THE
REFORMATION IN EUROPE
IN THE TIME OF CALVIN.
VOL. I.

LONDON
PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO.
NEW-STREET SQUARE

HISTORY
OF
THE REFORMATION IN EUROPE
IN THE TIME OF CALVIN.
BY J. H. MERLE D’AUBIGNÉ, D.D.
AUTHOR OF THE
‘HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY’ ETC.
‘Les choses de petite durée out coutume de devenir fanées, quand elles out passé leur temps.
‘Au règne de Christ, il n’y a que le nouvel homme qui soit florissant, qui ait de la vigueur, et dont il faille faire cas.’
Calvin.
VOL. I.
GENEVA AND FRANCE.
LONDON:
LONGMAN, GREEN, LONGMAN, ROBERTS, & GREEN.
1863.

PREFACE.

At the conclusion of the preface to the first volume of the History of the Reformation, the author wrote, ‘This work will consist of four volumes, or at the most five, which will appear successively.’ These five volumes have appeared. In them are described the heroic times of Luther, and the effects produced in Germany and other countries by the characteristic doctrine of that reformer—justification by faith. They present a picture of that great epoch which contained in the germ the revival of christianity in the last three centuries. The author has thus completed the task he had assigned himself; but there still remained another.

The times of Luther were followed by those of Calvin. He, like his great predecessor, undertook to search the Scriptures, and in them he found the same truth and the same life; but a different character distinguishes his work.

The renovation of the individual, of the Church, and of the human race, is his theme. If the Holy Ghost kindles the lamp of truth in man, it is (according to Calvin) ‘to the end that the entire man should be transformed.’—‘In the kingdom of Christ,’ he says, ‘it is only the new man that flourishes and has any vigour, and whom we ought to take into account.’

This renovation is, at the same time, an enfranchisement; and we might assign, as a motto to the reformation accomplished by Calvin, as well as to apostolical christianity itself, these words of Jesus Christ: The truth shall make you free.[1]

When the gods of the nations fell, when the Father which is in heaven manifested Himself to the world in the Gospel, adopting as His children those who received into their hearts the glad tidings of reconciliation with God, all these men became brethren, and this fraternity created liberty. From that time a mighty transformation went on gradually, in individuals, in families, and in society itself. Slavery disappeared, without wars or revolutions.

Unhappily, the sun which had for some time gladdened the eyes of the people, became obscured; the liberty of the children of God was lost; new human ordinances appeared to bind men’s consciences and chill their hearts. The Reformation of the sixteenth century restored to the human race what the middle ages had stolen from them; it delivered them from the traditions, laws, and despotism of the papacy; it put an end to the minority and tutelage in which Rome claimed to keep mankind for ever; and by calling upon man to establish his faith not on the word of a priest, but on the infallible Word of God, and by announcing to everyone free access to the Father through the new and saving way—Christ Jesus, it proclaimed and brought about the hour of christian manhood.

An explanation is, however, necessary. There are philosophers in our days who regard Christ as simply the apostle of political liberty. These men should learn that, if they desire liberty outwardly, they must first possess it inwardly. To hope to enjoy the first without the second is to run after a chimera.

The greatest and most dangerous of despotisms is that beneath which the depraved inclination of human nature, the deadly influence of the world, namely, sin, miserably subjects the human conscience. There are, no doubt, many countries, especially among those which the sun of christianity has not yet illumined, that are without civil liberty, and that groan under the arbitrary rule of powerful masters. But, in order to become free outwardly, men must first succeed in being free inwardly. In the human heart there is a vast country to be delivered from slavery—abysses which man cannot cross alone, heights he cannot climb unaided, fortresses he cannot take, armies he cannot put to flight. In order to conquer in this moral battle, man must unite with One stronger than himself—with the Son of God.

If there is anyone, in the present state of society, who is fatigued with the struggle and grieved at finding himself always overcome by evil, and who desires to breathe the light pure air of the upper regions of liberty—let him come to the Gospel; let him seek for union with the Saviour, and in his Holy Spirit he will find a power by which he will be able to gain the greatest of victories.

We are aware that there are men, and good men too, who are frightened at the word ‘liberty;’ but these estimable persons are quite wrong. Christ is a deliverer. The Son, He said, shall make you free. Would they wish to change Him into a tyrant?

There are also, as we well know, some intelligent men, but enemies of the Gospel, who, seeing a long and lamentable procession of despotic acts pass before them in the history of the Church, place them unceremoniously to the account of christianity. Let them undeceive themselves: the oppression that revolts them may be pagan, jewish, papal, or worldly ... but it is not christian. Whenever christianity reappears in the world, with its spirit, faith, and primitive life, it brings men deliverance and peace.

The liberty which the Truth brings is not for individuals only: it affects the whole of society. Calvin’s work of renovation, in particular, which was doubtless first of all an internal work, was afterwards destined to exercise a great influence over nations. Luther transformed princes into heroes of the faith, and we have described with admiration their triumphs at Augsburg and elsewhere. The reformation of Calvin was addressed particularly to the people, among whom it raised up martyrs until the time came when it was to send forth the spiritual conquerors of the world. For three centuries it has been producing, in the social condition of the nations that have received it, transformations unknown to former times. And still at this very day, and now perhaps more than ever, it imparts to the men who accept it a spirit of power which makes them chosen instruments, fitted to propagate truth, morality, and civilisation to the ends of the earth.

The idea of the present work is not a new one: it dates more than forty years back. A writer, from whom the author differs on important points, but whose name is dear to all who know the simple beauty of his character, and have read with care his works on the history of the Church and the history of Dogmas, which have placed him in the foremost rank among the ecclesiastical historians of our day—the learned Neander—speaking with the author at Berlin in 1818, pressed him to undertake a History of the Reformation of Calvin. The author answered that he desired first to describe that of Luther; but that he intended to sketch successively two pictures so similar and yet so different.

The History of the Reformation in Europe in the time of Calvin naturally begins with Geneva.

The Reformation of Geneva opens with the fall of a bishop-prince. This is its characteristic; and if we passed over in silence the heroic struggles which led to his fall, we should expose ourselves to just reproaches on the part of enlightened men.

It is possible that this event, which we are called upon to describe (the end of an ecclesiastical state), may give rise to comparisons with the present times; but we have not gone out of our way for them. The great question, which occupies Europe at this moment, also occupied Geneva at the beginning of the sixteenth century. But that portion of our history was written before these late exciting years, during which the important and complex question of the maintenance or the fall of the temporal power of the popes has come before, and is continually coming before, sovereigns and their people. The historian, while relating the facts of the sixteenth century, had no other prepossessions than those which the story itself called up.

These prepossessions were quite natural. Descended from the huguenots of France, whom persecution drove from their country in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the author had become attached to that hospitable city which received his forefathers, and in which they found a new home. The huguenots of Geneva captivated his attention. The decision, the sacrifices, the perseverance, and the heroism, with which the Genevans defended their threatened liberty, moved him profoundly. The independence of a city, acquired by so much courage and by so many privations, perils, and sufferings, is, without doubt, a sacred thing in the eyes of all; and no one should attempt to rob her of it. It may be that this history contains lessons for the people, of which he did not always think as he was writing it. May he be permitted to point out one?

The political emancipation of Geneva differs from many modern revolutions in the fact that we find admirably combined therein the two elements which make the movements of nations salutary; that is to say, order and liberty. Nations have been seen in our days rising in the name of liberty, and entirely forgetting right. It was not so in Geneva. For some time the Genevans persevered in defending the established order of things; and it was only when they had seen, during a long course of years, their prince-bishops leaguing themselves with the enemies of the state, conniving at usurpations, and indulging in acts contrary to the charters of their ancestors, that they accepted the divorce, and substituted a new state of things for the old one, or rather returned to an antecedent state. We find them always quoting the ancient libertates, franchesiæ, immunitates, usus, consuetudines civitatis Gebennensis, first digested into a code in 1387, while their origin is stated in the document itself to be of much greater antiquity. The author (as will be seen) is a friend of liberty; but justice, morality, and order are, in his opinion, quite as necessary to the prosperity of nations. On that point he agrees with that distinguished writer on modern civilisation, M. Guizot, though he may differ from him on others.

In writing this history we have had recourse to the original documents, and in particular to some important manuscripts; the manuscript registers of the Council of Geneva, the manuscript histories of Syndic Roset and Syndic Gautier, the manuscript of the Mamelus (Mamelukes), and many letters and remarkable papers preserved in the Archives of Geneva. We have also studied in the library of Berne some manuscripts of which historians have hitherto made little or no use; a few of these have been indicated in the notes, others will be mentioned hereafter. Besides these original sources, we have profited by writings and documents of great interest belonging to the sixteenth century, and recently published by learned Genevese archæologists, particularly by MM. Galiffe, Grenus, Revillod, E. Mallet, Chaponière, and Fick. We have also made great use of the memoirs of the Society of History and Archæology of Geneva.

With regard to France, the author has consulted various documents of the sixteenth century, little or altogether unknown, especially in what concerns the relations of the French government with the German protestants. He has profited also by several manuscripts, and by their means has been able to learn a few facts connected with the early part of Calvin’s life, which have not hitherto been published. These facts are partly derived from the Latin letters of the reformer, which have not yet been printed either in French or Latin, and which are contained in the excellent collection which Dr. Jules Bonnet intends giving to the world, if such a work should receive from the christian public the encouragement which the labour, disinterestedness, and zeal of its learned editor deserve.

The author having habitual recourse to the French documents of the sixteenth century, has often introduced their most characteristic passages into his text. The work of the historian is neither a work of the imagination, like that of the poet, nor a mere conversation about times gone by, as some writers of our day appear to imagine. History is a faithful description of past events; and when the historian can relate them by making use of the language of those who took part in them, he is more certain of describing them just as they were.

But the reproduction of contemporary documents is not the only business of the historian. He must do more than exhume from the sepulchre in which they are sleeping the relics of men and things of times past, that he may exhibit them in the light of day. We value highly such a work and those who perform it, for it is a necessary one; and yet we do not think it sufficient. Dry bones do not faithfully represent the men of other days. They did not live as skeletons, but as beings full of life and activity. The historian is not simply a resurrectionist: he needs—strange but necessary ambition—a power that can restore the dead to life.

Certain modern historians have successfully accomplished this task. The author, unable to follow them, and compelled to present his readers with a simple and unassuming chronicle, feels bound to express his admiration for those who have thus been able to revive the buried past. He firmly believes that, if a history should have truth, it should also have life. The events of past times did not resemble, in the days when they occurred, those grand museums of Rome, Naples, Paris, and London, in whose galleries we behold long rows of marble statues, mummies, and tombs. There were then living beings who thought, felt, spoke, acted, and struggled. The picture, whatever history may be able to do, will always have less of life than the reality.

When an historian comes across a speech of one of the actors in the great drama of human affairs, he ought to lay hold of it, as if it were a pearl, and weave it into his tapestry, in order to relieve the duller colours and give more solidity and brilliancy. Whether the speech be met with in the letters or writings of the actor himself, or in those of the chroniclers, is a matter of no importance: he should take it wherever he finds it. The history which exhibits men thinking, feeling, and acting as they did in their lifetime, is of far higher value than those purely intellectual compositions in which the actors are deprived of speech and even of life.

The author, having given his opinion in favour of this better and higher historical method, is compelled to express a regret: Le précepte est aisé, mais l’art est difficile.
And as he looks at his work, he has to repeat with sorrow the confession of the poet of antiquity: Deteriora sequor!

This work is not a biography of Calvin, as some may imagine. The name of that great reformer appears, indeed, on the title-page, and we shall feel a pleasure, whenever the opportunity occurs, in endeavouring to restore the true colours to that figure so strangely misunderstood in our days. We know that, in so doing, we shall shock certain deeply-rooted prejudices, and shall offend those who accept without examination, in this respect, the fables of Romish writers. Tacitus indeed assures us that malignity has a false show of liberty: Malignitati falsa species libertatis inest; that history is listened to with more favour when she slanders and disparages: Obtrectatio et livor pronis auribus accipiuntur. But what historian could entertain the culpable ambition of pleasing at the expense of truth? Moreover, we believe that, if our age still labours under great errors with respect to many men and things, it is more competent than those which went before to hear the truth, to examine, appreciate, and accept it.

We repeat, however, that it is not a history of Calvin, but of the Reformation in Europe in the time of that reformer which we desire to narrate. Other volumes are already far advanced, and we hope to publish two more in the ensuing year. But may we be permitted, in conclusion, to transcribe here a passage of Holy Scripture that has often occurred to our mind in executing a new work? It is this:

Ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live and do this or that.[2]

Eaux Vives, Geneva.

CONTENTS
OF
THE FIRST VOLUME.

[BOOK I.]
GENEVA AND THE FIRST HUGUENOTS.

HISTORY
OF THE
REFORMATION IN EUROPE
IN THE TIME OF CALVIN.

BOOK I.
GENEVA AND THE FIRST HUGUENOTS.

CHAPTER I.
THE REFORMATION AND MODERN LIBERTY.

Facts alone do not constitute the whole of history, any more than the members of the body form the complete man. There is a soul in history as well as in the body, and it is this which generates, vivifies, and links the facts together, so that they all combine to the same end.

The instant we begin to treat of Geneva, which, through the ministry of Calvin, was to become the most powerful centre of Reform in the sixteenth century, one question starts up before us.

What was the soul of the Reformation of Geneva? Truly, salvation by faith in Christ, who died to save—truly, the renewal of the heart by the word and the Spirit of God. But side by side with these supreme elements, that are found in all the Reformations, we meet with secondary elements that have existed in one country and not in another. What we discover at Geneva may possibly deserve to fix the attention of men in our own days: the characteristic element of the Genevese Reform is liberty.

Three great movements were carried out in this city during the first half of the sixteenth century. The first was the conquest of independence; the second, the conquest of faith; the third, the renovation and organisation of the Church. Berthelier, Farel, and Calvin are the three heroes of these three epics.

Each of these different movements was necessary. The bishop of Geneva was a temporal prince like the bishop of Rome; it was difficult to deprive the bishop of his pastoral staff unless he were first deprived of his sword. The necessity of liberty for the Gospel and of the Gospel for liberty is now acknowledged by all thoughtful men; but it was proclaimed by the history of Geneva three centuries ago.

But it may be said, a history of the Reformation has no concern with the secular, political, and social element. I have been reproached with not putting this sufficiently forward in the history of the Reformation of Germany, where it had relatively but little importance. I may perhaps be reproached with dwelling on it too much in the Reformation of Geneva, where it holds a prominent place. It is a hard matter to please all tastes: the safest course is to be guided by the truth of principles and not by the exigencies of individuals. Is it my fault if an epoch possesses its characteristic features? if it is impossible to keep back the secular, without wronging the spiritual, element? To cut history in two is to distort it. In the Reform of Geneva, and especially in the constitution of its church, the element of liberty predominates more than in the Reforms of other countries. We cannot know the reason of this unless we study the movement which gave birth to that Reform. The history of the political emancipation of Geneva is interesting of itself; liberty, it has been said,[3] has never been common in the world; it has not flourished in all countries or in all climates, and the periods when a people struggles justly for liberty are the privileged epochs of history. One such epoch occurred at the commencement of modern times; but strange to say, it is almost in Geneva alone that the struggles for liberty make the earlier decades of the sixteenth century a privileged time.

It is in this small republic that we find men remarkable for their devotion to liberty, for their attachment to law, for the boldness of their thoughts, the firmness of their character, and the strength of their energy. In the sixteenth century, after a repose of some hundreds of years, humanity having recovered its powers, like a field that had long lain fallow, displayed almost everywhere the marvels of the most luxuriant vegetation. Geneva is indeed the smallest theatre of this extraordinary fermentation; but it was not the least in heroism and grandeur, and on that ground alone it deserves attention.

There are, however, other reasons to induce us to this study. The struggle for liberty in Geneva was one of the agents of its religious transformation; that we may know one, we must study the other. Again, Calvin is the great man of this epoch; it is needful, therefore, to study the country where he appeared. A knowledge of the history of Geneva before Calvin can alone enable us to understand the life of this great reformer. But there remains a third and more important reason. I am about to narrate the history of the Reformation of the sixteenth century in the time of Calvin. Now, what chiefly distinguishes the Reformation of Calvin from that of Luther is, that wherever it was established, it brought with it not only truth but liberty, and all the great developments which these two fertile principles carry with them. Political liberty, as we shall see, settled upon those hills at the southern extremity of the Leman lake where stands the city of Calvin, and has never deserted them since. And more than this: earthly liberty, the faithful companion of divine truth, appeared at the same time with her in the Low Countries, in England, in Scotland, and subsequently in North America and other places besides, everywhere creating powerful nations. The Reformation of Calvin is that of modern times; it is the religion destined for the whole world. Being profoundly spiritual, it subserves also in an admirable manner all the temporal interests of man. It has the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

The free institutions of Protestant countries are not due solely to the Reformation of Calvin: they spring from various sources, and are not of foreign importation. The elements of liberty were in the blood of these nations, and remarkable men exerted a civilising influence over them. Magna Charta is older than the Genevese Reform; but we believe (though we may be mistaken) that this Reformation has had some small share in the introduction of those constitutional principles, without which nations can never attain their majority. Whence did this influence proceed?

The people of Geneva and their great doctor have each left their stamp on the Reformation which issued from their walls: Calvin’s was truth, the people’s, liberty. This last consideration compels us to narrate the struggles of which Geneva was the theatre, and which, though almost unknown up to the present hour, have aided, like a slender brook, to swell the great stream of modern civilisation. But there was a second and more potent cause. Supreme among the great principles that Calvin has diffused is the sovereignty of God. He has enjoined us to render unto Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s; but he has added: ‘God must always retain the sovereign empire, and all that may belong to man remains subordinate. Obedience towards princes accords with God’s service; but if princes usurp any portion of the authority of God, we must obey them only so far as may be done without offending God.’[4] If my conscience is thoroughly subject to God, I am free as regards men; but if I cling to anything besides heaven, men may easily enslave me. True liberty exists only in the higher regions. The bird that skims the earth may lose it at any moment; but we cannot ravish it from the eagle who soars among the clouds.

The great movements in the way of law and liberty effected by the people in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, have certain relations with the Reformation of Calvin, which it is impossible to ignore.

As soon as Guy de Brès and many others returned from Geneva to the Low Countries, the great contest between the rights of the people and the revolutionary and bloody despotism of Philip II. began; heroic struggles took place, and the creation of the United Provinces was their glorious termination.

John Knox returned to his native Scotland from Geneva, where he had spent several years; then popery, arbitrary power, and the immorality of a French court made way in that noble country for that enthusiasm for the gospel, liberty, and holiness, which has never since failed to kindle the ardent souls of its energetic people.

Numberless friends and disciples of Calvin carried with them every year into France the principles of civil and political liberty;[5] and a fierce struggle began with popery and the despotism, of the Valois first, and afterwards of the Bourbons. And though these princes sought to destroy the liberties for which the Huguenots shed their blood, their imperishable traces still remain among that illustrious nation.

The Englishmen who, during the bloody persecution of Mary, had sought an asylum at Geneva imbibed there a love for the gospel and for liberty. When they returned to England, a fountain gushed out beneath their footsteps. The waters confined by Elizabeth to a narrow channel, rose under her successors and swiftly became an impetuous roaring flood, whose insolent waves swept away the throne itself in their violent course. But restored to their bed by the wise hand of William of Orange, the dashing torrent sank into a smiling stream, bearing prosperity and life afar.

Lastly, Calvin was the founder of the greatest of republics. The ‘pilgrims’ who left their country in the reign of James I., and, landing on the barren shores of New England, founded populous and mighty colonies, are his sons, his direct and legitimate sons; and that American nation which we have seen growing so rapidly boasts as its father the humble reformer on the shores of the Leman.

There are, indeed, writers of eminence who charge this man of God with despotism; because he was the enemy of libertinage, he has been called the enemy of liberty. Nobody was more opposed than Calvin to that moral and social anarchy which threatened the sixteenth century, and which ruins every epoch unable to keep it under control. This bold struggle of Calvin’s is one of the greatest services he has done to liberty, which has no enemies more dangerous than immorality and disorder.

Should the question be asked, How ought infidelity to be arrested? we must confess that Calvin was not before his age, which was unanimous, in every communion, for the application of the severest punishments. If a man is in error as regards the knowledge of God, it is to God alone that he must render an account. When men—and they are sometimes the best of men—make themselves the avengers of God, the conscience is startled, and religion hides her face. It was not so three centuries back, and the most eminent minds always pay in one manner or another their tribute to human weakness. And yet, on a well-known occasion, when a wretched man, whose doctrines threatened society, stood before the civil tribunals of Geneva, there was but one voice in all Europe raised in favour of the prisoner; but one voice that prayed for some mitigation of Servetus’s punishment, and that voice was Calvin’s.[6]

However inveterate the prejudices against him may be, the indisputable evidence of history places Calvin among the fathers of modern liberty. It is possible that we may find impartial men gradually lending their ear to the honest and solemn testimony of past ages; and the more the world recognises the importance and universality of the Reformation which came forth from Geneva, the more shall we be excused for directing attention for a few moments to the heroic age of this obscure city.

The sixteenth century is the greatest in Christian times; it is the epoch where (so to speak) everything ends and everything begins; nothing is paltry, not even dissipation; nothing small, not even a little city lying unobserved at the foot of the Alps.

In that renovating age, so full of antagonist forces and energetic struggles, the religious movements did not proceed from a single centre; they emanated from opposite poles, and are mentioned in the well-known line—

Je ne décide pas entre Genève et Rome.[7]

The Catholic focus was in Italy—in the metropolis of the ancient world; the evangelical focus in Germany was transferred from Wittemberg to the middle of European nations—to the smallest of cities—to that whose history I have to relate.

When history treats of certain epochs, as for instance the reign of Charles V., there may be a certain disadvantage in the vastness of the stage on which the action passes; we may complain that the principal actor, however colossal, is necessarily dwarfed. This inconvenience will not be found in the narrative I have undertaken. If the empire of Charles V. was the largest theatre in modern history, Geneva was the smallest. In the one case we have a vast empire, in the other a microscopical republic. But the smallness of the theatre serves to bring out more prominently the greatness of the actions: only superficial minds turn with contempt from a sublime drama because the stage is narrow and the representation devoid of pomp. To study great things in small is one of the most useful exercises. What I have in view—and this is my apology—is not to describe a petty city of the Alps, for that would not be worth the labour; but to study in that city a history which is in the main a reflection of the history of Europe,—of its sufferings, its struggles, its aspirations, its political liberties, and its religious transformations. I will confess that my attachment to the land of my birth may have led me to examine our annals rather too closely, and narrate them at too great length. This attachment to my country which has cheered me in my task, may possibly expose me to reproach; but I hope it will rather be my justification. ‘This book,’ said Tacitus, at the beginning of one of his immortal works, ‘was dictated by affection: that must be its praise, or at least its excuse.’[8] Shall we be forbidden to shelter ourselves humbly behind the lofty stature of the prince of history?

Modern liberties proceed from three different sources, from the union of three characters, three laws, three conquests—the Roman, the German, and the Christian. The combination of these three influences, which has made modern Europe, is found in a rather striking manner in the valley of the Leman. The three torrents from north, south, and east, whose union forms the great stream of civilisation, deposited in that valley which the Creator hollowed out between the Alps and the Jura that precious sediment whose component parts can easily be distinguished after so many ages.

First we come upon the Roman element in Geneva. This city was for a long while part of the empire; ‘it was the remotest town of the Allobroges,’ says Cæsar.[9] About a league from Geneva there once stood an antique marble in honour of Fabius Maximus Allobrogicus, who 122 years before Christ had triumphed over the people of this district;[10] and the great Julius himself, who constructed immense works round the city, bequeathed his name to a number of Roman colonists, or clients at least. More remarkable traces—their municipal institutions—are found in most of the cities which the Romans occupied; we may be permitted to believe that Geneva was not without them.

In the fifth century the second element of modern liberties appeared with the Germans. The Burgundians—those Teutons of the Oder, the Vistula, and the Warta—being already converted to Christianity, poured their bands into the vast basin of the Rhone, and a spirit of independence, issuing from the distant forests of the north, breathed on the shores of the Leman lake. The Burgundian tribe, however, combined with the vigour of the other Germans a milder and more civilising temperament. King Gondebald built a palace at Geneva; an inscription placed fifteen feet above the gate of the castle, and which remains to this day, bears the words, Gundebadus rex clementissimus, &c.[11] From this castle departed the king’s niece, the famous Clotilda, who, by marrying Clovis, converted to Christianity the founder of the French monarchy. If the Franks then received the Christian faith from Geneva, many of their descendants in the days of Calvin received the Reformation from the same place.

Clotilda’s uncle repaired the breaches in the city walls, and having assembled his ablest counsellors, drew up those Burgundian laws which defended small and great alike, and protected the life and honour of man against injury.[12]

The first kingdom founded by the Burgundians did not, however, last long. In 534 it fell into the hands of the Merovingian kings, and the history of Geneva was absorbed in that of France until 888, the epoch when the second kingdom of Burgundy rose out of the ruins of the majestic but ephemeral empire of Charlemagne.

But long before the invasion of the Burgundians in the fifth century, a portion of Europe, and Geneva in particular, had submitted to another conquest. In the second century Christianity had its representatives in almost every part of the Roman world. In the time of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius and of Bishop Irenæus (177) some persecuted Christians of Lyons and Vienne, in Dauphiny, wishing to escape from the flames and the wild beasts to which Rome was flinging the children of God, and desirous of trying whether their pious activity could not bear fruit in some other soil, had ascended the formidable waters of the Rhone, and, coming to the foot of the Alps—refuge and refugees are of old date in this country—brought the gospel thither, as other refugees, coming also from Gaul, and also fleeing their persecutors, were fourteen centuries later to bring the Reformation. It seems they were only disciples, humble presbyters and evangelists, who in the second and third century first proclaimed the divine word on the shores of the Leman; we may therefore suppose that the Church was instituted in its simplest form. At least it was not until two centuries later, in 381, that Geneva had a bishop, Diogenes,[13] and even this first bishop is disputed.[14] Be that as it may, the gospel which the refugees brought into the valley lying between the Alps and the Jura, proclaimed, as it does everywhere, the equality of all men before God, and thus laid the foundations of its future liberties.

Thus were commingled in this region the generating elements of modern institutions. Cæsar, Gondebald, and an unknown missionary represent, so to speak, the three strata that form the Genevese soil.

Let us here sketch rapidly a few salient points of the ancient history of Geneva. The foundations upon which a building stands are certainly not the most interesting part, but they are perhaps the most necessary.

CHAPTER II.
FIRST USURPATIONS AND FIRST STRUGGLES.

Geneva was at first nothing but a rural township (vicus), with a municipal council and an edile. Under Honorius in the 4th century it had become a city, having probably received this title after Caracalla had extended the rights of citizenship to all the Gauls. From the earliest times, either before or after Charlemagne, Geneva possessed rights and liberties which guaranteed the citizens against the despotism of its feudal lord. But did it possess political institutions? was the community organised? Information is wanting on these points. In the beginning of the sixteenth century the Genevese claimed to have been free so long that the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.[15] But this ‘memory of man’ might not embrace many centuries.

The pope having invited Charlemagne to march his Franks into Italy, for the love of God, and to fight against his enemies, that prince proceeded thither in 773 with a numerous army, part of which crossed Mount St. Bernard, thus pointing the way to another Charlemagne who was to appear a thousand years later, and whose empire, more brilliant but still more ephemeral than the first, was also in its dissolution to restore liberty to Geneva, which had been a second time absorbed into France.[16] Charlemagne, while passing through with his army, halted at Geneva and held a council.[17] This word has led to the belief that the city possessed liberties and privileges, and that he confirmed them;[18] but the council was probably composed of the councillors around the prince, and was not a city council. Be that as it may, the origin of the liberties of Geneva seems to be hidden in the night of time.

Three powers in their turn threatened these liberties.

First came the counts of Geneva. They were originally, as it would seem, merely officers of the Emperor;[19] but gradually became almost independent princes.

As early as 1091, we meet with an Aymon, count of Genevois.[20] The rule of these counts of Genevois soon extended over a wide and magnificent territory. They resided not only at their hereditary manor-seat in Geneva, which stood on the site of Gondebald’s palace, but also in various castles scattered in distant parts of their domain—at Annecy, Rumilly, La Roche, Lausanne, Moudon, Romont, Rue, Les Clées, and other places.[21] In those days, the counts lived both a solitary and turbulent life, such as characterised the feudal period. At one time they were shut up in their castles, which were for the most part surrounded by a few small houses, and begirt with fosses and drawbridges, and on whose walls could be seen afar the arms of the warders glittering in the rising sun. At other times, they would sally forth, attended by a numerous escort of officers, with their seneschal, marshal, cup-bearers, falconers, pages, and esquires, either in pursuit of the chase on the heights of the Jura and the Alps; or it might be with the pious motive of visiting some place of pilgrimage; or not unfrequently indeed to wage harassing crusades against their neighbours or their vassals. But during all these feudal agitations another power was growing in Geneva—a power humble indeed at first—but whose mouth was to speak great things.[22]

At the period of the Burgundian conquest Geneva possessed a bishop, and the invasion of the Germans soon gave this prelate considerable power. Gifted with intelligence far superior to that of the men by whom they were surrounded, respected by the barbarians as the high-priests of Rome, knowing how to acquire vast possessions by slow degrees, and thus becoming the most important personages in the cities where they resided, the bishops laboured to protect their city from abroad and to govern it at home. Finally they confiscated without much ceremony the independence of the people, and united the quality of prince with that of bishop.

In 1124 Aymon, Count of Genevois, by an agreement made with Humbert of Grammont, Bishop of Geneva, gave up the city to the latter,[23] reserving only the old palace and part of the criminal jurisprudence, but continuing to hold the secondary towns and the rural district.

The institution of bishop-princes, half religious and half political, equally in disaccord with the Gospel of past ages and the liberty of the future, may have been exceptionally beneficent; but generally speaking it was a misfortune for the people of the middle ages, and particularly for Geneva. If at that time the Church had possessed humble but earnest ministers to hold up the light of the Gospel to the world, why should not the same spiritual power, which in the first century had vanquished Roman polytheism, have been able in later times to dispel the darkness of feudalism? But what could be expected of prelates who turned their croziers into swords, their flocks into serfs, their pastoral dwellings into fortified castles? Corruptio optimi pessima. The prince-bishop, that amphibious offspring of the barbaric invasion, cannot be maintained in christendom. The petty people of Geneva—and this is one of its titles to renown—was the first who expelled him in modern times; and the manner in which it did this is one of the pages of history we desire to transcribe. It needed truly a powerful energy—the arm of God—to undertake and carry through this first act which wrested from episcopal hands the temporal sceptre they had usurped. Since then the example of Geneva has often been followed; the feudal thrones of the bishops have fallen on the banks of the Rhine, in Belgium, Bavaria, Austria, and elsewhere; but the first throne that fell was that of Geneva, as the last will be that of Rome.

If the bishop, owing to the support of the emperors, succeeded in ousting the count from the city of Geneva, leaving him only the jurisdiction over his rural vassals, he succeeded also, in the natural course of things, in suppressing the popular franchises. These rights, however, still subsisted, the prince-bishop being elected by the people—a fact recorded by Saint Bernard at the election of Ardutius.[24] The prince even made oath of fidelity to the people. Occasionally the citizens opposed the prelate’s encroachments, and refused to be dragged before the court of Rome.[25]

Christianity was intended to be a power of liberty; Rome, by corrupting it, made it a power of despotism; Calvin, by regenerating it, set it up again and restored its first work.

