“All! all! Let them all be burned together,” shouted the mob, dancing frantically.
The other piles were quickly lighted, the smoke ascending from the fourteen fires forming a dark canopy overhead.
The victims, as long as they could be distinguished, were seen with their eyes turned to heaven, singing and praising God with their last breath.
The savage fury of the ignorant populace was not yet satiated. Those who had been hung up by the shoulders were now taken down, and so dreadfully flogged, that some of them petitioned that they might be thrown into the flames amid the ashes of their martyred friends; but this was a mercy their cruel executioners had no intention of affording them. Bleeding, they were dragged off to be imprisoned in a monastery, where they were to be shut up for life.
At length Villegagnon, who had looked on with perfect indifference, called to his companions to follow, and, the crowd beginning to disperse, they were able with less difficulty to advance.
The lowest of the rabble only had exulted in the dreadful scene; the greater number of the people exhibited very different feelings. Nigel observed many in tears, or with downcast looks, returning to their homes; others exchanging glances of indignation; and he heard several exclaiming, “They died in a righteous cause. May we have grace to suffer as they have done.”
“Truly, as I have heard it said in Scotland, ‘The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church,’” observed Nigel to another of his companions, whose tears and groans showed the grief he suffered at the spectacle he had just witnessed.
Villegagnon kept his party together, for more than once some of the more ferocious persons of the mob cast suspicious looks at them, and mutterings arose, “Who are these? They have the air of Lutherans, or they would look more joyous at the destruction of heretics.”
“I hold the king’s commission, and these are under my orders,” cried Villegagnon. “Make way, good people, make way, and allow us to proceed on our journey.”
Still the mob pressed round, and where showing a determination to stop the travellers, when a monk stepped forward, and exclaimed, “I know that gentleman, and he is a true son of the Church. Interfere not, at your peril, with him and his companions.”