em as being within
their competence. On being summoned by the attorney-general, Berquin
demanded to be present when an inventory was made of his books or
manuscripts, and to give such explanations as he should deem necessary;
and his request was granted without question. On the 26th of June, 1523,
the commissioners of the Sorbonne made their report. On the 8th of July,
Peter Lizet, king's advocate, read it out to the court. The matter came
on again for hearing on the 1st of August. Berquin was summoned and
interrogated, and, as the result of this interrogatory, was arrested and
carried off to imprisonment at the Conciergerie in the square tower. On
the 5th of August sentence was pronounced, and Louis de Berquin was
remanded to appear before the Bishop of Paris, as being charged with
heresy, "in which case," says the Journal d'un Bourgeois de Paris, "he
would have been in great danger of being put to death according to law,
as he had well deserved." The public were as ready as the accusers to
believe in the crime and to impatiently await its punishment.

It was not without surprise or without displeasure that, on the 8th of
August, just as they had "made over to the Bishop of Paris, present and
accepting" the prisoner confined in the Conciergerie, the members of the
council-chamber observed the arrival of Captain Frederic, belonging to
the archers of the king's guard, and bringing a letter from the king, who
changed the venue in Berquin's case so as to decide it himself at his
grand council; in consequence of which the prisoner would have to be
handed over, not to the bishop, but to the king. The chamber
remonstrated; Berquin was no longer their prisoner; the matter had been
decided; it was the bishop to whom application must be made. But these
remonstrances had been foreseen; the captain had verbal instructions to
carry off Louis de Berquin by force in case of a refusal to give him up.
The chamber decided upon handing over the bishop's prisoner to the king,
contenting themselves with causing the seized books and manuscripts to be
burned that very day in the space in front of Notre Dame. It was whilst
repairing to the scene of war in Italy, and when he was just entering
Melun, where he merely passed through, that the king had given this
unexpected order, on the very day, August 5, on which the Parliament
pronounced the decree which sent Berquin to appear before the Bishop of
Paris. There is no clear trace of th