als of woe and sadness.
Charles Emmanuel died on the 3rd of June, 1678. For a few years, under the
regency of his widow and the reign of his son, Victor Amadeus VII., there
was peace. But just at the time when their services against the banditti
of Mondovi might seem to have added to their claims and expectation, new
dangers appear.

It was in this wise. Louis XIV. of France thought to atone for the misdeeds
of a life of sensuality by the forced conversion of his subjects to popery,
and so, after a series of preliminary brutalities, to which he had been
stimulated by his confessor and others, he revokes the edict of Nantes, and
gives to the prosperity of his country a blow from which it has never
recovered. But the grand monarque of France was not content to tread this
royal road to heaven alone. He wished his neighbour of Savoy to share in
the benedictions of the pretended successor of St. Peter. However, the
young duke shrank from imitating such conduct, until he was politely
reminded by the French ambassador that his master would drive away the
heretics with fourteen thousand men, but that he would also retain their
valleys for himself. In consequence of this Amadeus engages to join with
the king of France in shedding the blood of the saints. A painful
foreboding of suffering filled the minds of the Vaudois as soon as they
heard of the revocation of the edict of Nantes; but they were not prepared
for the actual severity of the edict of January 30th, 1686, which forbade,
under pain of death, all religious services except the Romish, and ordered
the destruction of their temples, the banishment of their ministers and
schoolmasters, and the baptism and education of their children henceforth
in the false creed of Rome. This was indeed the bitterest drop in their cup
of overflowing grief. Staggered by the enormity of the evil, they first of
all sought the ear of their own prince. Disappointed, they began to make
preparations to defend themselves against the troops which were gathering
on their frontiers. On the 22nd of April the popish army began its march,
the Piedmontese led by Gabriel of Savoy, uncle of the duke, the French
commanded by Catinat. The latter began operations in the valley of Clusone.
They attacked the Vaudois entrenchments at Pramol, but were so obstinately
resisted, although they outnumbered the defenders as six to one, that after
ten hours' fighting they fell back, followed by the Vaudois as far as the
t