There are sad pages in all histories: there are tales in every land the
telling of which must awaken deep feelings of horror. Man’s inhumanity
to man has always been the dark stain upon God’s earth.
But no cruelties of the ancient days--not even the ghastly enormities of
Nero or the evil deeds of the ‘dark ages’--can exceed the terror and
trouble, the fiendish works, the rage and oppression which have reigned
in the Vaudois valleys.
From primitive times those valleys in the Savoy Alps have been the
refuge of Christians who only asked to be allowed to live, harmless and
insignificant, tending their mulberry trees, their vineyards and their
corn; with liberty to serve God according to the simple faith which had
been handed down to them from their fathers. They had books which they
greatly prized,--portions of God’s Word, poems, commentaries, and their
own _Noble Lesson_. This celebrated book was written or compiled about
the year 1100, in the Romance language,--and in this language they also
possessed the text of the Psalms and several books of the Old and New
Testaments.
They themselves declared that it was the persecutions of the Roman
emperors which had driven the first Christian settlers to the valleys;
and if it were so the little Church, born of persecution and nourished
by martyrdom, had learned from the first to endure all things as good
soldiers of its Master, Christ.
From the earliest times there have always been faithful hearts humbly
following the steps of the Lord, seeking, above earthly wealth and weal,
to know and to do God’s will. And such there will ever be until the
Master comes again. Evil may seem triumphant, and pride and arrogance
lift prosperous fronts, but the Lord knoweth them that are His, and
there shall never lack a remnant to watch and wait for Him.
It is not needful to trace in this story the growth of the pomp and
power of the Bishop of Rome, nor to tell at length how the ‘successor’
of St. Peter ceased to be either humble or faithful. The Empire of the
West had crumbled away, the ancient seat of the Cæsars was empty, and
gradually the bishop became the most important person in the city,
claiming one thread of power after another until the ‘Sovereign Pontiff’
asserted rule and right over the length and breadth of Christendom.
It was strange that such pretensions could be based on the Gospel of Him
who took on Himself the form of a servant, and whose first words of
teaching were a blessing on the ‘poor in spirit.’ Perhaps it was partly
a dim consciousness of this that made pope and cardinals wish the people
not to read the writings of the apostles and the words of the Lord.
But reading in those days was no easy matter.
Books were scarce and costly. Learning was difficult. The bulk of the
people only heard God’s Word through the mouths of those whose gain it
was to suppress and distort its simple teaching. Men and women lived and
died believing that pope and priest could forgive sins and wipe off all
offences, and that a handful of gold pieces could purchase their
entrance into paradise.
It was through these dark days that the Light of the Truth burned clear
in the hearts and homes of the simple race dwelling on the confines of
Savoy, where the frontier lines of Switzerland and France met on the
white-hill peaks. And this race it was, this ‘nest of heretics,’ that
the Roman power resolved to crush and kill.
The first persecution that was regularly organised to destroy them root
and branch took place at the end of the twelfth century. In addition to
those slain outright, the number of those carried into captivity was so
great that the Archbishop of Avignon declared that he had ‘so many
prisoners it is impossible not only to defray the charge of their
nourishment, but to get enough lime and stone to build prisons for
them.’
From this time onwards the history of valleys is one long tale of
persecution. The intervals when ‘the churches had rest, and were
edified,’ were so short that the accounts of suffering and martyrdom
must have been handed down verbally from father to son. Thirty-two
invasions were endured, invasions of troops filled with the remorseless
rage of religious fanaticism.
But it was in the year 1650 that the bitterest storm broke over them. It
was a time of extraordinary ‘religious’ feeling, and councils were
established in Turin and other cities, having for their object the
spread of the Romish faith and the utter extirpation of heretics. The
plan on which they worked was just the old barbarous way of force and
fire, and the worst weapon of all, treachery.
Once again the Vaudois fled before the soldiers hired to butcher them.
The caves and dens of the rocks, the mountain passes filled with snows
that April suns had no power to melt, the natural fastnesses and
citadels of the hills--these were the places to which the villagers
escaped. And as they went they were lighted by the blaze of their
burning homesteads, and followed by the shrieks and groans of the weak
and their helpless defenders, whom the ruthless murderers overtook,
tortured and slew.
