Meanwhile the episcopal mandate was causing disturbance in the city. ‘Forbid the preaching of the Gospel,’ said some; ‘burn the holy books! What a horrible notion! The Mahometans never did anything like it with regard to the Koran, or the Ghebers with the books of Zoroaster. Those who are charged to preach the Word of God are the very men to condemn it to the flames!’ Thus catholics and evangelicals took up arms—the former to destroy the Bible, the others to defend it. They remained under arms not only during the night of the first of January, but also during the second, the third, and a part of the fourth, bivouacking in the squares, and kindling great fires. The citizens of Geneva had often taken up arms from other motives. If any one had now gone to the catholics and asked them: ‘Why are you doing this?’ they would have answered: ‘Because we desire to drive out the Bible:’ and if the same question had been put to the reformed, they would have answered: ‘Because we desire to keep it.’ These poor folks had often nothing to eat or drink; and when any party sent to a house to procure provisions, the other party often seized the spoil. They were obliged to give the purveyors a strong escort.[440] It was a strange sight, no doubt, to see a town filled with armed men because of the Word of peace. It was in this way that great emotions displayed themselves at that epoch, and it would be ridiculous to exhibit the men of the sixteenth century with the manners of the nineteenth. The evangelical Christians believed that, if the Bible were taken from them, Jesus would also be lost to them; it seemed that if there were no more Scripture, there would be no more Christ, no more salvation. The political huguenots, not troubling themselves about that matter, thought that the Bible was the best means of getting rid of the bishop. Consequently all alike passed the days and nights under arms around the watchfires, being unwilling to have the Scriptures taken away from them. The reformed, desiring to appear pacific, thought it their duty to yield a little, and prevailed upon Alexander to withdraw, as he had been lawfully banished. He turned his steps in the direction of France, where he soon after found a martyr’s death. But the evangelical cause in Geneva lost nothing, for, as Alexander left on one side, Froment returned on the other; and almost at the same moment an embassy from Berne, headed by Sebastian of Diesbach, appeared at the city gates. These worthy deputies, seeing what was going on,—the bivouacks, the soldiers, the spears, and arquebuses,—stopped their horses, examined the groups with an air of astonishment, asked what it all meant, and finally exhorted the rival parties to withdraw. The Genevese began to understand the strangeness of their position: the huguenots felt that it was a different power from that of their arquebuses which should defend the Bible; the men of both parties, therefore, yielded to the wise