But what threatened most the independence and liberty of Geneva, was not the bishops and counts, but a power alien to it, that had begun by robbing the counts of their towns and villages. The house of Savoy, devoured by an insatiable ambition, strove to enlarge its dominions with a skill and perseverance that were crowned with the most rapid success. When the princes of Savoy had taken the place of the counts of Genevois and the dukes of Zœhringen in the Pays de Vaud, Geneva, which they looked upon as an enclave, became the constant object of their desires. They hovered for centuries over the ancient city, like those Alpine vultures which, spreading their wings aloft among the clouds, explore the country beneath with their glance, swoop down upon the prey, and return day after day until they have devoured each fragment. Savoy had her eyes fixed upon Geneva,—first, through ambition, because the possession of this important city would round off and strengthen her territory; and second, through calculation, because she discovered in this little state certain principles of right and liberty that alarmed her. What would become of the absolute power of princes, obtained at the cost of so many usurpations, if liberal theories should make their way into European law? A nest built among the craggy rocks of the Alps may perhaps contain a brood of inoffensive eaglets; but as soon as their wings grow, they will soar into the air, and with their piercing eyes discover the prey and seize it from afar. The safer course, then, is for some strong hand to kill them in their nest while young.

The relations between Savoy and Geneva—one representing absolutism, the other liberty—have been and are still frequently overlooked. They are of importance, however, to the history of Geneva, and even of the Reformation. For this reason we are desirous of sketching them.

The terrible struggle of which we have just spoken began in the first half of the thirteenth century. The house of Savoy finding two powers at Geneva and in Genevois, the bishop and the count, resolved to take advantage of their dissensions to creep both into the province and into the city, and to take their place. It declared first in favour of the bishop against the count, the more powerful of the two, in order to despoil him. Peter of Savoy, Canon of Lausanne, became in 1229, at the age of twenty-six, Provost of the Canons of Geneva; and having thus an opportunity of knowing the city, of appreciating the importance of its situation, and discovering the beauties that lay around it, he took a liking to it. Being a younger son of a Count of Savoy, he could easily have become a bishop; but under his amice, the canon concealed the arm of a soldier and the genius of a politician. On the death of his father in 1232, he threw off his cassock, turned soldier, married Agnes whom the Count of Faucigny made his heiress at the expense of her elder sister, and then took to freebooting.[26] Somewhat later, being the uncle of Elinor of Provence, Queen of England, he was created Earl of Richmond by his nephew Henry III., and studied the art of government in London. But the banks of the Thames could not make him forget those of the Leman. The castle of Geneva remained, as we have seen above, the private property of his enemy the Count of Geneva, and this he made up his mind to seize. ‘A wise man,’ says an old chronicler, ‘of lofty stature and athletic strength, proud, daring, terrible as a lion, resembling the most famous paladins, so brave that he was called the valiant (preux) Charlemagne’—possessing the organising genius that founds states and the warlike disposition that conquers them—Peter seized the castle of Geneva in 1250, and held it as a security for 35,000 silver marks which he pretended the count owed him. He was now somebody in the city. Being a man of restless activity, enterprising spirit, rare skill, and indefatigable perseverance, he used this foundation on which to raise the edifice of his greatness in the valley of the Leman.[27] The people of Geneva, beginning to grow weary of ecclesiastical authority, desired to enjoy freely those communal franchises which the clergy called ‘the worst of institutions.’[28] When he became Count of Savoy, Peter, who had conceived the design of annexing Geneva to his hereditary states, promised to give the citizens all they wanted; and the latter, who already (two centuries and a half before the Reformation) desired to shake off the temporal yoke of their bishop, put themselves under his guardianship. But erelong they grew alarmed, they feared the sword of the warrior more than the staff of the shepherd, and were content with their clerical government

De peur d’en rencontrer un pire.[29]

In 1267 the second Charlemagne was forced to declare by a public act that he refused to take Geneva under his protection.[30] Disgusted with this failure, weakened by age, and exhausted by his unceasing activity, Peter retired to his castle at Chillon, where every day he used to sail on that beautiful lake, luxuriously enjoying the charms of nature that lay around; while the harmonious voice of a minstrel, mingling with the rippling of the waters, celebrated before him the lofty deeds of the illustrious paladin. He died in 1268.[31]

Twenty years later Amadeus V. boldly renewed the assault in which his uncle had failed. A man full of ambition and genius, and surnamed ‘the Great,’ he possessed all the qualities of success. The standard of the prince must float over the walls of that free city. Amadeus already possessed a mansion in Geneva, the old palace of the counts of Genevois, situated in the upper part of the city. He wished to have more, and the canons gave him the opportunity which he sought of beginning his conquest. During a vacancy of the episcopal see, these reverend fathers were divided, and those who were hostile to Amadeus, having been threatened by some of his party, took refuge in alarm in the Château de l’Ile. This castle Amadeus seized, being determined to show them that neither strong walls nor the two arms of the river which encircle the island could protect them against his wrath. This conquest gave him no authority in the city; but Savoy was able more than once to use it for its ambitious projects. It was here in 1518, shortly after the appearance of Luther, that the most intrepid martyr of modern liberty was sacrificed by the bishop and the duke.

Amadeus could not rest satisfied with his two castles: in order to be master in Geneva, he did not disdain to become a servant. As it was unlawful for bishops, in their quality of churchmen, to shed blood, there was an officer commissioned in all the ecclesiastical principalities to inflict the punishment of death, vice domini, and hence this lieutenant was called vidomne or vidame. Amadeus claimed this vidamy as the reward of his services. In vain did the citizens, uneasy at the thought of so powerful a vidame, meet in the church of St. Magdalen (November 1288); in vain did the bishop forbid Amadeus, ‘in the name of God, of the glorious Virgin Mary, of St. Peter, St. Paul, and all the saints, to usurp the office of lieutenant,’[32] the vulture held the vidamy in his talons and would not let it go. The citizens jeered at this sovereign prince who turned himself into a civil officer. ‘A pretty employment for a prince—it is a ministry (ministère) not a magistry (magistère)—service not dominion.’ ‘Well, well,’ replied the Savoyard, ‘I shall know how to turn the valet into a master.’[33]

The princes of Savoy, who had combined with the bishop against the Count of Geneva to oust the latter, having succeeded so well in their first campaign, undertook a second, and joined the citizens against the bishop in order to supplant him. Amadeus became a liberal. He knew well that you cannot gain the hearts of a people better than by becoming the defender of their liberties. He said to the citizens in 1285, ‘We will maintain, guard, and defend your city and goods, your rights and franchises, and all that belongs to you.’[34] If Amadeus was willing to defend the liberties of Geneva, it is a proof that they existed: his language is that of a conservative and not of an innovator. The year 1285 did not, as some have thought, witness the first origin of the franchises of Geneva but their revival. There was however at that time an outgrowth of these liberties. The municipal institutions became more perfect. The citizens, taking advantage of Amadeus’s support, elected rectors of the city, voted taxes, and conferred the freedom of the city upon foreigners. But the ambitious prince had calculated falsely. By aiding the citizens to form a corporation strong enough to defend their ancient liberties, he raised with imprudent hand a bulwark against which all the plans of his successors were doomed to fail.

In the fifteenth century the counts of Savoy, having become dukes and more eagerly desiring the conquest of Geneva, changed their tactics a third time. They thought, that as there was a pope at Rome, the master of the princes and principalities of the earth, a pontifical bull would be more potent than their armies and intrigues to bring Geneva under the power of Savoy.

It was Duke Amadeus VIII. who began this new campaign. Not satisfied with having enlarged his states with the addition of Genevois, Bugey, Verceil, and Piedmont, which had been separated from it for more than a century, he petitioned Pope Martin V. to confer on him, for the great advantage of the Church, the secular authority in Geneva. But the syndics, councillors, and deputies of the city, became alarmed at the news of this fresh manœuvre, and knowing that ‘Rome ought not to lay its paw upon kingdoms,’ determined to resist the pope himself, if necessary, in the defence of their liberties, and placing their hands upon the Gospels they exclaimed: ‘No alienation of the city or of its territory—this we swear.’ Amadeus withdrew his petition; but Pope Martin V., while staying three months at Geneva, on his return in 1418 from the Council of Constance, began to sympathise with the ideas of the dukes. There was something in the pontiff which told him that liberty did not accord with the papal rule. He was alarmed at witnessing the liberties of the city. ‘He feared those general councils that spoil everything,’ says a manuscript chronicle in the Turin library; ‘he felt uneasy about those turbulent folk, imbued with the ideas of the Swiss, who were always whispering into the ears of the Genevese the license of popular government.’[35] The liberties of the Swiss were dear to the citizens a century before the Reformation.

The pope resolved to remedy this, but not in the way the dukes of Savoy intended. These princes desired to secure the independence of Geneva in order to increase their power; while the popes preferred confiscating it to their own benefit. At the Council of Constance, from which Martin was then returning, it had been decreed that episcopal elections should take place according to the canonical forms, by the chapter, unless for some reasonable and manifest cause the pope should think fit to name a person more useful to the Church.[36] The pontiff thought that the necessity of resisting popular liberty was a reasonable motive; and accordingly as soon as he reached Turin, he translated the Bishop of Geneva to the archiepiscopal see of the Tarentaise, and heedless of the rights of the canons and citizens, nominated Jean de Rochetaillée, Patriarch in partibus of Constantinople, Bishop and Prince of Geneva. Four years later Martin repeated this usurpation. Henry V. of England, at that time master of Paris, taking a dislike to Jean de Courte-Cuisse, bishop of that capital, the pope, of his sovereign authority, placed Courte-Cuisse on the episcopal throne of Geneva, and Rochetaillée on that of Paris. Thus were elections wrested by popes from a christian people and their representatives. This usurpation was to Geneva, as well as to many other parts of christendom, an inexhaustible source of evils.

It followed, among other things, that with the connivance of Rome, the princes of Savoy might become princes of Geneva. But could they insure this connivance? From that moment the activity of the court of Turin was employed in making interest with the popes in order to obtain the grant of the bishopric of Geneva for one of the princes or creatures of Savoy. A singular circumstance favoured this remarkable intrigue. Duke Amadeus VIII., who had been rejected by the citizens a few years before, succeeded in an unexpected manner. In 1434 having abdicated in favour of his eldest son, he assumed the hermit’s frock at Ripaille on the Lake of Geneva; and the Council of Basle having nominated him pope, he took the name of Felix V. and made use of his pontifical authority to create himself bishop and prince of Geneva. A pope making himself a bishop ... strange thing indeed! Here is the key to the enigma: the pope was a prince of Savoy: the see was the see of Geneva. Savoy desired to have Geneva at any price: one might almost say that Pope Felix thought it an advancement in dignity to become a Genevan bishop. It is true that Felix was pope according to the episcopal, not the papal, system; having been elected by a council, he was forced to resign in consequence of the desertion of the majority of European princes. Geneva and Ripaille consoled him for Rome.

As bishop and prince of Geneva, he respected the franchises of his new acquisition; but the poor city was fated somewhat later to serve as food to the offspring of this bird of prey. In 1451, Amadeus being dead, Peter of Savoy, a child eight or ten years old, grandson of the pope, hermit, and bishop, mounted the episcopal throne of Geneva; in 1460 came John Louis, another grandson, twelve years of age; and in 1482 Francis, a third grandson. To the Genevans the family of the pope seemed inexhaustible. These bishops and their governors were as leeches sucking Geneva even to the bones and marrow.

Their mother, Anne of Cyprus, had brought with her to Savoy a number of ‘Cypriote leeches’ as they were called, and after they had drained the blood of her husband’s states, she launched them on the states of her children. One Cypriote prelate, Thomas de Sur, whom she had appointed governor to little Bishop Peter, particularly distinguished himself in the art of robbing citizens of their money and their liberty. It was Bishop John Louis, the least wicked of the three brothers, who inflicted the most terrible blow on Geneva. We shall tell how that happened; for this dramatic episode is a picture of manners, carrying us back to Geneva with its bishops and its princes, and showing us the family of that Charles III. who was in the sixteenth century the constant enemy of the liberties and Reformation of the city.

Duke Louis of Savoy, son of the pope-duke Amadeus, was good-tempered, inoffensive, weak, timid, and sometimes choleric; his wife, Anne of Cyprus or Lusignan, was arrogant, ambitious, greedy, intriguing, and domineering; the fifth of their sons, by name Philip-Monsieur, was a passionate, debauched, and violent young man. Anne, who had successively provided for three of her sons by placing them on the episcopal throne of Geneva, and who had never met with any opposition from the eldest Amadeus IX., a youth subject to epilepsy, had come into collision with Philip. The altercations between them were frequent and sharp, and she never missed an opportunity of injuring him in his father’s affections; so that the duke, who always yielded to his wife’s wishes, left the young prince without appanage. Philip Lackland (for such was the name he went by) angry at finding himself thus deprived of his rights, returned his mother hatred for hatred; and instead of that family affection, which even the poets of heathen antiquity have often celebrated, an implacable enmity existed between the mother and the son. This Philip was destined to fill an important place in history; he was one day to wear the crown, be the father of Charles III. (brother-in-law to Charles V.) and grandfather of Francis I. through his daughter Louisa of Savoy. But at this time nothing announced the high destiny which he would afterwards attain. Constantly surrounded by young profligates, he passed a merry life, wandering here and there with his troop of scapegraces, establishing himself in castles or in farms; and if the inhabitants objected, striking those who resisted, killing one and wounding another, so that he lived in continual quarrels. ‘As my father left me no fortune,’ he used to say, ‘I take my property wherever I can find it.’—‘All Savoy was in discord,’ say the old annals, ‘filled with murder, assault, and riot.’[37]

The companions of the young prince detested the Cypriote (as they called the duchess) quite as much as he did; and in their orgies over their brimming bowls used the most insulting language towards her. One day they insinuated that ‘if she plundered her husband and her son it was to enrich her minions.’ Philip swore that he would have justice. Duke Louis was then lying ill of the gout at Thonon, on the southern shore of the Lake of Geneva. Lackland went thither with his companions, and entering the chapel where mass was going on, killed his mother’s steward, carried off his father’s chancellor, put him in a boat and took him to Morges, ‘where he was drowned in the lake.’ Duke Louis was terrified; but whither could he flee? In his own states there was no place where he could feel himself safe; he could see no other refuge but Geneva, and there he resolved to go.

John Louis, another of his sons, was then bishop, and he was strong enough to resist Philip. Although destined from his infancy for the ecclesiastical estate, he had acquired neither learning nor manners, ‘seeing that it is not the custom of princes to make their children scholars,’ say the annals. But on the other hand he was a good swordsman; dressed not as a churchman but as a soldier, and passed his time in ‘dicing, hawking, drinking, and wenching.’ Haughty, blunt, hot-headed, he was often magnanimous, and always forgave those who had rightfully offended him. ‘As appears,’ says the old chronicle, ‘from the story of the carpenter, who having surprised him in a room with his wife, cudgelled him so soundly, that he was left for dead. Nevertheless, the bishop would not take vengeance, and went so far as to give the carpenter the clothes he had on when he was cudgelled.’

John Louis listened favourably to his father’s proposals. The duke, Anne of Cyprus, and all the Cypriote officers arrived at Geneva in July 1642, and were lodged at the Franciscan convent and elsewhere; but none could venture outside Geneva without being exposed to the attacks of the terrible Lackland.[38]

The arrogant duchess became a prey to alarm: being both greedy and avaricious, she trembled lest Philip should succeed in laying hands upon her treasures; and that she might put them beyond his reach, she despatched them to Cyprus after this fashion. In the mountains near Geneva the people used to make very excellent cheeses; of these she bought a large number, wishing (she said) that her friends in Cyprus should taste them. She scraped out the inside, carefully stored her gold in the hollow, and therewith loaded some mules, which started for the East. Philip having received information of this, stopped the caravan near Friburg, unloaded the mules, and took away the gold. Now that he held in his hands these striking proofs of the duchess’s perfidy, he resolved to slake the hatred he felt towards her: he would go to Geneva, denounce his mother to his father, obtain from the exasperated prince the Cypriote’s dismissal, and receive at last the appanage of which this woman had so long deprived him.

Philip, aware that the bishop would not let him enter the city, resolved to get into it by stratagem. He repaired secretly to Nyon, and thence despatched to Geneva the more skilful of his confidants. They told the syndics and the young men of their acquaintance, that their master desired to speak to his father the duke about a matter of great importance. One of the syndics (the one, no doubt, who had charge of the watch) seeing nothing but what was very natural in this, gave instructions to the patrol; and on the 9th of October, Philip presenting himself at the city gate—at midnight, according to Savyon, who is contradicted by other authorities—entered and proceeded straight to Rive, his Highness’s lodging, with a heart full of bitterness and hatred against his cruel mother. We shall quote literally the ancient annals which describe the interview in a picturesque manner:—‘Philip knocks at the door; thereupon one of the chamberlains coming up, asks who is there? He answers: “I am Philip of Savoy, I want to speak to my father for his profit.” Whereupon the servant having made a report, the duke said to him: “Open to him in the name of all the devils, happen what may,” and immediately the man opened the door. As soon as he was come in Philip bowed to his father, saying: “Good day, father!” His father said: “God give thee bad day and bad year! What devil brings thee here now?” To which Philip replied meekly: “It is not the devil, my lord, but God who brings me here to your profit, for I warn you that you are robbed and know it not. There is my lady mother leaves you nothing, so that, if you take not good heed, she will not only make your children after your death the poorest princes in christendom, but yourself also during your life.”’

At these words Philip opened a casket which contained the gold intended for Cyprus, and ‘showed him the wherewithal,’ say the annals. But the duke, fearing the storm his wife would raise, took her part. Monsieur then grew angry: ‘You may bear with it if you like,’ he said to his father, ‘I will not. I will have justice of these thieves.’ With these words he drew his sword and looked under his father’s bed, hoping to find some Cypriotes beneath it, perhaps the Cypriote woman herself. He found nothing there. He then searched all the lodging with his band, and found nobody, for the Cypriotes had fled and hidden themselves in various houses in the city. Monsieur did not dare venture further, ‘for the people were against him,’ say the annals, ‘and for this cause he quitted his father’s lodging and the town also without doing other harm.’[39]

The duchess gave way to a burst of passion, the duke felt very indignant, and Bishop John Louis was angry. The people flocked together, and as they prevented the Cypriotes from hanging the men who had opened the gate to Monsieur, the duke chose another revenge. He represented to the bishop that his son-in-law Louis XI., with whom he was negotiating about certain towns in Dauphiny, detested the Genevans, and coveted their large fairs to which people resorted from all the country round. He begged him therefore to place in his hands the charters which gave Geneva this important privilege. The bishop threw open his archives to the duke; when the latter took the documents in question, and carrying them to Lyons, where Louis XI. happened to be, gave them to him. The king immediately transferred the fairs first to Bourges and then to Lyons, forbidding the merchants to pass through Geneva. This was a source of great distress to all the city. Was it not to her fairs, whose privileges were of such old standing, that Geneva owed her greatness? While Venice was the mart for the trade of the East, and Cologne for that of the West, Geneva was in a fair way to become the mart of the central trade. Now Lyons was to increase at her expense, and the city would witness no longer in her thoroughfares that busy, restless crowd of foreigners coming from Genoa, Florence, Bologna, Lucca, Brittany, Gascony, Spain, Flanders, the banks of the Rhine, and all Germany. Thus the catholic or episcopal power, which in the eleventh century had stripped Geneva of her territory, stripped her of her wealth in the fifteenth. It needed the influx of the persecuted Huguenots and the industrial activity of Protestantism to recover it from the blow that the Romish hierarchy had inflicted.[40]

This poor tormented city enjoyed however a momentary respite. In the last year of the fifteenth century, after the scandals of Bishop Francis of Savoy, and his clergy and monks, a priest, whom we may in some respects regard as a precursor of the Reformation, obtained the episcopal chair. This was Anthony Champion, an austere man who pardoned nothing either in himself or others. ‘I desire,’ he said, ‘to sweep the filth out of my diocese.’ He took some trouble to do so. On the 7th of May, 1493, five hundred priests convened by him met in synod in the church of St. Pierre. ‘Men devoted to God’s service,’ said the bishop with energy, ‘ought to be distinguished by purity of life; now our priests are given to every vice, and lead more execrable lives than their flocks. Some dress in open frocks, others assume the soldier’s head-piece, others wear red cloaks or corslets, frequent fairs, haunt taverns and houses of ill fame, behave like mountebanks or players, take false oaths, lend upon pawn, and unworthily vend indulgences to perjurers and homicides.’ Thus spoke Champion, but he died eighteen months after the synod, and the priestly corruption increased.[41]

In proportion as Geneva grew weaker, Savoy grew stronger. The duke, by circumstances which must have appeared to him providential, had lately seen several provinces settled on different branches of his house, reunited successively to his own states, and had thus become one of the most powerful princes of Europe. La Bresse, Bugey, the Genevois, Gex, and Vaud, replaced under his sceptre, surrounded and blockaded Geneva on all sides. The poor little city was quite lost in the midst of these wide provinces, bristling with castles; and its territory was so small that, as they said, there were more Savoyards than Genevans who heard the bells of St. Pierre. The states of Savoy enfolded Geneva as in a net, and a bold stroke of the powerful duke would, it was thought, be sufficient to crush it.

The dukes were not only around Geneva, they were within it. By means of their intrigues with the bishops, who were their fathers, sons, brothers, cousins, or subjects, they had crept into the city, and increased their influence either by flattery and bribes, or by threats and terror. The vulture had plumed the weak bird, and imagined that to devour him would now be an easy task. The duke by means of some sleight-of-hand trick, in which the prelate would be his accomplice, might in the twinkling of an eye entirely change his position—rise from the hospitable chair which My Lords of Geneva so courteously offered him, and seat himself proudly on a throne. How was the feeble city, so hunted down, gagged and fettered by its two oppressors, able to resist and achieve its glorious liberties? We shall see.

New times were beginning in Europe, God was touching society with his powerful hand; I say ‘society’ and not the State. Society is above the State; it always preserves its right of priority, and in great epochs makes its initiative felt. It is not the State that acts upon society: the movements of the latter produce the transformations of the State, just as it is the atmosphere which directs the course of a ship, and not the ship which fixes the direction of the wind. But if society is above the State, God is above both. At the beginning of the sixteenth century God was breathing upon the human race, and this divine breath worked strange revivals in religious belief, political opinions, civilisation, letters, science, morals, and industry. A great reformation was on the eve of taking place.

There are also transformations in the order of nature; but their march is regulated by the creative power in an unchangeable manner. The succession of seasons is always the same. The monsoons, which periodically blow over the Indian seas, continue for six months in one direction, and for the other six months in a contrary direction. In mankind, on the contrary, the wind sometimes comes for centuries from the same quarter. At the period we are describing the wind changed after blowing for nearly a thousand years in the same direction; God impressed on it a new, vivifying, and renovating course. There are winds, we know, which, instead of urging the ship gently forward, tear the sails, break the masts, and cast the vessel on the rocks, where it goes to pieces. A school, whose seat is at Rome, pretends that such was the nature of the movement worked out in the sixteenth century. But whoever examines the question impartially, confesses that the wind of the Reformation has wafted humanity towards the happy countries of light and liberty, of faith and morality.

In the beginning of the sixteenth century there was a living force in Geneva. The ostentatious mitre of the bishop, the cruel sword of the duke appeared to command there; and yet a new birth was forming within its bosom. The renovating principle was but a puny, shapeless germ, concealed in the heroic souls of a few obscure citizens; but its future developments were not doubtful. There was no power in Christendom able to stem the outbreak of the human mind, awakening at the mighty voice of the eternal Ruler. What was to be feared was not that the progress of civilisation and liberty, guided by the Divine word, would fail to attain its end; but that on the contrary, by abandoning the supreme rule, the end would be overshot.

Let us enter upon the history of the preparations for Reform, and contemplate the vigorous struggles that are about to begin at the foot of the Alps between despotism and liberty, ultramontanism and the Gospel.

CHAPTER III.
A BISHOP SENT BY THE POPE TO ROB GENEVA OF ITS INDEPENDENCE.
(APRIL TO OCTOBER 1513.)

On the 13th of April, 1513, there was great excitement in Geneva. Men were dragging cannon through the streets, and placing them on the walls. The gates were shut and sentries posted everywhere.[42] Charles de Seyssel, bishop and prince of Geneva, had just died on his return from a pilgrimage. He was a man of a mild and frank disposition, ‘a right good person,’ says the chronicler, ‘and for a wonder a great champion of both ecclesiastical and secular liberty.’ Duke Charles of Savoy, who was less attached to liberty than this good prelate, had recently had several sharp altercations with him. ‘It was I who made you bishop,’ haughtily said the angry duke, ‘but I will unmake you, and you shall be the poorest priest in the diocese.’[43] The bishop’s crime was having wished to protect the liberties of the city against Charles’s usurpations. The prince kept his word, and, if we may believe the old annals, got rid of him by poison.[44]

When the news of this tragical and unexpected death reached Geneva, the citizens were alarmed: they argued that no doubt the secret intention of the duke was to place a member of his family on the episcopal throne, in order thus to obtain the seigniory of the city. The excited citizens gathered in groups in the streets, and impassioned orators, among whom was Philibert Berthelier, addressed the people. The house from which this great citizen sprang appears to have been of high position, as early as the twelfth century; but he was one of those noble natures who court glory by placing themselves at the service of the weak. No man seemed better fitted to save Geneva. Just, generous, proud, decided, he was above all firm, true, and attached to what was right. His glorious ambition was not revolutionary: he wished to uphold the right and not to combat it. The end he set before himself was not, properly speaking, the emancipation of his country, but the restoration of its franchises and liberties. He affected no great airs, used no big words, was fond of pleasure and the noisy talk of his companions; but there were always observable in him a seriousness of thought, great energy, a strong will, and above all a supreme contempt of life. Enamoured of the ancient liberties of his city, he was always prepared to sacrifice himself for them.

‘The duke,’ said Berthelier and his friends in their animated meetings, ‘received immediate news of the death of the bishop, as did the pope also. The messengers are galloping with the news, each wants to have his share of the skin of the dead beast.’ The patriots argued that if the pope had long since laid hands on the Church, the Duke of Savoy now desired to lay his upon the State. Geneva would not be the first place that had witnessed such usurpations. Other cities of Burgundy, Grenoble, Gap, Valence, Die, and Lyons, had fallen one after the other beneath a foreign power. ‘We ourselves,’ said the citizens in the energetic and somewhat homely language of the day, ‘have had our wings cut so short already, that we can hardly spit from our walls without bespattering the duke. Having begun his conquest, he now wishes to complete it. He has put his snout into the city and is trying to get in all his body. Let us resist him. Is there a people whose franchises are older than ours? We have always been free, and there is no memory of man to the contrary.’[45] The citizens were resolved accordingly to close their gates against the influence of Savoy, and to elect a bishop themselves. They called to mind that when Ardutius, descending from his eyrie in the rocks of the Mole, was named bishop of Geneva, it was by the accord of clergy and people.[46] ‘Come, you canons,’ said they, ‘choose us a bishop that will not let the duke put his nose into his soup.’[47] This rather vulgar expression meant simply this: ‘Elect a bishop who will defend our liberties.’ They had not far to seek.

There was among the canons of Geneva one Aimé de Gingins, abbot of Bonmont and dean of the chapter, a man of noble house, and well connected in the Swiss cantons. His father Jacques, seignior of Gingins, Divonne, and other places, had been councillor, chamberlain, and high steward to the Duke of Savoy, and even ambassador from him to Pope Paul II. Aimé, who had been appointed canon of St. Pierre’s in Geneva when very young, was forty-eight years old at this time. He was ‘the best boon-companion in the world, keeping open house and feasting joyously the friends of pleasure,’ fond of hearing his companions laugh and sing, and of rather free manners, after the custom of the Church; but he excused himself with a smile, saying, without blush or shame: ‘It is a slippery sin.’ M. de Bonmont was the most respected of the priests in Geneva, for while his colleagues were devoted heart and soul to the house of Savoy, the dean stood by Geneva, and was no stranger to the aspirations which led so many generous minds to turn towards the ancient liberties. The people named him bishop by acclamation, and the chapter confirmed their choice; and forthwith the citizens made every effort to uphold the election. They prayed the Swiss cantons to support it before the pope, and sent to Rome ‘by post both letters and agents.’[48]

If this election by the chapter had been sustained, it is probable that M. de Gingins would have lived on good terms with the council and citizens, and that harmony would have been preserved. But the appointment of bishops, which had in olden times belonged to the clergy and the people, had passed almost everywhere to the prince and the pope. The election of a superior by the subordinates had given way to the nomination of an inferior by a superior. This was a misfortune: nothing secures a good election like the first of these two systems, for the interest and honour of the governed is always to have good governors. On the other hand, princes or popes generally choose strangers or favourites, who win neither the affection nor esteem of their flocks or of the inferior clergy. The last episcopal elections at Geneva, by separating the episcopacy from the people and the clergy, deprived the Church of the strength it so much needed, and facilitated the Reformation.

Duke Charles understood the importance of the crisis. This prince who filled for half a century the throne of Savoy and Piedmont, was all his life the implacable enemy of Geneva. Weak but irritable, impatient of all opposition yet undecided, proud, awkward, wilful, fond of pomp but without grandeur, stiff but wanting firmness, not daring to face the strong, but always ready to be avenged on the weak, he had but one passion—one mania rather: to possess Geneva. For that he needed a docile instrument to lend a hand to his ambitious designs—a bishop with whom he could do what he pleased. Accordingly he looked around him for some one to oppose to the people’s candidate, and he soon hit upon the man. In every party of pleasure at court there was sure to be found a little man, weak, slender, ill-made, awkward, vile in body but still more so in mind, without regard for his honour, inclined rather to do evil than good, and suffering under a disease the consequence of his debauchery. This wretch was John, son of a wench of Angers (communis generis, says Bonivard) whose house was open to everybody, priests and laymen alike; sparely liberal with her money (for she had not the means) ‘she was over-free with her venal affections.’ Francis of Savoy, the third of the pope-duke’s grandsons, who had occupied in turn the episcopal throne of Geneva, and who was also archbishop of Aux and bishop of Angers, used to ‘junket with her like the rest.’ This woman was about to become a mother, ‘but she knew not,’ says the chronicler, ‘whom to select as the father; the bishop being the richest of all her lovers, she fathered the child upon him, and it was reared at the expense of the putative parent.’ The Bishop of Angers not caring to have this child in his diocese, sent it to his old episcopal city, where there were people devoted to him.[49] The poor little sickly child was accordingly brought to Geneva, and there he lived meanly until being called to the court of Turin, he had a certain retinue assigned him, three horses, a servant, a chaplain, and the title of bastard of Savoy. He then began to hold up his head, and became the greediest, the most intriguing, the most irregular priest of his day. ‘That’s the man to be bishop of Geneva,’ thought the duke: ‘he is so much in my debt, he can refuse me nothing.’ There was no bargain the bastard would not snap at, if he could gain either money or position: to give up Geneva to the duke was an easy matter to him. Charles sent for him. ‘Cousin,’ said he, ‘I will raise you to a bishopric, if in return you will make over the temporality to me.’ The bastard promised everything: it was an unexpected means of paying his debt to the duke, which the latter talked about pretty loudly. ‘He has sold us not in the ear but in the blade,’ said Bonivard, ‘for he has made a present of us before we belonged to him.’[50]

The duke without loss of time despatched his cousin to Rome, under the pretext of bearing his congratulations to Leo X. who had just succeeded Julius II.[51] John the Bastard and his companions travelled so fast that they arrived before the Swiss. At the same time the court of Turin omitted nothing to secure the possession of a city so long coveted. First, they began to canvass all the cardinals they could get at. On the 24th February the Cardinal of St. Vital, and on the 1st March the Cardinal of Flisco promised their services to procure the bishopric of Geneva for John of Savoy.[52] On the 20th of April the Queen of Naples wrote to the duke, that she had recommended John to her nephew, the Cardinal of Aragon.[53] This was not enough. An unforeseen circumstance favoured the designs of Savoy.

The illustrious Leo X. who had just been raised to the papal throne, had formed the design of allying his family to one of the oldest houses in Europe. With this intent he cast his eyes on the Princess Philiberta of Savoy; a pure simple-hearted young girl, of an elevated mind, a friend to the poor, younger sister to the duke and Louisa of Savoy, aunt of Francis I. and Margaret of Valois. Leo X. determined to ask her hand for his brother Julian the Magnificent, lieutenant-general of the armies of the Church. Up to this time Julian had not lived a very edifying life; he was deeply enamoured of a widow of Urbino, who had borne him a son.

