The period for electing the syndics having arrived, it was determined to raise to the chief magistracy citizens fitted to maintain the rights of the country; and the name of Hugues was in every mouth. He was returned, as well as Montyon, Pensabin, and Balard. With Hugues for their chief, Geneva feared nothing. But the honest citizen refused the office to which he had been elected. His friends came round him and entreated him to accept: he seemed the only pilot able to steer the ship of the State through the numerous shoals. ‘The bishop is your friend; he will protect you,’ they said.--‘Yes,’ he answered, ‘as he protected Lévrier.’--‘If you refuse,’ said Balard, ‘we shall refuse also.’--‘The duke,’ replied Hugues, ‘has forbidden me personally to meddle in city affairs; I have given him my promise. Lévrier’s death has taught us what the duke’s wrath can do. I would rather be a confessor than a martyr.’ Did Hugues give way to a momentary weakness? We may be allowed to doubt it. He desired to keep the promise he had made, and had other motives besides. Thinking that he would be of little use in the council, and that Geneva must be saved by other means, he wished to remain free in his movements. But many could not understand him, and their anger broke through all restraint. ‘Hugues is wanting in his most sacred duties,’ they said. These proud republicans spared nobody. His friend and brother-in-law, the ex-syndic Baud, captain of the artillery, proposed to the council-general to deprive him of his citizenship for one year. Strange contradiction! almost at the same moment this man was raised to the head of the republic and in danger of being expelled from it. But the people seemed to have an instinctive sentiment that Hugues would not be wanting at last: ‘He gives way now,’ they said, ‘only to succeed better hereafter.’ Baud’s proposition was rejected.[363] Geneva began by a singular measure. The general council having assembled in the church of St. Pierre on the 10th of January, 1525, it was resolved to appeal to the pope against the attacks of Savoy, and delegates were despatched to lay the appeal before him. The Genevans were men of precedent: they desired to have recourse to a tribunal recognised for ages. ‘The popes,’ observed some of them, ‘are the defenders of the liberties of the people.’ But others, like Bonivard, well read in history, shook their heads, and argued that if princes had been excommunicated by popes, it was not for having violated the liberties of their people, but for resisting the ambition of pontiffs. They mentioned Philip Augustus and Philip the Fair. The appeal to the pope would serve to show that he took part with oppressors only. However, the deputies of Geneva started on their journey. It was ten years before the day when the Reformation was proclaimed within its walls. This measure is a remarkable indication of the peaceful and loyal sentiments by which the magistrates were animated.