miserable conditions.

"Officers, soldiers, and servants pillaged the house with odious rivalry, took possession of all the rooms, drove out the owners, and obliged the poor sick woman (by their continual threats and abominable conduct) to get up and try to retire to some other place. She crept into the courtyard, where, with her infant, she was detained in the cold for a long time by the soldiers, who would not allow her to quit the premises. At length, however, my poor wife got into the street, still, however, guarded by soldiers, who would not allow her to go out of their sight, or to speak with any one. She complained to the Intendant of their cruel ways, but instead of procuring her any relief, he aggravated her affliction, ordering the soldiers to keep strict watch over her, never to leave her, and to inform him with what persons she found a refuge, that he might make them pay the penalty."

De Pechels' wife was thus under the necessity of sleeping, with her babe and her children, in the street. After all was quiet, they sought for a door-step, and lay down for the night under the stars.

Madame de Pechels at length found temporary shelter. Mademoiselle de Delada, a friend of the Intendant, touched by the poor woman's sad condition, implored the magistrate's permission to give her refuge; and being a well-known Roman Catholic, she was at length permitted to take Madame de Pechels and her babe into her house, but on condition that four soldiers should still keep her in view. She remained there for a short time, until she was able to leave her bed, when she was privily removed to a country house belonging to Mademoiselle de Delada, not far from the town of Montauban.

To return to Samuel de Pechels. His house was still overflowing with soldiers. They proceeded to wreck what was left of his household effects; they carried off and sold his papers and his library, which was considerable. Some of the soldiers of Dampier's regiment carried off in a sack a pair of brass chimney dogs, the shovel and tongs, a grate, and some iron spits, the wretched remains of his household furniture. They proceeded to lay waste his farms and carry off his cattle, selling the latter by public auction in the square. They next pulled down his house, and sold the materials. After this, ten soldiers were quartered in a neighbouring tavern, at De Pechels' expense. Not being able to pay the expenses, the Intendant sent some archers to him to say that he would be carried off to prison unless he changed his religion. To that proposal he answered, as before, that "by the help of God he would never make that change, and that he was quite prepared to go to any place to which his merciful Saviour might lead him."

He was accordingly taken, into custody, and placed, for a time, in the Royal Chateau. On the same day, his sister De Darassus was committed to prison. Still holding steadfast by his faith, De Pechels was, after a month's imprisonment at Montauban, removed to the prison of Cahors, where he was put into the lowest dungeon. "By the grace of my Saviour," said he, "I strengthened myself more in my determination to die rather than renounce the truth."

After lying for more than three months in the dampest mould of the lowest dungeon in the prison of Cahors, and being still found immovable in his faith, De Pechels was ordered to be taken to the citadel of Montpellier, to wait there until he could be transported to America. His wife, the Marquise de Sabonnieres, having heard of his condemnation (though he was never tried), determined to see him before he left France for ever. The road from Cahors to Montpellier did not pass through Montauban, but a few miles to the east of it. Having spent the night in prayer to God, that He might endow her with firmness to sustain the trials of a scene, which was as heroic in her as it was touching to those who witnessed it, she went forth in the morning to wait along the roadside for the arrival of the illustrious body of prisoners, who were on their way, some to the galleys, some to banishment, some to imprisonment, and some to death.

At length the glorious band arrived. They were chained two and two. They were for the most part ladies and gentlemen who had refused to abjure their religion. Among them were M. Desparves, a gentleman from the neighbourhood of Laitoure, old and blind, led by his wife; M. de la Resseguerie, of Montauban, and many more. Madame de Pechels implored leave of the guard who conducted the prisoners to have an interview with her husband. It was granted. She had been supplied with the fortitude for which she had so ardently and piously prayed to God during the whole of the past night. It seemed as if some supernatural power had prompted the discourse with her husband, which softened the hearts of those who, up to that time, had appeared inaccessible to the sentiments of humanity. The superintendent allowed the noble couple to pray together; after which they were separated without the least weakness betraying itself on the part of Madame de Pechels, who remained unmoved, whilst all the bystanders were melted into tears. The procession of guards and prisoners then went on its way.

