Farel was inactive (a singular thing!) at the moment when we are going to see him prepare betimes for the conquest of Geneva. Wounded near Neuchâtel by a riotous crowd, he had been placed in a boat, and carried across the lake to Morat, as we have said in a former work.[378] His friends in that town had welcomed him with emotion, and kept watch around his bed. Condemned to repose, 'shivering with cold, spitting blood,' and scarcely able to speak, he was communing in silence with his God when he saw a young Dauphinese of good appearance, Christopher Fabri by name, enter his room. This Frenchman, of whom we have already spoken, had studied medicine at Montpelier, and there received the first rays of the gospel. Having started for Paris, in order to complete his studies in that city, he met with some friends of the truth at Lyons, who told him of all that was going on at Neuchâtel and its vicinity. Fabri was greatly moved, and being a man of lively, prompt, and decided character, he suddenly changed his route, calling, and life, and instead of going on to Paris turned his steps to Geneva, and thence to Morat. On arriving at that town, the student enquired after Farel, and on presenting himself at the house, was admitted into the room where the reformer was lying. Modestly approaching the bed, he said to him: 'I have forsaken everything, family, prospects, and country, to fight at your side, Master William. Here I am; do with me what seems good to you.' Farel looked at him kindly, and ere long appreciated the young man's lively affection and boundless devotion. He saw that they both had the same faith, the same Saviour. As he was unmarried, he looked upon Fabri as a son whom God had sent him,[379] and henceforward had frequent Christian conversations with him, in which he sought to train him for the ministry of the gospel. Farel would have liked to keep him always at his side; but he loved Jesus Christ more than the tenderest son is beloved; and accordingly, after a short but delightful intercourse he asked the converted Dauphinese to go and preach the gospel at Neuchâtel. Fabri, who had not expected so early a separation, exclaimed with tears: 'O master, my sorrow is greater to-day than when I left father and mother, so sweet have been my conversations with you!' He obeyed, however. Farel was never content with sending others to battle; he burned to return to it in person, and to lead to the heavenly King, whose servant he was, all the population which, enclosed between the Alps and the Jura, spoke the language of his country. He thought that if the intelligent people placed at the gates of France were won over to the divine Word, they would become a focus to cast the light of the gospel into that kingdom, and an asylum where the Christians persecuted by Francis I. might find a refuge.