The Spoon was taken up everywhere, as in the time of the crusades men took up the Cross: the decoration was characteristic of these loud-spoken free-living cavaliers. Meetings took place every week in the various castles of the neighbourhood. New members joined the order, and hung the spoon round their necks, saying: 'Since the commonalty (the Genevans and Swiss) form alliances, surely the nobles may do so!' They drew up 'statutes and laws for their guidance, which were committed to writing, as in public matters.'[773] Erelong the 'gentlemen of the Spoon,' as they called themselves, proceeded to perform their vow; they issued from their castles, plundered the estates of the Genevans, intercepted their provisions, and blockaded them closer and closer every day. When they came near the city, on the heights of Pregny, Lancy, and Cologny, they added derision to violence; they took their spoons and waved them in the air, as if they wished to use them in swallowing the city which lay smiling at their feet.

=ALARM AT GENEVA.=

The alarm increased every day in Geneva; the citizens called the Swiss to their aid, fortified their city, and kept strict watch. Whenever any friends met together, the story of the famous dinner at Bursinel was repeated. The Genevans went so far, says a chronicle, as to be unwilling to make use of the innocent spoon, such a horror they felt at it. Many of those who read the Scriptures began to pray to God to save Geneva; and on the 23rd of March, the council entered the following words in their register: 'May we be delivered from the evils we endure, may we conquer and have peace!... May the Almighty be pleased to grant it to us!'[774]

Pontverre was not a mere adventurer; he possessed a mind capable of discerning the political defects of his party. Two men in Geneva especially occupied his thoughts at this time: they were the bishop and the prior. In his opinion, they ought to gain the first and punish the other.

He began with Bonivard; no one was more detested by the feudal party than he was. That the head of a monastery should side with the huguenots seemed a terrible scandal. No one besides, at that time, advocated more boldly than the prior the principles opposed to absolute power; and this he showed erelong.

At Cartigny, on the left bank of the Rhone, about two leagues from Geneva, he possessed a fief which depended on the dukes of Savoy: 'It is a mere pleasure-house, and not a fortress,' he said; and yet he was in the habit of keeping a garrison there. The duke had seized it during his vassal's captivity, and to Bonivard's frequent demands for its restoration he replied 'that he dared not give it up for fear of being excommunicated by the pope.' Michaelmas having come, the time at which the rent was collected, the Savoy government forbade the tenants to pay it to the prior; the latter felt indignant, and the principles he then laid down deserve to be called to mind. 'The rights of a prince and his subjects are reciprocal,' he said. 'If the subject owes obedience to his prince, the prince owes justice to his subject. If the prince may constrain his subject, when the latter refuses obedience in a case wherein it is lawfully due, the subject has also the right to refuse obedience to his prince, when the latter denies him justice. Let the subject then be without fear, and rest assured that God is for him. Men, perhaps, will not be on his side; but if he has strength to resist men, I can answer for God.'[775]

Bonivard, who was determined to obtain justice, laid before the council of Geneva the patents which established his rights, and prayed their help in support of his claim. His petition at first met with some little opposition in the general council. 'The city has enough to do already with its own affairs,' said many, 'without undertaking the prior's;' but most of the huguenots were of a contrary opinion. 'If the duke has at St. Victor a lord after his fashion,' they said, 'it might be a serious inconvenience to us. Besides, the energetic prior has always been firm in the service of the city.' This consideration prevailed and the general council decided that they would maintain Bonivard's rights by force of arms if necessary.

The prior now made his preparations. 'Since I cannot have civil justice,' he said, 'I will have recourse to the law of nations, which authorises to repel force by force.' The petty sovereign of St. Victor, who counted ten monks for his subjects, who no longer possessed his uncle's culverins, and whose only warlike resources were a few arquebusiers, hired by a Bernese adventurer, besides four pounds of powder, determined to march against the puissant Duke of Savoy, prince of Piedmont, and even to brave that pope-king who once upon a time had only to frown to make all the world tremble. Perish St. Victor rather than principles!

=BONIVARD DEFENDS CARTIGNY.=

Bonivard sent for a herald and told him: 'The Duke of Savoy has usurped my sovereignty; you will therefore proceed to Cartigny and make proclamation through all my lordship, in these terms: "No one in this place shall execute either ducal or papal letters under pain of the gallows.'" We see that Bonivard made a large use of his supreme power. The herald, duly escorted, made the terrible proclamation round the castle; and then a captain, a commissioner, and a few soldiers, sent by Bonivard, took possession of the domain in his name, under the nose of the pope and the duke.[776] He was very proud of this exploit. 'The pope and the duke have not dared send men to prevent my captain from taking possession,' he said good-humouredly; for Bonivard, though sparkling with wit, was also a good-tempered man.