He invited the deputies--among whom were Leger, the historian and pastor; also the brave Joshua Janavello--to meet him at the convent of La Torre early on Wednesday morning. He represented that he was only in pursuit of those obstinate persons who had resisted the orders of Gastaldo; that the others had nothing to fear, provided they would consent to receive a regiment of infantry and two companies of horse soldiers, _as a mark of obedience and fidelity to their prince_, for two or three days. He then entertained them sumptuously, and sent them back to their communes to persuade their brethren of his sincerity and kindness. Leger and Janavello saw through the trick, but, alas! the others fell into the snare. Accordingly the Vaudois consented to receive the soldiers into their houses and to entertain them as friends. They allowed them to occupy their hiding-places and strongholds, from whence no fair fight had ever driven them. The very eagerness of the soldiers to penetrate into these recesses, and their brutality on their way to the Pra del Tor, opened the eyes of the Vaudois to their miserable condition. It is remarkable that the deputies from Angrogna were the readiest to believe in Pianezza's promises, and also the first to fall victims to his murderous soldiery. On Thursday and Friday Pianezza was occupied with three things--first, in keeping those of the Vaudois on the French frontier from escaping to that country; secondly, in persuading the inhabitants of the valleys of his "good intentions;" and thirdly, resting his soldiers in readiness for the day of slaughter. On Good Friday the Vaudois observed the day according to the usage of their church, by fasting and humiliation. They could not meet in their churches; but in their caverns and mountain dells they cried to the Lord for deliverance from their great distress, and for strength to remain faithful under persecution. The Lord heard their cry; but the church of the valleys was destined to pass through such a sea of suffering, inflicted in the name of the holy Catholic church, as would have made many a pagan persecutor blush with shame. At four o'clock in the morning of Easter-eve, on a signal given from the top of Castelluzzo, Pianezza's troops rose to slaughter the persons under whose roofs they had slept, and of whose food they had partaken the night before. Surely a religion which thus degrades men into monsters should have few apologists in our day. The mind recoils from the enumeration of the horrors of that "bloody Easter." Human depravity, goaded on by every motive which spiritual wickedness could suggest, celebrated such a carnival as must have staggered even a Nero. Men, women, and children were torn limb from limb, after suffering every possible outrage and indecency. Some were rolled from their native rocks to afford merriment to their butchers. Others were impaled on the trees by the wayside. Neither age nor sex hindered this work of brutality; and it is even said