It was harvest time, and Jean Ami Curtet or Curteti, a man well disposed towards the Gospel and belonging to a family which Duke Philibert le Beau had ennobled, had gone out in the morning to visit a field which he possessed on the banks of the Arve. He examined the ears and the stalks: everything promised a fine harvest. Knowing that when wheat is once ripe, there should be no delay in reaping it, he ordered the labourer who accompanied him to begin to cut it. But he was destined to fall before his corn, and on that very spot.... A sudden noise was heard, some men in disguise fell upon him, knocked him down, beat him and left him for dead in his own field. The news soon reached the city. 'It is some gentlemen in disguise who have murdered him,' said the people. On hearing the mournful news, the relations and friends of Curtet seized their arquebuses, and about forty of them hastened towards the Arve bridge. They raised the poor man who was seriously wounded, and bearing their sad burden returned slowly into the city, their hearts bursting with anger. As the procession passed in front of a house where some Friburgers lodged, one of the Genevans called them 'Rascals and traitors!' The Friburgers, innocent of the attempt, swore that they would demand satisfaction for such an outrage; but the sad procession, passing slowly through the principal streets of Geneva, under the windows of the chief citizens, called up very different thoughts. Men asked each other whether the partisans of the prince-bishop intended to add murder to illegal arrest; whether it was sufficient to wear a mask and strange garments to deprive citizens of their lives, without any risk to the murderers; and whether every huguenot, as he was engaging in the most innocent occupations, might be suddenly laid dead by a masked enemy in the fields bequeathed to him by his ancestors?[788]