The Huguenot: A Tale of the French Protestants. Volumes I-III

by G. P. R. James

The hour was about six o'clock in the evening, and as if to accord with the earth below it, there was a cold and wintry look about the sky which the season did not justify; and the long blue lines of dark cloud, mingled with streaks of yellow and orange towards the verge of heaven, seemed to bespeak an early autumn. There was one little pond in the foreground of the picture sunk deep amongst some banks and hawthorn bushes, and looking dark and stern as every thing around it. Flapping up from it, however, scared by the noise of a horse's feet, rose a large white stork, contrasting strangely with the dim shadowy waters.

The person that startled the bird by passing nearer to him than any body else had done, rode forward close by the head of the pond to a spot about three hundred yards farther on, where a great multitude of people were assembled, perhaps to the number of two thousand. He was followed by several servants; but it is to be remarked that both servants and lord were unarmed. He himself did not even wear the customary sword, without which not a gentleman in France was seen at any distance from his own house, and no apparent arms of any kind, not even the small knife or dagger, often worn by a page, was visible amongst the attendants. There was a buzz of many voices as he approached, but it was instantly silenced, when, dismounting from his horse, he gave the rein to a servant, and then advanced to meet one or two persons who drew out from the crowd as if privileged by intimacy to speak with him. The first of these was Claude de l'Estang, whose hand he took and shook affectionately, though mournfully. The second was a tall thin ravenous-looking personage, with sharp-cut lengthened features, a keen, but somewhat unsettled, we might almost use the word phrenzied, eye, and an expression of countenance altogether neither very benevolent nor very prepossessing. He also took the Count's hand, saying, "I am glad to see thee, my son; I am glad to see thee. Thou art somewhat behind the time, and in this great day of backsliding and falling off I feared that even thou, one of our chief props and greatest lights, might have departed from us into the camp of the Philistines."

"Fear not, Monsieur Chopel," replied the Count; "I trust there is no danger of such weakness on my part. I was detained to write a letter in answer to one from good Monsieur de Rouvré, who has suffered so much in our cause, and who, it seems, arrived at Ruffigny last night."

"I know he did," said Claude de l'Estang; "but pray, my dear Albert, before either myself or our good brother, Monsieur Chopel, attempt to lead the devotions of the people, do you speak a few words of comfort and consolation to them, and above all things counsel them to peace and tranquil doings."

The Count paused and seemed to hesitate for a moment. In truth, the task that was put upon him was not pleasant to him, and he would fain have avoided it; but accustomed to overcome all repugnance to that which was right, he conquered himself with scarcely a struggle, and advanced with Claude de l'Estang into the midst of the people, who made way with respectful reverence, as he sought for some slightly elevated point from which to address them more easily. Chopel and l'Estang, however, had chosen a sort of rude rock for their pulpit before he came, and having been led thither, the Count mounted upon it, and took off his hat, as a sign that he was about to speak. All voices were immediately hushed, and he then went on.

"My brethren," he said, "we are here assembled to worship God according to our own consciences, and to the rules and doctrines of the reformed church. In so doing we are not failing in our duty to the King, who, as sovereign of these realms, is the person whom, under God, we are most bound to obey and reverence. It has seemed fit to his Majesty, from motives, upon which I will not touch, to withdraw from us much that was granted by his predecessors. He has ordered the temples in which we are accustomed to worship to be closed, so that on this, the Sabbath day, we have no longer any place of permitted worship but in the open air. That, however, has not been denied us; there is no prohibition to our meeting and praising God here, and this resource at least is allowed us, which, though it may put us to some slight inconvenience and discomfort, will not the less afford the sincere and devout an opportunity of raising their prayers to the Almighty, in company with brethren of the same faith and doctrines as themselves. We know that God does not dwell in temples made with hands; and I have only to remind you, my brethren, before giving place to our excellent ministers, who will lead our devotions this day, that the God we have assembled to worship is also a God of peace, who has told us, by the voice of his Son, not to revile those who revile us, nor smite those that smite us, but to bear patiently all things, promising that those who endure to the last shall be saved. I appointed this place," he continued, "for our meeting, because it was far from any town, and consequently we shall have few here from idle curiosity, and afford no occasion of offence to any man. I begged you earnestly to come unarmed also, as I myself have done, that there might be no doubt of our views and purposes being pacific. I am happy to see that all have followed this advice, I believe without exception, and also that there are several women amongst us, which, I trust, is a sign that, in the strait and emergency in which we now are, they will not abandon their husbands, their fathers, and their brothers, for any inducement, but continue to serve God in the faith in which they have been brought up."

Having thus spoken, the Count gave place and descended amongst the people, retiring several steps from the little sort of temporary pulpit, and preparing to go through the service of the reformed church, as if he had been within the walls of the temple his father had built in Morseiul, and which was now ordered to be levelled with the ground.

After a few words between Claude de l'Estang and Chopel, the latter mounted the pulpit and gave out a psalm, the ----, which he led himself, in a voice like thunder. The whole congregation joined; and though the verses that they repeated were in the simple unadorned words of the olden times, and the voices that sung them not always in perfect harmony, yet the sound of that melody in the midst of the desert had something strangely impressive, nay, even affecting. The hearts of a people that would not bow down before man, bowed down before God; and they who in persecution and despair had lost all trust on earth, in faith and hope raised their voices unto heaven with praise and adoration.

When the psalm was over, and the minds of all men prepared for prayer, the clergyman who had given out the psalm, closing his eyes and spreading his hands, turned his face towards the sky and began his address to the Almighty. We shall not pause upon the words that he made use of here, as it would be irreverent to use them lightly; but it is sufficient to say, that he mingled many themes with his address that both Claude de l'Estang and the Count de Morseiul wished had been omitted. He thanked God for the trial and purification to which he had subjected his people: but in doing so, he dwelt so long upon, and entered so deeply into, the nature of all those trials and grievances and the source from which they sprang, pointed out with such virulent acrimony the tyranny and the persecution which the reformed church had suffered, and clothed so aptly, nay, so eloquently, his petitions against the persecutors and enemies of the church, in the sublime language of scripture, that the Count could not but feel that he was very likely to stir up the people to seek their deliverance with their own hand and think themselves fully justified by holy writ; or, at all events, to exasperate their already excited passions, and render the least spark likely to cast them into a flame.

Albert of Morseiul was uneasy while this was proceeding, especially as the prayer lasted an extraordinary length of time, and he could not refrain from turning to examine the countenances of some of the persons present, in order to discover what was the effect produced upon them, especially as he saw a man, standing between him and the rock on which the preacher stood, grasp something under his cloak, as if the appearance of being unarmed was, in that case, not quite real. Near to him were one or two women wrapped up in the large grey cloaks of the country, and they obstructed his view to the right; but at some distance straight before him he saw the burly form of Virlay, the blacksmith, and close by him again the stern, but expressive, countenance of Armand Herval. Scattered round about, too, he remarked a considerable number of men with a single cock's feather stuck in the front of the hat, which, though bands of feathers and similar ornaments were very much affected, even by the lower classes of that period, was by no means a common decoration in the part of the country where he then was.