To tempt the duke to this marriage, which was very flattering to the parvenus of Florence, the pope made ‘many promises,’ say the Italian documents.[54] He even sent an envoy to the court of Turin to tell Charles that he might ‘expect from him all that the best of sons may expect from the tenderest of fathers.’[55]

The affair could only be decided at Rome, and Leo X. took much trouble about it. He received the bastard of Savoy with the greatest honour, and this disagreeable person had the chief place at banquet, theatre, and concert. Leo took pleasure in talking with him, and made him describe Philiberta’s charms. As for making him bishop of Geneva, that did not cause the least difficulty. The pope cared nothing for Dean de Bonmont, the chapter, or the Genevans. ‘Let the duke give us his sister, and we will give you Geneva,’ said he to the graceless candidate. ‘You will then make over the temporal power to the duke.... The court of Rome will not oppose it; on the contrary, it will support you.’ Everything was settled between the pope, the duke, and the bastard. ‘John of Savoy,’ says a manuscript, ‘swore to hand over the temporal jurisdiction of the city to the duke, and the pope swore he would force the city to consent under pain of incurring the thunders of the Vatican.’[56]

This business was hardly finished when the Swiss envoys arrived, empowered to procure the confirmation of Dean de Bonmont in his office of bishop. Simple and upright but far less skilful than the Romans and the Piedmontese, they appeared before the pope. Alas! these Alpine shepherds had no princess to offer to the Medici. ‘Nescio vos,’ said Leo X. ‘Begone, I know you not.’ He had his reasons for this rebuff; he had already nominated the bastard of Savoy bishop of Geneva.

It was impossible to do a greater injury to any church. For an authority, and especially an elective authority, to be legitimate, it ought to be in the hands of the best and most intelligent, and he who exercises it, while administering with zeal, should not infringe the liberties of those he governs. But these are ideas that never occurred to the worthless man, appointed by the pope chief pastor of Geneva. He immediately however found flatterers. They wrote to him (and the letters are in the Archives of Geneva) that his election had been made by the flock ... ‘not by mortal favour, but by God’s aid alone.’ It was however by the favour of the Queen of Naples, of Charles III., and by several other very mortal favours, that he had been nominated. He was exhorted to govern his church with integrity, justice, and diligence, as became his singular gravity and virtue.[57] The bastard did not make much account of these exhortations; his reign was a miserable farce, a long scandal. Leo X. was not a lucky man. By the traffic in indulgences he provoked the Reformation of Wittemberg, and by the election of the bastard he paved the way for the Reformation of Geneva. These are two false steps for which Rome has paid dearly.

The news of this election filled the hearts of the Genevan patriots with sorrow and indignation. They assembled in the public places, murmuring and ‘complaining to one another,’ and the voices of Berthelier and Hugues were heard above all the rest. They declared they did not want the bastard, that they already had a bishop, honoured by Geneva and all the league, and who had every right to the see because he was dean of the chapter. They insinuated that if Leo X. presumed to substitute this intrusive Savoyard for their legitimate bishop, it was because the house of Savoy wished to lay hands upon Geneva. They were especially exasperated at the well-known character of the Romish candidate. ‘A fine election indeed his Holiness has honoured us with!’ said they. ‘For our bishop he gives us a disreputable clerk; for our guide in the paths of virtue, a dissipated bastard; for the preserver of our ancient and venerable liberties, a scoundrel ready to sell them.’ ... Nor did they stop at murmurs; Berthelier and his friends remarked that as the storm came from the South, they ought to seek a shelter in the North; and though Savoy raised her foot against Geneva to crush it, Switzerland stretched out her hand to save it. ‘Let us be masters at home,’ they said, ‘and shut the gates against the pope’s candidate.’

All did not think alike: timid men, servile priests, and interested friends of Savoy trembled as they heard this bold language. They thought, that if they rejected the bishop sent from Rome, the pope would launch his thunders and the duke his soldiers against Geneva. The canons of the cathedral and the richest merchants held lands in the states of Charles, so that (says a manuscript) the prince could at pleasure ‘starve them to death.’ These influential men carried the majority with them, and it was resolved to accept the bishop nominated at Rome. When the leaders of the independent party found themselves beaten, they determined to carry out forthwith the plan they had formed. On the 4th of July, 1513, Philibert Berthelier, Besançon Hugues, Jean Taccon, Jean Baud, N. Tissot, and H. Pollier petitioned Friburg for the right of citizenship in order to secure their lives and goods; and it was granted. This energetic step might prove their ruin; the duke might find the means of teaching them a bloody lesson. That mattered not: a great step had been taken; the bark of Geneva was made fast to the ship that would tow them into the waters of liberty. As early as 1507 three patriots, Pierre Lévrier, Pierre Taccon, and D. Fonte, had allied themselves to Switzerland. Now they were nine, drawn up on the side of independence, a small number truly, and yet the victory was destined to remain with them. History has often shown that there is another majority besides the majority of numbers.[58]

While this little band of patriots was on its way to embrace the altar of liberty in Switzerland, the ducal and clerical party was making ready to prostrate itself slavishly before the Savoyard prince. The more the patriots had opposed him, the more the episcopalians laboured to give him a splendid reception. On the 31st of August, 1513, the new prince-bishop entered the city under a magnificent canopy; the streets and galleries were hung with garlands and tapestry, the trades walked magnificently costumed to the sound of fife and drum, and theatres were improvised for the representation of miracles, dramas, and farces. It was to no purpose that a few citizens in bad humour shrugged their shoulders and said: ‘He is truly as foul in body as in mind.’ The servile worshipped him, some even excusing themselves humbly for having appeared to oppose him. They represented that such opposition was not to his lordship’s person, but simply because they desired to maintain their right of election. John of Savoy, who had said to himself, ‘I will not spur the horse before I am firm in the saddle,’ answered only by a smile of his livid lips: both people and bishop were acting a part. When he arrived in front of the cathedral, the new prelate met the canons, dressed in their robes of silk and damask, with hoods and crosses, each according to his rank. They had felt rather annoyed in seeing the man of their choice, the abbot of Bonmont, unceremoniously set aside by the pope; but the honour of having a prince of the ducal family for their bishop was some compensation. These reverend gentlemen, almost all of them partisans of Savoy, received the bastard with great honour, bowing humbly before him. The bishop then entered the church, and standing in front of the altar, with an open missal before him, as was usual, made solemn oath to the syndics, in presence of the people, to maintain the liberties and customs of Geneva. Certain good souls took him at his word and appeared quite reassured; but the more intelligent wore a look of incredulity, and placed but little trust in his protestations. The bishop having been recognised and proclaimed sovereign, quitted the church and entered the episcopal palace to recruit himself after such unusual fatigue. There he took his seat in the midst of a little circle of courtiers, and raising his head, said to them: ‘Well, gentlemen, we have next to savoyardise Geneva. The city has been quite long enough separated from Savoy only by a ditch, without crossing it. I am commissioned to make her take the leap.’ These were almost the first words the bastard uttered after having sworn before God to maintain the independence of the city.[59]

The bishop, naturally crafty and surrounded by counsellors more crafty still, was eager to know who were the most influential men of the party opposed to him, being resolved to confer on them some striking mark of his favour. First he met with one name which was in every mouth—it was that of Philibert Berthelier. The bishop saw this citizen mingling with the people, simple, cheerful, and overflowing with cordiality, taking part in all the merry-makings of the young folks of Geneva, winning them by the animated charm of his manners, and by the important services he was always ready to do them. ‘Good!’ thought John of Savoy, ‘here is a man I must have. If I gain him, I shall have nothing to fear for my power in Geneva.’ He resolved to give him one of the most honourable charges at his disposal. Some persons endeavoured to dissuade the bishop: they told him that under a trifling exterior Berthelier concealed a rebellious, energetic, and unyielding mind. ‘Fear nothing,’ answered John, ‘he sings gaily and drinks with the young men of the town.’ It was true that Berthelier amused himself with the Enfans de Genève,[60] but it was to kindle them at his fire. He possessed the two qualities necessary for great things: a popular spirit, and an heroic character; practical sense to act upon men, and an elevated mind to conceive great ideas.

The bishop, to whom all noble thoughts were unknown, appeared quite enchanted with the great citizen; being always ready to sell himself, he doubted not that the proud Genevan was to be bought. The Castle of Peney, situated two leagues from the city, and built in the thirteenth century by a bishop of Geneva, happened at that time to be without a commandant: ‘You shall have the governorship of Peney,’ said the prelate to Berthelier. The latter was astonished, for it was, as we have said, one of the most important posts in the State. ‘I understand it all,’ said he, ‘Peney is the apple which the serpent gave to Eve.’ ‘Or rather,’ added Bonivard, ‘the apple which the goddess of Discord threw down at the marriage of Peleus.’ Berthelier refused; but the bastard still persisted, making fine promises for the future of the city. At last he accepted the charge, but with the firm intention of resigning it as soon as his principles required it. The bishop could not even dream of a resignation: such an act would be sheer madness in his eyes; so believing that he had caught Berthelier, he thought that Geneva could not now escape him. This was not all; the bishop elect, M. de Gingins, whose place the bastard had taken, possessed great influence in the city. John gave him a large pension. Believing he had thus disposed of his two principal adversaries, he used to joke about it with his courtiers. ‘It is a bone in their mouths,’ said they, laughing and clapping their hands, ‘which will prevent their barking.’[61]

The people had next to be won over. ‘Two features characterise the Genevans,’ said the partisans of Savoy to the bishop, ‘the love of liberty and the love of pleasure.’ Hence the counsellors of the Savoyard prince concluded, that it would be necessary to manœuvre so as to make one of these propensities destroy the other. The cue was accordingly given. Parties, balls, banquets, and entertainments were held at the palace and in all the houses of the Savoyard party. There was one obstacle however. The bastard was naturally melancholy and peevish, and his disease by no means tended to soften this morose disposition. But John did violence to himself, and determined to keep open house. ‘Nothing was seen at the palace but junketing, dicing, dancing, and feasting.’ The prelate leaving his apartments, would appear at these joyous entertainments, with his wan and gloomy face, and strive to smile. Go where you would, you heard the sound of music and the tinkling of glasses. The youth of Geneva was enchanted; but the good citizens felt alarmed. ‘The bishop, the churchmen, and the Savoyards,’ they said, ‘effeminate and cowardise our young men by toothsome meats, gambling, dancing, and other immoderate delights.’ Nor did they rest satisfied with complaining; they took the young citizens aside, and represented to them that if the bishop and his party were lavish of their amusements, it was only to make them forget their love for the common weal. ‘They are doing as Circe did with the companions of Ulysses,’ said a man of wit, ‘and their enchanted draughts have no other object than to change men into swine.’ But the bastard, the canons, and the Savoyard nobles continued to put wine upon their tables and to invite the most charming damsels to their balls. The youths could not resist; they left the old men to their dotage; in their intoxication they indulged with all the impetuosity of their age in bewitching dances, captivating music, and degrading disorders. Some of the young lords, as they danced or drank, whispered in their ears: ‘Fancy what it would be if the duke established his court with its magnificent fêtes at Geneva.’ And these thoughtless youths forgot the liberties and the mission of their country.[62]

Among the young men whom the courtiers of Savoy were leading into vice, was the son of the bishop’s procurator-fiscal. One of the ablest devices of the dukes who desired to annex Geneva to their states, had been to induce a certain number of their subjects to settle in the city. These Savoyards, being generally rich men and of good family, were joyfully welcomed and often invested with some important office, but they always remained devoted to the ducal interests. Of this number were F. Cartelier of La Bresse, M. Guillet, seignior of Montbard, and Pierre Navis of Rumilly in Genevois; all these played an important part in the crisis we are about to describe. Navis, admitted citizen in 1486, elected councillor in 1497, was a proud and able man, a good lawyer, thoroughly devoted to the duke, and who thought he was serving him faithfully by the unjust charges he brought against the patriots. Andrew, the youngest of his sons, was a waggish, frolicsome, noisy boy who, if sometimes showing a certain respect to his father, was often obstinate and disobedient. When he passed from boyhood to youth, his passions gained more warmth, his imagination more fire: family ties sufficed him no longer, and he felt within him a certain longing which urged him towards something unknown. The knowledge of God would have satisfied the wants of his ardent soul; but he could find it nowhere. It was at this period, he being twenty-three years old, that John of Savoy arrived in Geneva, and his courtiers began to lay their toils. The birth of Andrew Navis marked him out for their devices, and it was his fate to be one of their earliest victims. He rushed into every kind of enjoyment with all the impetuosity of youth, and pleasure held the chief place in his heart. Rapidly did he descend the steps of the moral scale: he soon wallowed in debauchery, and shrank not from the most shameful acts. Sometimes his conscience awoke and respect for his father gained the upper hand; but some artful seduction soon drew him back again into vice. He spent in disorderly living his own money and that of his family. ‘When I want money,’ he said, ‘I write in my father’s office; when I have it, I spend it with my friends or in roaming about.’ He was soon reduced to shifts to find the means of keeping up his libertinism. One day his father sent him on horseback to Chambery, where he had some business to transact. Andrew fell to gambling on the road, lost his money, and sold his horse to have the chance of winning it back. He did worse even than this: on two several occasions, when he was short of money, he stole horses and sold them. He was not however the only profligate in Geneva: the bishop and his courtiers were training up others; the priests and monks whom John found at Geneva, also gave cause for scandal. It was these immoralities that induced the citizens to make early and earnest complaints to the bishop.[63]

CHAPTER IV.
OPPOSITION TO THE DESIGNS OF THE DUKE, THE POPE, AND THE BISHOP.
(1513-1515.)

The opposition to the bishop was shown in various ways and came from different quarters. The magistrates, the young and new defenders of independence, and lastly (what was by no means expected) the cardinals themselves thwarted the plan formed to deprive Geneva of its independence. Opinion, ‘the queen of the world,’ as it has been called, overlooked worldliness in priests but not libertinism. Debauchery had entered into the manners of the papacy. The Church of the middle ages, an external and formal institution, dispensed with morality in its ministers and members. Dante and Michael Angelo place both priests and popes in hell, whether libertines or poisoners. The crimes of the priest (according to Rome) do not taint the divine character with which he is invested. A man may be a holy father—nay, God upon earth—and yet be a brigand. At the time when the Reformation began there were certain articles of faith imposed in the Romish church, certain hierarchies, ceremonies, and practices; but of morality there was none; on the contrary, all this framework naturally tended to encourage Christians to do without it. Religion (I reserve the exceptions) was not the man: it was a corpse arrayed in magnificent garments, and underneath all eaten with worms. The Reformation restored life to the Church. If salvation is not to be found in adherence to the pope and cardinals, but in an inward, living, personal communion with God, a renewal of the heart is obligatory. It was within the sphere of morality that the first reforming tendencies were shown at Geneva.

In the month of October 1513 the complaints in the council were very loud: ‘Who ought to set the people an example of morality, if not the priests?’ said many noble citizens; ‘but our canons and our priests are gluttons and drunkards, they keep women unlawfully, and have bastard children as all the world knows.’[64] Adjoining the Grey Friars’ convent at Rive stood a house that was in very bad repute. One day a worthless fellow, named Morier, went and searched the convent for a woman who lived in this house, whom these reverend monks had carried off. The youth of the city followed him, found the poor wretch hidden in a cell, and carried her away with great uproar. The monks attracted by the noise appeared at their doors or in the corridors but did not venture to detain her. Morier’s comrades escorted her back in triumph, launching their jokes upon the friars.[65] The Augustines of our Lady of Grace were no better than the Franciscans of Rive, and the monks of St. Victor did no honour to their chief. All round their convents were a number of low houses in which lived the men and women who profited by their debauchery.[66]

The evil was still greater among the Dominicans of Plainpalais: the syndics and council were forced to banish two of them, Brother Marchepalu and Brother Nicolin, for indulging in abominable practices in this monastery.[67] The monks even offered accommodation for the debaucheries of the town; they threw open for an entrance-fee the extensive gardens of their monastery, which lay between the Rhone and the Arve, and whose deep shades served to conceal improper meetings and midnight orgies.[68] Nobody in Geneva had so bad a reputation as these monks: they were renowned for their vices. In the way of avarice, impurity, and crime, there was nothing of which they were not thought capable. ‘What an obstinate devil would fear to do,’ said some one, ‘a reprobate and disobedient monk will do without hesitation.’[69]

What could be expected of a clergy at whose head were popes like John XXIII., Alexander VI., or Innocent VIII., who having sixteen illegitimate children when he assumed the tiara, was loudly proclaimed ‘the father of the Roman people?’[70] The separation between religion and morality was complete; every attempt at reform, made for centuries by pious ecclesiastics, had failed: there seemed to be nothing that could cure this inveterate, epidemic, and frightful disease:—nothing save God and his Word.

The magistrates of Geneva resolved however to attempt some reforms, and at least to protest against insupportable abominations. On Tuesday, 10th October, the syndics appeared in a body before the episcopal council, and made their complaints of the conduct of the priests.[71] But what could be expected from the council of a prelate who bore in his own person, visibly to all, the shameful traces of his infamous debaucheries? They hushed up complaints that compromised the honour of the clergy, the ambition of the duke, and the mitre of the bishop. However the blow was struck, the moral effect remained. One thought sank from that hour deep into the hearts of upright men: they saw that something new was wanted to save religion, morality, and liberty. Some even said that as reforms from below were impossible, there needed a reform from heaven.

It was at this moment when the breeze was blowing towards independence, and when the liberal party saw its defenders multiplying, that there came to Geneva a brilliant young man, sparkling with wit, and full of Livy, Cicero, and Virgil. The priests received him heartily on account of his connection with several prelates, and the liberals did the same on account of his good-humour; he soon became a favourite with everybody and the hero of the moment. He had so much imagination: he knew so well how to amuse his company! This young man was not a superficial thinker: in our opinion he is one of the best French writers of the beginning of the 16th century, but he is also one of the least known. Francis Bonivard—such was the name of this agreeable scholar—had, in the main, little faith and little morality; but he was to play in Geneva by his liberalism, his information, and his cutting satires, a part not very unlike that played by Erasmus in the great Reformation. As you left the city by the Porte St. Antoine, you came almost immediately to a round church, and by its side a monastery inhabited by some monks of Clugny,[72] whose morals, as we have seen, were not very exemplary. This was the priory of St. Victor, and within its walls were held many of the conversations and conferences that prepared the way for the Reformation. St. Victor was a small state with a small territory, and its prior was a sovereign prince. On the 7th of December, 1514, the prior, John Aimé Bonivard, was on his death-bed, and by his side sat his nephew Francis, then one-and-twenty. He was born at Seyssel;[73] his father had occupied a certain rank at the court of Duke Philibert of Savoy, and his mother was of the noble family of Menthon. Francis belonged to that population of nobles and churchmen whom the dukes of Savoy had transplanted to Geneva to corrupt the citizens. He was educated at Turin, where he had become the ringleader of the wild set at the university; and ever carrying with him his jovial humour, he seemed made to be an excellent bait to entice the youth of the city into the nets of Savoy. But it was far otherwise, he chose the path of liberty.

For the moment he thought only of his uncle whose end seemed to have arrived. He did not turn from him his anxious look, for the old prior was seriously agitated on his dying bed. Formerly, in a moment of irritation, he had ordered four large culverins to be cast at the expense of the Church in order to besiege the seignior of Viry, one of his neighbours, in his castle at the foot of Mount Saleve. Old Bonivard had committed many other sins, but he troubled himself little about them, compared with this. These large guns, purchased out of the ecclesiastical revenues, with a view to kill men and batter down the castle of an old friend, gave him a fearful pang.[74] In his anguish he turned towards his nephew. He had found an expedient, a meritorious work which seemed calculated to bring back peace to his agitated conscience. ‘Francis,’ he said to his nephew, ‘listen to me; you know those pieces of cannon ... they ought to be employed in God’s service. I desire that immediately after my death they may be cast into bells for the church.’ Francis gave his promise, and the prior expired satisfied, leaving to his nephew the principality, the convent, and the culverins.

A close sympathy soon united Berthelier and Bonivard. The former had more energy, the latter more grace; but they both belonged to the new generation; they became brothers in arms, and promised to wage a merciless war against superstition and arbitrary power. They gave each other mutual marks of their affection, Bonivard standing godfather for one of Berthelier’s sons. Berthelier, having paid his friend a visit of condolence on the very day of his uncle’s death, heard from his lips the story of the culverins. ‘What!’ said he, ‘cast cannons to make into bells! We will give you as much metal as you require to make a peal that shall ring loud enough to stun you; but the culverins ought to remain culverins.’ Bonivard represented that, according to his uncle’s orders, the cannon were to be employed in the service of the Church. ‘The Church will be doubly served,’ retorted Berthelier; ‘there will be bells at St. Victor, which is the church, and artillery in the city, which is the church land.’ He laid the matter before the council, who voted all that Berthelier required.[75]

But the Duke of Savoy had no sooner heard of this than he claimed the guns from the monastery. The Council of Fifty was convened to discuss the affair, and Berthelier did not stand alone in supporting the rights of the city. A young citizen of twenty-five, of mild yet intrepid temper, calm and yet active, a friend to law and liberty, without meanness and without arrogance, and who had within him deep-seated and vigorous powers,—this man feared not to provoke a contest between Geneva and the most formidable of his neighbours. He was Besançon Hugues, who had just lost his father and was beginning to enter into public life. One idea governed him: to maintain the independence of his country and resist the usurpations of Savoy, even should it draw upon him the duke’s hatred. ‘In the name of the people,’ he said, ‘I oppose the surrender of this artillery to his Highness, the city cannot spare them.’ The four guns remained at Geneva, but from that hour Charles III. looked with an angry eye upon Berthelier, Hugues, and Bonivard. ‘I will be even with them,’ said he.—‘When I paid him my respects after the death of my uncle,’ said Bonivard, ‘his Highness turned up his nose at me.’[76]

Charles III., son of Philip Lackland, was not much like that adventurous prince. When Philip reached a certain age, he became reformed; and after having several natural children, he married Margaret of Bourbon, and on her death Claudine of Penthievre or Brittany, and in 1496 ascended the throne of Piedmont and Savoy. Charles III., his son by the second wife, rather took after his grandfather Duke Louis; like him he was steady but weak, submissive to his wife, and inherited from Monsieur only his bursts of passion. His understanding was not large; but his councillors who were very able made up for this. One single thought seemed to possess him: to annex Geneva to Savoy. It was almost his whole policy. By grasping after Geneva he lost his principalities. Æsop’s fable of the dog and the shadow has never been better illustrated.

In 1515 everything seemed favourable to the plans of this prince. The marriage of the Princess Philiberta, which had not been solemnised in 1513 in consequence of her youth, was about to take place. The Bishop of Geneva, then at Rome for the Lateran Council, backed his cousin’s demand touching the temporal sovereignty. The ministers of Charles, the court, nobility, and priests, all of them pressed the annexation of Geneva. Was not that city the market for the provinces neighbouring on Savoy? Was it not necessary for the strategic defence of the duchy? Claude de Seyssel, a skilful diplomatist, author of the Monarchie de France, ‘a bitter despiser of every republic, and soon after made archbishop of Turin, was continually repeating to the duke that if Geneva remained in his territory without being of it, Savoy would incur great danger.’ ‘Truly,’ said Bonivard, when he heard of Seyssel’s arguments, ‘there is no need to push his Highness to make him run. He has begun to beat the tabor, and is now going to open the dance.’[77]

But would the pope take part in the dance? Would he surrender up Geneva to Savoy? That was the question. Leo X. loved wealth, the arts, pleasure, and all the enjoyments of life; he was generous, liberal, prodigal even, and did not care much for business. He had prepared a magnificent palace in the city of the popes and of the Cæsars, for Julian and his young wife. Entertainments of unusual splendour celebrated the union of the Medici with the old family of Humbert of the white hand. ‘I will spare no expense,’ Leo said, and in fact these rejoicings cost him the enormous sum of 15,000 ducats.

How could a pontiff always occupied in plundering others to enrich and exalt his own kindred, compromise so glorious an alliance in order to maintain the independence of an unknown city in the wild country of the Alps? Besides, the situation at Geneva was disquieting; the free institutions of the city threatened the temporal power of the bishop, and if that were destroyed, what would become of his spiritual power? But if the Duke of Savoy should become sovereign prince there, he would revoke the insolent liberties of the citizens, and thus save the episcopal prerogative. Such had been the history of most cities in the middle ages: was it also to be that of Geneva?[78] Lorenzo de’ Medici had been accustomed to say: ‘My son Julian is good; my son John (Leo X.) is crafty; my son Peter is mad.’ Leo thought he was displaying considerable tact by sacrificing Geneva to the glory of the Medici and the ambition of Savoy. ‘The Duke of Savoy,’ says a catholic historian, ‘took advantage of this circumstance (the marriage) to procure a bull confirming the transfer of the temporal authority.’[79] Charles III. triumphed. He had reached the end which his predecessors had been aiming at for centuries: he had done more than Peter, surnamed Charlemagne; more than Amadeus the Great; he fancied himself the hero of his race. ‘I am sovereign lord of Geneva in temporal matters,’ he told everybody. ‘I obtained it from our holy father the reigning pope.’ But what would they say at Geneva? Would the ancient republic meekly bow its head beneath the Savoyard yoke?[80]

The whole city was in commotion when this important news arrived. Berthelier, Bonivard, Hugues, Vandel, Bernard, even the most catholic of the citizens, exasperated at such a usurpation, hurried to and fro, conversing eagerly and especially blaming the pontiff. ‘The power of the popes,’ they said, ‘is not over principalities but over sins—it is for the purpose of correcting vices, and not to be masters of sovereigns and peoples, that they have received the keys of the kingdom of heaven.’ There was at Geneva a small number of scholars (Bonivard was one) who opened the dusty tomes of their libraries in search of arguments against the papal resolution. Did not St. Bernard say to Pope Eugene: ‘To till the vineyard of the Lord, to root out the noxious plants, is your task.... You need not a sceptre but a hoe.’[81]

On the 25th of May a deputation from the council waited on the bishop. ‘My lord,’ said the first syndic, ‘we conjure you to leave the community in the same state as your predecessors transmitted it to you, enjoying its rightful customs and ancient franchises.’ The bishop was embarrassed: on the one hand he feared to irritate men whose energy was not unknown to him, and on the other to displease his cousin whose slave he was; he contented himself with muttering a few words. The syndics waited upon the chapter next: ‘Prevent this iniquity,’ they said to the canons, ‘seeing that it touches you as much as the city.’ But the reverend fathers, who possessed fat benefices in the duke’s territory, and feared to have them confiscated, replied in such complicated phrases that nobody could understand them. Both bishop and canons surrendered Geneva to the man who claimed to be its master.

The report that the city was decidedly given to Savoy spread farther and farther every day: people wrote about it from every quarter. The syndics, moved by the letters they received, returned to the bishop. ‘It is now a general rumour,’ said they; ‘protest, my lord, against these strange reports, so that the usurpation, although begun, may not be completed.’ The bishop looked at them, then fixing his hollow, sunken eyes upon the ground, preserved an obstinate silence. The syndics withdrew without obtaining anything. What was to be done now? The last hour of liberty seemed to have struck in the old republic. The citizens met one another without exchanging a word; their pale faces and dejected looks alone expressed their sorrow. One cry, however, was heard among them: ‘Since justice is powerless,’ said the most spirited, ‘we will have recourse to force, and if the duke is resolved to enter Geneva, he shall pass over our bodies.’ But the majority were uneasy; knowing their own weakness and the power of Savoy, they considered all resistance useless. Old Rome had destroyed the independence of many a people; new Rome desired to imitate her.... The city was lost. Salvation came from a quarter whence no one expected it.[82]

The sacred college had assembled, and the princes of the Church, robed in purple, had examined the affair. To deprive a bishop of his temporal principality ... what a dangerous example for the papacy itself! Who knows whether princes will not some day desire to do as much by his Holiness? To hear them, you would have fancied, that catholicism would decline and disappear if it did not join the sceptre of the Cæsars with the shepherd’s crook. The cardinals resolved that for it to be lawful for a prince of the Church to alienate his temporal jurisdiction, it was necessary, ‘first, that subjects be in rebellion against their prince; second, that the prince be not strong enough to reduce them; third, that he should have a better recompense.’ Was this recompense to be another temporality or simply a pecuniary compensation? This the documents do not say. In any case, the sacred college refused its consent to the papal decision, and the bull was recalled.[83]

The duke was surprised and irritated. His counsellors reassured him: they pointed out to him that, according to the decision of the cardinals, it only required a revolt in order to withdraw the temporal jurisdiction from the bishop. ‘The Genevans, who are hot-headed and big talkers,’ said they, ‘will commit some imprudence by means of which we shall prove to the sacred college that it needs a stronger shepherd than a bishop to bring them back to their duty.’ To these representations they proposed adding certain crafty devices. The judicial officers of the ducal party would draw up long, obscure, unintelligible indictments against the citizens; my lords the cardinals at Rome, who are indolence itself, would waive the reading of these tiresome documents, the matter would be explained to them vivâ voce; they would be told that the only means of saving the bishop was to give the duke the sovereignty over the city. Charles felt comforted and sent his cousin fresh instructions. ‘Since I cannot have the tree,’ he said, ‘I wish at least to taste the fruit. Set about plundering right and left (ab hoc et ab hac) to fill my treasury.’ By means of this plundering, the Genevans would be irritated; they would be driven to take up arms, and thus the duke would succeed in confiscating their independence with the consent not only of the pope but of the cardinals also.[84]

CHAPTER V.
BERTHELIER AND THE YOUTH OF GENEVA AROUSED BY THE BISHOP’S VIOLENCE.
(1515-1517.)

The bishop, the humble servant of the duke, prepared to act according to his instructions. Charles had set a trustee over him, who allowed him only what was absolutely necessary for his bare maintenance. One day, when an eminent citizen asked him a favour, John of Savoy exclaimed: ‘I have only my crozier and my mitre, the property belongs to the duke. He is bishop and abbot.’ ... ‘For,’ adds the chronicler, ‘the duke being very rapacious, John was forced to give the rein to his Highness’s extortioners.’ They imposed excessive fines; where in the inferior courts the penalty should not exceed sixty sols, they exacted fifty livres. No prince ever made such efforts to suppress revolt as the bastard to foment it. He was almost brave in his devices for losing his principality, but it was the result of servility. He deprived the syndics of their judicial functions; he threw men into prison to avenge private or imaginary offences. The people began to murmur: ‘A singular shepherd this!’ they said. ‘He is not satisfied with shearing his flock, but tears and worries them with his dogs.’ The partisans of Savoy were delighted. By one of these exploits the bastard very nearly revolutionised Geneva.[85]

Claude Vandel was one of the most respected citizens of Geneva. A distinguished lawyer, a man of noble character and spotless integrity, of retiring and respectful manners, but also of great courage, he protected at his own expense the weak and poor against the violence of the great. A citizen having been unjustly prosecuted by a bishop’s officer, Vandel undertook his defence and so enraged the prelate that he swore to be revenged on him. But how was he to begin? The people respected Vandel; his ancestors had filled the highest offices in the State; his wife, Mie du Fresnoir, belonged to a good family allied to the Chatillons and other Savoyard houses of the best blood. Moreover Vandel possessed four sons, united by the closest affection, full of veneration for their father, and all destined one day to be called to important duties. Robert, the eldest, was a syndic; Thomas, a canon, procurator-fiscal, and one of the first priests that embraced the Reformation; of the two youngest, who were still youths, Hugo was afterwards the representative of the republic in Switzerland, and Peter captain-general. It was known at the bishop’s palace that Vandel’s sons would not permit a hand to be laid upon their father; and that even the people would take up his defence. Nevertheless it was decided to make the Genevans bend under the yoke of absolute authority. Thomas, who was then incumbent of Morges, hurried to Geneva on hearing of the design that threatened his father. He was a man of most decided character, and ‘handled the sword better than his breviary.’ When they learned what were the bishop’s intentions, his brothers and he had felt in their hearts one of those sudden and unlooked-for impulses that proceed from the noblest of affections, and they swore to make their bodies a rampart for their father. The bishop and his courtiers had recourse to stratagem. Vandel was in the country, Robert and Thomas keeping guard beside him. A rumour was set afloat that the bishop’s bailiffs would come at nightfall and seize the lawyer. Consequently, ‘before night came on,’ Robert and Thomas went out to watch for the men who were to carry off their father. But these, instead of leaving at the appointed hour, had started earlier and hidden themselves near the house. As soon as it was dark they left their hiding-place, and while Vandel’s sons and friends were looking for them in another direction, they seized the republican Claude, bound him, took him into the city by a secret postern, and conducted him along a subterranean passage to the bishop’s prison.[86]

The next morning, Vandel’s sons ran in great distress to their friends and appealed to the people whom they met. They represented that the syndics alone had the right of trial in criminal matters, and that by arresting their father the bishop had trampled the franchises of the city under foot. The people were excited, the council assembled; the syndics went to the bishop and called upon him to let Vandel go, or else hand over to them, his lawful judges, the papers in his case.

