er (called Lafage), had just returned
from Lausanne, where he had been pursuing his studies for three years.
He had been tracked by a spy to a certain house, where he had spent
the night. Next morning the house was surrounded by soldiers. Tessier
tried to escape by getting out of a top window and running along the
roofs of the adjoining houses. A soldier saw him escaping and shot at
him. He was severely wounded in the arm. He was captured, taken before
the Intendant of Languedoc, condemned, and hanged in the course of the
same day.

Religious meetings also continued to be surrounded, and were treated
in the usual brutal manner. For instance, an assembly was held in
Lower Languedoc on the 8th of August, 1756, for the purpose of
ordaining to the ministry three young men who had arrived from
Lausanne, where they had been educated. A number of pastors were
present, and as many as from ten to twelve thousand men, women, and
children were there from the surrounding country. The congregation was
singing a psalm, when a detachment of soldiers approached. The people
saw them; the singing ceased; the pastors urging patience and
submission. The soldiers fired; every shot told; and the crowd fled in
all directions. The meeting was thus dispersed, leaving the
murderers--in other words, the gallant soldiers--masters of the field;
a long track of blood remaining to mark the site on which the
prayer-meeting had been held.

It is not necessary to recount further cruelties and tortures.
Assemblies surrounded and people shot; preachers seized and hanged;
men sent to the galleys; women sent to the Tour de Constance; children
carried off to the convents--such was the horrible ministry of torture
in France. When Court heard of the re-inflictions of some old form of
torture--"Alas," said he, "there is nothing new under the sun. In all
times, the storm of persecution has cleansed the threshing-floor of
the Lord."

And yet, notwithstanding all the bitterness of the persecution, the
number of Protestants increased. It is difficult to determine their
numbers. Their apologists said they amounted to three millions;[69]
their detractors that they did not amount to four hundred thousand.
The number of itinerant pastors, however, steadily grew. In 1756 there
were 48 pastors at work, with 22 probationary preachers and students.
In 1763 there were 62 pastors, 35 preachers, and 15 students.

[Footnote 69: Ripert de Monclar, procureur-genera