nd more stringent edicts were published,
consigning to the flames, without form of process, all that made or
attended conventicles. Liberal rewards were offered to stimulate
denunciation. Domiciliary visits were enjoined upon the proper officers.
Extraordinary powers were given to the "lieutenant-criminel" and a few
of the counsellors of the Chatelet, known to be inimical to the "new
doctrines," to act during the recess of parliament. It was even ordained
by letters-patent of the king, that the very houses in which unlawful
assemblages had taken place by night and the Lord's Supper had been
profanely administered contrary to the rites of the Roman Catholic
Church, should be razed to the ground, and never rebuilt, as a memorial
for all time.[772] The church followed the example of the civil power.
The parishes resounded with excommunications of all that failed to
reveal the heretical sentiments of their acquaintance, and with
exhortations to watchfulness.[773] Parliament itself had lent its
authority to the inquisitorial work, by enjoining upon owners or
occupants of houses in the city or suburbs "to make diligent inquiry as
to the good and Christian life" of such as lodged with them. In
particular they were to inform against such as did not attend upon
divine worship in the churches, especially upon feast-days.[774]

[Sidenote: Other informers.]

[Sidenote: "La petite Geneve" a scene of pillage.]

Meanwhile, to De Russanges other informers were added. One was a weak
and unstable man whom persecution had once before--in the famous year of
the Placards--driven to the basest of offices. Among others two
apprentices, brought forward to testify against the Protestant employers
who had dismissed them, were pliant instruments in the hands of the
heretic-hunters. By a well-concerted movement a simultaneous descent was
made, and entire families were put under arrest.[775] In some places,
however, an unexpected resistance was encountered. The guests of one
Visconte, with whom travellers from Switzerland and Germany frequently
lodged, supposed the house to be attacked by robbers, and defended
themselves with such bravery against their assailants, that they
effected their retreat in safety. Their host's wife and his aged father
alone were taken into custody. A dressed capon and some uncooked meat
found in the larder--it was on a Friday that the incursion was
made--graced the triumph of the captors. "Little Geneva," as that
porti