‘My council,’ the bishop answered, ‘will examine whether this arrest is contrary to your liberties, in which case I will amend what is to be amended.’ Even the episcopal council decided for Vandel’s discharge; but the bastard obstinately refused.

The anger of the people now grew fiercer against the citizens who had accepted the bishop’s pensions.

‘The bishop knows very well,’ they said, ‘that some of them prefer his money to the liberties of the city. Why should he fear to infringe our rights, when traitors have sold them to him?’ Thomas Vandel, the priest, the most ardent of the family, hastened to Berthelier. ‘The irritation is general,’ he said, ‘and yet they hesitate. Nobody dares bell the cat.’ Berthelier joined Vandel’s sons, and their bold representations, as well as the murmurs of the people, aroused the syndics. The day (June 29) was already far advanced; but that mattered not, and at the unusual hour of eight in the evening the council met, and ‘all the most eminent in the city to the number of about three hundred,’ joined the assembly. The people gathered in crowds and filled the hall.

Berthelier was present. He was still governor of Peney, the bishop’s gift; and the latter made merry with his courtiers at having put ‘a bone in his mouth to prevent his barking.’ There were some Genevans who looked frowningly upon him, as if that great citizen had betrayed his country. But Berthelier was calm, his countenance determined: he was prepared to strike the first blow. The syndics described the illegal act of the bishop; the sons of the prisoner called upon them to avenge their father; and Berthelier exclaimed: ‘To maintain the liberties of the city, we must act without fear; let us rescue the citizen whom traitors have seized.’ John Taccon, captain-general, and at the same time a pensioner of the bishop’s, stopped him: ‘Gently,’ said he, ‘if we do as you advise, certain inconveniences may follow.’ Berthelier in great excitement exclaimed: ‘Now the pensioners are showing themselves!’ At these words Taccon could not contain himself: ‘It was you,’ he said, ‘yes, you, who showed me the way to take a pension.’ On hearing this reproach Berthelier pulled out the bishop’s letters appointing him governor of Peney, and which he had brought with him to the council, and tore them in pieces before the meeting, saying: ‘Since I showed you the way to take them, look, I now show you the way to resign them.’ These words acted like an electric shock. A cry of ‘No more pensions!’ was raised on all sides. All the pensioners declared themselves ready to tear up their letters-patent like Berthelier. The commotion was very great. ‘Toll the bell for the general council,’ cried some. ‘No, no,’ said the more prudent, ‘it would be the signal for a general outbreak, and the people would right themselves.’[87]

Something however must be done. A portion of the assembly went off to the bishop’s palace, and began to shout for the prelate: ‘Release the prisoner!’ But the bishop did not appear; the doors and windows of the palace remained closely barred. The irritation grew general. ‘As the bishop will not show himself,’ they said, ‘we must assemble the people.’ Upon this John Bernard, whose three sons played an important part in the Reformation, ran off to the tower of St. Pierre to ring the bell for the general council. But the priests, anticipating what would happen, had fastened the belfry door. Bernard did not renounce his purpose: he caught up a huge hammer and was beginning to batter the door, when some citizens came up and stopped him. They had just learned that the bastard did not appear because, dreading the fury of the people, he had left Geneva in great haste. One thought consoled the bishop in all his terror: ‘Surely here is an argument that will convince the sacred college: my people are in revolt!’ But the episcopal council thought differently: Vandel’s arrest was illegal, and they restored him to liberty. From that hour the bishop’s hatred grew more deadly against those who would not bend to his tyranny.[88]

The energy displayed by the citizens showed the bastard what he would have to expect if he laid hands on their independence. His creatures resolved therefore to set to work in another way: to enervate this proud and resolute people, and with that view to encourage superstition and profligacy in Geneva. Superstition would prevent the citizens from thinking about truth and reform, while profligacy would make them forget their dignity, their rights, and their dearest liberties.

At the commencement of 1517—the year when the Reformation began in Germany—a bare-footed friar, named Thomas, came and preached at Geneva in Italian, and the people who did not understand a word listened to him with admiration. The Virgin Mary, the saints, and the departed were his ordinary theme. Bonivard shrugged his shoulders, saying: ‘He is a mere idiot with his cock-and-bull stories!’ The friar proceeded next to work miracles; sick persons were brought to him after service; he blessed them right and left, and many returned home cured. ‘What do you say to that?’ triumphantly asked some bigots of the sceptical prior. ‘Why, imaginatio facit casum, it is the effect of imagination,’ he replied. ‘The fools believe so firmly that he will heal them, that the cure follows; but it does not last long, and many return worse than they came.’ The honourable councillors, befooled like the rest, sent the friar ‘princely presents.’

As superstition did not suffice, entertainments and debauchery were added. Duke Philibert the Fair, who visited Geneva in 1498 with his bastard brother René, had already employed this means of subduing the Genevans. ‘Go,’ said he to his noblest lords, ‘and win over all these shopkeepers and mechanics by being on the most familiar footing with them.’ The Savoyard nobles, affably accosting the Genevans, used to sit down with them in the taverns, drink, laugh, and sing with them, bewildering the simple by their high-flown language and ‘grand airs.’ They concealed their subtle treachery under fine phrases; and throwing off all shame, they even permitted looks and gestures of abominable lewdness, infecting the hearts with impurity, and corrupting the young. The priests, far from opposing this depravity, were the first to give way to it. A shameful wantonness engendered criminal excesses which would have brought ruin on those who indulged in them and on the city itself. Effrontery stalked in the streets. The strangers who stopped in Geneva exclaimed:—‘It is indeed a city sunk to the eyes in pleasure. Church, nobles, and people are devoted to every kind of excess. You see nothing but sports, dances, masquerades, feasts, lewdness, and consequently, strife and contention. Abundance has generated insolence, and assuredly Geneva deserves to be visited with the scourge of God.’[89]

Philip Berthelier, a man of indomitable courage, untiring activity, enthusiastic for independence and the ancient rights of liberty, but infected with the general disease, now put the plan he had conceived into execution, and resolved to turn against Savoy the dissolute habits with which she had endowed his country. He took part in all their feasts, banquets, and debaucheries; drank, laughed, and sang with the youth of Geneva. There was not an entertainment at which he was not present: ‘Bonus civis, malus homo, a good citizen, but a bad man,’ they said of him. ‘Yes, malus homo,’ he replied; ‘but since good citizens will not risk their comforts in an enterprise of which they despair, I must save liberty by means of madmen.’ He employed his practical understanding and profound sagacity in winning men over,[90] and he attained the end he had set before him. The assemblies of the Genevan youth immediately changed in character. Philibert the Fair had made them a school of slavery; Philibert Berthelier made them a school of liberty. Those who opposed the usurpations of the Savoyard princes, boldly held their meetings at these joyous and noisy feasts. The great citizen, as if he had been invested with some magic charm, had entirely changed the Genevan mind, and, holding it in his hand, made it do whatever he pleased. Sarcasms were heaped upon the bishop and the duke’s partisans, and every jest was greeted with loud bursts of laughter and applause. If any episcopal officer committed an illegality, information was given to these strange parliaments, and these redressors of wrong undertook to see the victim righted. When the Savoyard party put themselves without the law, the Genevan party did the same, and the war began.

Had Berthelier taken the right course? Could the independence of Geneva be established on such a foundation? Certainly not; true liberty cannot exist without justice, and consequently without a moral change that comes from God. So long as ‘young Geneva’ loved diversion above everything, the bishop and the duke might yet lay hands upon her. Such was the love of pleasure in the majority of these youths, that they would seize the bait with eager impetuosity if it were only dropped with sufficient skill. ‘They felt that the hook was killing them,’ said a writer of the sixteenth century; but they had not strength to pull it out. This strength was to come from on high. The human mind, so inconstant and so weak, found in God’s Word the power it needed, and which the light of the fifteenth century could never have given them. The Reformation was necessary to liberty, because it was necessary to morality. When the protestant idea declined in some countries, as in France for instance, the human mind lost its energy also, profligacy once more overran society; and that highly endowed nation, after having caught a glimpse of a magnificent dawn, fell back into the thick night of the traditional power of Rome and the despotism of the Valois and Bourbons. Liberty has never been firmly established except among a people where the Word of God reigns.[91]

CHAPTER VI.
THE OPPOSING PARTIES PREPARE FOR BATTLE.
(1516-1517.)

As a new and powerful opposition was forming in Geneva, it became necessary for the duke and the bishop to unite more closely. About this time an incident of little importance was nearly setting them at variance, and thus accelerating the emancipation of the city.

One day as the gouty bastard, stretched on a couch, was suffering cruelly from his disease, he heard a noise in the street. ‘What is the matter?’ he asked.—‘They are taking a thief to be hanged,’ replied the old woman that tended him, who added: ‘If your Lordship would but pardon him, he would pray for your health all the days of his life.’ The bishop, carried away by that fancy of sick people which makes them try everything in the hope that it will cure them, said: ‘Be it so, let them set him at liberty.’ It was the custom—a strange custom—in Geneva for the syndics to hand over to the vidame the men they had condemned; the vidame transferred them to the governor of Gaillard in Savoy, and the governor to the executioner. The executioner, attended by the governor, was about to hang the man when the bishop’s officers brought an order to release him. ‘I am the servant of my most dread lord the Duke of Savoy,’ said the governor, ‘and I shall discharge the duty intrusted to me.’ It was agreed, however, that the execution should be put off, and the bishop called his council together to examine whether he had not the right to pardon a malefactor even when he was already in the hands of the officer empowered to execute him. There was among the members of the episcopal council a man of noble character destined to take a place in the history of Geneva by the side of Berthelier and even above him. Aimé Lévrier, judge in the criminal court, son of a former syndic, knew no rule but the law, and had no motive but duty. Serious, calm, full of dignity, endowed with the wisdom of a Nestor, he was decided and energetic in carrying the laws into execution, and as soon as his conscience spoke, he obeyed it in his humble sphere with the impetuosity of an Achilles, if one may compare small things with great. The turbulence of the people and the self-will of princes found him equally unbending. He saw in this little incident the great question between the legitimate authority of the bishop and the usurpations of the duke. ‘The prince of Geneva,’ he said, ‘has the right to pardon a criminal, even if he is on the territory of Savoy and at the foot of the scaffold.’ And then, wishing to seize the opportunity of showing that the duke was servant in Geneva and not master, he left the hall, went up to the culprit, cut his bonds, took him by the hand, and, leading him to the bishop, said to the poor wretch: ‘Give thanks to God and my lord;’ and after that, boldly set him at liberty. But the bishop, who had never imagined the existence of such power, began to tremble already.

They had not indeed long to wait for the duke’s anger. If he had given his cousin the diocese of Geneva, it was that he might himself acquire the supreme power; and here was the bishop seized with a fit of independence and going so far as to contest his rights as vidame, his functions as executioner!... He would take advantage of this strange boldness to put the bastard in his right place, get rid of Lévrier, destroy the remnant of liberty still to be found in the city, and establish the ducal authority therein. The seignior of La Val d’Isère, attended by two other commissioners, arrived at Geneva in order to execute his Highness’s pleasure. Striding haughtily into the bishop’s palace, he addressed the bastard rudely on the part of the angry duke. The bishop was lavish of salutations, attentions, and respect, but all to no purpose. La Val d’Isère, who had learnt his lesson well, raised his voice still higher: Wretched bastard! (he said) what did he want with pardoning a man they were going to hang? The poor prelate was on the rack and more dead than alive; at last the ducal envoy having finished his severe reprimand, the bishop tremblingly excused himself, ‘like our father Adam when he threw the blame on Eve,’ says Bonivard. ‘It was one Lévrier, a judge and doctor of laws, who did it,’ said he. The seignior of La Val d’Isère gave the bishop to understand that instead of indulging any longings for independence, he ought to unite with the duke in combating the spirit of liberty in Geneva.

To a certain extent, however, the ducal envoy admitted the prelate’s excuse; he knew his weakness, and saw that another will than his own had acted in this business. He informed the duke of Lévrier’s misdeed, and from that hour this intrepid judge became odious to the court of Turin, and was doomed to destruction. The Savoyards said that as he had rescued the thief from the gallows, he ought to be hanged in his place. The duke and his ministers were convinced that every attempt to enslave Geneva would fail, so long as it contained such an energetic defender of the law. The evening of the day when La Val d’Isère had reprimanded the bishop, the ducal envoy, with one of his colleagues and the vidame, supped at the priory of St. Victor: the ambassador was Bonivard’s cousin, and had purposely gone to visit him. He desired to make his cousin a devoted agent of Savoy in Geneva, and to employ him, by way of prelude, in the arrest of the recalcitrant judge. After supper, La Val d’Isère took the prior aside, and began to compliment him highly. ‘My dear cousin,’ said he, ‘the duke has not in all his states a man better fitted than you to do him a service. I know you; I observed you when you were studying beyond the mountains, an intelligent fellow, a skilful swordsman, always ready to execute any deed of daring if it would render your friends a service. Your ancestors were loyal servants of the house of Savoy, and my lord expects you will show yourself worthy of them.’ The astonished Bonivard made no reply. Then La Val d’Isère explained to him how he could aid the duke in his schemes against Geneva, adding that at this very moment he might do him an important service. There was Aimé Lévrier, a determined malcontent, a rebel like his father, whom it was necessary to arrest.... La Val d’Isère communicated his plot to Bonivard. Aimé Lévrier went ordinarily to pay his devotions at the church of Our Lady of Grace, near the bridge of Arve. Bonivard would follow him, seize him the moment he came near the church, and, holding him by the throat, cross the bridge with him, and deliver him up to the ducal soldiers, who would be on the other side ready to receive him. ‘This will be an easy task for you, dear cousin,’ added the ambassador; ‘everybody knows your readiness and your prowess.’ ... La Val d’Isère added that Bonivard would thus gain two advantages: first, he would be revenged on the bishop whom he loved but little; and second, he would receive a handsome reward from my lord of Savoy. It was a singular idea to intrust this outrage to the prior of a monastery; yet it was in accordance with the manners of the day. Bonivard’s interests and family traditions would have induced him to serve Savoy; but he had an enlightened understanding and an independent spirit. He belonged to the new times. ‘Ever since I began to read history,’ he said, ‘I have always preferred a republican to a monarchical state, and especially to those where the throne is hereditary.’ The duke would have given him honours and riches in abundance, whilst he received from the cause which he embraced only poverty and a dungeon: still he never hesitated. The love of liberty had taken possession of that distinguished man, and he was always faithful to it: whatever may have been his weaknesses, this is a glory which cannot be taken from him. Bonivard wished to decline the proposal without however irritating the ambassador too much. He pointed to his robes, his prayer-book, his monks, his priory, and assigning these as a reason, he said: ‘Handling the sword is no longer my business; I have changed it for the breviary.’ Upon this La Val d’Isère in great disappointment became angry and said: ‘Well, then, I swear I will go myself to-night and take Lévrier in his bed, and carry him tied hand and foot into Savoy.’ Bonivard looked at him with a smile: ‘Will you really make the attempt?’ he asked; ‘shake hands then.’ The ambassador thinking he was won over gave him his hand. ‘Are you going to make preparation for the affair?’—‘No, cousin,’ replied Bonivard with a bow, ‘I know the people of Geneva; they are not indulgent, I warn you, and I shall go and set aside thirty florins to have a mass said for your soul to-morrow.’ The ambassador left him in great anger.[92]

Bonivard perceived that Lévrier’s life was in danger. At that time people supped early; the prior waited until nightfall, and then leaving his monastery in disguise, he passed stealthily through the streets, and entering the house of his friend the judge, told him everything. Lévrier in his turn ran to Berthelier. ‘Oh, oh!’ said the latter, who was captain of the city, ‘my lords of Savoy want to be masters here! we will teach them it is not so easy.’

At this moment news was brought the syndics that some lansquenets were at the Vengeron (half a league from the city on the right shore of the lake) and preparing to enter the faubourg of St. Gervais: it was clear that Savoy desired to carry off the judge. The syndics ordered Berthelier to keep watch all night under arms. He assembled the companies, and the men marched through the streets in close order with drums beating, passing and repassing the house of the vidame, Aymon Conseil, where the ambassadors were staying.

The seignior of La Val d’Isère, with his two colleagues the Sieur J. de Crans and Peter Lambert, expected every moment to be attacked by these armed men. They called to mind the mass for the dead of which Bonivard had spoken, and altogether passed a horrible night. Towards the morning the city grew calm, and it was scarcely light when the envoys of Savoy, ordering their horses to be saddled, rode out by a secret door of which the bishop had the key, and hastened to report to their master.[93]

Notwithstanding their precipitate retreat one of the objects of their mission was attained. The deputies from Savoy did not quit Geneva alone; the bastard was still more frightened than they; fear drove away the gout, he left his bed, and taking with him the Count of Genevois, the duke’s brother, he hurried over the mountains to Turin, in order to pacify his terrible cousin. The latter was extremely irritated. It was not enough to encroach on his rights, they also forced his envoys to flee from Geneva. The bastard spared no means to justify himself; he crouched at Charles’s feet. He was the most to be pitied, he said; these Genevans frightened him day and night. ‘I will forget everything,’ said the prince to him at last, ‘provided you assist me in bringing these republicans to reason.’ It was what the prior of St. Victor had foreseen. ‘Just as Herod and Pilate agreed in their dark designs,’ he said, ‘so do the duke and the bishop agree for the ruin of Geneva.’—‘Cousin,’ continued the duke, ‘let us understand one another: in your fold there are certain dogs that bark very loudly and defend your sheep very stoutly; you must get rid of them.... I don’t mean only Lévrier the son—there is Lévrier the father and Berthelier also, against whom you must sharpen your teeth.’—‘The elder Lévrier,’ answered the bastard, ‘is a sly and cunning fox, who knows how to keep himself out of the trap; as for Berthelier, he is hot, choleric, and says outright what he thinks: we shall have a far better chance of catching him; and when he is done for, it will be an easy matter with the others.’ In this way the princes of Savoy, meeting in the duke’s cabinet in the palace of Turin, conspired the ruin of Geneva, and plotted the death of its best citizens. Charles the Good was the cruellest and most obstinate of the three. ‘Let us play the game seriously,’ he repeated; ‘we must have them dead or alive.’ The duke, the count, and the bishop arranged their parts, and then the wolves (it was the name Bonivard gave them) waited a good opportunity for falling on the dogs.[94]

While they were making these preparations at Turin to crush liberty, others were preparing at Geneva to fight and to die for her. Both parties took up arms: the contest could not fail to be severe, and the issue important to Geneva and to society. Two friends especially did not lose sight of the approaching struggle. Berthelier inclined to the revival of Geneva from democratic motives; Bonivard, from a love of learning, philosophy, and light. Seated opposite each other in the priory of St. Victor, with the mild sparkling wine of the country on the table, they discoursed about the new times. Bonivard possessed an indescribable attraction for Berthelier. The young prior whose mind was full of grace, simplicity, poetry, imagination, and also of humour, was waking up with the sixteenth century, and casting an animated glance upon nature and the world. His style indicates his character: he always found the strongest, the most biting expressions, without either the shades of delicacy or the circuitousness of subtlety. There were however elevated parts in him: he could be enthusiastic for an idea. A thought passing through his mind would call up high aspirations in his soul and bring accents of eloquence to his lips. But, generally, men displeased him. A well-bred gentleman, a keen and graceful wit, a man of the world, he found the townspeople about him vulgar, and did not spare them the sting of his satire. When Berthelier, in the midst of the uproar of a tavern, shook the youths of Geneva warmly by the hand, and enlisted them for the great campaign of independence, Bonivard would draw back with embarrassment and put on his gloves. ‘These petty folks,’ he said with some contempt, ‘only like justice in others; and as for the rich tradesmen, they prefer the feasts and the money of the Savoyard nobles to the charms of independence.’ He was inclined to suspect evil: this was one of the disagreeable features in his character. Even Besançon Hugues was, in his eyes, nothing but pride, hidden under the mask of a citizen. Bonivard, like Erasmus, laughed at everybody and everything, except two: like him he was fond of letters, and still more fond of liberty. At Geneva he was the man of the Renaissance, as Calvin was the man of the Reformation. He overcame his antipathies, sat down at table with the young Genevans, scattered brilliant thoughts in their conversations, and kindled in their understanding a light that was never to be extinguished. Frivolous and grave, amiable and affectionate, studious and trifling, Bonivard attacked the old society, but he did not love the new. He scourged the enormities of the monks, but he was alarmed at the severe doctrines of the Reformation. He desired to bury the past joyously, but he did not know what future to set up in its place.

Berthelier, who fancied he knew, explained his plans to his friends in their familiar colloquies. The liberty of the Italian republics—a selfish liberty, full of discord and faction—had come to an end; a more noble, more vital, more durable liberty was destined to appear. But neither the politic Berthelier nor the æsthetic Bonivard thought of the new element which in new times was to give life to modern liberties: this element was a strong faith, it was the authority of God, held up on high, that was destined to consolidate society after the great earthquake it would have to go through. After Berthelier the republican, after Bonivard the classic, another man was to appear, tertium genus, a third kind, as they said at the time when paganism and Judaism disappeared before the Gospel. A Christian hero, boldly standing erect above the volcano of popular passions, was called in the midst of the convulsions of popery to lay in Geneva the foundations of enlightened society, inflexible morality, unyielding faith, and thus to save the cause of liberty. The work of Calvin, thus coming after that of Berthelier and Bonivard, no doubt presents a very strange juxtaposition; but three centuries have shown its necessity. The Reformation is indispensable to the emancipation of nations.

Berthelier, Bonivard, and their friends turned their eyes in another direction. ‘Have done with banquets and dances,’ said Berthelier to his friend; ‘we must organise young Geneva into a defensive league.’ ‘Yes, let us march onwards,’ replied Bonivard, ‘and God will give a good issue to our bold enterprise!’ ... Berthelier stretched out his hand. ‘Comrade,’ he said, ‘your hand.’[95] Then, as he held Bonivard’s hand in his, he was touched with deep emotion: a cloud passed over his face, and he added: ‘But know that for the liberty of Geneva, you will lose your benefice, and I ... I shall lose my head.’ ‘He told me that a hundred times,’ added the prior of St. Victor, who has handed down this conversation to us. The gloomy foreboding was but too amply fulfilled.

CHAPTER VII.
ASSEMBLY, AGITATION, AND COMEDY OF THE PATRIOTS.
(1516-1517.)

Without delay Berthelier entered upon the work to which he had sworn to devote his life. Wishing to prepare it carefully, he invited the most ardent of the young Genevans to confer with him on the salvation of the country. He did not select for this meeting some lonely field, above the shores of the lake, as the Grütli: he had to deal with the inhabitants of a city and not with the children of the mountains. He therefore took a hall in the principal square of the city, la Place du Molard, then almost washed by the waters of the river, and appointed a time for the meeting when the streets were most thronged. About twilight one afternoon, probably in 1516 (it is difficult to fix precisely the date of this important meeting[96]), Berthelier, and then a few other patriots, set out for the Molard: they came from the Rue du Rhone, la Rive, and from the Cité; those who came from the upper part of the town passed down the Rue du Perron. As they walked, they conversed of the tyranny of the bishop and the plots of the princes of Savoy. One of those who appeared to have the most influence was Amadeus de Joye, the son of distinguished, upright, and honourable parents, who had brought him up virtuously. The public voice, while proclaiming him ‘a merry fellow,’ added that he was honest and straightforward, and connected with all the good men of the city: he exercised the honourable vocation of druggist and apothecary, and had always enjoyed a good reputation in his business. Not far from him was Andrew Navis: a change had taken place in the son of the procurator-fiscal. The cause of liberty had dawned upon his ardent soul in all its beauty: in it he fancied he had found the unknown good he had sought so eagerly; his imagination had been inflamed, his heart moved, and leaving the Savoyard party, of which his father was one of the chiefs, he rushed with all his natural impetuosity to the side of independence. One of his friends, John Biderman, surnamed Blanchet, had accompanied him, a young man about twenty-four years old. Full of natural wit, disliking work, very fond of fun, Blanchet ‘trotted up and down,’ picked up all the news, repeated it at random, and meddled in everybody’s business. He had, however, at bottom a sensitive heart, and the tyranny of the bishop provoked him. Berthelier, who was among the earliest arrivals, scanned attentively the young people and the earnest men who had joined them, and experienced a feeling of happiness at the sight. There was in him a being superior to the follies of banquets. The daily routine, the small passions, the vulgarity of mind, life such as he had hitherto known it, wearied him. At last he had before him an assembly brought together for the noble cause of independence; and for that reason he affectionately pressed the hand of all comers. At this moment the bell rang for vespers at Magdalen old church, and was distinctly heard at the Molard. There were present with Berthelier about fifty citizens—a small meeting, and yet more numerous than that of Walter Fürst and his friends. Besides, did not all noble hearts in Geneva beat in harmony with those of the fifty patriots?[97]

They gathered in a circle round Berthelier, and stood silent; the heroic citizen reminded them that from the most remote times Geneva had been free; but that for one or two centuries the princes of Savoy had been trying to enslave it, and that the duke only waited for the favourable opportunity to impose his usurped sovereignty upon their country. Then fixing his noble look upon his audience, he asked them if they wished to transmit to their children not liberty but ... slavery? The citizens answered No, and demanded anxiously how the liberties of the city could effectually be saved? ‘How!’ said Berthelier. ‘By being united, by forgetting our private quarrels, by opposing with one mind every violation of our rights. We have all the same franchises, let us all have the same heart. If the bishop’s officers lay hands on one of us, let all the others defend him with their swords, their nails, their teeth!’[98] Then he exclaimed: ‘Who touches one, touches all.’ At these words they all raised their hands and said: ‘Yes, yes! one heart, one common cause! Who touches one, touches all!’—‘Good,’ resumed Berthelier, ‘let this motto be the name of our alliance, but let us be faithful to the noble device. If the bishop’s constables take one of us to prison, let us rescue him from their hands. If they indulge in criminal extortions, let us seek out the abominable plunder even in their houses.’ And then he repeated in a loud voice: ‘Who touches one, touches all!’ And yet in the midst of this enthusiasm, the marks of fear could be seen on some faces. One citizen asked with considerable uneasiness what they would do if my lord of Geneva, aided by his Highness, should attack the city with a strong army? ‘Fear nothing,’ answered Berthelier sharply, ‘we have good friends;’ and he added soon after: ‘I will go to the Swiss, I will bring back forces, and then ... I will settle accounts with our adversaries.’[99]

From that time the consultations and debates became more and more frequent: the discussions went on in private families, at St. Victor’s, in the houses of the principal citizens, sometimes even in the public places: men reminded each other of the customs and franchises of Geneva, and promised to be mutually faithful.

One day Berthelier, Blanchet, and several other citizens meeting at Mugnier’s to discourse round the table about the common interest, unfortunately brought with them a vile and corrupt fellow, a creature of the bishop’s, named Carmentrant. They sat down, the wine circulated, and their heads soon became heated: ‘The bishop,’ said one of them, ‘has sold Geneva to the duke!’—‘If he breaks his oath,’ said another, ‘his treason does not free us from ours. When princes trample the law under foot, the citizens ought to uphold it at any cost.’—‘We must let the bishop know,’ added Berthelier, ‘the resolution we have adopted to defend our independence.’—‘That is not easy,’ observed one; ‘how can we approach my lord and dare tell him all the truth?’—‘Let us mask ourselves,’ returned he; ‘we may say hard things under our masks.... Let us make a momon at the palace.’ The momon was a bet made by maskers when playing at dice. Pécolat did not seem convinced. ‘Leave that to me,’ said Berthelier, ‘I shall find a way of speaking to the prelate.’ Carmentrant listened in silence; he engraved in his memory every word of the great patriot, ready to add to them his private interpretations. He asserted afterwards that Berthelier proposed attacking the prelate’s life; but the contrary was proved, and even the farce of the momon was never carried out. That mattered not; the smallest joke at that time was metamorphosed into the crime of high treason.[100]

Berthelier was not the only person the bishop caused to be watched; Bonivard, ever sparkling with wit, gave opportunities to informers. He had at that time a difference with the bishop about the right of fishing in the Rhone. One day when walking with Berthelier and other friends, he complained of the prelate’s avarice; and then indulging in a joke, he said laughingly: ‘If ever I meet him near my fishery, one or other of us will catch an ugly fish.’ This was made a principal charge against him: he wished to drown the bishop. They were mistaken: Bonivard was not a violent character; but he was ambitious, and, without wishing the bishop any harm, he secretly aspired to the bishopric. ‘I will go to Rome,’ said he to one of his intimate friends, ‘and will not have my beard shaved until I am bishop of Geneva.’

The court of Turin had not forgotten the famous decision of the cardinals. A few light words were not enough to prove to the sacred college that the people of Geneva were in revolt; an émeute (as the Savoyards called it) furnished this party with the arms they sought.

On the 5th of June, 1517, the only talk throughout the city was about Messire Gros’ mule, which was dead. This mule was well known, for the judge rode it whenever he went on his judicial investigations. People seriously discussed in the streets and at table the cause of the death of this famous beast. ‘It is Adrian of Malvenda,’ said some, ‘that Spaniard whose father came from Valence la Grande, who, having had a quarrel with the judge at a dinner party, has hamstrung the beast.’ ‘No,’ said others, ‘some young Genevans meeting the judge on his mule and wishing to frighten him, shouted out and drew their swords: his servants drew also, and one of them awkwardly wounded the mule, so that it died.’[101]

Messire Claude Gros or Grossi, judge of the three castles (Peney, Thiez, and Jussy) was one of those harsh magistrates who are hated by a whole people. They coupled him in this respect with the procurator-fiscal Peter Navis; and Berthelier, De Lunes, and De la Thoy had often threatened both of them with the vengeance of the patriots. Their hatred against these two magistrates was such that even Andrew Navis suffered from it. In vain had he given himself up heart and soul to the party of liberty; he was regarded with distrust; and men asked if any good could come from the house of the procurator-fiscal. Quite recently Andrew had had a dispute with John Conod on this subject. The two young people were, however, reconciled, and the very evening of the day when the mule died, Conod gave a supper to Navis and thirty ‘children of Geneva.’ This was the name they gave to the young men of age to bear arms. That evening, however, some citizens of riper years joined them: among whom were Berthelier, J. de Lunes, E. de la Mare, J. de la Porte, J. de la Thoy, and J. Pécolat. ‘Gentlemen,’ said Berthelier after supper, ‘it is a long time since this merry company has had any fun.’ They were all agreed. Berthelier delighted in setting his enemies at defiance without any regard for the consequences. ‘The mule of the respectable Claude Grossi is dead,’ he continued; ‘that judge is a wretch continually beating after us and our friends. Let us play him a trick: let us sell his mule’s skin by auction to the highest bidder.’ The proposal was adopted by acclamation. Two or three, however, appeared to wish to withdraw: ‘Let every one follow the drum on pain of being fined a gold crown,’ said Berthelier. ‘Agreed, agreed!’ cried the giddiest of the company. At every Court and even in the houses of many noblemen it was the custom to keep fools who had the privilege of telling the boldest truths with impunity. The Abbot of Bonmont had one named Master Littlejohn Smallfoot. Berthelier, desirous of carrying out the practical joke to the uttermost, sent for Littlejohn. ‘Here,’ said he, ‘here’s a proclamation for you to cry through the streets. Forward!’ All marched out with drawn swords, and, with the drummer at their head, began to traverse the streets, stopping at every place where the ordinary publications were made. After a roll of the drum, Master Littlejohn blew a horn and cried with his squeaking voice: ‘O yes, this is to give notice that whoever wishes to buy the skin of a beast, of the grossest ass in Geneva, and will call at the house situate between the keeper’s and the Hôtel de Ville, it will be sold to the highest bidder.’ ‘Is not that where Judge Gros lives?’ asked a bystander. ‘Yes, it’s he that is the gross ass,’ replied another. A general burst of laughter followed this proclamation. Andrew Navis in particular indulged in the most noisy demonstrations; he was bent on showing that he was as good a patriot as the rest.

