attempt was made to carry out this measure of deportation of the
people, but totally failed. With the aid of spies, stimulated by high
rewards, numerous meetings in the Desert were fallen upon by the
troops, and those who were not hanged were transported--some to Italy,
some to Switzerland, and some to America. But transportation had no
terrors for the people, and the meetings continued to be held as
before.

Baville then determined to occupy the entire province with troops, and
to carry out a general disarmament of the population. Eight
regiments of regular infantry were sent into the Cevennes, and fifty
regiments of militia were raised throughout the province, forming
together an army of some forty thousand men. Strong military posts
were established in the mountains, and new forts and barracks were
erected at Alais, Anduze, St. Hyppolyte, and Nismes. The
mountain-roads being almost impassable, many of them mere mule paths,
Baville had more than a hundred new high-roads and branch-roads
constructed and made practicable for the passage of troops and
transport of cannon.

By these means the whole country became strongly occupied, but still
the meetings in the Desert went on. The peasantry continued to brave
all risks--of exile, the galleys, the rack, and the gibbet--and
persevered in their assemblies, until the very ferocity of their
persecutors became wearied. The people would not be converted either
by the dragoons or the priests who were stationed amongst them. In the
dead of the night they would sally forth to their meetings in the
hills; though their mountains were not too steep, their valleys not
too secluded, their denies not too impenetrable to protect them from
pursuit and attack, for they were liable at any moment to be fallen
upon and put to the sword.

The darkness, the dangers, the awe and mystery attending these
midnight meetings invested them with an extraordinary degree of
interest and even fascination. It is not surprising that under such
circumstances the devotion of these poor people should have run into
fanaticism and superstition. Singing the psalms of Marot by night,
under the shadow of echoing rocks, they fancied they heard the sounds
of heavenly voices filling the air. At other times they would meet
amidst the ruins of their fallen sanctuaries, and mysterious sounds of
sobbing and wailing and groaning would seem as if to rise from the
tombs of their fathers.

* * *