Catinat shook him by the hand, then raised his eyes and glanced with a calm and penetrating look round the circle, and said: "My valiant brethren, my fault is evident and undeniable, it consists in transgression against subordination, and as I have been as good a soldier as brother Roland, I know well that nothing can be said to extenuate it. If you speak in accordance with the letter of the law, I am then condemned, and I will lay down my command as obediently as I accepted it from Roland. But I again ask you here openly, as I have already expressed my opinion privately on this point, can we, the immediate instruments of the Most High, penetrated with his spirit, measure commands and quietly follow them? shall we, are we permitted to pursue this war as with men like ourselves, and may we obstinately withdraw the holy zeal, when the spirit descends upon us, and rules the sword in our hand, and hurls the burning brand into the idolatrous temples? Where then is truth, confidence, and faith, if I am not allowed to do what the Lord himself designs to exact from me. No my friends, my inspired brethren! let other self-sufficient, self-willed men then, who fight without heaven be your soldiers, I can never be such. Roland and Cavalier pardon the prisoners we make, send them back comforted, refresh and succour their wounded, and hope by their well-meaning kindness to arouse the hearts of the villains, that they may feel humane and brotherly towards us. But no such thing! they mock at this our weakness and call it folly, nay, they publicly term it cowardice and say, that we dare not act otherwise, for we are only rebels and outlaws. Assuredly we are a reproach to men, and when they catch, or wound us, they show us less compassion than they would testify to a dog, even if it had torn their dearest child to pieces. Is it then necessary to remind you of the barbarities they have practised upon our brethren, who have struggled and died for the faith? I will only recall to your recollection the holy father Brusson, who gloriously won the crown of martyrdom at Montpellier, the pious man, who preached the gospel to us poor abandoned flocks in the wilderness, and then took leave of us, drew no sword, lighted no torch, lived and died in the spirit of peace, and who only came once more to take a last farewell of the old mountains, and of the brethren, whom the faith had collected around him as his own children, with the gospel in his pocket, and with the bread of tears he wished to return to the strange land, which had become to him as his native country; and when they caught him, of what avail was his quiet, peaceable spirit to him? Under martyrdom, at which the imagination shudders, he was forced to resign his soul into the hands of the Creator. Need I remind you of the noble spirit of Seguier, how heroically he died and only scorned the cruel ingenuity of the executioner? But how then do you forget the wholly