It was then that Janavel of Rora came to the front. He had but six men
with him when he first made a stand on the heights above Villaro, where
the mountain track leads over the Collina di Rabbi to Rora. He lay in
ambush, resolved to do what he could to stop the foreign soldiers from
ravaging his home, and in his desperate mood he had no thought save to
sell his life as dearly as he could: what could seven men do against
hundreds?
But in that narrow place seven men could do much. The simultaneous
discharge of their muskets threw the soldiers into confusion. No enemy
was to be seen; the troops could not be sure that those rocks and trees
did not shelter scores of Vaudois. They faltered, then fell back.
Again the musket-balls came crashing from the hill-side. It was more
than hired courage could stand! The troops of Savoy turned and fled,
leaving sixty or seventy of their number dead on the ground.
They fled only to return. The next day six hundred picked men ascended
the mountain by the Cassutee, a wider, more practicable path. But here
also Janavel was ready for them. He had now gathered eighteen herdsmen,
some armed with muskets and pistols, but the greater number having only
slings and flint stones, which they knew very well how to use. Their
ambush was well chosen. The column advanced, only to be assailed flank
and front with a shower of balls and stones. Again this invisible foe
was too much for them to stand. They thought only of escaping from the
fatal defile; once more Janavel was victorious.
The Marquis of Pianezza, the Savoy leader, was furious at these
repulses. He hastily collected his whole force, sending for his
lieutenant, the impetuous and cruel Mario, to bring up the rear-guard,
together with some bands of Irish mercenaries, who were specially fit
for dashing and dangerous service. Rora should surely be carried this
time! Every soul there should rue the hour in which they had dared to
oppose Pianezza!
But Janavel and his heroes were armed with a strength on which the foe
had little calculated. For the third time victory rested with the weak.
For the third time the soldiers were driven down the mountain-slopes,
hurling one another to destruction in their mad flight.
But this could not last for ever. Eight thousand soldiers and two
thousand popish peasants were marched on Rora, and this time the work of
death was done.
Janavel and his friends, who had been decoyed to a distance from the
village, escaped with their lives, and for many weeks they carried on
the struggle, only to be beaten at last, overpowered by numbers. But the
name of Janavel was reverenced far and wide as that of a good man, ‘bold
as a lion, meek as a lamb,’ rendering to God alone the praise of his
victories, dauntless in his faith and love, while tried as few are
tried. His wife and daughter had fallen into the hands of
Pianezza,--spared for the time from the massacre at Rora; a letter from
the general reached Janavel, offering him his life, and their lives, if
he would abjure his heresy, but threatening him with death and his dear
ones with being burnt alive if he persisted in his resistance. ‘We are
in God’s hands,’ answered Janavel; ‘our bodies may die by your means,
but our souls will serve Him by the grace that He gives to us. Tempt me
no more.’
And much the same he wrote thirty years after, when he and Pastor Arnaud
planned the Glorious Return.
It was no marvel that Rénée, Gaspard Botta’s betrothed wife, blushed as
she spoke of fear. The blood of her heroic grandsire ran in her veins.
She too could trust in God, and for His sake endure.
There was a time of peace after that terrible persecution. The whole of
Protestant Europe had remonstrated against the cruelties and horrors
that had taken place. Oliver Cromwell, then governing England, sent an
ambassador to Turin to enforce, if possible, his indignant demand for
mercy. Holland, Switzerland, the German Protestant powers, and even a
large number of French subjects, all sent messengers to the Duke of
Savoy. And they sent also large sums--more than a million francs--to
relieve the most pressing necessities of the homeless and the
destitute.
The Duke of Savoy died, and under the rule of his son, Victor Amadeus
II., the Vaudois had some years of peace. They showed their gratitude
for this forbearance by loyally defending the frontier against the
Genoese, and by eagerly helping to quell the banditti infesting the
mountain passes. They sought to prove, with a devotion that borders upon
pathos, that they also could be good subjects, that their allegiance to
their God only heightened their loyalty to their sovereign.
