self, laid his hands.
The Sunday following, there was a conventicle of Protestants in the
woods of Altefage upon Mount Bouges; where there stood up one
Seguier--Spirit Seguier, as his companions called him--a wool-carder,
tall, black-faced, and toothless, but a man full of prophecy. He
declared, in the name of God, that the time for submission had gone by,
and they must betake themselves to arms for the deliverance of their
brethren and the destruction of the priests.

The next night, 24th July 1702, a sound disturbed the Inspector of
Missions as he sat in his prison-house at Pont de Montvert: the voices
of many men upraised in psalmody drew nearer and nearer through the
town. It was ten at night; he had his court about him, priests,
soldiers, and servants, to the number of twelve or fifteen; and now
dreading the insolence of a conventicle below his very windows, he
ordered forth his soldiers to report. But the psalm-singers were already
at his door, fifty strong, led by the inspired Seguier, and breathing
death. To their summons, the archpriest made answer like a stout old
persecutor, and bade his garrison fire upon the mob. One Camisard (for,
according to some, it was in this night's work that they came by the
name) fell at this discharge: his comrades burst in the door with
hatchets and a beam of wood, overran the lower story of the house, set
free the prisoners, and finding one of them in the _vine_, a sort of
Scavenger's Daughter of the place and period, redoubled in fury against
Du Chayla, and sought by repeated assaults to carry the upper floors.
But he, on his side, had given absolution to his men, and they bravely
held the staircase.

"Children of God," cried the prophet, "hold your hands. Let us burn the
house, with the priest and the satellites of Baal."

The fire caught readily. Out of an upper window Du Chayla and his men
lowered themselves into the garden by means of knotted sheets; some
escaped across the river under the bullets of the insurgents; but the
archpriest himself fell, broke his thigh, and could only crawl into the
hedge. What were his reflections as this second martyrdom drew near? A
poor, brave, besotted, hateful man, who had done his duty resolutely
according to his light both in the Cevennes and China. He found at least
one telling word to say in his defence; for when the roof fell in and
the upbursting flames discovered his retreat, and they came and dragged
him to the public place of t