The oldest of the patriots were however uneasy: the elder Lévrier thought they were going too fast. ‘Ah,’ said he, ‘these young folks will play us a pretty game!’ ‘Certes,’ added others spitefully, ‘this Berthelier has a singular talent for stirring up quarrels.’[102] The joke was continued through great part of the night.

The next day the judge of the three castles hastened to lay his complaint before the vidame and the episcopal council. The vidame called for the arrest of the guilty parties, who disappeared. Being summoned by sound of trumpet to appear at the Château de l’Ile under pain of being fined a hundred crowns, they came out of their hiding-places, and Berthelier brought an action against the vidame for having threatened him and his friends with a fine that was not authorised by the law. The partisans of Savoy were still more exasperated. ‘There is a conspiracy against my lord the bishop-prince of Geneva,’ they exclaimed; ‘he alone has the right of making proclamations.’ They wrote letter after letter to Turin, and metamorphosed a fool’s jest into the crime of high treason.[103]

The princes of Savoy thought that this was a disorder by which they might profit. Charles had the reputation in his hereditary states of being irresolute in deciding and feeble in executing; but whenever Geneva was concerned, he ventured upon daring measures. He gave the order of departure to his court; took with him one of the most learned diplomatists of the age, Claude de Seyssel, whom he thought he should require in the great matters that were to be transacted, and arrived in Geneva. The vidame, still irritated by the story of the mule, immediately presented his homage to the duke, and described the situation in the gloomiest of colours. ‘You see,’ said Charles to his councillors, ‘the citizens of Geneva are in revolt: it needs a stronger shepherd than a bishop to bring them back to their duty.’ But Seyssel was a man of great judgment; he was no novice either in government or in history; he had studied Thucydides, Appian, Diodorus, and Xenophon, and even rendered them into French. He inquired more particularly into the matter, learned that the notice had been cried by the Abbot of Bonmont’s fool, and that it was the same fellow who sang habitually in the streets all the comic songs produced by the satiric vein of the Genevans. The diplomatist smiled. ‘This business of the mule is a mere practical joke,’ he said to the duke; ‘fools, you know, have the privilege of saying and doing everything; and as for the band of wags who surrounded the buffoon, do not let us make these young men into Cethegi and Catilines. The cardinals will never consent to give us the temporal sovereignty of Geneva for such foolery. It would be too much, my lord, for the first stroke; we must mount to the pinnacle of sovereignty by shorter steps. This story will not however be quite useless to us; we will employ it to sow dissension among our enemies.’ In fine, the able Seyssel having come to an understanding with the bishop, the latter summoned to his presence those of ‘the band,’ that is to say, of the children of Geneva, whom he thought most pliable. ‘You will gain nothing,’ said Claude de Seyssel to them, ‘by following a lot of rioters and rebels. In making this proclamation you committed a wrongful action, and you might justly receive corporal punishment; but the bishop is a good prince, inclined to mercy; he will pardon all of you except Berthelier and his accomplices. He will even give you office, places, and pensions ... only do not consort any more with seditious people.’ Many, delighted at getting out of the scrape, thanked Seyssel heartily, and promised that they should be seen no more among the disaffected.[104] The bastard showed himself more difficult with regard to the son of his procurator-fiscal: the bravadoes of Andrew Navis, at the time of the proclamation about the mule, had aroused all the prelate’s anger. It would seem that the poor father dared not intercede for his prodigal son; one of his friends obtained his pardon, but only after Navis had promised to reform. He returned to his father’s office and might be seen constantly poring over the laws and acts of the exchequer.

This manœuvre having succeeded, and the party of the independents being thus weakened, the bishop, the duke, and their friends thought that its head should be removed: that head was Berthelier. It was not easy, however, to get rid of him: he was a member of council, much looked up to in Geneva, and possessed a skill and energy that baffled all their attempts. ‘To catch this big partridge,’ said the bishop, ‘we must first trap a little decoy-bird.’ The advice appeared excellent. The prince determined accordingly to catch some friend of Berthelier’s, less formidable than himself, who by his depositions (for the question would not be spared) would compromise the best citizens in Geneva. The decoy would by his song draw the large birds into the nets spread to catch them.[105]

CHAPTER VIII.
PÉCOLAT TORTURED AND BERTHELIER ACCUSED.
(1517.)

Among the best patriots of Geneva was John Pécolat, whom we have already met at the mule supper. He had not Berthelier’s strength of character, but he had spirit. A prey by turns to enthusiasm and fear, at times indulging in the most courageous acts or the most culpable weakness, subject to the blackest melancholy or to fits of the maddest humour, Pécolat was at once a hero and a jester. His social position offered the same contrasts. One of his ancestors had been syndic in 1409, another councillor in 1474; in 1508 his father had exercised the highest functions in the State, and he was himself one of the Council of Fifty; he was well instructed, understood Latin, and yet was a hosier by trade. It is true that at this time we often find traders invested with the highest offices; it is one of the peculiarities of democratic manners; and we meet with examples of it in modern society. An accident which deprived him of the use of his right arm, compelled him to give up his business, reduced him to poverty, and plunged him at first into great dejection. However, that did not last long, and there was no man in Geneva that had such fits of gaiety. At a banquet, nobody was louder than Pécolat; he laughed and joked; pun followed pun, in rapid succession. ‘What happy things come into his head!’ said everybody, and ‘it was these happy things,’ adds the chronicler, ‘that gave him access to good tables.’[106] When he entered the room a frank and hearty greeting, an enthusiasm mingled with laughter welcomed his arrival. But Pécolat had hardly left his friends when dark thoughts mounted to his brain. Sitting in his narrow chamber, he thought of his maimed arm, his indigence, his dependent life; he thought frequently too of the liberties of Geneva, which he saw sacrificed; and this strange man who made all the city laugh, would burst into tears. It was not long before Pécolat compromised himself in such a manner as to furnish arms against the patriots of Geneva.

The Bishop of Maurienne, precentor of the cathedral and canon of Geneva, who had a suit against the bishop, was then staying in the city and ‘feasting’ the citizens. Having one day invited several of his friends, and among others his colleague the Abbot of Bonmont, who always had a grudge against the bishop for depriving him of the diocese, he invited Pécolat also. During the dinner the two prelates worked themselves into a passion against the bastard of Savoy: each tried who could attack him the most bitterly, and indeed he gave them a fair handle. Pécolat began to do as the others, and to let fly his usual epigrams against the bastard. Maurienne had no end of complaints. ‘Pray, my lord,’ said Pécolat, ‘do not vex yourself about the bishop’s injustice: non videbit dies Petri: he will not live as long as St. Peter!’ This was a saying they were in the habit of applying to the popes at the time of their coronation; and Pécolat meant to say that the bishop, who, as everybody knew, was suffering under an incurable disease, could not live long. Two Savoyards, creatures of the duke and the bishop, who were of the party, went immediately and repeated these words to the bastard. ‘At sumptuous tables,’ said the prior of St. Victor, who was probably one of the guests, ‘there are always gluttons picking up words that will get them another dinner.’ The episcopal court concluded from the Latin proverb that the independents were conspiring against the bishop, and that Pécolat announced the prelate’s death as near at hand. This speech was not sufficient, however, to send him to trial: they waited for some act that would serve as a pretence for the charge of assassination.[107]

The opportunity soon occurred. Not long after, the duke having crossed the mountains to present his homage to Queen Claude of Brittany, whom Francis I. had just married, and who was then at Lyons, invited the bishop to come and see him in this city. The bastard set off immediately: his steward ordered some fish pasties as provision for the journey, and the purveyor, whether from hurry or from desire to make a large profit, used fish that had been kept too long. The bishop did not touch them, but some of his people having eaten of them, fell sick; it was asserted that one of them died. The bastard, whose conscience was none of the easiest, saw an assassin everywhere; and though in this matter of the pasties there was nothing but what was very natural, he thought or seemed to think that it was an attempt at poisoning. The idea occurred to certain Savoyards that they might make use of this story to accuse Pécolat, and show the cardinals that the prince-bishop’s subjects were conspiring against him.

Pécolat had so little to do with my lord’s kitchen that at first the vidame refused to prosecute; but the affair of Messire Gros’ mule having occurred, and greatly annoyed the judges, they hesitated no longer. Pécolat was one of the band who had cried ‘The skin of the gross beast!’ On the 27th of July, 1517, a warrant was issued against him.

It was necessary to arrest Pécolat; but that was no easy thing, for the members of the society Who touches one touches all, would no doubt rise and defend him. It was resolved to arrange the matter carefully. First they would get the most determined of the young men out of Geneva; then they would entice Pécolat into some lonely place; and finally, as they knew not what might happen, the bishop should go and stay in some castle beyond the reach of the Genevese. This triple stratagem was immediately put into execution. The Count of Genevois, who played the part of a jovial host, organised a grand hunt of wild animals, the rendezvous being at Vouache, two leagues to the west of Geneva; he invited the Abbot of Bonmont, Bonivard, and many young men of the city, whose names were in the black book, that is, whom they wished to get rid of. While this joyous company was hunting with hound and horn at the foot of Mont Saleve, the bishop wishing to enjoy a fresher air (it was said) had repaired, escorted by a few gentlemen, to his castle of Thiez between the mountains of Mole, Voirons, and Reposoir, on the road to Mont Blanc, a little above the point where the Giffre torrent joins the Arve. At the same time one Maule, a secret agent of the vidame, invited Pécolat to take a walk with him to Pressinge, a village situated between the lake and the Voirons, where one of them possessed some property. Ten horsemen setting out from the castle of Thiez lay in ambush. They surrounded the two pedestrians, bound and carried them to the castle, where the bishop having released the tempter, threw Pécolat into prison. When the news of this treachery reached Geneva, the irritation was directed against Maule still more than against the bishop. The traitor, who seems to have been a man of debauched life, was loaded with the people’s maledictions. ‘May the cancer eat Maule up!’ they cried; and this saying became a proverb applicable to traitors ever afterwards.[108]

He had however played his part so well that the imprisoned Pécolat was exasperated not against him but against his most intimate friend Berthelier. His black fit came over him. He said to himself that although a man of the most inoffensive character, he seemed destined to expiate the faults of all his party. With what had they to reproach him? Mere jokes and laughter.... Berthelier was the real conspirator, and he was at large.... On the 3rd of April Pécolat was removed from the dungeon into which he had been thrown, and conducted to the top of the castle, under the roof. The bishop had ordered him ‘to be examined and forced to speak the truth;’ and the torture-room was at the top of the castle. After the usual preliminaries the examination began. The plot of the non videbit and the salt fish was too absurd; M. de Thoire, the examining judge, dwelt but little upon it, and endeavoured particularly (for that was the object of the arrest) to obtain such admissions as would ruin Geneva and her principal citizens. As Pécolat deposed to nothing that would inculpate them, he was tied by one hand to the rope, and, as he still refused to answer, was hoisted four feet from the floor. The poor fellow groaned deeply and speaking with difficulty[109] said: ‘Cursed be Berthelier for whom I am shut up!’ He made no confession, however.

The next day they resorted to another expedient. The bishop gave himself the pleasure of keeping the wretched man hanging to the cord while he was at dinner. The servants, as they passed backwards and forwards waiting on their master, said to Pécolat: ‘You are very stupid to let yourself be put to such torture: confess everything. What will your silence help you? Maule has told everything; he has named So-and-so ... the Abbot of Bonmont, for instance, whom you want to make your bishop after you have done for my lord.’ All these traps were useless—he made no confession. It was next determined to expose Pécolat to a more cruel torture: the executioners tied his hands behind his back, and then pulled the rope so as to raise his arms above his head; lastly they lifted him five or six feet from the floor, which was enough to dislocate his shoulders. Pécolat suffered horribly, and he was not a Regulus. ‘Let me down! let me down!’ he cried, ‘and I will tell all.’ ... The judges, delighted at having vanquished the obstinate rebel at last, ordered him to be lowered. Terror was in his heart, and his features betrayed the trouble of his mind. The man, usually so gay and so witty, was now pale, affrighted, his eyes wandered, and he fancied himself surrounded by hungry dogs. He said all that they wanted him to say. To the falsest imputations against the noblest of his friends he answered ‘Yes, yes!’ and the satisfied judges sent him back to his dungeon.[110]

This was no comfort to the unhappy Pécolat: more terrible anguish awaited him there. The thought that he had deposed against his best friends and even incurred the guilt of bearing false witness, alarmed him seriously: the fear of God’s judgment surpassed all the terrors which men had caused him. ‘Gentlemen,’ said he to the noble F. de Thoire and others standing round him, ‘my declarations were extorted from me only by the fear of torture. If I had died at that moment, I should have been eternally damned for my lies.’[111]

The bastard, not liking to feel himself within the same walls as his victim, had removed to St. Joire, two leagues from Thiez, and there attentively watched the examination and the torture. He had acquired a taste for it; and accordingly on the 5th of August he ordered another prisoner to be put to the question. ‘I have some here who say plenty of good things,’ he wrote to Geneva.[112] These ‘good things’ were the false witness extorted by pain and which permitted the imprisonment of the innocent. The terror increased in Geneva every day. People kept themselves indoors, the streets were deserted: a few labourers only could be seen in the fields. Bonivard, who feared, and not without cause, that the bishop and the duke wished to carry him off also, did not leave St. Victor’s. ‘Things are in such a state,’ he said, ‘that no one dares venture into the country lest he should be treated like Pécolat.’ Many of the citizens quitted Geneva. One day two friends happened to meet in a room of the hostelry of St. Germain on the Jura. ‘Where are you going?’ asked one of them who had just come from Lyons. ‘I am leaving Geneva,’ answered the other, by name Du Bouchet. ‘They have so tortured Pécolat that his arms remained hanging to the rope, and he died upon the rack.’ Du Bouchet added: ‘The Church not having the right of putting men to death, my lord of Geneva will have to send somebody to Rome to get him absolved. He weeps greatly about it, they say; but I place no trust in such crocodile’s tears!... I am going to Lyons.’[113]

The bishop had no notion of excusing himself to the pope: on the contrary, he thought only of pursuing his revenge. The decoy was in the cage and some small birds with him; he wished now at any cost to catch the large one,—Berthelier. Most of the youth of Geneva were either out of the way or disheartened; the league Who touches one touches all was nearly dissolved, at the moment when it ought to have been ready to save its founder. The bishop thought it superfluous to resort to stratagem or violence and simply required the syndics to surrender the great agitator to him. At eight o’clock in the evening of the 28th of July, 1517, the council was sitting, when the president who was on the bishop’s side said: ‘It is my lord’s pleasure that we take up one of his subjects against whom he possesses sufficient informations which he will communicate in proper time and place; and that when the said subject is in prison, the syndics shall execute justice, if the affair requires it.’[114] At these words every one looked at a seat which was empty for the first time. Berthelier’s friends were uneasy; and as the bishop had adopted a lawful course, the council answered the prelate that they would take up the accused, provided that on his part he maintained the liberties of Geneva.

As the councillors left the Hôtel de Ville in the dark, they said to one another: ‘It is Berthelier.’ The friends he had among them ran off to tell him the news, conjuring him to escape the vengeance of the prince by flight. Bonivard joined his entreaties to theirs: ‘The sword is over your head,’ he said.—‘I know it,’ answered Berthelier, ‘yes, I know that I shall die, and I do not grieve at it.’ ‘Really,’ said Bonivard, ‘I never saw and never read of one who held life so cheap.’ The friends of the noble-minded citizen redoubled their entreaties. They represented to him that there remained in Geneva only a small number of civic guards, imperfectly trained to arms;[115] that one part of the burgesses would assent through fear to the plots of the Savoyard party, and that another part would aid them. Berthelier still resisted: ‘God,’ said he, ‘will miraculously take away their power.’[116] His friends resorted to another argument. There happened to be just then in Geneva some envoys from Friburg; Berthelier’s friends begged him to depart with them. ‘Out of Geneva,’ they said, ‘you will serve the city better than within.’ That consideration decided him. He went during the night to the hostelry of the Friburgers. ‘We leave to-morrow,’ they told him; ‘here is a livery cloak with the arms of Friburg; put it on, and thus disguised you shall come with us, like one of the state riders. If you are not recognised at the gates of Geneva or in the Pays de Vaud, you are safe.’ The Friburgers left the city very early: the guard looked at them for a moment as they passed the gate, but without suspecting that the great republican was with them. He was safe.

The next day the syndic Nergaz having delivered the message of the council to the bastard of Savoy, the latter was exasperated because instead of seizing Berthelier, they simply told him that they intended doing so. ‘Do you mean to give him time to escape?’ he asked. The council immediately ordered a great display of force to arrest the liberal leader. His friends the councillors, who knew him to be already far away in the country, let his enemies go on. ‘Shut all the city gates,’ said they. ‘Assemble the tithing men and the tens; summon the vidame to assist in executing the law; let the syndics preside in person over the search for the culprit.’[117] ‘Bravo!’ whispered some aside, ‘shut the cage ... the bird has flown.’ The most zealous of the bishop’s partisans hurried off to close the gates. The syndics and tithing men set out, followed by a great number of citizens, and all went towards Berthelier’s house. They searched every chamber, they sounded every hiding-place, but found nobody. Some were angry, others laughed in their sleeves; the most violent, supposing he had escaped to one of his friends, put themselves at the head of the troop and searched every house that Berthelier was in the habit of frequenting. As a six days’ search led to nothing, they were forced to rest satisfied with summoning the accused by sound of the trumpet. No one had any more doubts about his escape: the liberals were delighted, but anger and vexation prevailed at the castle.

CHAPTER IX.
BERTHELIER CALLS THE SWISS TO THE AID OF GENEVA; HUGUENOTS AND MAMELUKES; THE BISHOP’S VIOLENCE.

Berthelier’s flight was more than a flight. He went to Switzerland; and from that day Switzerland turned towards Geneva, and held out the hand to her.

Disguised in the livery of an usher of the city of Friburg, the faithful citizen arrived there without hindrance. No one there felt more affection for Geneva than Councillor Marty, governor of the hospital, who by his energy, rank, and intelligence, possessed great influence in the city. Berthelier went to his house, sat down at his hearth, and remained for some time sorrowful, silent, and motionless. It was thus that an illustrious Roman had formerly sat with veiled head at the hearth of a stranger; but Coriolanus sought among the Volsci the means of destroying his country, Berthelier sought at Friburg the means of saving his. A great idea, which had long since quickened in the hearts of himself and some other patriots, had occupied his mind while he was riding through the Vaudois territory. Times had changed. The long conspiracy of Savoy against Geneva was on the point of succeeding. The obstinate duke, the dishonoured bishop, the crafty count—all united their forces to destroy the independence of the city. Switzerland alone, after God, could save it from the hands of the Savoyards. Geneva must become a canton, or at least an ally of Switzerland. ‘For that,’ said Berthelier, ‘I would give my head.’ He began to discourse familiarly with his host. He told him that he had arrived in Friburg, poor, exiled, persecuted, and a suppliant; not to save his life, but to save Geneva; that he had come to pray Friburg to receive the Genevans into citizenship. At the same time he described with eloquence the calamities of his country. Marty greatly moved held out his hand, told him to take courage and to follow him into the ‘abbeys’ where the guilds assembled. ‘If you gain them,’ he said, ‘your cause is won.’

The Genevan and the Friburger immediately set off together to the chief of these ‘abbeys’ or clubs. They had scarcely entered the hall, when Marty in some confusion whispered into his companion’s ear: ‘Some of the duke’s pensioners are here; veil your meaning, for fear they should stop our work.’ Berthelier took the hint, and, rendered cautious by the presence of his enemies, spoke in ambiguous language, concealing his thoughts, but in such a manner that they might be guessed. He spoke of the wars that Burgundy had waged against Switzerland and of Charles the Bold; he intended thus to remind them of the war Savoy was now making upon Geneva and of Charles the Good. He hinted that the Swiss ought to distrust the Duke of Savoy, however smiling the face he showed them. Had they not spoiled his country during the Burgundian wars, and did they not still occupy a part of it? ‘Your ancestors,’ said Berthelier, ‘have plundered and ravaged certain provinces—you know which—and in any case others do not forget it.... If somebody should become master of Geneva, he would fortify it against you ... but if Geneva became your ally, you could make it your rampart against all princes and potentates.’ Every one knew of whom Berthelier was speaking. But if he saw the angry eye of some pensioner of Savoy fixed upon him, he became more guarded, his language more figurative and interrupted; he spoke lower, and ‘as if at random,’ said Bonivard. Then remembering Geneva, his courage revived, and his energetic accents burst forth again in the council of Friburg. He then forgot all prudence, and made, says the chronicler, a great lament of the oppression under which the city groaned. This speech, which aroused violent storms, was not to remain useless: Berthelier’s eloquent words were fruitful thoughts, cast into the hearts of the people of Friburg. Like those seeds which, borne by the tempest, fall here and there among the Alps, they were destined one day to revive in Geneva the ancient tree of her liberties.[118]

The exile desired that the Friburgers should see the misfortunes of Geneva with their own eyes, and connect themselves with the principal men there. If Geneva and Friburg come together, he thought, the flame will break out and the union will be cemented. He attained his end. Some citizens of Friburg set off, arrived at Geneva, and were welcomed by Besançon Hugues, Vandel, and all the patriots. They dined sometimes with one, sometimes with the other. They spoke of the liberties of the Swiss; they described their heroic struggles, and in these animated conversations, hearts were melted and united in such a way as to form but one. The deputies, having been received by the council, complained of the violation of the franchises of the city, and demanded a safe-conduct for Berthelier. Three councillors immediately set off for St. Joire, a village in the mountains, a few leagues from Geneva, where the bastard happened to be staying at a castle he possessed there. John did not like to be disturbed in his country retreats; he gave orders, however, that the magistrates should be admitted, when they set before him pretty plainly the complaints of the Friburgers. ‘What! I violate the franchises!’ he exclaimed, with a look of astonishment, ‘I had never even thought of it. A safe-conduct for Berthelier ... why, he does not require one. If he believes himself innocent, let him come; I am a good prince.... No, no, no! No safe-conduct!’ On the 12th of August the syndics communicated this answer to the Friburgers. The Swiss were indignant, and as if the syndics had some share in the matter, they upbraided them: ‘Why even the Turks would not refuse a safe-conduct, and yet a bishop dares do it! A safe-conduct useless?... Was not Pécolat seized a few days ago beyond the bounds of the city? Did they not expose him to such torture that pain extorted from him all they wanted? Citizens have left the town in alarm; others are shut up in their houses. Are they not always bringing one or another into trouble? And yet the bishop refuses Berthelier a safe-conduct?... Very well! we will get together all these grievances and see them remedied. Rest assured of this ... we will risk our persons and our goods. We will come in such force that we will take his Highness’s governor in the Pays de Vaud, the friends of Savoy in your city, and then—we will treat them as you have treated our friends.’—Upon this they departed in great anger, say contemporary manuscripts.[119]

The language of the Friburgers, repeated from house to house, inflamed all hearts. The union between Geneva and Switzerland was, so to speak, accomplished before any public act had rendered it official and authentic. Berthelier had foreseen that Geneva would find in the Helvetic league a mightier protection than in that of the young men enrolled beneath the flag of dissipation.[120] From that moment a political party was slowly formed, a party calm but firm, which put itself at the head of the movement and replaced the licentious band of the ‘children of Geneva.’

The Friburg deputies had hardly left the city, when the duke’s party accosting the independent Genevans, and gallicising each in his own way the German word Eidesgenossen (confederates) which they could not pronounce, called after them Eidguenots, Eignots, Eyguenots, Huguenots! This word is met with in the chronicles of the time written in different ways;[121] Michel Roset, the most respectable of these authorities of the sixteenth century, writes Huguenots; we adopt that form, because it is the only one that has passed into our language. It is possible that the name of the citizen, Besançon Hugues, who became the principal leader of this party, may have contributed to the preference of this form over all the others. In any case it must be remembered that until after the Reformation this sobriquet had a purely political meaning, in no respect religious, and designated simply the friends of independence. Many years after, the enemies of the protestants of France called them by this name, wishing to stigmatise them, and impute to them a foreign, republican, and heretical origin. Such is the true etymology of the word; it would be very strange if these two denominations, which are really but one, had played so great a part in the sixteenth century, at Geneva and in French protestantism, without having had any connection with one another. A little later, about Christmas, 1518, when the cause of the alliance was more advanced, its use became more general. The adherents of the duke had no sooner started the nickname than their opponents, repaying them in their own coin, called out: ‘Hold your tongues, you Mamelukes!... As the Mamelukes have denied Christ to follow Mahomet, so you deny liberty and the public cause to put yourselves under a tyranny.’[122] At the head of these Mamelukes were some forty rich tradesmen, men good enough at heart despite their nickname, but they were men of business who feared that disturbances would diminish their gains. The term Mamelukes put them into a great passion: ‘Yes,’ continued the Huguenots, ‘Sultan Selim conquered the Mamelukes last year in Egypt; but it seems that these slaves, when expelled from Cairo, took refuge at Geneva. However, if you do not like the name ... stay, since you deliver up Geneva through avarice, we will call you Judases!’[123]

While the city was thus disturbed, the bishop, proud of having tortured the wretched Pécolat, removed from St. Joire to Thonon. He had never experienced to a like degree the pleasure of making his power felt, and was delighted at it; for though servile before the duke, he had in him some of the characteristics of the tyrant. He had made somebody tremble! ... and he therefore regarded the trap laid for Pécolat as a glorious deed, and desired to enjoy his triumph in the capital of Chablais. At the same time he repeated to every one who would listen to him that he would not return to Geneva: ‘They would murder me,’ he said. The Genevans, conscientiously submissive to the established order, resolved to display their loyalty in a marked manner. There lived at that time in Geneva an old man, Pierre d’Orsières, respected by all parties, whose family possessed the lordship of that name in Valais, on the way to the St. Bernard pass. Forty years before (in 1477) he had been one of the hostages given to the Swiss; since then he had been six times elected chief magistrate of the State. His son Hugonin had been made a canon out of respect to his father; but he was a fanatical priest and in after days the most hostile of all the clergy to the Reformation. The council resolved to send a solemn deputation to the bishop, and placed the syndic D’Orsières at its head.

It was perhaps carrying rather far their desire to appear loyal subjects, and these good people of Geneva were to learn what it costs to flatter a tyrant. The bastard determined to gain fresh triumphs. Tormented by disease he needed diversion; the sufferings of his enemies made him feel a certain pleasure—it was sympathy after his fashion. He bore a mortal hatred against all the Genevans, even against the most catholic: an opportunity of gratifying it offered itself. The deputation having appeared before him and made every demonstration of respect, he fixed his bloodshot eyes upon the noble old man, whose hoary head bent humbly before him, and ordered him to be seized, to be taken out of his sight and thrown into a dungeon. If he had been proud of his exploits against Pécolat the hosier, he was more so now at having by one bold stroke put out of the way a man whose family shone in the first rank, and whom his fellow-citizens had invested with the sacred character of ambassador. When the news of this outrage reached Geneva, all the city (Huguenot and Mameluke) cried out. The man most respected in the whole State had been seized as a criminal at the very moment when he was giving the bishop proofs of the most loyal fidelity. They doubted not that this crime would be the signal of an attack upon the city; the citizens immediately ran to arms, stretched the chains across the streets, and shut the gates.[124]

The duke was displeased at these mistakes of the bishop, and they came upon him at a difficult moment. Charles III., a weak and fickle prince, inclined at that time to the emperor’s side, and displeased his nephew Francis I., who seemed disposed to give him a roughish lesson. Moreover, the proceedings of the Friburgers disquieted him, for Geneva was lost to Savoy if the Swiss took up its cause. Liberty, hitherto driven back to the German Alps, would plant her standard in that city of the Leman, and raise a platform whence she would act upon all the populations speaking the French tongue. The most skilful politicians of Savoy—Seyssel who had just been appointed archbishop of Turin, and Eustace Chappuis who understood thoroughly the mutual relations of states, and whom Charles V. employed afterwards in his negotiations with Henry VIII.—represented to the duke that he must take care at any cost not to alienate the Swiss. The terrified Charles III. assented to everything, and Chappuis was authorised to patch up the blunders committed by the bishop.

This learned diplomatist saw clearly that the great business was, if possible, to raise an insurmountable barrier between the Swiss and the Genevans. He reflected on the means of effecting it: and resolving to show himself kind and good-natured, he set out for Geneva. By the duke’s intervention he had been made official of the episcopal court; as such he was sworn in before the syndics; he then exerted all his skill to alienate the Genevans from the Swiss and attach them to the house of Savoy; but his fine words did not convert many. ‘The duke,’ said the prior of St. Victor, ‘seeing that his cats have caught no rats, sends us the sleekest of mousers.’ Chappuis immediately set off for Friburg, where he began to practise on the pensioners. ‘Ha!’ said they, ‘Berthelier is an instance of what the princes of Savoy can do.’ The diplomatist stuck at nothing: he called upon the fugitive and entreated him to return to Geneva, promising him a pardon.—‘A pardon!’ exclaimed the haughty citizen, ‘pardon does not concern good men but criminals. I demand absolution if I am innocent, and punishment if I am guilty.’[125]

Berthelier’s firmness paralysed all the diplomatist’s efforts; and it was decided that the duke himself should visit Switzerland. Making a pretence of business at Geneva and Lausanne, Charles III. arrived at Friburg and Berne. He endeavoured to win over the cantons, induced them to dissuade the king of France from making war upon him, renewed his alliance with the League, and as they complained of the tyranny of his cousin the bishop, of the illegal arrest of Pécolat, and of Berthelier’s exile, he made them all the fairest promises.[126]

But he reckoned without his host: the bishop who had a meaner character than the duke, had also a more obstinate temper. As his illustrious cousin had visited Switzerland, it was his duty to be there to receive him; he had accordingly returned to Geneva, and as some sensible men had made him understand how deeply he was compromised in D’Orsières’ arrest, he set the good old man at liberty. If he consented to yield on this point, he was determined not to give way on others. When the syndics complained to him of the irregularities committed within the city and without, representing to him that citizens were arrested without cause, and that too, not by the officers of justice, but—a thing unprecedented—by his own archers, the prelate was deaf; he turned away his head, looked at what was going on around him, and dismissed the magistrates as politely as he could. Accordingly when the duke returned from Friburg, the syndics laid all their grievances before him: ‘Our franchises are infringed by the bishop. A citizen cannot be arrested beyond our boundaries, yet Pécolat was seized at Pressinge. All criminal cases fall within the syndics’ jurisdiction, yet Pécolat has been tried by the episcopal officers.’ Whereupon the bishop and the duke, wishing to have the appearance of giving some little satisfaction to the Swiss and the Genevans, transferred Pécolat from his prison at Thiez to Geneva, and shut him up in the Château de l’Ile. But neither the duke nor the bishop dreamt of letting him go; would they ever have a better opportunity of showing the cardinals that the bishop’s life was in danger? But if Pécolat should appear before the syndics, his judges, would he be condemned? The duke’s friends shook their heads. ‘One of them, the elder Lévrier, an incorrigible dotard,’ they said, ‘would sooner be put in prison, as in 1506, than give way; another, Richardet, a hot-headed fellow, would wax wroth, and perhaps draw his sword; and Porral, a wag like his elder brother, would turn his back and laugh at the Mamelukes!’

CHAPTER X.
FRESH TORTURES, PÉCOLAT’S DESPAIR AND STRIKING DELIVERANCE.

