superintendents whom he wished to set over the syndics and the council, as representatives of the people. ‘That done,’ continued Philippe, ‘these gentlemen will hold their Little and Great Councils, and the plaintiffs shall be heard before all.’ Naturally, Philippe wished these twenty-five to be of his party. The syndics understood and were indignant. ‘Do you mean, then,’ said they, ‘to have men set over us?’ The crafty Philippe did not lose the thread. ‘Not _men_ over you,’ he said, ‘but the general council is over all.’ Then, like a very tribune, he turned boldly to the people. ‘Gentlemen,’ said he, ‘do you not intend that the general council should be supreme over all?’ Instantly the cry was heard from all sides, ‘Yes, yes!’ The opposition succeeding thus in getting the people on their side, the days of the party in power were numbered. The syndics hastened to cut short. ‘Now then,’ said the syndic Curtet, let us talk of business.’[548] It then occurred to them that the general council had to appoint deputies to go to Berne. The three leaders of the opposition, Jean Philippe, Ami de Chapeaurouge and Jean Lullin, were proposed by the council itself, which would much rather see them at Berne, where they might support the cause of the republic, than at Geneva, where they were making war on the government. But the three opponents saw through the trick. ‘For my part,’ said Lullin, ‘I have an excuse which prevents my going.’ ‘I hold to what was decreed,’ said Philippe, ‘that those who have begun the business should go thither to complete it.’--‘I say the same,’ added De Chapeaurouge. The three conspirators (if we may give them such a name) will therefore spend the winter at Geneva, and they will not be idle there. [Sidenote: VINDICATION OF THE REFORMERS.]