J'aimais tes murs croulants, vieux moutier ruiné! _Naître, souffrir, mourir!_ devise triste et forte . . . Quel châtelain pensif te grava sur la porte?[702] Further on, and near Thonon, on an isolated hill, shaded by luxuriant chestnut trees, stood the vast castle of Allinges, which is still a noble ruin. The lords of these places, energetic, rude, freebooting, and often cruel men, growing weary of their isolation and their idleness, would collect their followers, lower their drawbridges, rush into the high roads in search of adventures, and indulge in a life of raids and plunder, violence and murder. The towns, with their traders and travellers, were especially the abhorrence of these gentlemen robbers. From the tenth century the Genevan travellers and foreign merchants, passing through Geneva with their goods, often fell a prey to the plundering vagabondage of the neighbouring lords. This was not without important consequences for civilisation and liberty. Seeing the nobles perpetually in insurrection against social order, the burghers learnt to revolt against despotism, murder, and robbery. Geneva received one of these lessons, and profited by it better than others.[703] [Sidenote: PONTVERRE AND THE SAVOYARD NOBLES.] In all the castles of Genevois, Chablais, and the Pays de Vaud, it was said, in 1526, that the alliance of Geneva with the free Swiss cantons menaced the rights of Savoy, the temporal (and even the spiritual) power of the bishop, and Roman-catholicism. And hence the irritated nobles ruminated in their strongholds upon the means of destroying the union, or at least of neutralising its effects. François de Ternier, seigneur of Pontverre, whose domains were situated between Mont Salève and the Rhone, about a league from Geneva, thought of nothing else night or day. A noble, upright, but violent man; a fanatical enemy of the burgher class, of liberty, and of the Reformation; and a representative of the middle ages, he swore to combat the Swiss alliance unto death, and he kept his oath. Owing to the energy of his character and the nobility of his house, François possessed great influence among his neighbours. One day, after long meditation over his plans, he left his residence, attended by a few horsemen, and visited the neighbouring castles. While seated at table with the knights, he made his apprehensions known to them, and conjured them to oppose the accursed alliance. He asked them whether it was for nothing that the privilege of bearing arms had been given to the nobles. 'Let us make haste,' he said, 'and crush a new and daring power that threatens to destroy our castles and our churches.' He sounded the alarm everywhere; he reminded the nobles that they had a right to make war whenever they pleased;[704] and forthwith many lords responded to his energetic appeals. They armed themselves, and, issuing from their strongholds, covered the district around Geneva like a cloud of locusts.