precocious child,
Olympia Morata. See M. Jules Bonnet's monograph, Vie d'Olympia Morata,
episode de la Renaissance et de la Reforme en Italie. Staehelin has well
traced Calvin's religious influence upon Renee and the important family
of Soubise. Joh. Calvin, i. 94-110. The extant letters of Calvin to
Renee are full of manly and Christian frankness, and affectionate
loyalty. Lettres francaises, i. 428, etc.]

[Footnote 406: Staehelin is skeptical about, and Prof. Billiet and M.
Douen reject altogether the story of Calvin's labors at Aosta. Thus much
M. Bonnet believes to be established by concurrent MS. and traditional
authority: That, early in the year 1536, Calvin had succeeded in gaining
over to the reformed doctrines a number of influential men in this
Alpine valley, of the families of La Creste, La Visiere, Vaudan,
Borgnion, etc.; that he and his converts were accused of plotting to
induce the district to embrace Protestantism, and imitate the example of
its Swiss neighbors, by constituting itself a canton, free of the Duke
of Savoy; that the estates, on the 28th of February, 1536, declared
their intention (with a unanimity procured, perhaps, by the expulsion of
the opposite party) to live and die in the obedience of the Duke of
Savoy and of mother Holy Church; that Calvin and his principal adherents
escaped with difficultly into Switzerland; and that expiatory
processions were instituted at Aosta, in token of gratitude for
deliverance from heresy, in which the bishop and the most prominent
noblemen, as well as the common people, "walked with bare feet and in
sackcloth and ashes, notwithstanding the rigor of the season." Tradition
still points out the "_farm-house_ of Calvin," his "_bridge_," and the
_window_ by which he is said to have escaped. The event is commemorated
by a monument of the market-place, bearing an inscription that testifies
to its having been erected in 1541, and renewed in 1741 and 1841. See
the interesting Aostan documents contributed by M. Bonnet to the
Bulletin de l'hist. du protest. francais, ix. (1860) 160-168, and his
letter to Prof. Rilliet, ibid., xiii. (1864) 183-192.]

[Footnote 407: This is Calvin's distinct statement: "quum rectum iter
Argentoratum tendenti bella clausissent, hac (Geneva) celeriter transire
statueram, ut _non longior quam unius noctis morae_ in urbe mihi foret."
Calvin, Preface to Psalms.]

[Footnote 408: "Unus homo, qui nunc turpi defectione iterum ad Papistas
re