Pécolat’s condemnation became the chief business of the court of Turin in its relations with Geneva. Archbishop Seyssel, who at that time possessed great influence, was not for despotism: he approved of moderating the royal authority, but hated republics, and wished to take advantage of Pécolat’s trial to crush the spirit of liberty, which was displaying so much energy in Geneva, and which might spread farther. Feeling the importance of this case, in combating the Huguenot influence, the archbishop determined to withdraw, if possible, the Genevan from his natural judges, and resorted to a trick unworthy so great a statesman. He represented that high treason, the crime of which Pécolat was accused, was not one of those comprehended under the constitutions of the city, and that the cognisance belonged therefore to the prince; but he could not succeed. ‘We have the power,’ answered the syndics, ‘to take cognisance of every criminal case.’ All that Seyssel could obtain was that the bishop should appoint delegates who would sit in court and give their opinion, but not vote.[127]

The judges met in the Château de l’Ile on the 10th of December, 1517; they were surrounded by the duke’s and the bishop’s attorneys, the governor of Vaud, and other partisans of Savoy. Among the six councillors who were to sit with the syndics (the judges being thus ten in number), were some decided ducal partisans, upon whom the bishop could rely for a sentence of condemnation. Poor Pécolat, still suffering, was brought in by the vidame. The sight of the syndics—of the elder Lévrier, Richardet, and Porral—revived his courage: he knew that they were just men and enemies of episcopal despotism. ‘The confessions I made at Thiez,’ he said, ‘were wrung from me by torture: the judge dictated the words and I repeated them after him. I knew that if I did not say what they wanted, they would break my arms, and maim me for ever.’[128]

After this declaration, the examination began: the clearness of Pécolat’s answers, his gentleness and candour, showed all present that they had before them an innocent man, whom powerful princes desired to destroy. The syndics having declared that they were bound to acquit him, the bishop said: ‘Give him the question, and you will see clearly that he is guilty.’ The syndics refused, whereupon the two princes accused them of being partial and suspected men. The episcopal council, therefore, decided, that the city and the bishop should each appoint four judges—an illegal measure, to which the syndics submitted.

The new examination ought to have taken place on the 20th of January, 1518; but Pécolat, suffering from the torture past and terrified by the torture to come, had fallen seriously ill, and it was necessary to send the doctor to him. This man consented to his being carried before the court. The four episcopal judges immediately called for the question, but the syndics opposed it, and the episcopal delegates began to study this living corpse. After examining him attentively they said: ‘He still affords some hold for the torture; he may be examined with a few torments’ (such is the expression in the report). Nergaz siding with the Savoyard doctors, the torture was decided upon. Poor Pécolat began to tremble from head to foot; he knew that he should denounce all his friends, and cursed his own weakness. They tied his hands behind his back, they showed him the rack, and interrogated him.... ‘However, they did not torture him,’ continues the report, ‘considering the weakness of his body and his long imprisonment.’ They thought that the fear of the rack would suffice to make him speak; they were deceived; the sick—we might almost call him the dying man, though tied up and bound, having the instrument of torture before him, answered with simplicity and frankness. Even the bishop’s judges were struck with his candour, and two of them, ‘having the fear of God before their eyes,’ says Bonivard, rather than the fear of men, declared roundly: ‘They have done this poor man wrong. Non invenimus in eo causam. We find no fault in him.’[129]

This honourable declaration embarrassed the duke all the more that he had other anxieties on his mind. The news from Piedmont was bad: every day he received letters urging him to return. ‘The Marquis of Montferrat.’ they told him, ‘is committing serious depredations.’ But the headstrong prince was ready to lose his own states, if he could but get Geneva—and lose them he did not long after. Finding himself on the point of discovering a conspiracy, calculated to satisfy the cardinals, he resolved not to yield. His creatures and those of the prelate held conference after conference; at last they found a means—a diabolical means—of putting Pécolat to death. Seeing that lay judges were not to be persuaded to condemn an innocent man, they resolved that he should be tried by priests. To put this plan into execution, it was necessary to change the layman—the ex-hosier, the merry fellow who was at every banquet and every masquerade—into a churchman. They succeeded. ‘To gratify their appetite,’ said Bonivard, ‘they produced a forged letter, to the effect that Pécolat was an ordained clerk ... and therefore his case belonged not to the secular, but to the ecclesiastical judge.’ The fraud found, or seemed to find belief in the official world. ‘Accordingly,’ goes on the chronicle, ‘they transferred him from the Château de l’Ile, which was the lay prison, to the bishop’s palace which was the Church court, and he was placed once more in the hands of the Pharisees.’ This was a stroke worthy of a celebrated religious order not yet in existence, but which was about to be founded to combat the Reformation. Henceforth we shall see none of that silly consideration, of that delicate circumspection, which the laymen had employed. The bishop, now become judge and party, ‘deliberated how to handle him well.’ Some persons having asserted that Pécolat could not endure the rack, the doctors again examined his poor body: some said yes and others no, so the judges decided that the first were right, and the instrument of torture was prepared. It was not only heroic men like the Bertheliers and Lévriers, who, by their daring opposition to arbitrary power, were then raising the edifice of liberty; but it was also these wicked judges, these tyrannical princes, these cruel executioners, who by their wheel and rack were preparing the new and more equitable times of modern society.[130]

When Pécolat was informed of the fatal decision, his terrors recommenced. The prospect of a new torture, the thought of the accusations he would make against his friends, disturbed his conscience and plunged him into despair.... His features were distorted by it, his beard was in disorder, his eyes were haggard: all in him expressed suffering and terror. His keepers, not understanding this state of his mind, thought that he was possessed by a devil. ‘Berthelier,’ said they, ‘is a great charmer, he has a familiar spirit. He has charmed Pécolat to render him insensible to the torture; try as we may, he will say nothing.’ It was the belief at that time that the charmers lodged certain devils in the patients’ hair. The prisoner’s long rough beard disquieted the bishop’s officers. It was resolved that Pécolat should be shaved in order to expel the demon.[131]

According to rule it should have been an exorcist and not a barber that they should have sent for. Robed in surplice and stole, the priest should have made the sign of the cross over Pécolat, sprinkled him with holy water, and pronounced loud-sounding anathemas against the evil spirit. But no, the bishop was contented to send a barber, which was much more prosaic; it may be that, besides all his other vices, the bastard was a freethinker. The barber came and got his razor ready. The devil whom Pécolat feared, was his own cowardice. ‘I shall inculpate my best friends,’ he said to himself; ‘I shall confess that Berthelier wished to kill the bishop; I shall say all they want me to say.... And then if I die on the rack (which was very possible, considering the exhaustion of his strength) I shall be eternally damned for having lied in the hour of death.’ This idea alarmed him; a tempest agitated his soul; he was already in agony. ‘It is better,’ he thought, ‘to cut off an arm, a foot, or even the tongue, than fall into everlasting perdition.’ At this moment the barber, who had wetted the beard, quitted the room to throw the water out of the basin; Pécolat caught up the razor which the man had left on the table by his side and raised it to his tongue; but moral and physical force both failing him, he made only a gash. He was trying again, when the barber returned, sprang upon him in affright, snatched the razor from his hand, and raised an alarm. The gaoler, his family, and the prince’s surgeon rushed in and found Pécolat ‘coughing and spitting out blood in large quantities.’ They seized him and began to stanch the blood, which it was not difficult to do. His tongue was not cut off, as some have asserted; there was only a deep wound. The officers of the duke and the bishop took extraordinary pains to cure him, ‘not to do him good,’ say the chronicles, ‘but to do him a greater ill another time, and that he might use his tongue in singing whatever they pleased.’ All were greatly astounded at this mystery, of which there was great talk throughout the city.[132] Pécolat’s wound having been dressed, the bastard demanded that he should be put to the rack, but Lévrier, feeling convinced that Pécolat was the innocent victim of an illegal proceeding, opposed it. The bishop still persisted in the necessity of obtaining a confession from him: ‘Confession!’ replied the judge, ‘he cannot speak.’—‘Well then,’ answered, not the executioner but, the bishop, ‘let him write his answer.’ Lévrier, as firm when it was necessary to maintain the respect due to humanity as the obedience due to the law, declared that such cruelty should not be practised before his tribunal. The bishop was forced to give way, but he kept account of this new offence on the part of the contumacious judge.[133]

All Geneva pitied the unhappy man, and asked if there was no one to deliver him from this den of thieves? Bonivard, a man who afterwards knew in his own person the horrors of a prison, never ceased thinking of the means of saving him. He loved Pécolat; he had often admired that simple nature of his, so impulsive, so strong and yet so weak, and above all his devotion to the cause of the liberties of the city. He felt that human and divine rights, the compassion due to the unhappy, his duty towards Geneva, (‘although I am not a native,’ he said,)—all bound him to make an effort. He left his monastery, called upon Aimé Lévrier, and expressed his desire to save Pécolat. Lévrier explained to him that the bishop had forbidden any further steps, and that the judges could not act without his consent. ‘There is however one means,’ added he. ‘Let Pécolat’s relations demand justice of me; I shall refuse, alleging the prince’s good pleasure. Then let them appeal, on the ground of denial of justice,[134] to the metropolitan court of Vienne.’ Bonivard, full of imagination, of invention, of resources, heedless of precedents, and energetic, immediately resolved to try this course. The Archbishop of Vienne (he argued) being always jealous of the Bishop of Geneva, would be delighted to humble his powerful colleague. ‘I have friends, relations, and influence in Savoy,’ said he, ‘I will move heaven and earth, and we will teach the bastard a pretty lesson.’ He returned to his monastery and sent for Pécolat’s two brothers. One of them, Stephen, enjoyed the full confidence of his fellow-citizens, and was afterwards raised to the highest offices; but the tyranny of the princes alarmed everybody: ‘Demand that your brother be brought to trial,’ said Bonivard to the two brothers.—‘No,’ they answered, ‘the risk is too serious.’ ... Bonivard’s eloquence prevailed at last. Not wishing to leave them time for reflection, he took them forthwith to Lévrier; the petition, answer, and legal appeal were duly made; and Stephen Pécolat, who by contact with these two generous souls had become brave, departed for Vienne in Dauphiny with a warm recommendation from the prior. The Church of Vienne had enjoyed from ancient times the title of holy, of maxima sedes Galliarum, and its metropolitan was primate of all Gaul. This prelate, delighted with the opportunity of making his authority felt by a bishop who was then more powerful than himself, summoned the procurator-fiscal, the episcopal council, and the bishop of Geneva to appear before his court of Vienne within a certain term, to hear judgment. In the meanwhile he forbade the bishop to proceed against the prisoner under pain of excommunication. ‘We are in the right road now,’ said Bonivard to Lévrier. But who would serve this daring summons upon the bishop? These writs of Vienne were held in such slight esteem by the powerful prelates of Geneva, that it was usual to cudgel the bearers of them. It might be foreseen that the bishop and duke would try every means to nullify the citation, or induce the archbishop to recall it. In short, this was not an ordinary case. If Pécolat was declared innocent, if his depositions against Berthelier were declared false, what would become of the scheme of Charles III. and Leo X. at which the bishop himself so basely connived? Geneva would remain free.... The difficulties which started up did not dishearten Bonivard; he thought that the devices set on foot to enslave the city were hateful, and that as he wished to live and die there, he ought to defend it. ‘And then,’ adds a chronicler, ‘the commander of St. Victor was more bold than wise.’ Bonivard formed his resolution. ‘Nobody,’ he said, ‘dares bell the cat ... then I will attempt the deed.’ ... But his position did not permit him ‘to pass the river alone.’ It was necessary that the metropolitan citation should be served on the bishop by an episcopal bailiff. He began to search for such a man; and recollecting a certain poor clerk who vegetated in a wretched room in the city, he sent for him, put two crowns in his hand, and said: ‘Here is a letter from the metropolitan that must be delivered to the bishop. The duke and the prelate set out the day after to-morrow for Turin; to-morrow morning they will go and hear mass at St. Pierre; that will be the latest hour. There will be no time after that. Hand this paper to my lord.’ The clerk was afraid, though the two crowns tempted him strongly; Bonivard pressed him: ‘Well,’ said the poor fellow, ‘I will promise to serve the writ, provided you assist me personally.’ Bonivard agreed to do so.

The next day the prior and the clerk entered the cathedral. The princes were present, surrounded with much pomp: it was high mass, a farewell mass; nobody was absent. Bonivard in his quality of canon had a place of honour in the cathedral which would have brought him near the bishop; but he took care not to go there, and kept himself at a distance behind the clerk in order to watch him; he feared lest the poor man should get frightened and escape. The consecration, the elevation, the chanting, all the sumptuous forms of Roman worship, all the great people bending before the altar, acted upon the unlucky bailiff’s imagination. He began to tremble, and when the mass was ended and the moment for action arrived, ‘seeing,’ says Bonivard, ‘that the game was to be played in earnest,’ he lost his courage, stealthily crept backwards, and prepared to run away. But Bonivard, who was watching him, suddenly stepped forward, seized him by the collar, and placing the other hand upon a dagger, which he held beneath his robe, whispered in his ear: ‘If you do not keep your promise, I swear I will kill you.’ The clerk was almost frightened to death, and not without cause, ‘for,’ adds Bonivard in his plain-spoken ‘Chronicles,’ ‘I should have done it, which I do not say to my praise; I know now that I acted foolishly. But youth and affection carried me away.’ He did not kill the clerk, however; he was satisfied with holding him tightly by the thumb, and with a firm hand held him by his side. The poor terrified man wished in vain to fly: Bonivard’s dagger kept him motionless; he was like a marble statue.[135]

Meanwhile the duke, his brother the count, and the bishop were leaving the church, attended by their magnificent retinue, and returning to the episcopal palace, where there was to be a grand reception. ‘Now,’ said Bonivard to the clerk, ‘no more delay, you must discharge your commission;’ then he put the metropolitan citation into the hand that was free, and still holding him by the thumb, led him thus to the palace.

When he came near the bishop, the energetic prior letting go the thumb, which he had held as if in a vice, and pointing to the prelate, said to the clerk: ‘Do your duty.’ The bishop hearing these words, ‘was much afraid,’ says Bonivard, ‘and turned pale, thinking I was ordering him to be killed.’ The cowardly prelate turning with alarm towards the supposed assassin cast a look of distress upon those around him. The clerk trembled as much as he; but meeting the terrible eye of the prior and seeing the dagger under his robes, he fell on his knees before the bishop, and kissing the writ, presented it to him, saying: ‘My lord, inhibitur vobis, prout in copia.’[136] He then put the document into his hand and ran off: ‘Upon this,’ adds the prior, ‘I retired to my priory of St. Victor. I felt such juvenile and silly arrogance, that I feared neither bishop nor duke.’ Bonivard had his culverins no longer, but he would yet have stood a siege if necessary to bring this matter to a successful issue. The bishop never forgot the fright Bonivard had caused him, and swore to be even with him.

This energetic action gave courage to others. Fourscore citizens more or less implicated with Pécolat in the affair of the rotten fish—‘all honest people’—appeared before the princes, and demanded that if they and Pécolat were guilty, they should be punished; but if they were innocent that it should be publicly acknowledged. The princes, whose situation was growing difficult, were by no means eager to have eighty cases in hand instead of one. ‘We are sure,’ they answered, ‘that this poisoning is a thing invented by certain wicked men, and we look upon all of you as honest people. But as for Pécolat, he was always a naughty fellow; for which reason we wish to keep him a short time in prison to correct him.’ Then fearing lest he should be liberated by force during their absence, the princes of Savoy had him transferred to the castle of Peney, which was contrary to the franchises of the city. The transfer took place on the 29th of January, 1518.[137]

A division in the Church came to Pécolat’s assistance. Since the struggles between Victor and Polycrat in the second century, between Cyprian and Stephen in the third, dissensions between the catholic bishops have never ceased; and in the middle ages particularly, there were often severe contests between the bishops and their metropolitans. The Archbishop of Vienne did not understand yielding to the Bishop of Geneva, and at the very moment when Luther’s Theses were resounding throughout Christendom—in 1517 and 1518—the Roman Church on the banks of the Rhone was giving a poor illustration of its pretended unity. The metropolitan, finding his citations useless, ordered the bishop to liberate Pécolat, under pain of excommunication;[138] but the episcopal officers who remained in Geneva, only laughed, like their master, at the metropolitan and his threats.

Pécolat’s friends took the matter more seriously. They feared for his life. Who could tell whether the bastard had not left orders to get rid of the prisoner, and left Geneva in order to escape the people’s anger? These apprehensions were not without cause, for more than one upright man was afterwards to be sacrificed in the castle of Peney. Stephen Pécolat and some of his brother’s friends waited on St. Victor; ‘The superior metropolitan authority has ordered Pécolat to be released,’ they said; ‘we shall go off straight in search of him.’ The acute Bonivard represented to them that the gaolers would not give him up, that the castle was strong, and they would fail in the attack; that the whole people should demand the liberation of the innocent man detained by the bishop in his dungeons, in despite of the liberties of the city and the orders of his metropolitan. ‘A little patience,’ he continued; ‘we are near the beginning of Lent, holy week is not far off; the interdict will then be published by the metropolitan. The christians finding themselves deprived of the sacrament will grow riotous, and will compel the bishop’s officers to set our friend at liberty. Thus the inhibition which we served upon the bishop in his palace, will produce its effect in despite of him.’ The advice was thought sound, they agreed to it, and everybody in Geneva waited with impatience for Easter and the excommunication.

Anthony de la Colombière, official to the metropolitan of Vienne, arrived to execute the orders of his superior, and having come to an understanding with the prior of St. Victor and judge Lévrier, he ordered, on the 18th of March, that Pécolat should be released within twenty-four hours. He waited eight days, but waited in vain, for the episcopal officers continued to disobey him. Then, on Good Friday, the metropolitan officers, bearing the sentence of excommunication and interdict, proceeded to the cathedral at two o’clock in the afternoon, and there, in the presence of John Gallatin, notary, and three other witnesses, they posted up the terrible monition; at four o’clock they did the same at the churches of St. Gervais and St. Germain. This was not indeed the thunder of the Vatican, but it was nevertheless the excommunication of a prelate who, at Geneva, filled the first place after the pope in the Roman hierarchy. The canons, priests, and parishioners, as they went to evening prayers, walked up to the placards and were quite aghast as they read them. ‘We excommunicate,’ they ran, ‘the episcopal officers, and order that this excommunication be published in the churches, with bell, book, and candle. Moreover, we command, under pain of the same excommunication, the syndics and councillors to attack the castles and prisons wherein Pécolat is detained, and to liberate him by force. Finally we pronounce the interdict against all places wherein these excommunicates are found. And if, like the deaf adder, they persist in their wickedness, we interdict the celebration not only of the sacraments, but also of divine service, in the churches of St. Pierre, Notre Dame la Neuve, St. Germain, St. Gervais, St. Victor, St. Leger, and Holy Cross.’[139] After the canons and priests had read this document, they halted in consternation at the threshold of the church. They looked at one another, and asked what was to be done. Having well considered, they said: ‘Here’s a barrier we cannot get over,’ and they retired.

As the number of devout catholics was still pretty large in Geneva, what Bonivard had foreseen came to pass; and the agitation was general. No more services, no more masses, no baptisms, no marriages ... divine worship suspended, the cross hidden, the altars stripped.[140] ... What was to be done? The chapter was sitting, and several citizens appeared before them in great irritation. ‘It is you,’ they said to the terrified canons, ‘that are the cause of all this.’ ... Nor was this all. The excommunicates of the Savoyard parishes of the diocese used to come every year at the approach of Easter and petition the bishop’s official for letters of consentment, in order that their parish priests might give them the communion. ‘Now of such folks there chanced to be a great number at Geneva. Heyday, they said, it is of no use putting one obstacle aside, when another starts up immediately, all owing to the fault of these episcopal officers!’ ... The exasperated Savoyards united with the Genevans, and the agitated crowd assembled in front of the cathedral gates; the men murmured, the women wept, even priests joined the laity. Loud shouts were heard erelong. The people’s patience was exhausted; they took part against their bishop. ‘To the Rhone,’ cried the devout, ‘to the Rhone with the traitors! the villains who prevent us from receiving our Lord!’ The excommunicated episcopal officers had a narrow escape from drowning. All the diocese fancied itself excommunicated, and accordingly the confusion extended beyond the city. The syndics came up and entreated the citizens to be calm; and then, going to the episcopal council, the bishop being still absent, they said: ‘Release Pécolat, or we cannot protect you against the anger of the people.’ The episcopal officers seeing the bishop and the duke on one side, the metropolitan and the people on the other, and impelled in contrary directions, knew not whom to obey. It was reported to them that all the city was in an uproar, that the most devout catholics wished at any cost to communicate on Easter Sunday, and that looking upon them as the only obstacle which prevented their receiving the host, they had determined to throw them over the bridge. ‘The first of you that comes out shall go over,’ cried the crowd. They were seized with great alarm, and fancying themselves half drowned already, wrote to the governor of Peney to release Pécolat forthwith. The messenger departed, and the friends and relations of the prisoner, not trusting to the episcopal court, accompanied him. During the three-quarters of an hour that the walk occupied, the crowd kept saying:—suppose the governor should refuse to give up his victim; suppose the bastard’s agents have already carried him away—perhaps put him to death? None of these suppositions was realised. Deep in a dungeon of the castle, the poor man, heavily chained, in utter darkness, wrecked both in mind and body, was giving way to the blackest melancholy. Suddenly he hears a noise. He listens; he seems to recognise well-known voices: it was his brothers and his friends arriving noisily under the walls of the castle, and giving utterance to their joy.

Their success was, however, less certain than it appeared to them. Strange things were, in fact, taking place at that moment in Geneva. The bishop and the duke had not been so passive as had been imagined, and at the very instant when the messenger bearing the order from the episcopal court, and accompanied by a body of Genevans, was leaving by the French gate, a courier, with an order from the Roman court, entered by the Savoy gate. The latter went with all speed to the bishop’s representatives, and handed them the pontifical letters which the princes had obtained, and by which the pope annulled the censures of the metropolitan. This Roman messenger brought in addition an order from the bishop forbidding them on their lives to release Pécolat. The bastard had shuddered at the thought that the wretch whom he had so successfully tortured, might escape him: he had moved heaven and earth to keep him in prison. We may imagine the emotion and alarm which fell upon the episcopal councillors when they read the letters handed to them. The coincidence of the moment when these two contradictory orders left Geneva and arrived there is so striking, that we may ask whether these letters from Rome and Turin were not supposed—invented by the episcopal officers themselves; but there is nothing in the narrative to indicate a trick. ‘Immediately on reading the letters, the episcopal officers with all diligence countermanded the release.’ These words in the ‘Annals’ show the precipitation with which they endeavoured to repair the mistake they had committed. There was not, in fact, a moment to lose, if they wished to keep Pécolat. Several officers got on horseback and set off full gallop.

The bearers of this order were hardly halfway, when they met a numerous jubilant and noisy crowd returning from Peney. The friends of Pécolat, preceded by the official letters addressed to the governor, had appeared before that officer, who, after reading the despatch over and over, had thought it his duty to obey. Pécolat’s friends hurried after the gaoler, who, carrying a bunch of keys in his hand, went to open the cell; they entered with him, shouting release! They broke the prisoner’s chains; and, finding him so weak, carried him in their arms and laid him in the sunshine in the castle yard. Without loss of time they placed him in a peasant’s cart and all started for Geneva. This was the crowd met by the episcopal officers. The Genevans were bringing back their friend with shouts of joy. In vain did the episcopal officers stop this joyous band, and require that the prisoner should be led back to Peney; in vain did they speak of the bishop and even of the pope; all was of no use. Despite the rogations of the pope, the prelate, and the messengers, the people carried Pécolat back in triumph. This resistance offered to the Roman pontiff, at the moment he was lending assistance to the bastard in his oppression of a poor innocent man, was, as it were, an affair of outposts; and the Genevans were thus training themselves for more notable battles. ‘Forward,’ they shouted, ‘to the city! to the city!’ and the crowd, leaving the episcopal officers alone in the middle of the road, hastened to the gates.

At last they approached Geneva, and there the excitement was not less great than on the road. Pécolat’s return was the triumph of right over injustice, of liberty over despotism; and accordingly it was celebrated with enthusiasm. The poor man, dumb (for his wound was not yet healed), shattered by the torture, and wasted away by his long captivity, looked silently on all around him, and experienced an emotion he could hardly contain. After such trials he was returning into the old city amid the joyous cries of the population. However, his friends did not forget the orders of the pope and the bishop; and fearing lest the vidame should again seize the poor fellow, they took him to the convent of the Grey Friars of Rive, an asylum reputed inviolable, and quartered him in the cell of his brother, the monk Yvonnet. There the poor invalid received all the affectionate attendance he required; he remained some time without saying much; but at last he recovered his speech, ‘by the intercession of a saint,’ said the priests and Pécolat himself, as it would appear. Was it devoutly or jestingly that he spoke of this pretended miraculous cure? We shall not decide. Bonivard, who perhaps no longer believed in the miracles of saints, assigns another reason: ‘The surgeons dressed the wound in his tongue;’ and he adds: ‘He always stuttered a little.’ If Bonivard had doubts about the saints, he believed in the sovereign justice of God: ‘Then came to pass a thing,’ he said, ‘which should not be forgotten; all the judges who condemned Pécolat to be tortured died this year, one after another, which we cannot suppose to have happened except as a divine punishment.’

The remembrance of Pécolat’s torture long remained in the memory of the citizens of Geneva, and contributed to make them reject the rule of the Romish bishops.[141] In fact the interest felt for this victim of episcopal cruelty was manifested in every way. The cell of brother Yvonnet, in the Grey Friars’ convent, was never empty; everybody wished to see the bishop’s victim. The prior of St. Victor was one of the first to come, attended by several friends. The poor man, being tongue-tied, told ‘the mystery of his sufferings with his fingers,’ says Bonivard. It was long since there had been such an interesting sight in Geneva. The citizens, standing or sitting around him, could not turn their eyes away from his thin pale face. By his gestures and attitudes Pécolat described the scenes of the examination, the torture, and the razor, and in the midst of these remembrances which made the tears come to his eyes, he from time to time indulged in a joke. The young men of Geneva looked at each other and trembled with indignation ... and then sometimes they laughed, at which the episcopal officers ‘were terribly enraged.’ The latter were in truth both vexed and angry. What! they receive an order from the bishop, an order from the pope, and only a few minutes before they have issued a contrary order! Strange mishap! Not knowing whom to blame, they imprisoned the governor, who had only released Pécolat by their command, and to cover their responsibility were actually planning to put him to death.

Some timid and alarmed citizens dared not go and see Pécolat; one of these was Blanchet, the friend of Andrew Navis, who had been present at the famous meeting at the Molard and the momon supper, and who, falling not long after beneath the bishop’s violence, was doomed to expiate his errors by a most cruel death. Blanchet is the type of a character frequent at this epoch. Having learnt, shortly after the famous momon banquet, that a certain individual whose name even he did not know, but who, he said, ‘had given him the lie to his face,’ was in Burgundy, Blanchet set off after him, gave him a box on the ears, and returned. He came back to Geneva, thence he went into Faucigny, and afterwards to Italy; he took part in the war between the pope and the Duke of Urbino (who so terribly frightened Leo X.); returned to Pavia, thence to Turin, and finally to Geneva. His cousin Peter, who lived in Turin, had told him that during his travels Pécolat had been arrested for plotting against the bishop. ‘I shall not go and see him,’ he said, ‘for fear of compromising myself.’ In spite of his excessive precaution, he could not finally escape the barbarous vengeance of the prelate.[142]

CHAPTER XI.
BERTHELIER TRIED AT GENEVA; BLANCHET AND NAVIS SEIZED AT TURIN; BONIVARD SCANDALISED AT ROME.
(1518.)

No one embraced Pécolat with so much joy as Berthelier, who had returned to Geneva within these few days. In fact the duke, desirous to please the Swiss by any means, had given him, and also made the bishop give him, a safe-conduct which, bearing date February 24, 1518, extended to Whitsunday, May 23, in the same year. The favour shown the republican hero was not great, for permission was granted him to return to Geneva to stand his trial; and the friends of the prelate hoped that he would not only be tried, but condemned and put to death. Notwithstanding these forebodings, Berthelier, a man of spirit and firm in his designs, was returning to his city to accomplish the work he had prepared in Switzerland: namely, the alliance of Geneva with the cantons. He had taken great trouble about it during his residence among the confederates. He was seen continually ‘visiting, eating, drinking in the houses of his friends or at the guilds (called abbeys), talking with the townsfolk, and proving to them that this alliance would be of great use to all the country of the League.’ Berthelier was then full of hope; Geneva was showing herself worthy of liberty; there was an energetic movement towards independence; the people were wearied of the tyranny of princes. Free voices were heard in the general council. ‘No one can serve two masters,’ said some patriots. ‘The man who holds any pension or employment from a prince, or has taken an oath to other authorities than the republic, ought not to be elected either syndic or councillor.’ This resolution was carried by a large majority. And better still, the citizens chose for syndics three men capable of guarding the franchises of the community; they were Ramel, Vandel, and Besançon Hugues. A mameluke, ‘considering the great credit of the party,’ had also been elected, but only one, Montyon; he was the premier syndic.[143]

Whilst the patriots were thus making efforts to save the independence of the city, the duke, the bishop, the count, Archbishop Seyssel, and other councillors, meeting at Turin, were pursuing contrary schemes. Would they succeed? Seyssel, the illustrious author of the Grande Monarchie, might tell them that in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, in France, Burgundy, and Flanders, the bishop and the lay lord had combined against the liberties of the towns, and aided by arms and anathemas had maintained a war against the communes which had ended in the destruction of the rights and franchises of the citizens. Then the night was indeed dark in the social world. At Geneva, these rights existed still: you could see a flickering light glimmering feebly in the midst of the darkness. But would not the bishop and the duke succeed in extinguishing it? If so, despotism would hold all Europe under its cruel hand, as in the Mahometan and other countries of the world. Why should the operation carried through at Cambray, Noyon, St. Quentin, Laon, Amiens, Soissons, Sens, and Rheims, fail on the shores of the Leman? There was indeed a reason for it, but they did not take it into account. We do not find this reason—at least not alone—in the fact that the heroes of liberty were more intrepid at Geneva than elsewhere. The enfranchisement was to come from a higher source: God then brought forth light and liberty. The middle ages were ending, modern times were beginning. The princes and bishops of Roman Catholicism, in close alliance, had everywhere reduced to ashes the edifice of communal liberties. But in the midst of these ashes some embers were found which, kindled again by fire from heaven, lighted up once more in the world the torch of lawful liberty. Geneva was the obstacle to the definite annihilation of the popular franchises, and in Geneva the strength of the obstacle was Berthelier. No wonder then that the Savoyard princes agreed that in order to check the triumph of the spirit of independence, it was absolutely necessary to get rid of this proud, energetic, and unyielding citizen. They began to prepare the execution of their frightful project. A strange blindness is that which imagines that by removing a man from the world it is possible to thwart the designs of God!

Berthelier, calm because he was innocent, provided besides with an episcopal safe-conduct, had appeared before the syndics to be tried. The duke and the bishop had given orders to their agents, the vidame Conseil and Peter Navis, the procurator-fiscal, to manage his condemnation. The trial began: ‘You are charged,’ said these two magistrates, ‘with having taken part in the riotous amusements of the young men of Geneva.’—‘I desired,’ answered Berthelier frankly, ‘to keep up the good-will of those who were contending for liberty against the usurpations of tyrants.’ The justification was worse than the charge. ‘Let us seize him by the throat, as if he were a wolf,’ said the two judges. ‘You have conspired,’ they continued, ‘against the life of the prince-bishop,’ and they handed in Pécolat’s depositions as proof. ‘All lies,’ said Berthelier coldly, ‘lies extorted by the rack and retracted afterwards.’ Navis then produced the declarations of the traitor Carmentrant, who, as we have seen at the momon supper, undertook the office of informer. ‘Carmentrant!’ contemptuously exclaimed the accused, ‘one of the bishop’s servants, coming and going to the palace every day, eating, drinking, and making merry ... a pretty witness indeed! The bishop has prevailed upon him, by paying him well, to suffer himself to be sent to prison, so that he may sing out against me whatever they prompt him with ... Carmentrant boasts of it himself!’ When they sent the report to the bishop, he perceived, on reading it, that this examination, instead of demonstrating the guilt of the accused, only revealed the iniquity of the accuser; the alarmed prelate therefore wrote to the vidame and Navis to ‘use every imaginable precaution.’ It was necessary to destroy Berthelier without compromising the bishop.

