in the Cevennes relates something surpassing
all this which took place at Montelus on the 22nd February "There were
a few Protestants in the place," he says, "but they were far outnumbered
by the Catholics; these being roused by a Capuchin from Bergerac, formed
themselves into a body of 'Cadets of the Cross,' and hastened to serve
their apprenticeship to the work of assassination at the cost of their
countrymen. They therefore entered the house of one Jean Bernoin, cut
off his ears and further mutilated him, and then bled him to death like
a pig. On coming out of this house they met Jacques Clas, and shot him
in the abdomen, so that his intestines obtruded; pushing them back, he
reached his house in a terrible condition, to the great alarm of his
wife, who was near her confinement, and her children, who hastened
to the help of husband and father. But the murderers appeared on the
threshold, and, unmoved by the cries and tears of the unfortunate wife
and the poor little children, they finished the wounded man, and as the
wife made an effort to prevent them, they murdered her also, treating
her dead body, when they discovered her condition, in a manner too
revolting for description; while a neighbour, called Marie Silliot, who
tried to rescue the children, was shot dead; but in her case they did
not pursue their vengeance any further. They then went into the open
country and meeting Pierre and Jean Bernard, uncle and nephew, one aged
forty-five and the other ten, seized on them both, and putting a pistol
into the hands of the child, forced him to shoot his uncle. In the
meantime the boy's father had come up, and him they tried to constrain
to shoot his son; but finding that no threats had any effect, they ended
by killing both, one by the sword, the other by the bayonet.

"The reason why they put an end to father and son so quickly was that
they had noticed three young girls of Bagnols going towards a grove of
mulberry trees, where they were raising silk-worms. The men followed
them, and as it was broad daylight and the girls were therefore not
afraid, they soon came up with them. Having first violated them, they
hung them by the feet to a tree, and put them to death in a horrible
manner."

All this took place in the reign of Louis the Great, and for the greater
glory of the Catholic religion.

History has preserved the names of the five wretches who perpetrated
these crimes: they were Pierre Vigneau, Antoine Rey, Jean