First came into the country the white Petrels of the Bourbons, precursors of the storm--the emigrants. There were many valiant men among them, but the larger number, who gave character and repute to the whole, were worthless, reckless rabble. Like a pestilence, they corrupted the morals of the cities in which they located themselves, and the courts of small, simple Sovereigns, who felt themselves honoured by receiving these distinguished adventurers. Coblentz, the seat of government of Electoral Treves, was their head-quarters, and that city was the first where their immorality brought ruin into families, and disunion into the State, They were fugitives enjoying the hospitality of a foreign country, but with knavish impudence, wherever they were the strongest, they ill-treated the German citizens and peasants, as well as the foolish nobleman who honoured in them polite Paris. When Veit Weber, the valiant author of "Sagen der Vorzeit," whilst travelling in a Rhine boat, was humming a French song upon contentment, of which the refrain was, "_Vive la Liberte_," some emigrants, who were travelling with him, drew their swords upon him and his unarmed companion, misused them with the flat blade, bound them with cords round their necks, and so dragged them to Coblentz, where they robbed them of their money and passports, and, thus wounded, they were imprisoned without examination till the Prussians arrived and freed them.[35] Besides brutal violence, the emigrants also introduced into the circles which admitted them vices hitherto unknown to the people, loathsome diseases, and meannesses of every kind. In the whole of the Rhine valley a feeling of hatred and disgust was excited by their presence; nothing worked so favourably for the French republican party; the feeling became general among the people, that a struggle which was to rid France of such evil deeds and abominations must be just. They were equally despised by the more powerful States--Prussia and Austria. The troops that they hired were composed of the worst rabble; even the poor people of the Imperial States looked with repugnance on the bands of emigrants.