Pécolat’s friends took the matter more seriously. They feared for his life. Who could tell whether the bastard had not left orders to get rid of the prisoner, and left Geneva in order to escape the people’s anger? These apprehensions were not without cause, for more than one upright man was afterwards to be sacrificed in the castle of Peney. Stephen Pécolat and some of his brother’s friends waited on St. Victor; ‘The superior metropolitan authority has ordered Pécolat to be released,’ they said; ‘we shall go off straight in search of him.’ The acute Bonivard represented to them that the gaolers would not give him up, that the castle was strong, and they would fail in the attack; that the whole people should demand the liberation of the innocent man detained by the bishop in his dungeons, in despite of the liberties of the city and the orders of his metropolitan. ‘A little patience,’ he continued; ‘we are near the beginning of Lent, holy week is not far off; the interdict will then be published by the metropolitan. The christians finding themselves deprived of the sacrament will grow riotous, and will compel the bishop’s officers to set our friend at liberty. Thus the inhibition which we served upon the bishop in his palace, will produce its effect in despite of him.’ The advice was thought sound, they agreed to it, and everybody in Geneva waited with impatience for Easter and the excommunication. Anthony de la Colombière, official to the metropolitan of Vienne, arrived to execute the orders of his superior, and having come to an understanding with the prior of St. Victor and judge Lévrier, he ordered, on the 18th of March, that Pécolat should be released within twenty-four hours. He waited eight days, but waited in vain, for the episcopal officers continued to disobey him. Then, on Good Friday, the metropolitan officers, bearing the sentence of excommunication and interdict, proceeded to the cathedral at two o’clock in the afternoon, and there, in the presence of John Gallatin, notary, and three other witnesses, they posted up the terrible monition; at four o’clock they did the same at the churches of St. Gervais and St. Germain. This was not indeed the thunder of the Vatican, but it was nevertheless the excommunication of a prelate who, at Geneva, filled the first place after the pope in the Roman hierarchy. The canons, priests, and parishioners, as they went to evening prayers, walked up to the placards and were quite aghast as they read them. ‘We excommunicate,’ they ran, ‘the episcopal officers, and order that this excommunication be published in the churches, with bell, book, and candle. Moreover, we command, under pain of the same excommunication, the syndics and councillors to attack the castles and prisons wherein Pécolat is detained, and to liberate him by force. Finally we pronounce the interdict against all places wherein these excommunicates are found. And if, like the deaf adder, they persist in their wickedness, we