The trials of Madame de Pechels were not yet ended. Though she had parted with her husband, who was now on his way to banishment, she had still the children with her; and, cruellest torture of all! these were now to be torn from her. One evening a devoted friend came to inform her that a body of men were to arrive next morning and take her children, even the baby from her breast, and immure them in a convent. She was also informed that she herself was to be seized and imprisoned.

The intelligence fell like a thunderbolt upon the tender mother. What was she to do? Was she to abjure her religion? She prayed for help from God. Part of the night was thus spent before she could make up her mind to part from her innocent children, who were to be brought up in a religion at variance with her own. In any case, a separation was necessary. Could she not fly, like so many other Protestant women, and live in hopes of better days to come? It was better to fly from France than encounter the horrors of a French prison. Before she parted with her children she embraced them while they slept; she withdrew a few steps to tear herself from them, and again she came back to bid them a last farewell!

At length, urged by the person who was about to give her a refuge in his house, she consented to follow him. The man was a weaver by trade, and all day long he carried on his work in the only room which he possessed. Madame de Pechels passed the day in a recess, concealed by the bed of her entertainers, and in the evening she came out, and the good people supplied her with what was necessary. She passed six months in this retreat, without any one knowing what had become of her. It was thought that she had taken refuge in some foreign country.

Numbers of ladies had already been able to make their escape. The frontier was strictly guarded by troops, police, and armed peasantry. The high-roads as well as the byways were patrolled day and night, and all the bridges were strongly guarded. But the fugitives avoided the frequented routes. They travelled at night, and hid themselves during the day. There were Protestant guides who knew every pathway leading out of France, through forests, wastes, or mountain paths, where no patrols were on the watch; and they thus succeeded in leading thousands of refugee Protestants across the frontier. And thus it was that Madame de Pechels was at length enabled, with the help of a guide, to reach Geneva, one of the great refuges of the Huguenots.

On arrival there she felt the loss of her children more than ever. She offered to the guide who had conducted her all the money that she possessed to bring her one or other of her children. The eldest girl, then nine or ten years old, was communicated with, but having already tasted the pleasure of being her own mistress, she refused the proposal to fly into Switzerland to join her mother. Her son Jacob was next communicated with. He was seven years old. He was greatly moved at the name of his mother, and he earnestly entreated to be taken to where she was. The guide at once proceeded to fulfil his engagement. The boy fled with him from France, passing for his son. The way was long—some five hundred miles. The journey occupied them about three weeks. They rested during the day, and travelled at night. They avoided every danger, and at length the faithful guide was able to place the loving son in the arms of his noble and affectionate mother.

Samuel de Pechels was condemned to banishment without the shadow of a trial. He could not be dragooned into denying his faith, and he was therefore imprisoned, preparatory to his expulsion from France. "I was told," he said, "by the Sieur Raoul, Roqueton (or chief archer) to the Intendant of Montauban, that if I would not change my religion, he had orders from the King and the Intendant to convey me to the citadel of Montpellier, from thence to be immediately shipped for America. My reply was, that I was ready to go forthwith whithersoever it was God's pleasure to lead me, and that assuredly, by God's help, I would make no change in my religion."

After five months' imprisonment at Cahors, he was taken out and marched, as already related, to the citadel of Montpellier. The citadel adjoins the Peyrou, a lofty platform of rock, which commands a splendid panoramic view of the surrounding country. It is now laid out as a pleasure-ground, though it was then the principal hanging-place of the Languedoc Protestants. Brousson, and many other faithful pastors of the "Church in the Desert," laid down their lives there. Half-a-dozen decaying corpses might sometimes be seen swinging from the gibbets on which the ministers had been hung.

