As soon as order was partially restored, the first syndic, Richardet, a hot-tempered man, as we know, put to the vote the demand made by the ambassadors of Berne; or rather, taking a less regular but more artful course, proposed the rejection of the demand. ‘Let all those,’ he said, ‘who wish that Farel, Calvin, and Courault should not enter the town, hold up their hands.’ The secretary of the council said that almost all hands were held up. This secretary was Ruffi, who had been elected in the place of Claude Rozet on the very day of the banishment of the reformers. His partiality was manifest in the fact that he wrote at the same time that the fourteen articles contained some untruths; untruths which the passionate Vandel himself had not been able to detect. It was a piece of gratuitous falsehood, and imputations of that kind do not inspire much confidence in anything that Ruffi might report. After the voting, the first syndic requested that those who wished the preachers to be readmitted to the town and to be heard should hold up their hands. ‘A few were raised,’ said Michel Rozet, ‘to signify that they wished for the ministers.’ The secretary named two or three of them, amongst others Chautemps, in whose house Olivétan, a kinsman of Calvin, had lived; but he added, ‘and certain others, few in number.’ Timid men, in the presence of the storm which threatened to break out, thought it prudent to be silent; some courage was required to face it. In fact, at the mere sight of these few hands raised, a transport of spite and wrath broke out; they could not endure an act of independence, which was at the same time, with many there, an act of respect for the reformers and the Reformation. _The rage was so great_, says Rozet, _that the first two were compelled to fly_. Many pursued them; some drew their swords; others, ‘glancing at them fiercely,’ cried out, _Kill them! kill them!_ ‘The majority of votes,’ say the Registers, ‘decided that the preachers should not again be admitted into the town.’ The people of Geneva thus adopted a resolution which, if they had not repented of it, would have prevented light going forth from that city, and would have thrown an obstacle in the way of its greatness.[712] Thus was the matter decided. _Alea jacta est._ The powerful party which, in their contest with the pope, the bishop, and the princes of Savoy, had taken for their flag liberty and the truth, and had transformed Geneva into an evangelical republic, had quarrelled after their victory, as very commonly happens, and those who did not wish for the Gospel had remained conquerors. But the citizens, _few in number_, who had made their voice heard in the general council, were not the only ones who longed for a Christian republic. This minority gradually increased, or rather dared to show itself. It continued united, fervent, determined, active; and to it ultimately the victory was to be given. CHAPTER XIV.