It was then that Rénée Janavel sang as she sewed the long seams in the
linen store that her foster-mother had spun. It was then that Gaspard
would whistle as his plane cut through the white plank, and the shavings
fell, silky and shining, about his feet.
Even the grim house-master would let the suspicion of a smile lurk under
the straight moustache of iron-grey that almost hid his lips. He could
remember the times of terror--oh, yes, he could remember them only too
well!--but ferns and wreaths of mauve auricula were now growing about
the ruins that had then been made so fearsome; and the mulberries were
flourishing again; and it was a comfort to see Mother Madeleine about
and well after her sharp attack of fever a year or two ago; and Emile
and Gaspard had grown sturdy and strong--the finest young men in all
Rora; and Rénée--the child--was always singing when she was not
laughing: what a gay, sweet heart it was, to be sure! And, all things
considered, it was no marvel that Henri Botta now and then forgot all
the ghastly doings of the past, and let a smile dawn upon his lips or
glimmer in his eyes.
[Illustration: GASPARD AND RÉNÉE.]
‘Shall it be in the spring time, dear?’ Gaspard said, as he stood in the
house that his hands had builded for his bride, and let his glance rest
lovingly on her bright face. ‘Say, dear, shall we light our fire on this
hearth when the snows melt on Mount Friolent, and the flowers bloom
under the hedges yonder?’
If she did not answer him in words, he was nevertheless well contented.
And it was settled that so it should be: for not even the neighbours
could disapprove of such a marriage. Were not the two born for each
other? he so strong and dark and staunch, and she so fair and sweet! And
was not Gaspard the best workman in the commune, with his earnings all
safely saved since he came back from Turin?
Why should there not be a marriage procession along the stream-side to
the little white-walled church when the flowers bloomed? Why not,
indeed? And wide and long should be the festive wreaths woven of those
very flowers to do honour to the grandchild of the hero Janavel.
It was the close of the year 1685. There had been twenty years of
freedom in the valleys--twenty calm years of liberty and peace. The
horrid sounds of massacre had died away before Rénée was old enough to
remember, before Gaspard was old enough to understand. And so they
looked into one another’s eyes, and thought that life and love and earth
and heaven were smiling on their troth.
But far away, beyond the French Alps, beyond the vineyards of Burgundy
and the Lyonais, an old man sat in his splendid palace, a wretched and
restless man, who had something to say to the plans and the promises of
the simple folk in the Savoy valleys.
For he was King Louis XIV., Louis, surnamed the Great, Louis, the
husband of the bigot Françoise de Maintenon, trying in his old age of
repentance to atone for the guilt of a misspent life. Madame de
Maintenon hated heretics as her cold, calculating heart hated nothing
else; and she loved the approval and the flattery of her courtier
priests far more than she loved the king.
‘Revoke the edicts giving liberty to the Protestants, sire,’ she said to
her husband. ‘Crush heresy, and so purchase your peace with God.’
Louis listened. He was aged and ailing; his sons were dead; his
friends--such friends as he had--were dead too. He also must soon appear
before the Throne that was greater even than the glories of his own. It
was time he hearkened to the promptings of the Church. Popes and priests
must know best about these things; he would do their bidding, and do it
thoroughly, as a king should!
So the edicts were revoked throughout the land of France. All the civil
rights of his subjects belonging to the Reformed faith were taken away.
The heretics must be converted, or go, or die.
Thus he ordered.
And even then, not quite content, he forced his neighbour, the young
Duke of Savoy, to do likewise. To the valleys also the persecution
should extend.
* * * * *
And Gaspard set his teeth hard as he brightened up his father’s sword;
and Rénée’s tears fell fast as she folded away the snowy linen she had
bleached so fair.
[Illustration: GASPARD SHARPENING HIS SWORD.]
When the violets bloomed in the hedges long processions passed that were
different indeed from marriage-trains. Trumpet-calls and the tramp of
troops echoed from the hills and rocks; and the white walls of the
church had been splashed with crimson, and were now blackened with fire.
Once more Rome had sent her ‘terror’ to the valleys. Once more faith was
to be tried to the death, and steadfast souls to win their martyr
crowns.