A more bitter fate was, however, reserved for De Pechels. After about a month's imprisonment in the citadel, he was removed to Aiguesmortes, under the charge of several mounted archers and foot soldiers. He was accompanied by fourteen Protestant ladies and gentlemen, on their way to perpetual imprisonment, to the galleys, or to banishment. Aiguesmortes was the principal fortified dungeon in the south of France, used for the imprisonment of Huguenots who refused to be converted. It is situated close to the Mediterranean, and is surrounded by lagunes and salt marshes. It is a most unhealthy place; and imprisonment at Aiguesmortes was considered a slower but not a less certain death than hanging. Sixteen Huguenot women were confined there in 1686, and the whole of them died within five months. When the prisoners died off, the place was at once filled again. The castle of Aiguesmortes was thus used as a prison for nearly a hundred years.

De Pechels gives the following account of his journey from Montpellier to Aiguesmortes:—"Mounted on asses, harnessed in the meanest manner, without stirrups, and with wretched ropes for halters, we entered Aiguesmortes, and were there locked up in the Tower of Constance, with thirty other male prisoners and twenty women and girls, who had also been brought hither, tied two and two. The men were placed in an upper apartment of the tower, and the women and girls below, so that we could hear each other pray to God and sing His praises with a loud voice."

De Pechels did not long remain a prisoner at Aiguesmortes. He was shortly after put on board a king's ship bound for Marseilles. He was very ill during the voyage, suffering from seasickness and continual fainting fits. On reaching Marseilles he was confined in the hospital prison used for common felons and galley-slaves. It was called the Chamber of Darkness, because of its want of light. The single apartment contained two hundred and thirty prisoners. Some of them were chained together, two and two; others, three and three. The miserable palliasses on which they slept had been much worn by the galley-slaves, who had used them during their illnesses. The women were separated from the men by a linen cloth attached to the ceiling, which was drawn across every evening, and formed the only partition between them.

As may easily be supposed, the condition of the prisoners was frightful. The swearing of the common felons was mixed with the prayers of the Huguenots. The guards walked about all night to keep watch and ward over them. They fell upon any who assembled and knelt together, separating them and swearing at them, and mercilessly ill-treating them, men and women alike. "But all their strictness and rage," says De Pechels, "could not prevent one from seeing always, in different parts of the dungeon, little groups upon their knees, imploring the mercy of God and singing His praises, whilst others kept near the guards so as to hinder them from interfering with the little bands of worshippers."

At length the time arrived for the embarkation of the Huguenots for America. On the 18th of September, 1687, De Pechels, with fifty-eight men and twenty-one women, was put on board a flute called the Mary—the French flute consisting of a heavy narrow-sterned vessel, called in England a "pink." De Pechels was carefully separated from all with whom he had formed habits of intimacy, and whose presence near him would doubtless have helped him to bear the bitterness of his fate. On the same day, ninety prisoners of both sexes were embarked in another ship, named the Concord, bound for the same destination. The two vessels set sail in the first place for Toulon, in order to obtain an escort of two ships-of-war.

The voyage was very disastrous. Three hours after the squadron had left Toulon, the Mary was nearly dashed against a rock, owing to the roughness of the weather. Three days after, a frightful storm arose, and dashed the prisoners against each other. All were sick; indeed, De Pechels' malady lasted during the entire voyage. The squadron first cast anchor amongst the Formentera Islands, off the coast of Spain, where they took in water. On the next day they anchored in the Straits of Gibraltar for the same purpose. They next sailed for Cadiz, but a strong west wind having set in, the ship was forced back to the road of Gibraltar. After waiting there for three days they again started, under the shelter of a Dutch fleet of eighteen sail, "which," says De Pechels, "providentially saved us from falling into the hands of the Algerine corsairs, some of whom had appeared in sight, and from whose hands God, in His great mercy, delivered us." As if the Algerine corsairs would have treated the Huguenots worse than their own king was now treating them. The Algerine corsairs would have sold them into slavery; whilst the French king was transporting them to America for the same purpose.

At length the squadron reached Cadiz roads. Many ships were there—English as well as Dutch. When the foreigners heard of the state and misfortunes of the Huguenots on board the French ships, they came to visit them in their anchoring ground, and were profuse in their charity to the prisoners for conscience' sake confined in the two French vessels. "God, who never leaves Himself without witness, brought us consolation and relief from this town, where superstition and bigotry reign in their fullest force." As it was in De Pechels' day, so it is now.