Navis was the man for that. Of a wily and malicious character, he understood nothing about the liberties of Geneva; but he was a skilful and a crafty lawyer. ‘He so mixes retail truth with wholesale falsehood,’ people said, ‘that he makes you believe the whole lump is true. If any iniquity of the bishop’s is discovered, straight he cuts a plug to stop the hole. He is continually forging new counts, and calling for adjournments.’ Navis, finding himself at the end of his resources, began to turn and twist the safe-conduct every way: it expressly forbade the detention of Berthelier’s person. That mattered not. ‘I demand that Berthelier be arrested,’ he said, ‘and be examined in custody; for the safe-conduct, if you weigh it well, is not opposed to this.’[144]—‘The first of virtues,’ said Berthelier, ‘is to keep your promise.’ Navis, little touched by this morality, resolved to obtain his request by dint of importunity; the next day he required that ‘Berthelier should be shut up closely in prison;’ on the 20th of April, he moved that ‘he should be incarcerated;’ and on the following day, he made the same request; about the end of May he demanded on two different occasions, not only that ‘the noble citizen should be arrested but tortured also.’ ... All these unjust prayers were refused by the court.[145] Navis, being embarrassed and irritated, multiplied his accusations; his plaint was like an overflowing torrent: ‘The accused,’ he said, ‘is a brawler, fighter, promoter of quarrels, illegal meetings, and seditions, rebellious to the prince and his officers, accustomed to carry out his threats, a debaucher of the young men of the city, and all without having ever been corrected of his faults and excesses.’—‘I confess that I am not corrected of these faults,’ answered Berthelier with disdain, ‘because I never was guilty of them.’[146] It was determined to associate with the syndics some commissioners devoted to the bishop; but the syndics replied that this would be contrary to law. The vidame and Navis, not knowing what to do next, wrote to the duke and the prelate to find some good grievances. ‘You shall have them,’ they answered; ‘we have certain witnesses to examine here, this side the mountains.’ ... Who were these witnesses? Navis little imagined that one of them was his own son, and that the inquiry would end in a catastrophe that would extort from him a cry of anguish. Let us now see what was going on at Turin.[147]

Blanchet, disgusted with his condition since he had been to the wars, cared little for Geneva. During his sojourn at Turin, in the house of the magnificent lord of Meximieux, the splendour of the establishment had dazzled him. His love for liberty had cooled down, his taste for the luxuries and comforts of life had increased. ‘I will seek patrons and fortune,’ he often repeated. With this object he returned from Geneva to Turin. It was the moment when the bishop was on the watch to catch one of the ‘children of Geneva.’ Blanchet was seized and thrown into prison; and that was not all.[148]

Andrew Navis, who, since the affair of the mule, had led a more regular life, was dreadfully weary of his father’s office. One Sunday, M. de Vernier gave his friends a splendid breakfast, to which Navis and Blanchet had been invited. Andrew was never tired of hearing ‘the wanderer’ talk about Italy, its delightful landscapes, the mildness of its climate, its fruits, monuments, pictures, concerts, theatres, beautiful women, and of the war between the pope and the Duke of Urbino. A desire to cross the Alps took possession of Andrew. ‘As soon as there is any rumour at Geneva of a foreign war,’ he said, ‘some of my companions hasten to it: why should I not do the same?’ The Duke of Urbino, proud of the secret support of France, was at that time a cause of great alarm to Leo X. An open war against a pope tempted Navis. The vices from which he suffered were not those base errors which nullify a man; but those ardent faults, those energetic movements which leave some hope of conversion. Leaning on his father’s desk, disgusted with the pettifogging business, he felt the need of a more active life. An opportunity presented itself. A woman named Georgia, with whom he had formerly held guilty intercourse, having to go to Turin, to join a man who was not her husband, asked Andrew to be her escort, promising him ‘a merry time of it.’ Navis made up his mind, and without his father’s knowledge left Geneva and his friends, and reached Turin at noon of Saturday the 8th of May. One Gabriel Gervais, a Genevan, was waiting for him: ‘Be on your guard,’ he said; ‘Blanchet has been taken up for some misunderstandings with the bishop.’ The son of the procurator-fiscal thought he had nothing to fear. But on the morrow, about six o’clock in the evening, the same Gabriel Gervais came and told him hastily: ‘They are going to arrest you: make your escape.’ Andrew started off directly, but was caught as he was about to leave the city and taken to the castle.[149]

The bishop and the duke wished, by arresting these young Genevans, to punish their independent spirit, and above all to extort from them confessions of a nature to procure the condemnation of Berthelier and other patriots. On the 26th of April the Bishop of Geneva had issued his warrant to all the ducal officers, and, in his quality of peaceful churchman, had concluded with these words: ‘We protest we have no desire, so far as in us lies, that any penalty of blood or death should result, or any mutilation of limbs, or other thing that may give rise to any irregularity.’[150] We shall see with what care the bishop avoided mutilation of limbs. The duke issued his warrant the same day.

Blanchet’s examination began on the 3rd of May in the court of the castle of Turin. He believed himself accused of an attempt upon the life of the bishop, and doubted not that torture and perhaps a cruel death were reserved for him; accordingly this young man, of amiable but weak disposition, became a prey to the blackest melancholy. On the 5th of May, having been brought back to the court of the castle, he turned to the lieutenant De Bresse, who assisted the procurator-fiscal, and without waiting to be interrogated, he said: ‘I am innocent of the crime of which I am accused.’—‘And of what are you accused?’ said the lieutenant. Blanchet made no answer, but burst into tears. The procurator-fiscal then commenced the examination, and Blanchet began to cry again. On being skilfully questioned, he allowed himself to be surprised, and made several depositions against Berthelier and the other patriots; then perceiving his folly, he stopped short and exclaimed with many groans: ‘I shall never dare return to Geneva! my comrades would kill me.... I implore the mercy of my lord duke.’ Poor Blanchet moved even his judges to pity. Navis, when led before the same tribunal on the 10th of May, did not weep. ‘Who are you?’ they asked. ‘I am from Geneva,’ he replied, ‘scrivener, notary, a gentleman’s son, and twenty-eight years old.’ The examination was not long. The bishop, who was then at Pignerol, desired to have the prisoners in his own hand, as he had once held Pécolat; they were accordingly removed thither.[151]

On the 14th, 15th,and 21st of May, Navis and Blanchet were brought into the great hall of the castle before the magnificent John of Lucerne, collateral of the council, and Messire d’Ancina. ‘Speak as we desire you,’ said the collateral, ‘and then you will be in his Highness’s good graces.’ As they did not utter a word, they were at first threatened with two turns of the cord, and that not being sufficient, they were put to the rack; they were fastened to the rope, and raised an arm’s length from the floor. Navis was in agony; but instead of inculpating Berthelier, he accused himself. The commandment which says: ‘Honour thy father and thy mother,’ was continually in his mind, and he felt that it was in consequence of breaking it, that he had fallen into dissipation and disgrace. ‘Alas!’ said he, when put to the question, ‘I have been a vagabond, disobedient to my father, roaming here and there, squandering my own and my father’s money in taverns.... Alas! I have not been dutiful to my parents.... If I had been obedient, I should not have suffered as I do to-day.’ On the 10th of June, says the report, he was again put to the torture and pulled up the height of an ell. After remaining there a moment, Navis begged to be let down, promising to tell everything. Then sitting on a bench, he accused himself bitterly of the crime of which he felt himself guilty; he confessed ... to having disobeyed his parents.[152] Peter Navis was a passionate judge in the opinion of many; Andrew saw only the father in him; and contempt of paternal authority was the great sin that agonised the wretched young man. Looking into himself, foreseeing the fatal issue of the trial, he did not give way, like Blanchet, to the fear of death, but bewailed his faults. Family recollections were aroused in his heart, the most sacred of bonds recovered their strength, and the image of his father followed him night and day.

The bishop had got thus far in his prosecutions when he learnt that Bonivard had just passed through Turin on his way to Rome. Delighted at seeing the prior of St. Victor fall into his net, the prelate gave orders to seize him on his return. Was it not Bonivard who had caused him such alarm in the palace on the occasion of the metropolitan summons? Was it not this man who had robbed him of Pécolat, and who even aspired to sit some day on his episcopal throne?... It is the nature of certain animals to carry their prey into their dens to devour it. The bastard of Savoy had already dragged Navis and Blanchet into his dungeons, and was preparing to mutilate their limbs; but it would be much better still if he could catch and rend the hated Bonivard with his claws.[153]

The latter so little suspected the impending danger, that he had come into Italy to solicit the prelate’s inheritance. It was evident that the sickly bastard had not long to live. ‘I will go to Rome,’ said Bonivard to his friends, ‘to obtain the bishop’s benefices by means of a cardination’ (an intrigue of cardinals).[154] He desired eagerly to be bishop and prince of Geneva; had he succeeded, his liberal catholicism would perhaps have sufficed for the citizens, and prevented the Reformation. Bonivard reached Rome without any obstacle six years after Luther, and like the reformer was at once struck by the corruption which prevailed there. ‘The Church,’ he said, ‘is so full of bad humours, that it has become dropsical.’[155] It was in the pontificate of Leo X.; all that priests, monks, bishops, and cardinals thought about was being present at farces and comedies, and of going masked to courtesans’ houses.[156] Bonivard saw all this with his own eyes, and has left us some stories into which he has admitted expressions we must soften, and details we must suppress. ‘Having business one day with the concubinary of the pope’s cubicular (we leave these unusual expressions, the meaning of which is not very edifying), I had to go and find him at a courtesan’s.... She wore smart feathers, waving over a fine gold coif, and a silk dress with slashed sleeves; you would have taken her for a princess.’[157] Another day, while walking in the city, he met one of these ‘misses,’ disguised as a man, and riding on a Spanish jennet; on the crupper behind her was a janin wrapped in a Spanish cape, which he drew carefully over his nose so that he might not be recognised. ‘Who is he?’ asked Bonivard. ‘It is Cardinal So-and-so with his favourite,’ was the reply. ‘We say in my country,’ he rejoined, ‘that all the madmen are not at Rome; and yet I see you have them in abundance.’[158]

The prior of St. Victor did not lose sight of the object of his journey, and canvassed unceasingly; but began to despair of success. ‘Do you wish to know,’ he was asked, ‘what you must do to obtain a request from the pope and cardinals? Tell them that you will kill any man whom they have a grudge against; or that you are ready to serve them in their pleasures, to bring them la donna, to gamble, play the ruffian, and rake with them—in short, that you are a libertine.’ Bonivard was not strict; yet he was surprised that things had come to such a pass in the capital of catholicism. His mind, eager to learn, asked what were the causes of this decline.... He ascribed it to the disappearance of christian individualism from the Church, so that a personal conversion, a new creature, was required no longer. ‘That in the first place,’ he said, ‘because when princes became christians, their whole people was baptised with them. Discipline has been since then like a spider’s web which catches the small flies, but cannot hold the large ones. And next it comes from the example of the popes.... I have lived to see three pontiffs. First, Alexander VI., a sharp fellow,[159] a ne’er-do-well, an Italianised Spaniard,—and what was worst of all,—at Rome! a man without conscience, without God, who cared for nothing, provided he accomplished his desires. Next came Julius II., proud, choleric, studying his bottle more than his breviary; mad about his popedom, and having no thought but how he could subdue not only the earth, but heaven and hell.[160] Last appeared Leo X., the present pope, learned in Greek and Latin, but especially a good musician, a great glutton, a deep drinker; possessing beautiful pages whom the Italians style ragazzi; always surrounded by musicians, buffoons, play-actors, and other jesters; accordingly when he was informed of any new business, he would say: Di grazia, lasciatemi godere queste papate in pace; Domine mio me la ha date. Andate da Monsignor di Medici.[161] ... Everything is for sale at the court: red hats, mitres, judgeships, croziers, abbeys, provostries, canonries.... Above all do not trust to Leo the Tenth’s word; for he maintains that since he dispenses others from their oaths, he can surely dispense himself.’[162]

Bonivard, astonished at the horrible state into which popes and cardinals, priests and monks, had sunk the Church, asked whence could salvation come.... It was not six months since Prierias, master of the sacred palace, had published a book entitled: Dialogue against the Presumptuous Propositions of Martin Luther.[163] ‘Leo X. and his predecessors,’ said Bonivard, ‘have always taken the Germans for beasts: pecora campi, they were called, and rightly too, for these simple Saxons allowed themselves to be saddled and ridden like asses. The popes threatened them with cudgelling (excommunication), enticed them with thistles (indulgences), and so made them trot to the mill to bring away the meal for them. But having one day loaded the ass too heavily, Leo made him jib, so that the flour was spilt and the white bread lost. That ass (he added) is called Martin, like all asses, and his surname is Luther, which signifies enlightener.’[164]

They found at Rome that Bonivard had not the complaisance necessary for a Roman bishop; and the prior, seeing that he had no chance of success, shook the dust off his feet against the metropolis of catholicism, and departed for Turin. His journey had not, however, been useless: he had learnt a lesson which he never forgot, and which he told all his life through to any one that would listen to him. When he reached Turin, he went to visit his old friends of the university, but they cried out with alarm: ‘Navis and Blanchet are within a hair’s-breadth of death, and it has been decided to arrest you. Fly without losing a moment.’ Bonivard remained. Ought he to leave in the talons of the vulture those two young men with whom he had so often laughed at the noisy banquets of ‘the children of Geneva?’ He resolved to do what he could to interest his friends in their fate. For a whole week he went from house to house, and walked through the streets without any disguise. Nothing seemed easier than to lay hands on him, and the ducal police would have attempted it, but he was never alone. The scholars, charmed with his spirit and independence, accompanied him everywhere, and these thoughtless headstrong youths would have defended him at the cost of their blood. Bonivard, wishing to employ every means, wrote by some secret channel to Blanchet and Navis; the gaoler intercepted the letter, and took it to the bishop, who, fancying he saw in it a conspiracy hatching against him, even in Turin, pressed the condemnation of the prisoners, and ordered Bonivard to be seized immediately. Informed of what awaited him, the intelligent prior displayed great tranquillity. ‘I shall stay a month longer at Turin,’ he told everybody, ‘to enjoy myself with my old friends.’ Many invitations being given him, he accepted them all; but the next day, before it was light, he took horse and galloped off for Geneva.[165]

CHAPTER XII.
BLANCHET AND NAVIS EXECUTED. THEIR LIMBS SUSPENDED TO THE WALNUT-TREE NEAR THE BRIDGE OF ARVE.
(October 1518.)

The bastard was staggered when he was informed that Bonivard had escaped. He consoled himself, however, with the thought that he had at hand the means of gratifying his tastes and his revenge, and concentrated all his attention on Navis and Blanchet. What should he do with these two young men who had so thoughtlessly fallen into his net? How, in striking them, could he best strike the independent men of Geneva? For he was not thinking merely of getting rid of these two adventurers, but of filling all the city with terror by means of their death. To no purpose was he reminded that the father of one of the prisoners was the most zealous of his officers; the bastard cared little for a father’s grief, and thought that Peter Navis would serve him still better, when he had given him a striking example of the manner in which he desired to be served. He pressed the court to hasten on the trial. Ancina, judge in criminal matters; Caracci, seignior of Farges, and attorney-general of Savoy; and Licia, his deputy, constituted by ducal letters judges of Navis and Blanchet, declared them solemnly convicted, first, of having been present at the meeting at the Molard, and of having promised, they and their accomplices, to be ‘unanimous against the bishop’s officers, to rescue out of their hands any of their number whom these episcopal agents might take into custody; second, of having proposed, in case the duke should take part against them, to flee and place themselves under a foreign government (Switzerland), abandoning thus the sovereignty of Savoy and the splendour of the white cross.’ The two prisoners were condemned to be beheaded, and then quartered, according to the bishop’s desire. They prepared for execution immediately.[166]

Navis breathed not a murmur; the feeling of his disobedience to his father closed his lips; it appears also that Blanchet recovered from his terror, dried his tears, and acknowledged his folly. Nothing indicates that the repentance of these two Genevan youths was truly christian; but it would be unjust to overlook their noble confession at the hour of death. The provost and his men, having received them from the hands of the magistrates, led them to the place of execution. Their appearance was becoming, and their look serious; they walked between their guards, calm, but without weakness or alarm. When they had mounted the scaffold, Navis spoke: ‘Wishing before all things to make amends for the evil we have done, we retract all that we have said touching certain of our countrymen, and declare that such avowals were extorted from us by the fear of torture. After proclaiming the innocence of others, we acknowledge ourselves guilty. Yes, we have lived in such a way that we justly deserve death, and we pray God, in this our last hour, to pardon our sins. Yet understand, that these sins are not those of which we are accused; we have done nothing contrary to the franchises and laws of Geneva: of that we are clean.... The sins which condemn us are our debaucheries.’ Navis would have continued, but the provost, vexed at what he had said already, ordered the executioner to do his duty. The man set to work instantly: the two young men knelt down, he raised his sword, and ‘thus they were beheaded, and then quartered.’[167]

At last the bishop saw his desires satisfied; he had in his possession the heads and the quarters of two of the ‘children of Geneva.’ This little man, so frail, livid, hideous, reduced almost to a shadow, without genius and without will, had nevertheless the will and the genius of evil. Notwithstanding his protest against the mutilation of limbs, he decided that three of the quarters of the two bodies should be exposed over the gates of Turin, and reserved for his own share a quarter of Navis and of Blanchet, with the two heads. He had the flesh pickled, for he intended to keep them as long as possible; and when this savage operation, worthy of the Mohawks, was completed, he placed the heads and limbs in two barrels on which were marked the arms of the count, the duke’s brother. The bishop wished to show his flock a sample of his cleverness; and as the execution did not take place at Geneva, he intended at least to send the limbs of the victims ‘to stir up and terrify the scoundrels.’ The bearers of these two pickle-tubs started from Turin, crossed Mont Cenis, arrived in the basin of the Leman on Saturday, October 2, 1518, and lodged on ‘the other side of the Arve.’[168]

On the bank of this river, which then separated the ducal states from those of Geneva, at the foot of the bridge on the Savoy side, stood a fine walnut-tree, whose leafy branches spread opposite the church of Our Lady of Grace on the Genevan side. The bishop’s agents, who had received orders to make an exhibition of the mutilated limbs for the benefit of the Genevans, proceeded to the bridge on Saturday night in order to discharge their disgraceful commission under cover of the darkness. They carried with them, in addition to their casks filled with flesh, brine, and blood, a ladder, a hammer, some nails and cord. On reaching the tree, they opened the barrels and found the features well preserved and easily recognisable. The bastard’s agents climbed the tree, and nailed the heads and arms to the branches in such a manner as to be seen by all the passers-by. They fixed a placard underneath, bearing these words: ‘These are the traitors of Geneva;’ and the white cross of Savoy above. They then withdrew, leaving the empty casks at the foot of the tree. ‘It was done by order of your bishop,’ said the duke in a letter written three days later (October 5) to his very dear, beloved, and trusty citizens of Geneva, ‘your bishop, whom we have in this supported and favoured, which ought to be to your contentment.’[169]

The day broke, the people arose, opened their windows, and went out of their houses; some were going to the city. One man was about to cross the bridge, when, fancying he saw something strange, he drew near, and discovered with astonishment human limbs hanging from the tree. He shuddered, supposing that this had been done by some murderers in mere bravado; and, wishing to make the extraordinary occurrence known, he quickened his steps. ‘The first who saw this mystery did not keep it secret, but ran and told the news all through the city. “What’s the matter?” people asked ... and then everybody hurried thither,’ adds the chronicler. In truth, an immense crowd of citizens—men, women, and children—soon gathered round the tree. It was Sunday, a day which the bastard had probably selected for this edifying sight; every one was free from his ordinary occupations, and during all that holy day an agitated multitude pressed continually around the tree where the blood-stained remains of the two victims were hanging. They looked closely at them and examined the features: ‘It is Navis,’ they said; ‘it is Blanchet.’ ... ‘Ah!’ exclaimed a huguenot, ‘it is not difficult to penetrate the mystery. It is one of my lord bishop’s messages come to us by the Turin post!’ Bonivard, who had returned to Geneva, thought himself fortunate that the swiftness of his horse had carried him beyond the prelate’s reach, and rejoiced that his head was not between those of Blanchet and Navis; but he was at the same time filled with indignation and anger against the monster who had so treated his two young friends. The Genevan youth indulged in bitter irony. ‘A fine maypole they have raised us this morning on the city boundary!’ they said; ‘they have put up a flag already; it only wants a few ribands and flowers to make the show complete!’ But the sight of these bloody fragments, swinging in the air, was no fit subject for jesting; there was great mourning in the city; groans and weeping were heard in the crowd; women gave vent to their horror, and men to their indignation.

Navis’s father, a man detested by the Genevans, was not the last to be informed; some people ran to tell him of the tragic event that was stirring up the whole city. ‘Come,’ said they, ‘come and see the reward the bishop sends you for your faithful services. You are well paid; the tyrants recompense you right royally for the disfavour you have won from all of us; they have sent from Turin, as your pay, the head of your son.’ ... Peter Navis might be an unjust judge, but he was a father: at first he was overwhelmed. Andrew had been disobedient, but the ingratitude of the child had not been able to extinguish the love of the parent. The unhappy man, divided between affection for his son and respect for his prince, shed tears and endeavoured to hide them. Prostrated by grief and shame, pale and trembling, he bent his head in sullen silence. It was not the same with the mother, who gave way to the most violent affection and most extravagant despair. The grief of Navis’s parents, which was expressed in such different ways, struck all the spectators. Bonivard, who at this tragic moment mingled in the agitated groups of the citizens, was heart-stricken by all he saw and heard, and on returning to his priory exclaimed: ‘What horror and indignation such a spectacle excites! even strangers, whom it does not affect, are disgusted at it.... What will the poor citizens do now? the poor relations and friends? their father and mother?’ ...

The Genevans did not confine themselves to useless lamentations; they did not turn their eyes to the blow they had just received, they looked to the hand that struck it; it was the hand of their bishop. Everybody knew the failings of Navis and Blanchet, but at this moment no one spoke of them; they could only see two young and unhappy martyrs of liberty. The anger of the people rose impetuously, and poured itself out on the prelate more than on the duke. ‘The bishop,’ they said, ‘is a wolf under a shepherd’s cloak. Would you know how he feeds his lambs, go to the bridge of Arve!’ Their leaders thought the same: they said, it was not enough for the prince-bishop to plunge families and a whole city into mourning, but his imagination coldly calculated the means of increasing their sorrow. These suspended heads and arms were a notable instance of that cruel faculty of invention which has always distinguished tyrants. To torture in Piedmont the bodies of their young friends did not satisfy the prelate, but he must torture all hearts in Geneva. What is the spirit that animates him? What are the secret motives of these horrible executions?... Despotism, self-interest, fanaticism, hatred, revenge, cruelty, ambition, folly, madness.... It was indeed all these together. Think not that he will stop in the midst of his success: these are only the first-fruits of his tenderness. To draw up proscription lists, to butcher the friends of liberty, to expose their dead bodies, to kill Geneva,—in one word, to take pattern by Sylla in everything,[170]—such will henceforward be the cure of souls of this son of the pope.

The resistance of the citizens to the encroachments of the prelate assumed from that hour a character that must necessarily lead to the abolition of the Roman episcopacy in Geneva. There is a retributive justice from which princes cannot escape, and it is often the innocent successors who are hurled from their thrones by the crimes of their guilty predecessors; of this we have seen numerous examples during the past half-century. The penalty which has not fallen on the individual falls on the family or the institution; but the penalty which strikes the institution is the more terrible and instructive. The mangled limbs hanging on the banks of the Arve left an indelible impression on the minds of the Genevan people. If a mameluke and a huguenot happened to pass the bridge together, the first, pointing to the walnut-tree, would say to the second with a smile: ‘Do you recognise Navis and Blanchet?’—the huguenot would coldly reply: ‘I recognise my bishop.’[171] The institution of a bishop-prince, an imitation of that of a bishop-king, became every day more hateful to the Genevans. Its end was inevitable—its end at Geneva: hereafter the judgments of God will overtake it in other places also.

The agitation was not confined to the people: the syndics had summoned the council. ‘This morning,’ they said, ‘before daybreak, two heads and two arms were fastened to a tree opposite the church of Our Lady of Grace. We know not by whose order.’[172] Everybody guessed whose heads they were and by whose order they had been exposed; but the explosion was not so great in the council as in the crowd. They must have understood that this cruel act betokened sinister designs; they heard the thunder-clap that precedes the storm: yet each man drew a different conclusion. Certain canons, monks, and other agents of the Roman Church, accomplices of the tyrant, called for absolute submission. Certain nobles thought that if they were freed from the civic councils, they could display their aristocratic pretensions more at their ease. Certain traders, Savoyards by birth, who loved better ‘large gains in slavery than small gains in liberty,’ amused themselves by thinking that if the duke became master of the city, he would reside there with his court, and they would get a higher price for their goods. But the true Genevans joyfully consented that their country should be small and poor, provided it were the focus of light and liberty. As for the huguenots, the two heads were the signal of resistance. ‘With an adversary that keeps any measure,’ they said, ‘we may relax a little of our rights; but there are no considerations to be observed with an enemy who proceeds by murder.... Let us throw ourselves into the arms of the Swiss.’

The bishop’s crime thus became one of the stages on the road to liberty. No doubt the victims were culpable, but the murderers were still more so. All that was noble in Geneva sighed for independence. The mameluke magistrates strove in vain to excuse an act which injured their cause; they were answered rudely; contrary opinions were bandied to and fro in the council, and ‘there was a great disturbance.’ At last they resolved to send an ambassador to the princes to inquire whether this barbarous act had been perpetrated by their orders, and in that case to make remonstrances. This resolution was very displeasing to the mamelukes, who endeavoured to soften the harsh message by intrusting it to pleasing messengers. ‘To obtain what you desire from princes, you must send them people who are agreeable to them,’ said the first syndic. The assembly accordingly named the vidame Aymon Conseil, an unblushing agent of Savoy; the ex-syndic Nergaz, a bad man and personal enemy of Berthelier; and Déléamont, governor of Peney, against whom the huguenots had more than once drawn the sword. The duke, being at that time in his Savoy provinces, received the deputation coldly at a public audience, but made much of them in private. The ambassadors returned in three days with an unmeaning answer.[173]

The bishop was at Pignerol, where he had presided over the terrible butchery. The council were content to write to him, considering the distance; and as he was still proud of his exploit, he replied by extolling the mildness of his government: ‘You have never had prince or prelate with such good intentions as myself,’ he wrote from Turin on the 15th of October; ‘the execution done the other side the bridge of Arve is to give those a lesson who desire to lead evil lives.’ Accordingly the bastard exhorted the Genevans to show themselves sensible of his kindness by returning him a double share of love. These executions, far from causing him any remorse, gave him a longing for more; he invited the Genevans to acknowledge his tender favours by granting him the head of Berthelier and a few others besides. Making confession to the council of his most secret anguish, he expressed a fear that if these heads did not fall before his return, it would prevent his enjoying the pleasures of the table. ‘Discharge your duty,’ said he, ‘so that when I am with you, there may be nothing to do but to make good cheer.’ To live merrily and to put his most illustrious subjects to death were the two chief points of his episcopal cure of souls. To be more sure of obtaining these heads, he threatened Geneva with his vengeance: ‘If you should refuse,’ said he in conclusion, ‘understand clearly that I shall pray my lord (the duke) and his brother (the count) to preserve my good rights; and I have confidence in them, that they will not let me be trampled upon; besides this, I will risk my life and my goods.’ This mild pastoral was signed: The Bishop of Geneva.[174]

Thus everybody was leaguing against Geneva. Would it be crushed? Was there in this small republic strength enough to resist the twofold lay and clerical opposition, which had crushed so many free cities in the dark ages? There were influences at work, as we have seen, in the formation of modern liberties, and we find in Geneva the representatives of the three great schools in which Europe has learnt the principles of government. The characteristic of the German liberties was an energetic love of independence; now Berthelier and many of his friends were true Germans in this respect. The characteristic of the Roman liberties was legality; we find this strongly marked in Lévrier and other eminent men. The third element of the independence of this people was to be that christian principle which, subjecting the conscience to God, and thus giving man a firmness more than human, makes him tread in the path of liberty and walk along precipices without his head turning or his feet stumbling. Yet a few years more, and a great number of Genevans will find this latter element in the Gospel. To this Geneva owes principally the maintenance of her existence.

After the murder of Blanchet and Navis, the passion of independence became dominant. ‘From that time,’ said a magistrate of the seventeenth century, ‘the duke and bishop were looked upon in Geneva as two tyrants who sought only the desolation of the city.’[175]

CHAPTER XIII.
THE HUGUENOTS PROPOSE AN ALLIANCE WITH THE SWISS, AND THE MAMELUKES AMUSE THEMSELVES AT TURIN.
(October to December 1518.)

The moment had come when men of decision were about to apply themselves to the work. The patriots learnt that the encroaching designs of Savoy were irrevocable, and that it was consequently necessary to oppose them with an energetic and unbending resistance. Berthelier, ‘the great despiser of death,’ smiled coldly at the bishop’s threats; magnanimous, firm, and resolute, he fancied he saw the happy moment approaching when his fondest dream would be realised—the giving his life to save Geneva. If he wished to escape from the cruelties of the princes which threatened him on every side, he must sink himself, retire, give up his noblest plans: he shrank with horror from the thought. To resist the conspiracy directed against the liberties of Geneva was his duty; if he neglected to discharge it, he would degrade himself in his own eyes, he would expose himself to remorse; while if he accomplished this task, he would feel himself in his proper place; it seemed to him that he would become better and more acceptable to God. But it was not only imperious, invincible duty which impelled him: it was passion, the noblest of passions; nothing could calm the tempests struggling in his bosom. He therefore threw himself energetically into the midst of dangers. In vain did Bonivard show symptoms of discouragement, and say to his generous friend in their meetings at St. Victor: ‘You see the pensions and threats of the prince are inducing many reputed sensible men to draw in their horns.’ Bonivard could not check Berthelier’s decision. Caring for nothing, not even for his life, provided he saved the liberties of Geneva, the intrepid citizen went through the city, visiting from house to house, remonstrating with the citizens ‘one by one;’ exhorting them in private.[176]

His exhortations were not unavailing: a strong fermentation began to stir men’s minds. They called to remembrance how these Swiss, from whom they expected deliverance, had conquered their liberty. A hat set up in Altorf on the top of a pole; an apple placed by a cruel order on the head of a child: were, according to the old traditions of that people, the signal of their independence. Was the bastard less tyrannous than Gessler? Those two heads, those two arms,—were they not a still more frightful signal? The remains of Navis and of Blanchet were long left exposed: in vain did the unhappy father, judge Navis, address frequent and earnest appeals to the bishop to have them removed; the prelate took delight in this demonstration of his power.[177] It was a strange blindness on his part. Those dead limbs, those closed eyes, those blood-stained lips preached to the citizens that it was time to defend their ancient liberties.... The great agitator took advantage of the bastard’s cruelty, and employing the energetic language of the times, he said: ‘The same pin hangs on the cloak of every one of us. We must resist. Let us unite, let us give our hand to the League, and fear nothing, for nobody dares touch their allies ... any more than St. Anthony’s fire.[178] ... Let us help ourselves, and God will help us.’

