became the chief centre for the
instruction of the Huguenot youth. It was, however, in the great
triangular plateau of mountain called the Cevennes that, among the small
farmers, the cloth and silk weavers and vine dressers, Protestantism was
most intense and universal. These people were (and still are) very poor,
but intelligent and pious, and of a character at once grave and fervent.
From the lists of Huguenots sent from Languedoc to the galleys (1684 to
1762), we gather that the common type of _physique_ is "belle taille,
cheveux bruns, visage ovale." The chief theatre of the revolt comprised
that region of the Cevennes bounded by the towns of Florac,
Pont-de-Montvert, Alais and Lasalle, thus embracing the southern portion
of the department of Lozere (the Bas-Gevaudan) and the neighbouring
district in the east of the department of Gard.

In order to understand the War of the Cevennes it is necessary to recall
the persecutions which preceded and followed the revocation of the edict
of Nantes. It is also necessary to remember the extraordinary religious
movement which had for a great number of years agitated the Protestants
of France. Faced by the violation of that most solemn of treaties, a
treaty which had been declared perpetual and irrevocable by Henry IV.,
Louis XIII. and even Louis XIV. himself, they could not, in the
enthusiasm of their faith, believe that such a crime would be left
unpunished. But being convinced that no human power could give them
liberty of conscience, they went to the Bible to find when their
deliverance would come. As far back as 1686 Pierre Jurieu published his
work _L'Accomplissement des propheties_, in which, speaking of the
Apocalypse, he predicted the end of the persecution and the fall of
Babylon--that is to say of Roman Catholicism--for 1689. The Revolution
in England seemed to provide a striking corroboration of his prophecies,
and the apocalyptic enthusiasm took so strong a hold on people's minds
that Bossuet felt compelled to refute Jurieu's arguments in his
_Apocalypse expliquee_, published in 1689. The _Lettres pastorales_ of
Jurieu (Rotterdam, 1686-1687), a series of brief tracts which were
secretly circulated in France, continued to narrate events and
prodigies in which the author saw the intervention of God, and thus
strengthened the courage of his adherents. This religious enthusiasm,
under the influence of Du Serre, was manifested for the first time in
the Dauphine. Du Ser