At length the French squadron set sail for America. The voyage was tedious and miserable. There were about a hundred and thirty prisoners on board. Seventy of them were sick felons, chained with heavy irons. Being useless for the French galleys, they were now being transported to America, to be sold as slaves. The imprisoned Huguenots—men and women—were fifty-nine in number. They were crammed into a part of the ship that could scarcely hold them. They could not stand upright; nor could they lie down. They had to lie upon each other. The den was moreover very dark, the only light that entered it being through the narrow hatchway; and even this was often closed. The wonder is that they were not suffocated outright.

The burning heat of the sun shining on the deck above them, the never-ceasing fire of the kitchen, which was situated alongside their place of confinement, created such a stifling heat, that the prisoners had to take off their shirts to relieve their agony. The horrid stench arising from so many persons being crowded together, and the entire want of the means of cleanliness, caused the inmates to become covered with vermin. They were also tormented by the intolerable thirst which no means were taken to allay. Their feeding was horrible; for they must be kept alive in some way, in order that the intentions of their gracious sovereign might be carried into effect. One day they had stinking salt beef; the next, cod fish half boiled; then peas as hard as when they were put into the pot; and at other times, dried cod fish, or rank cheese. These things, together with the violent motion of the sea, occasioned severe sickness, from which many of the sufferers were relieved by death. This deplorable voyage extended over five months. Here is De Pechels' account of the sufferings of the prisoners, written in his own words:—

"The intense and suffocating heat, the horrible odour, the maddening swarm of vermin that devoured us, the incessant thirst and wretched fare, sufficed not to satisfy our overseers. They sometimes struck us rudely, and very often threw down sea-water upon us, when they saw us engaged in prayer and praise to God. The common talk of these enemies of the truth was how they would hang, when they came to America, every man who would not go to mass, and how they would deliver the women to the natives. But far from being frightened at these threats, or even moved by all the barbarities of which we were the victims, many of us felt a secret joy that we were chosen to suffer for the holy name of Jesus, who strengthened us with a willingness to die for His sake. For myself, these menaces had been so often repeated during my imprisonments, that they had become familiar; insomuch that, far from being shaken by them any more than by the sufferings to which it had pleased my Saviour to call me, I considered them as transient things, not worthy to be weighed against the glory to come, and such as would procure me a weight of glory supremely excellent. 'Blessed are they who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.'"

On the 2nd of January, 1688, the island of San Domingo came in sight. It was for the most part inhabited by savages. The French had a settlement on the west coast of the island, and the Spaniards occupied the eastern part. Dense forests separated the two settlements. The Mary coasted along the island, and afterwards made sail for Guadaloupe, another colony belonging to the French. The ship seemed as yet to have had no proper destination, for, four days later, the Mary weighed her anchor, and sailed to St. Christopher, another island partly belonging to the French. "It was well situated," says De Pechels, "as may readily be believed, when I add that it possessed a colony of Jesuits—an order which never selects a bad situation. The Jesuits here are very rich and in high repute. Two of the fraternity, having come on board, were received by the crew with every demonstration of respect; and on their retirement, three guns were fired as a mark of honour to the distinguished visitors."

The Huguenots were still under hatches,—weary, longing, wretched, and miserable. They were most anxious to be put on shore—anywhere, even among savages. But the Mary had not yet arrived at her destination. She again set sail, and passed St. Kitts, St. Eustace, St. Croix, Porto Rico, and at length again reached San Domingo. The ship dropped anchor before Port au Prince, the residence of the governor. The galley-slaves were disembarked and sold. Some of the Huguenots were also sold for slaves, though De Pechels was not among them. The rest were transferred to the Maria, a king's ship, commanded by M. de Beauguay, who treated the prisoners with much humanity. The ship then set sail for Leogane, another part of the colony, where the remaining Huguenots were disembarked. They were quartered on the inhabitants at the pleasure of the governor.