When the syndic saw this, he lost all hope. The duke of Savoy invited the sisters to take refuge in his states, making them fine promises. 'Fair ladies,' said the magistrate, 'name the day you wish to depart.'—'To-morrow,' said the mother-superior, 'to-morrow, at daybreak.'—'Fair ladies,' resumed the syndic, 'pack up your goods.'[600]
Early next morning the syndics arrived, when the sisters, after singing a De Profundis, put their breviaries under their arm, and drew up in two ranks. The mother-vicar placed the young sisters, who might have any longing to quit the veil, by the side of some sturdy nuns who could detain them. A great crowd had assembled before the convent and in the streets. Seeing this, many of the nuns 'shrank back with fear,' but the courageous superior said, with animation: 'Cheer up, my sisters, make the sign of the cross, and keep our Lord in your hearts.' They stepped forward. This procession of veiled and silent women represented Roman-catholicism leaving Geneva. Sobs were heard here and there. Three hundred archers marched in front, behind, and at the side of the nuns, to protect them. 'If any one moves,' said the syndic to the spectators, 'he shall lose his head.' The crowd looked on silently as the sisters passed along.[601]
When the procession arrived at the Arve bridge, where the territory of the city ceased, the nuns, who had imagined they would find the duke and his court waiting at the frontiers of his states to receive them with great honor, could see nobody. A poor monk alone appeared, bringing a wretched wagon, in order to carry the old and sick.[602]
The rain and the muddy roads delayed their progress. The poor nuns, who knew nothing but their convent, were startled at everything. Seeing a few sheep grazing in a meadow, they screamed aloud, taking them (says one of the sisters) for ravening wolves. A little farther on, some cows which were in the fields, attracted by this troop passing along, stretched out their heads towards the road, and lowed. The nuns imagined they were hungry bears, and had not even strength to run away. At nightfall they reached St. Julien, having taken fifteen hours to go a short league. The next day they entered Annecy, where the duke gave them the monastery of the Holy Cross. All the bells of the city rang at their arrival. Here the poor nuns found some repose; but they did not forget the judgment of God that had banished them from Geneva, and did not hide the cause of their misfortunes. 'Ah!' said Sister Jeanne de Jussie, 'the prelates and churchmen did not observe their vows at this time, but squandered dissolutely the ecclesiastical property, keeping women in adultery and lubricity, and awakening the anger of God, which brought divine punishment on them.'[603]
If the truth extorted such a confession from a nun, an honest but fanatical disciple of popery, we may understand what the reformed thought and said. A cry came from their hearts against the immorality and hypocrisy of those who ought to have been their guides. Hence there was great agitation among the priests; they came running in a distracted manner to Monseigneur de Bonmont, and asking him: 'What is to be done? must we stay or go?'
=FLIGHT OF THE GRAND-VICAR.=
The grand-vicar thought it was necessary to go. Public opinion declared unequivocally against him: he was one of those priests who called forth Sister Jeanne's reproof. 'Monseigneur keeps in his house several mistresses and agents of debauchery,' people said. 'Gaming, mots de gueule, dances, banquets, impudicity, and every kind of dissolute living, are his delight. He generally has five vile prostitutes at his table, seated according to their degree, two at his right and two at his left, while the oldest waits upon the others. He smiles when he talks of impudicity, and says, "It is a mere backsliding, and does not count."' Seeing the storm grow darker, the wretched priest was terrified in his conscience, and resolved to act like his bishop, and quit a city where he could no longer live as he had always lived. The Reformation was the re-establishment of morality as well as of faith. Monseigneur fled to the mountain, to solitude in the abbey of Bonmont, near Nyon, on a spur of the Jura, which overlooks Lake Leman and its rich valley. Another terror was soon to drive him thence.[604]
The anger of God (spoken of by Jeanne) continued to work out his judgments: opprobrium accumulated on those priests who had thought themselves the kings of the earth. On the 18th of September, some of the citizens having caught one of them in an act of impurity, they set him on a donkey, and paraded him thus through the city, making his mistress, disguised as a lackey, walk behind him. Serious men disapproved of such buffoonery. 'Ah!' they said, 'disease, the consequence of their disorders, has so punished them, that as we see them pass along in their processions we might imagine them to be soldiers returning from the war, they are so covered with scars—true martyrs of the pope!'[605] The magistrates would have liked not to punish them, not to banish them, but to reform them. 'Give up,' they said, 'your dances, gluttony, and dissolute living, and dwell in our city according to God's law, like citizens and good friends.' But that seemed too difficult for the priests: they preferred to leave Geneva.
The most active, however, remained. Dupan and some of his colleagues went from house to house, strengthening the weak. They might be seen passing along the streets, wearing their sacerdotal vestments. If a child was born, they hastened to christen it according to the Roman ritual; if fervent Catholics desired the sacrament, they met secretly in some chamber, knelt down before a hastily constructed altar, crossed themselves, and said mass. They even carried their zeal so far as to visit certain of the reformed, in order to bring them back to the fold of the Church. At the very moment when the edifice was giving way on all sides, their natural inflexibility and enthusiasm for the papacy made them remain, as if their feeble hands were sufficient to support it. Such courage claims our admiration, but the reformed considered it rather as a matter for serious anxiety. They felt the necessity of concord and unity at this critical moment. 'See what your condescension exposes us to,' they said to the magistrates. 'Just as the enemy is marching against the city, these priests are going to stir up a civil war within our gates.'[606]