The year 1707 witnessed an effort of the inferior burghers to wrest from the principal families a part of their usurped power, and to introduce amendments in the constitution. In this emergency, the council invoked the mediation of Bern and Zurich, received a confederate garrison, and maintained itself by force of arms and by execution of its principal antagonists. A renewal of the disturbances which had been quelled by such violent measures, was produced, in 1714, by the imposition of an arbitrary tax by the council for the enlargement and completion of the fortifications of the town. This stretch of power occasioned great discontent among the burghers; bitter attacks and censures on the government appeared in print; and the more strictly these were prohibited, they obtained the more eager perusal and credence. One of the arch-promoters of the rising storm was Michael Ducrest, a Genevan burgher and noble, an officer in the army, and a member of the great council. This man opposed himself with extraordinary vehemence to the building of the new fortifications, and heaped offensive charges on the partisans of the measure. The government condemned him to recant, and, on his evading compliance by flight, a penal sentence was pronounced against him. New attempts which he made to excite disturbance were followed by a sentence of perpetual imprisonment. This sentence could not be put in execution, as Ducrest had taken refuge under a foreign jurisdiction, where he set at defiance the council of Geneva, and provoked that body to such a degree by his writings and intrigues against them, that sentences more and more severe were heaped upon his head, until at length the most offensive of his writings was torn by the hangman, and his effigy was suspended from the gallows. His person, however, enjoyed impunity till 1744, when he was taken into custody in the territory of Bern. The government of Geneva did not thirst for his blood, and was content with his perpetual imprisonment. Even in this situation he contrived to mix in Hentzi’s conspiracy, was confined in the castle of Aarburg, and closed, in extreme old age, as a state prisoner, a life which he had spent in incessant labours in the cause of democracy. [Sidenote: [1734-1738 A.D.]]