The young, the poor, all generous hearts listened to Berthelier’s words; ‘but the great and the rich,’ says Bonivard, ‘were afraid on account of their riches which they preferred to their life.’[179] These great and rich folk, Montyon and the ducal faction, seeing the dangers that threatened the princes of Savoy in Geneva, resolved to send a second embassy with orders to go this time even to Turin and Pignerol. The same three mamelukes were intrusted with the mission. The patriots were indignant: ‘What!’ they said, ‘you want to save the sheep, and yet select wolves to do it?’—‘Do you not understand,’ replied Montyon, ‘that if you wish to tame princes, you must take care not to send men who are disagreeable to them?’ The deputation arrived at Turin, where the duke then was. They demanded an audience to present their homage to his Highness, and as their sentiments were known, their prayer was easily granted. They timidly stated their grievances. ‘It was not I who did it,’ said Charles; ‘it was my lord of Geneva; go to the bishop at Pignerol.’ The deputation proceeded to this town, situated in the neighbourhood of the schismatic Waldenses, whom the prelate hated as much at least as he did the Genevans. Having obtained an audience, they repeated the lesson they had been taught: ‘The city is much astonished that you have put two of our citizens to death and sent their quarters to the frontiers of Geneva. If any private individuals had offended against you, say our citizens, you had only to accuse them, they would have been punished at Geneva.’[180]—‘It was not I who did that,’ said the bishop, ‘it was my lord the duke.’ The mameluke deputies were strongly inclined to admit one half of the assertion of the two princes, and to believe that probably the murder came neither from John nor Charles. The official mission being ended, the prelate, who knew well with whom he had to deal, gave directions for the ambassadors to be entertained. The latter desired nothing better. The bishop ‘accordingly entertained them,’ say the chronicles, ‘treated, feasted, and made merry with them.’ Pleasure parties followed each other rapidly, and the three mamelukes, forgetting their diplomatic business, found the wines of Italy excellent, and the bastard and his court quite captivating.[181]

All good cheer however comes to an end: the politicians of the court of Turin wished to profit by the embassy, and, although it had been directed against the usurpations of the princes of Savoy, to turn it skilfully against the liberties of the people of Geneva. This was not difficult, for their representatives were betraying them. The three ambassadors, the bishop, his officers, and the ducal councillors deliberated on the answer to be sent to the council of Geneva. The princes, trusting in their pensioners, despised the liberal party; but the three envoys, the vidame, Nergaz, and Déléamont, who had seen the danger closely, far from doing the same, were alarmed at this carelessness. ‘There are loyal subjects in Geneva,’ they said; ‘but there are also rascals, rebels and plotters who, in order to escape the punishment of their misdeeds, urge the people to contract an alliance with Friburg. The evil is greater than you imagine; the Helvetic republics will establish their accursed popular government in Geneva. You must therefore punish very sharply the advisers of such matters, and crush the rebels.’[182] The two cousins desired nothing better. Charles had no wish to see liberal principles come nearer to Savoy and perhaps to Turin; but he preferred making only a verbal answer to the council. The deputies, alarmed at the responsibility thus laid upon them, insisted on a written answer, and a letter was accordingly drawn up. In it the duke and the bishop informed the council ‘that they would hold them loyal subjects if they would assist in unhesitatingly putting to death Berthelier and ten or twelve others,’ whom they named. ‘We hand you this letter,’ said the duke and the bishop to the deputies; ‘but you will not deliver it to the syndics and council of Geneva unless they promise on their oaths (before reading it) to execute without delay the orders it contains.’ Never had monarch put forward such enormous pretensions. God first disorders in mind those whom He intends to ruin. The servile ambassadors took care to make no objections, and delighted with the success of their embassy and particularly with the brilliant fêtes of the court of Turin, they departed with the strange instructions which the two princes had given them.[183]

While the mamelukes and Savoyards were conspiring at Turin and Pignerol against the liberties of the city, Berthelier and his friends were thinking how to preserve them. The iniquity of the duke and the bishop showed them more and more every day the necessity of independence. They resolved to take a decisive step. Berthelier, Bernard, Bonivard, Lévrier, Vandel, De la Mare, Besançon Hugues, and some others met in consultation. ‘Hitherto,’ said Berthelier, ‘it is only in parlours and closets that we have advised an alliance with the Swiss; we must now proclaim it on the house-tops; simple conversations are no longer enough: it is time to come to a common decision. But alas! where, when, and how?... The princes of Savoy have accustomed us to assemble only for our pleasures. Who ever thinks in our meetings of the safety of the city?’ Bonivard then began to speak: ‘The house of M. de Gingins and mine at St. Victor have often seen us assembled in small numbers for familiar conversation. We now require larger rooms and more numerous meetings. This is my proposition. Let us employ to do good the same means as we have hitherto used to do evil. Let us take advantage of the meetings where until now nothing was thought of but pleasure, to deliberate henceforth on the maintenance of our liberties.’ This proposition met with a favourable reception.

Since the murder of Blanchet and Navis, it had become more difficult to hold these huguenot meetings. The threats of Savoy were such that men were afraid of everything that might give an excuse for violent measures. ‘There was in former times at Geneva,’ observed one of the company, ‘a brotherhood of St. George which is now degenerated but not destroyed; let us revive it and make use of it; let us employ it to save the franchises threatened by the Savoy princes.’[184]

Berthelier set to work as soon as the meeting broke up. When he desired to assemble his friends, he used to pass whistling under their windows. He began to saunter through the streets with a look of unconcern, but with his eyes on the watch, and gave a whistle whenever he passed the house of a devoted citizen. The huguenots listened, recognised the signal of their chief, came out, and went up to him: a meeting was appointed for a certain day and hour.

The day arrived. ‘We were about sixty,’ said Bonivard. It was not a large number, but they were all men of spirit and enterprise. It was no meeting of conspirators: the worthiest members of the republic had assembled, who had no intention to go beyond the rights which the constitution gave them. In fact Berthelier and Besançon Hugues proposed simply an alliance with the Swiss. ‘This thought is not a fancy sprung from an empty brain,’ they said; ‘the princes of Savoy force us to it. By taking away our fairs, by trampling the laws under foot, by breaking off our relations with other countries, they compel us to unite with the Swiss.’ When they found Savoy violently breaking the branches of the tree, and even trying to uproot it, these patriots were determined to graft it on the old and more vigorous stock of Helvetic liberty.[185]

The rumour of this decision, which they tried however to keep secret, reached Turin. Nothing in the world could cause more anger and alarm to the bishop and the duke. They answered immediately, on the 13th of October, by sending an order to bring Berthelier to trial in the following month before the episcopal commissioners; this was delivering him to death. Councillor Marti of Friburg, a blunt man, but also intelligent, warm, devoted and ready, being informed of what was going on, hastened to Geneva. The most sacred friendship had been formed between him and Berthelier when, seated at the same hearth, they had conversed together about Geneva and liberty. The thought that a violent death might suddenly carry off a man so dear, disturbed Marti seriously. He proceeded to the hôtel-de-ville, where the Council of Fifty had met, and showed at once how full he was of tenderness for Berthelier, and of anger for his enemies. ‘Sirs,’ he said bluntly, ‘this is the fifth time I have come here about the same business: I beg that it may be the last. Protect Berthelier as the liberties of your city require, or beware! Friburg has always desired your good; do not oblige us to change our opinion.... Do not halt between two sides: decide for one or the other. The duke and the bishop say one thing, and they always do another: they think only of destroying your liberties, and Friburg of defending them.’ The council, who found it more convenient to give the right hand to one and the left to another, to keep on good terms with Friburg and the bishop, thought this speech a little rude. They thanked Marti all the same, but added that, before giving a decisive answer, they must wait the return of the deputies sent to the bishop and the duke. ‘Nevertheless,’ added the syndics, ‘as regards Berthelier we will maintain the liberties of the city.’[186]

The deputies whom they expected from Turin—Nergaz, Déléamont, and the vidame—soon arrived. When they returned to the free city, they were still dazzled by the pomp of the Piedmontese court, and filled with the ideas which the partisans of absolute power had instilled into them. ‘Everything is in the prince,’ they had said, ‘and the people ought to have no other will but his.’ Thinking only of claiming absolute authority for the bishop, they appeared on the 29th of November before the Council of State, and said in an imperative tone: ‘We have orders from my lord bishop not to discharge our mission until you have added to your number twenty of the most eminent citizens.’ In this way the princes of Savoy wished to make sure of a majority. The council assented to this demand. ‘We require them,’ added Syndic Nergaz, ‘to make oath in our presence that they will reveal nothing they may hear.’—‘What means all this mystery?’ the councillors asked each other; but the oath was taken. The ambassadors then advanced another step: ‘Here is the letter in which my lord makes known his sovereign will; but before it is opened, you must all swear to execute the orders it contains.’ This strange demand was received in sullen silence; such open despotism astonished not only the friends of liberty but even the mamelukes. ‘Hand us the letter addressed to us, that we may read it,’ said Besançon Hugues and other independent members of the council. ‘No,’ replied Nergaz, ‘the oath first, and then the letter.’ Some partisans of Savoy had the impudence to second this demand; but ‘the friends of independence’ resisted firmly, and the meeting broke up. ‘There must be some secret in that letter dangerous to the people,’ they said. It was resolved to convene the general council in order that the ambassadors might deliver their message in person. This appeal to the people was very disagreeable to the three deputies; yet they encouraged one another to carry out their mission to the end.[187]

On Sunday, December 5, the sound of a trumpet was heard, the great bell of the cathedral tolled, the citizens put on their swords, and the large hall of Rive was ‘quite filled with people.’ The deputies were desired to ‘deliver their message.’—‘Our message is found in the letter,’ said Nergaz, ‘and our only instructions are that before the council of Geneva open it, they shall swear to carry out its orders.’ These words caused an immense agitation among the people. ‘We have so good a leader,’ said they with irony, ‘that we ought to follow him with our eyes shut and not fear to fall into the ditch with him! How can we doubt that the secret contained in this mysterious paper is a secret of justice and love?... If there are any sceptics among us, let them go to the walnut-tree at the bridge of Arve, where the limbs of our friends are still hanging.’—‘Gentlemen,’ said the more serious men, ‘we return you the letter unopened, and beg you will send it back to those who gave it you.’ Then Nergaz, feeling annoyed, exclaimed bitterly: ‘I warn you that my lord of Savoy has many troops in the field, and that if you do not execute the orders contained in this letter, no citizen of Geneva will be safe in his states. I heard him say so.’ The people on hearing this were much exasperated. ‘Indeed!’ they exclaimed, ‘if we do not swear beforehand to do a thing without knowing it, all who possess lands in Savoy or who travel there, will be treated like Navis and Blanchet.’ ... Thereupon several citizens turned to the three deputies and said: ‘Have you remained five or six weeks over the mountains, feasting, amusing yourselves, exulting, and living merrily, in order to bring us such despatches? To the Rhone with the traitors! to the Rhone! The three mamelukes trembled before the anger of the people. Were they really to be flung into the river to be cleansed from the impurities they had contracted in the fêtes at Turin?... Lévrier, Besançon Hugues, and other men of condition quieted the citizens, and the servile deputies got off with their fright. Calm being restored, the councillors returned the prince’s letter to Nergaz and his colleagues, saying: ‘We will not open it.’ They feared the influence of the creatures of Savoy, of whom there were many in the Great Council. We give this name to the body established in 1457, which consisted at first of only fifty persons, and which being frequently increased became somewhat later the Council of Two Hundred. The people withdrew from this assembly a privilege they had given it in 1502, and decreed that the general council alone should henceforward decide on all that concerned the liberties of Geneva.[188]

CHAPTER XIV.
THE HUGUENOTS DEMAND AN ALLIANCE WITH FRIBURG: THE MAMELUKES OPPOSE IT. BERTHELIER IS ACQUITTED.
(December 1518 to January 1519.)

The cruel butchery of Navis and Blanchet, and the insolent sealed letter, were acts ruinous to those who had committed them. If the bishop had possessed only the spiritual power, he would not have been dragged into such measures; but by wishing to unite earthly dominion with religious direction, he lost both: a just punishment of those who forget the words of Christ: ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’ The bishop had torn the contract that bound him to the free citizens of the ancient city. The struggle was growing fiercer every day, and would infallibly end in the fall of the Roman episcopate in Geneva. It was not the Reformation that was to overthrow the representative of the pope: it was the breath of liberty and legality that was to uproot that barren tree, and the reformers were to come afterwards to cultivate the soil and scatter abroad the seeds of life. Two parties, both strangers to the Gospel, stood then face to face. On the one side were the bishop, the vicar and procurator-fiscal, the canons, priests, monks, and all the agents of the popedom; on the other were the friends of light, the friends of liberty, the partisans of law, the representatives of the people. The battle was between clerical and secular society. These struggles were not new; but while in the middle ages clerical society had always gained the victory, at Geneva, on the contrary, in the sixteenth century the series of its defeats was to begin. It is easy to explain this phenomenon. Ecclesiastical society had long been the most advanced as well as the strongest; but in the sixteenth century secular society appeared in all the vigour of youth, and was soon to gain the victories of a maturer age. It was all over with the clerical power: the weapons it employed at Geneva (the letter and the walnut-tree) indicated a thorough decline of human dignity. Out of date, fallen into childishness, and decrepid, it could no longer contend against the lay body. If the duel took place on open ground, without secret understandings, without trickery, the dishonoured clerical authority must necessarily fall. The Epicurean hog (if we may be permitted to use an ancient phrase), at once filthy and cruel, who from his episcopal throne trampled brutally under foot the holiest rights, was unconsciously preparing in Geneva the glorious advent of the Reformation.

The meeting of the 5th of December was no sooner dissolved than the citizens dispersed through the town. The insolent request of the princes and the refusal of the people were the subject of every conversation: nothing else was talked of ‘in public or in private, at feast or funeral.’ The letter which demanded on behalf of Geneva an alliance with Friburg was not sealed like the bishop’s; it was openly displayed in the streets, and carried from house to house; a large number of citizens hastened to subscribe their names: there were three hundred signatures. It was necessary to carry this petition to Friburg; Berthelier, who was still under trial, could not leave the city; besides, it would be better to have a new man, more calm perhaps, and more diplomatic. They cast their eyes on the syndic Besançon Hugues, who in character held a certain mean between Berthelier the man of action, and Lévrier the man of law. ‘No one can be more welcome among the confederates than you,’ they said; ‘Conrad Hugues, your father, fought at Morat in the ranks of Zurich.’—‘I will go,’ he replied, ‘but as a mere citizen.’ They wished to give him a colleague of a more genial nature, and chose De la Mare. He had resided for some time on a property his wife possessed in Savoy; but the gentry of the neighbourhood ‘playing him many tricks,’ because he was a Genevan, he had returned to the city burning with hatred against the Savoyard dominion.

The two deputies met with a warm reception and great honour at Friburg. The pensioners of Savoy opposed their demand in vain; the three hundred Genevans who had signed the petition received the freedom of the city, with an offer to make the alliance general if the community desired it. On Tuesday, December 21, the two deputies returned to Geneva, and on the following Thursday the proposal of alliance was brought before the people in general council. It was to be a great day; and accordingly the two parties went to the council determined, each of them, to make a last effort. The partisans of absolutism and those of the civic liberties, the citizens attached to Rome and those who were inclined to throw off their chains, the old times and the new, met face to face. At first there were several eloquent speeches on both sides: ‘We will not permit law and liberty to be driven out of Geneva,’ said the citizens, ‘in order that arbitrary rule may be set up in their place. God himself is the guarantee of our franchises.’ They soon came to warmer language, and at last grew so excited that deliberation was impossible. The deputy from Friburg, who had returned with Hugues and De la Mare, strove in vain to calm their minds; the council was compelled to separate without coming to any decision. Switzerland had offered her alliance, and Geneva had not accepted it.[189]

The friends of independence were uneasy; most of them were deficient in information and in arguments; they supplied the want by the instinct of liberty, boldness, and enthusiasm; but these are qualities that sometimes fail and fade away. Many of them accordingly feared that the liberties of Geneva would be finally sacrificed to the bishop’s good pleasure. The more enlightened thought, on the contrary, that the rights of the citizens would remain secure; that neither privilege, stratagem, nor violence would overthrow them; but that the struggle might perhaps be long, and if, according to the proverb, Rome was not built in a day, so it could not be thrown down in a day. These notable men, whose motto was ‘Time brings everything,’ called upon the people to be patient. This was not what the ardent Berthelier wanted. He desired to act immediately, and seeing that the best-informed men hesitated, he said: ‘When the wise will not, we make use of fools.’ He had again recourse to the young Genevans, with whom he had long associated, with a view of winning them over to his patriotic plans. He was not alone. Another citizen now comes upon the scene, a member of one of the most influential families in the city, by name Baudichon de la Maison-Neuve, a man of noble and exalted character, bold, welcome everywhere, braving without measure all the traditions of old times, often turbulent, and the person who, more perhaps than any other, served to clear in Geneva the way by which the Reformation was to enter. These two patriots and some of their friends endeavoured to revive in the people the remembrance of their ancient rights. At the banquets where the young men of Geneva assembled, epigrams were launched against the ducal party, civic and Helvetic songs were sung, and among others one composed by Berthelier, the unpoetical but very patriotic burden of which was: Vivent sur tous, Messieurs les alliés!
Every day this chorus was heard with fresh enthusiasm. The wind blew in the direction of independence, and the popular waves continued rising. ‘Most of the city are joining our brotherhood,’ said Bonivard; ‘decidedly the townsfolk are the strongest.’ The Christmas holidays favoured the exultation of the citizens. The most hot-headed of the Genevan youths paraded the streets; at night they kindled bonfires in the squares (which they called ardre des failles), and the boys, making torches of twisted straw, ran up and down the city, shouting: ‘Hurrah for the League! the huguenots for ever!’ Armed men kept watch throughout the city, and as they passed the houses of the mamelukes, they launched their gibes at them. ‘They were very merry,’ said Bonivard, ‘and made more noise than was necessary.’ The two parties became more distinct every day, the huguenots wearing a cross on their doublets and a feather in their caps, like the Swiss; the mamelukes carrying a sprig of holly on their head. ‘Whoever touches me will be pricked,’ said they, insolently pointing to it. Quarrels were frequent. When a band of the friends of Savoy happened to meet a number of the friends of the League, the former would cry out: ‘Huguenots!’ and the latter would reply: ‘We hold that title in honour, for it was taken by the first Swiss when they bound themselves by an oath against the tyranny of their oppressors!... But you mamelukes have always been slaves!’—‘Beware,’ said the vidame, ‘your proceedings are seditious.’—‘The necessity of escaping from slavery makes them lawful,’ replied Berthelier, Maison-Neuve, and their followers. The mountain torrent was rushing impetuously down, and men asked whether the dykes raised against it would be able to restrain its fury.[190]

The party of Savoy resolved to strike a decisive blow. No one was more threatened than Berthelier. The two princes might perhaps have spared the lives of the other citizens whose names were contained in the letter; but as for Berthelier, they must have his head, and that speedily. This was generally known: people feared to compromise themselves by saluting him, and timid men turned aside when they saw him coming, which made Bonivard, who remained faithful to him, exclaim with uneasiness: ‘Alas! he is abandoned by almost everybody of condition!’ But Berthelier did not abandon himself. He saw the sword hanging over his head; he knew that the blow was coming, and yet he was the most serene and animated of the citizens of Geneva; it was he who ‘by word and by example always comforted the young men.’ He asked simply that right should be done. ‘I am accused of being a marplot because I ask for justice;—a good-for-nothing, because I defend liberty against the enterprises of usurpers;—a conspirator against the bishop’s life, because they conspire against mine.’ His case was adjourned week after week. His friends, touched by the serenity of his generous soul, loudly demanded a general council. The people assembled on the 19th of January: ‘All that I ask,’ said Berthelier, ‘is to be brought to trial; let them punish me if I am guilty; and if I am innocent, let them declare it.’ The general council ordered the syndics to do justice.[191]

They hesitated no longer: they carefully examined the indictment; they summoned the vidame and the procurator-fiscal three times to make out their charges. The vidame, knowing this to be impossible, got out of the way: he could not be found. Navis appeared alone, but only to declare that he would give no evidence. All the formalities having been observed, the Grand Council, consisting at that time of 117 members, met on the 24th of January, 1519, and delivered a judgment of acquittal. The syndics, bearing their rods of office and followed by all the members of the council, took their station (according to the ancient custom) on the platform in front of the hôtel-de-ville. An immense crowd of citizens gathered round; many were clinging to the walls; all fixed their eyes with enthusiasm on the accused who stood calm and firm before his judges. Then Montyon, the premier syndic, a mameluke yet a faithful observer of the law, said to him: ‘Philibert Berthelier, the accusations brought against you proceeding, not from probable evidence but from violent and extorted confessions, condemned by all law human and divine. We, the syndics and judges in the criminal courts of this city of Geneva, having God and the Holy Scriptures before our eyes,—making the sign of the cross and speaking in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,—declare you, Philibert, by our definitive sentence, to be in no degree attaint or guilty of the crime of conspiring against our prince and yours, and declare the accusations brought against you unreasonable and unjust. Wherefore you ought to be absolved and acquitted of these, and you are hereby absolved and acquitted.’ This judgment, delivered by a magistrate devoted to the duke and the bishop, was a noble homage paid to the justice of the cause defended by Berthelier. A solemn feeling, such as accompanies a great and just deliverance, pervaded the assembly, and the joyful patriots asked if Berthelier’s acquittal was not the pledge of the liberation of Geneva.[192]

But if the joy among the huguenots was great, the consternation of the mamelukes was greater still. This mystery—for such they called the acquittal of an innocent man—terrified them. They had fancied their affairs in a better position, and all of a sudden they appeared desperate. That noble head, which they desired to bring low, now rose calm and cheerful in the midst of an enthusiastic people. To complete their misfortune, it was one of their own party that had delivered that abominable verdict of acquittal. They sent the news to their friends in Piedmont, adding that their affairs had never been in a worse position. Berthelier’s acquittal created a deep sensation at the court of Turin. It was a triumph of law and liberty that compromised all the plans of Savoy. By seizing Berthelier, they had hoped to extinguish that fire of independence and liberty, which they could discern afar on the Genevan hills; and now the fire which they hoped had been stifled, was shooting out a brighter and a higher flame.... The Archbishop of Turin, who had sworn to destroy all republican independence, represented to his sovereign the true meaning of the sentence that had just been delivered. The feeble duke, who knew not how to carry out his enterprises and feared spending money more than losing his dominions, had remained until this moment in a state of foolish confidence. He now awoke: he saw that the alliance with Switzerland would deprive him of Geneva for ever, and considered Berthelier’s acquittal as an outrage upon his honour. He determined to break the alliance, to quash the judgment, and to employ, if necessary, all the force of Savoy. He began, however, with diplomatic measures.[193]

On the 30th of January his ambassadors, the president of Landes, the seignior of Balayson, Bernard of St. Germain, and the skilful and energetic Saleneuve, arrived in Geneva, and, having been introduced to the general council, made at first loud protestations of friendship. But soon changing their tone and wishing to terrify by their threats, they said: ‘Nevertheless his Highness learns that some of you are conspiring against him.’ At these words there was a great commotion in the assembly: ‘Who are the conspirators? name them,’ was the cry from every side. The seignior of Landes, who had let the word escape him, corrected himself, and assured them that the duke was delighted to hear that the people had refused to favour those who were opposed to him. But the ambassador changed his tone to no purpose—the Genevan susceptibility was roused: that unlucky word conspire spread through the city. ‘To conspire against the duke he must first be our prince,’ said some. ‘Now, whatever he may say, he is only vidame, that is, a civil officer, and as such subordinate to the supreme council. We will make no reply to the ambassadors of Savoy so long as they do not name the conspirators.’ The Savoyards increased their attentions, and showed the tenderest regard for the purses of the Genevans. ‘We are quite alarmed,’ they said, ‘at the quantity of gold florins you will have to pay Friburg for its alliance.’ They carefully hid themselves under sheep’s clothing; but do what they would, the wolf’s fangs peeped out unexpectedly now and then; and while the chiefs were enshrouding themselves in diplomacy, sharp disputes occurred between the citizens and the ambassadors’ attendants. ‘All the Genevans are traitors!’ exclaimed a servant belonging to the treasury of Chambéry. The varlet was reprimanded, but the ambassadors thought it prudent to leave the city. They were exasperated, and on their return to Turin told the duke: ‘You will gain nothing by reasoning with these citizens. If you say you are their prince, they will maintain that you are their vassal.’—‘Well, then,’ said the duke, ‘let us settle the matter not with the pen but with the sword.’ That was just what the energetic Saleneuve desired.[194]

CHAPTER XV.
THE PEOPLE IN GENERAL COUNCIL VOTE FOR THE ALLIANCE. THE DUKE INTRIGUES AGAINST IT.
(February and March 1519.)

The Genevans knew what sort of report would be made of them at Turin; they therefore resolved to forestall the duke and to conclude as soon as possible an alliance with the Swiss, which would permit them vigorously to repel the Savoyards. Nothing could be more lawful. Liberty was of old date in Geneva: the despotism of the princes was an innovation. The people having met according to custom on Sunday, February 6, 1519, to elect the four syndics for the year, Besançon Hugues came forward. At first he seemed to be speaking in personal explanation, but one only thought filled his heart—he wished to see Geneva united to Switzerland. To propose this openly would endanger his life, and perhaps give an advantage to the enemy; he therefore proceeded artfully to work. ‘Sovereign lords,’ said he, ‘the ambassadors of Savoy spoke of conspirators; I think they meant me, and had my journey to Friburg in their mind. Now, I declare that I have done nothing contrary to the duty of a citizen.... Besides,’ added he, as if parenthetically, ‘if you desire to know all about it, you will find it explained at length in a letter from the council of Friburg.’—‘The letter, read the letter,’ they cried out. This was just what Hugues wanted: Friburg would thus make the proposal which he dared not bring forward himself. The letter was read before all the assembly. ‘When it shall please the entire community of Geneva to join in friendship and citizenship with the people of Friburg,’ said the writer, ‘the latter will agree cheerfully, without prejudice either to the rights of the bishop and prince of Geneva, or to the liberties and franchises of the city, and neither of the parties shall pay tribute to the other.’[195]

When they heard this loyal and generous letter, the people were enraptured. The Swiss themselves were stretching out their hands to them. The joy was universal; there was a cry for the offer of these noble confederates to be put to the vote. Montyon, the mameluke syndic, was alarmed; he was taken unawares; that immense affair against which the bishop and Savoy were uniting their forces was about to be carried as if by storm. Even the patriotic Vandel was intimidated, and proposed that they should proceed immediately to the election of the syndics conformably to the order of the day. It was too late. Since the 22nd of December, Berthelier and his friends had displayed unwearied activity: in six weeks the huguenot party had made immense progress. Desire, hope, and joy animated the citizens. Another feeling, however, was mingled with this enthusiasm, and it was indignation. The ambassadors of Savoy had insinuated, it will be remembered, that Geneva would have to pay tribute to Friburg. ‘Where are those famous gold florins, with which they frightened us?’ said the citizens. ‘The duke who is only a civil officer among us, in his desire to become prince, condescends to vile falsehoods in order that he may succeed!’ ... From every quarter rose the cry: ‘A poll, a poll! citizenship with Friburg! A poll, a poll!’ As the two first syndics obstinately refused, Hugues remembered that there are moments when audacity alone can save a people. He laid aside his habitual scruples, and acting solely on his own responsibility, he proposed the alliance. ‘Yes, yes,’ replied the majority of the assembly with uplifted hands. A few mamelukes, surprised, disconcerted, and disheartened, remained silent and still.[196]

Thus, at the very moment when the court of Turin was expressing its discontent at the acquittal of Berthelier, the people replied by a resolution which threatened still more the ambitious designs of Savoy. The citizens of Geneva opened their gates to the Swiss. By turning their backs on the south, they forsook despotism and popery; by turning towards the north, they invited liberty and truth.

The nomination of the syndics, which came next, seemed to confirm this solemn vote: it was the most huguenot election ever known. Three of the new syndics were devoted partisans of independence, namely, Stephen de la Mare, a connection of the Gingins, who had accompanied Hugues to Friburg; John Baud, Hugues’ brother-in-law; and Louis Plongeon, seignior of Bellerive. Guiges Prévost, the premier syndic, had indeed very close relations with the ducal party, but he was a man of good intentions. Many old councillors had to make way for devoted patriots. Geneva was beginning to soar: it desired to be free. Ambassadors set off immediately to announce to Friburg that the people had voted the alliance.[197]

Then burst forth one of those great transports that come over a whole nation, when after many struggles it catches a glimpse of liberty. In all the city there were bonfires, cheering, songs, processions, and banquets. But here and there, in the midst of this great joy, there were gloomy faces to be seen; the mamelukes strove in vain to keep down their anger; it broke out suddenly in insults and riots. The reaction was indeed prompt: in the presence of the simple joy of the people, the duke’s friends drew closer together, and their party was organised. The house of Savoy had still many adherents in Geneva, capable of opposing the desire for independence and truth. There were old Savoyard families devoted to the duke; persons who were sold to him; young men of birth, enthusiasts of absolute power; priests and laymen enamoured of Rome; traders averse to a war that would injure their business; weak men, trembling at the least commotion, and many low people without occupation, who are easily excited to riot. The party felt the necessity of calculating their strength and coming to some understanding; but it was not its most prominent leaders who placed themselves in the front. Francis Cartelier, a native of Bresse, and syndic in 1516, a lettered, prudent, and cunning but mean man, convened its principal members in a room at the convent of Rive, which was called ‘the little stove.’ Thither came in succession, besides Montyon and Nergaz, whom we know already, other mamelukes young and full of zeal: Messieurs de Brandis, who were at the head of Genevan society; the two De Fernex, who derived their name from a lordship which became famous in after years; Marin de Versonex, whose family was distinguished by its good works, a young man of limited understanding but ardent imagination, of a disposition easily led away, and passionately devoted to the Church of Rome, which alone he thought able to save him; by his side was his cousin Percival de Pesmes, united to him by a sincere friendship, and whose ancestors had been among the crusading barons who followed St. Louis; lastly, many other noble mamelukes, determined to oppose even to death the triumph of the party of liberty and Switzerland. These old magistrates and these young nobles found themselves out of their element in Geneva. Sincere for the most part in their convictions, they believed they saw in the new day that was rising over the world, a day of tempest which destroying what existed would put nothing in its place. What must be done to avert so dire a misfortune? They resolved to inform the duke of the alliance which had just been voted, and urge him to make every exertion to prevent its being carried out.[198]

All these efforts were to prove useless. Liberty was beginning to raise her head in one of the smallest but most ancient cities of the Empire and the Church. It is a strange thing that the city bearing on its flag the symbols of these two absolute powers—the key of the popes and the eagle of the emperors—raised this very significant banner, and thus proclaimed, as if in a spirit of contradiction, liberty in Church and State. While other nations (if we except the Swiss League) were sleeping under the feudal sceptre of their masters, this little republic in the centre of Europe was awaking. Like a dead man lying in a vast cemetery, it began to stir and alone came forth triumphant from its tomb. In all the neighbouring countries, in Switzerland, Savoy, France, and places more remote, people talked of the strange movements taking place at Geneva, and of the daring resistance opposed by a few energetic citizens to a prince who was brother-in-law to Charles V. and uncle to Francis I. Men of the old times grew alarmed. True, it was but a cloud, small as a man’s hand, but it might grow into a fierce tempest in which the two ancient buttresses of feudal and Roman society—absolute power in spiritual and in temporal matters—might be shattered. What would happen then? Might not this emancipatory movement extend through Europe? At Geneva men talked of political liberty; at Wittemberg of religious reform: if these two streams should chance to unite, they would make a formidable torrent which would throw down the edifice of the dark ages and sweep away its ruins into the great abyss. ‘People spoke everywhere,’ Bonivard tells us, ‘of huguenots and mamelukes, as they once did of Guelfs and Ghibelines.’ The prior of St. Victor, to whom these things were reported, reflected on them and said in his musings: ‘Geneva is beginning to be a member in the body of christendom of which strange things are said.’ In examining them, however, he thought there was room for abatement both of hopes and fears:—‘Fame, as Virgil sings, is a goddess who makes things greater than they are.’[199] These things were greater than Bonivard thought. Geneva, by setting out in search of liberty, was to find the Gospel.

The duke, the count, and the bishop, informed successively by their ambassadors, the vidame, and lastly by the mamelukes of ‘the little stove,’ ‘drank of these bitter waters’ and asked themselves if they were going to lose that city from which the house of Savoy had derived such great profit for centuries. They began to understand the imprudence of their rough policy; they began to regret the arrests and the murders; they would have liked that ‘the work was to be done over again.’ That seemed difficult; yet after many conferences, the three princes agreed upon certain plans, one or other of which they thought must succeed.