Few countries could have presented greater difficulties to the daring reformer. The princess of Longueville, residing in France in the suite of Francis I., a woman of courtly habits, vain, extravagant, always in debt, and thinking of Neuchatel only as a farm that should bring her in a large revenue, was devoted to the Pope and Popery. Twelve canons with several priests and chaplains formed a powerful clergy, at whose head was the provost Oliver of Hochberg, natural brother to the princess. Auxiliaries full of zeal flanked this main army. On the one side there was the abbey of the Premonstrantes of Fontaine-André, three quarters of a league beyond the town, the monks of which, after having in the twelfth century cleared the ground with their own hands,[970] had gradually become powerful lords; and, on the other side, the Benedictines of the Island of St. John, whose abbot, having been deposed by the Bernese, had taken refuge, burning with hatred and vengeance, in his priory at Corcelles. [970] Propriis manibus. (Hist. of Neuchatel, by F. de Chambrier, p. 13.) [Sidenote: FAREL'S LABOURS.] The people of Neuchatel had a great respect for ancient rights, and it was easy to take advantage of this state of feeling, considering the general ignorance, to maintain the innovations of Popery. The canons improved the opportunity. For the instructions of the Gospel they substituted pomps and shows. The church, situated on a steep rock, was filled with altars, chapels, and images of saints; and religion, descending from this sanctuary, ran up and down the streets, and was travestied in dramas and mysteries, mingled with indulgences, miracles, and debauchery.[971] [971] Mémoires sur l'Eglise collegiale de Neuchatel, p. 240. The soldiers of Neuchatel, however, who had made the campaign of 1529 with the Bernese army, brought back to their homes the liveliest enthusiasm for the Evangelical cause. It was at this period that a frail boat, quitting the southern bank of the lake, on the side opposite Morat, and carrying a Frenchman of mean appearance, steered towards the Neuchatel shore. Farel, for it was he, had learnt that the village of Serrière, situated at the gates of Neuchatel, depended in spiritualities on the evangelical city of Bienne, and that Emer Beynon, the priest of the place, "had some liking for the Gospel." The plan of his campaign was immediately drawn up. He appeared before parson Emer, who received him with joy; but what could be done? for Farel had been interdicted from preaching in any church whatever in the earldom. The poor priest thought to reconcile everything by permitting Farel to mount on a stone in the cemetery, and thus preach to the people, turning his back upon the church.[972] [972] M. de Perrot, ex-pastor of Serrière, and author of a work entitled "L'Eglise et la Réformation," has shown me the stone on which Farel stood.