J. H. Merle D'Aubigné - History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin (Vol. 1-8)

=FLEES BY NIGHT TO ST. CLAUDE.=

In the night of the 1st and 2nd of August, 1527, Hugues went secretly to the palace, accompanied by Michael Guillet, a leading mameluke. The prelate received his friends like liberating angels. They all three went down into the vaults, where La Baume ordered a private door to be opened which led into the street now called the Rue de la Fontaine. He had to go along this street to reach the lake; but might not some of those terrible huguenots stop him in his flight? He crept stealthily and in disguise out of the palace, put himself between his two defenders, and, a prey to singular alarm, went forward noiselessly. On arriving at the brink of the water, the fugitive and his two companions descried through the darkness the boatmen whom Hugues had engaged. La Baume and Besançon entered the boat, while Michael Guillet returned to the city. The boatmen took their oars, and crossed the lake at the point where the Rhone flows out of it. La Baume looked all round him; but he could see nothing, could hear nothing but the dull sound of the oars. The danger, however, was far from being passed. The right bank might be occupied by a band of his enemies.... When the boat touched the shore, La Baume caught sight of two or three men with horses. They were friends. Hugues and the bishop got into their saddles without a moment's loss, and galloped off in the direction of the Jura. The bishop had never better appreciated his good luck in being one of the best horsemen of his day; he drove the spurs into his steed, fancying at times that he heard the noise of Savoyard horses behind him. In this way the bishop and his companion rode on, all the night through, along by-roads and in the midst of great dangers, for all the passes were guarded by men-at-arms. At last the day appeared. In proportion as they advanced, La Baume breathed more freely. After four-and-twenty hours of cruel fright, the travellers arrived at St. Claude. Pierre de la Baume was at the summit of happiness. 751

The day after his departure, the news of the bishop's flight suddenly became known in Geneva, where it caused a great sensation. 'Alas!' said the monks in their cloisters, 'Monseigneur, seeing the approaching tribulation, has got away by stealth across the lake.' The patriots, on the contrary, collecting in groups in the public places, rejoiced to find themselves delivered by one act both from their bishop and their prince. At the same time the Savoyard soldiers, posted round Geneva, were greatly annoyed; they had been on the watch night and day, and yet the bishop had slipped through their fingers. To avenge themselves, they swore to arrest Besançon Hugues on his return. The latter, making no stay at St. Claude, reappeared next morning at daybreak in the district of Gex, when he soon noticed that gentlemen and soldiers were all joining in the chase after him. The bells were rung in the village steeples, the peasants were roused, and every one shouted: 'Hie! hie! the traitor Besançon!' It seemed impossible for him to escape. Having descended the mountain, he followed the by-roads through the plain, when suddenly a number of armed men fell upon him. Hugues had great courage, a stout sword, and a good horse; fording the water-courses, and galloping across the hills, he saved himself, 'as by a miracle,' says his friend Balard. 752

=THE HIRELING FORSAKES THE SHEEP.=

The Genevans were very uneasy about him, for they all loved him. The drums beat, the companies mustered under their officers, and they were about to march out with their arms to protect him, when suddenly he arrived, panting, exhausted, and wounded. They would have liked to speak to him, and, above all, to hear him; but Hugues, hardly shaking hands with his friends, rode straight to his own house and went to bed; he was completely knocked up. The syndics went to his room to investigate the circumstances of which he had to complain. But erelong the brave man recovered from his fatigue, and the city was full of joy. The bishop's flight still further increased their cheerfulness: it snapped the bonds of which they were weary. 'The hireling ,' they said, 'leaveth the sheep, and fleeth, when he seeth the wolf coming.' 753'Therefore,' they added, 'he is not the shepherd.'

743Registres du Conseil du 12 juillet 1527.

744Roset MS. Chronol. liv. ii. ch. xv. Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 455.

745Beaumanoir, Coutumes de Beauvaisis , p. 61. Guizot, Histoire de la Civilisation en France , iv. p. 72.

746Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 464.

747Registres du Conseil des 30 juillet et 25 août 1527. Journal de Balard , pp. 125, 126.

748'Quot saxis, quot et pulveribus corpus oppressum.'—G. de Novigento, Opp. p. 507.

749Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 473. Spon, Hist. de Genève , ii. p. 410. Gautier MS.

750Savyon, Annales , p. 139. Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 474. Galiffe, Matériaux pour l'Histoire de Genève , pp. 427, 428, &c.

751 Journal de Balard , p. 126. Bonivard, Chroniq. ii. p. 474. Mém. d'Archéol. ii. p. 12.

752 Journal de Balard , p. 127. Registres du Conseil du 6 août 1527, La Sœur de Jussie, p. 4.

753John x. 12.

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THE Duke of Savoy was the wolf. When he heard of the bishop's flight, his vexation was greater than can be imagined. He had told the Bernese: 'I shall have Monsieur of Geneva at my will,' 754and now the wily prelate had escaped him a second time. At first Charles III. lost all self-control. 'I will go,' he said, 'and drag him across the Alps with a rope round his neck!' After which he wrote to him: 'I will make you the poorest priest in Savoy;' and, proceeding to gratify his rage, he seized upon the abbeys of Suza and Pignerol, which belonged to La Baume. Gradually his anger cooled down; the duke's counsellors, knowing the bishop's irresolute and timid character, said to their master: 'He is of such a changeable disposition 755that it will be easy to bring him over again to the side of Savoy.' The prince yielded to their advice, and sent Ducis, governor of the Château de l'Ile, to try to win him back. It appeared to the ducal counsellors that Pierre de la Baume, having fled from Geneva, could never return thither, and would have no wish to do so; and that the time had come when a negotiation, favourable in other respects to the prelate, might put the duke in possession of a city which he desired by every means to close against heresy and liberty.

=THE DUKE TRIES TO WIN THE BISHOP.=

The bishop, at that moment very dejected, was touched by the duke's advances; he sent an agent to the prince, and peace seemed on the point of being concluded. But Charles had uttered a word that sounded ill in the prelate's ears. 'The duke wishes me to subscribe myself his subject ,' he wrote to Hugues. 'I think I know why.... It is that he may afterwards lay hands on me.' Nevertheless, the duke appeared to restrain himself. 'I will give back all your benefices,' he told the bishop, 'if you contrive to annul the alliance between Geneva and Switzerland.' La Baume consented to everything in order to recover his abbeys, whose confiscation made a large gap in his revenues. He did not care much about living at Geneva, but he wished to be at his ease in Burgundy. At this moment, as the duke and the Genevans left him at peace, he was luxuriously enjoying his repose. Instead of being always in the presence of huguenots and mamelukes, he walked calmly in his garden 'among his pinks and gilly-flowers.' 756He ordered some beautiful fur robes, lined with black satin, for the winter; he kept a good table, and said: 'I am much better supplied with good wine here than we are at Geneva.' 757