For some years past the reformed religion had spread rapidly in this corner of France, and Palissy, always anxious to understand everything that came in his way, began first to inquire into the new doctrines, and then to adopt them. One of the converts, Philibert Hamelin, a native of Tours, was seized by the magistrates and condemned to death, and Palissy, who was his special friend, careless of any risk to himself, did all that was possible to obtain his pardon; when that proved hopeless, the potter arranged a plan of escape for the prisoner, but Hamelin declined to fly, and was hanged at Bordeaux in 1557.
The new religion had changed life outwardly as well as inwardly at Saintes, as Palissy himself tells us. 'Games, dances, songs, banquets, smart clothes, were all things of the past. Ladies were forbidden by Calvin, whose word was law, even to wear ribbons; the wine shops were empty, for the young men passed their spare hours in the fields; girls sat singing hymns on the banks of the streams, and boys abandoned their games, and were as grave as their fathers.' The new faith spread rapidly in this district, but the converts did not all behave in the peaceable manner described by Palissy. As the party grew stronger it also grew more violent, and it was plain to him and to everyone else that civil war must shortly follow. Cruelty on one side was answered by cruelty on the other, and Palissy had thrown in his lot with the Huguenots, and by his writings as well as his words urged them to take arms against the Catholics. Perhaps the artist in him may have grieved to hear of the destruction in the beautiful churches of the carved images of the saints that were broken by axes and hammers; of the pictures that were burned, or the old illuminated manuscripts that were torn in pieces; but outwardly he gave his approval, and when things went against the Huguenots, even Palissy's powerful friends who admired his works could no longer shut their eyes. He was warned to change his ways, and as he did not the duke of Montpensier, then governor of the rebellious provinces, thought he would keep Palissy from greater mischief by putting him into prison. From Saintes he was sent to Bordeaux, where the magistrates, irritated at his having given the use of a tower which they had granted him for a studio as a meeting-place for Huguenots, ordered him into stricter confinement, while they debated whether the studio should be destroyed. But the constable of France, Anne de Montmorency, hearing of this proposal, hastened to the queen dowager, Catherine de Médicis, who came to the rescue by appointing him potter to the royal household. In this manner Palissy and his studio both escaped, and soon afterwards the Treaty of Amboise (1563) gave peace to both parties.
After this the happiest period of Palissy's life began. He was free, he was on the way to grow rich, and he had leisure to write down the thoughts and plans that had come to him long ago as a boy in his wanderings, or lately, in his lonely hours in prison. His children could be well provided for, and he need have no more anxiety about them. As to his wife, she appears to have been already dead when fortune at last visited him, and, indeed, she played but a small part in his life.
Now his first book was composed, and in it we can read about the gardens that Palissy hoped to lay out if his rich friends, Montmorency, or Montpensier, or Condé, or even the queen herself, would help him to carry out his designs.
The garden of Palissy's thoughts was to be very large, and certainly would cost a great deal of money. It was to be situated under a hill, so that the flowers and fruits might be protected from the winds, and many streams were to flow through it. Broad alleys would cross the garden, ending in arbours, some made of trees, trained or cut into different shapes, and filled with statues; others of different coloured stones, with lizards and vipers climbing upon the walls, while on the floor texts would be picked out in pebbles. Plants and flowers would hang from the roofs of the grottos, and beside them the rivulets would broaden into basins where real frogs and fish would gaze with surprise at their stone companions on the brink. Here and there the stream would be dammed up into a lake covered with tiny islands, and filled with forget-me-nots and water-lilies and pretty yellow irises, and at the next turn of the path the visitor would be delighted by a beautiful statue half hidden by a grove of trees. Catching sight of an inscription in the left hand of the figure, he would not resist stepping aside to read it, and as he was stooping to see what was written a jar of water in the figure's right hand would empty itself on his head.
A jar of water in the figure's right hands emptied itself on his head.
Wet and cross, the visitor would pursue his way, taking care not to go near another statue standing alone in a wide grassy space, with a ring dangling from its finger. The children or pages waiting on the lady of the house would, however, think that the flat lawn would be a splendid place in which to play at 'tilting at the ring,' and here was a ring just set up for the purpose. Hastily fetching their toy weapons, they would choose a starting-place and, holding their lances well back, run swiftly towards the statue, hoping to thrust the lance-point through the ring, as by-and-by they would have to do at the sports at a royal wedding or a coronation. But the moment the ring was touched a huge wet sponge would swing round from the back of the figure and hit the champion a sharp blow on the back of the head, to the great delight and surprise of his companions.