This new refusal exasperated the mamelukes. They were determined to use Wernli's death as an instrument of war to beat down the ancient edifice of Genevese liberties, to root up the foundations of the Reformation, and to establish on the ruins their own theories concerning the absolute power of the pope and the prince. Consequently they demanded the convocation of the Two Hundred, hoping to find favourable voices among them. The great council met the next day, and the Friburg ambassadors appeared before it, attended by a great number of the relations and friends of the canon—all dejected, gloomy, and silent, like the suppliants of ancient times. It was not fanaticism which animated the greater part of them. They had played with Wernli in their childhood; they had loved him in their youth; they venerated his memory now that a terrible catastrophe had stretched him dead in the streets of the city. If they had been unable to defend him in the hour of danger, they wished to do everything now the hour of vengeance was come. It was not sufficient to have sprinkled his body with their tears, the blood of victims must flow in the very spot where the martyr had been struck down. 'Most honoured lords,' said the canon's brother, 'the justice which men owe to one another is written on earth in the hearts of the just; why, then, should you trample it under foot? You have not yet done justice for the death of him who was our brother and our friend; on the contrary, you left the criminals free to come and go for six weeks. His body lies in the grave, but his blood, sprinkled on the stones of your city, calls for vengeance. If you are armed with the sword, it is not for mere show but to strike malefactors. And yet your tribunals are dumb, and your sword slumbers in the sheath. Permit my lord bishop to cite the case before him. If you refuse, you may rest assured that we shall seek other means of avenging the death of our friend, and we shall drown our sorrow and anger not in the waters of justice but in blood.' The Friburgers spoke as if it were a murder: they forgot that the canon had put on a cuirass, that he had grasped the halberd, that he had gone fully armed to the scene of tumult, that he had rekindled the dying flames, and attacked the huguenots, who had only used their arms in legitimate self-defence. The avoyer of Friburg seconded the eloquent menaces of Wernli's brother.[781] [Sidenote: REFUSAL OF THE TWO HUNDRED.]