admiration for that general, and was so constantly eulogizing him,
that his comrades gave him the nickname of Catinat, which he continued
to bear all through the Camisard war.

But the most distinguished of all the Camisard chiefs, next to Roland,
was the youthful John Cavalier, peasant boy, baker's apprentice, and
eventually insurgent leader, who, after baffling and repeatedly
defeating the armies of Louis XIV., ended his remarkable career as
governor of Jersey and major-general in the British service.

Cavalier was a native of Ribaute, a village on the Gardon, a little
below Anduze. His parents were persons in humble circumstances, as may
be inferred from the fact that when John was of sufficient age he was
sent into the mountains to herd cattle, and when a little older he was
placed apprentice to a baker at Anduze.

His father, though a Protestant at heart, to avoid persecution,
pretended to be converted to Romanism, and attended Mass. But his
mother, a fervent Calvinist, refused to conform, and diligently
trained her sons in her own views. She was a regular attender of
meetings in the Desert, to which she also took her children.

Cavalier relates that on one occasion, when a very little fellow, he
went with her to an assembly which was conducted by Claude Brousson;
and when he afterwards heard that many of the people had been
apprehended for attending it, of whom some were hanged and others sent
to the galleys, the account so shocked him that he felt he would then
have avenged them if he had possessed the power.

As the boy grew up, and witnessed the increasing cruelty with which
conformity was enforced, he determined to quit the country; and,
accompanied by twelve other young men, he succeeded in reaching Geneva
after a toilsome journey of eight days. He had not been at Geneva more
than two months, when--heart-sore, solitary, his eyes constantly
turned towards his dear Cevennes--he accidentally heard that his
father and mother had been thrown into prison because of his
flight--his father at Carcassone, and his mother in the dreadful tower
of Constance, near Aiguesmortes, one of the most notorious prisons of
the Huguenots.

He at once determined to return, in the hope of being able to get them
set at liberty. On his reaching Ribaute, to his surprise he found them
already released, on condition of attending Mass. As his presence in
his father's house might only serve to bring fresh trouble upon
them--he himsel