In October, 1880, the expulsions began. The residences and colleges of the Jesuits and other Congregations were entered and their occupants driven out. Very often the military were called upon to enforce the decrees. It was to no purpose that the Catholics of the nation lifted up their voices in angry protest, or that bishops--like Mgr. Gay and Mgr. de Cabrieres--clothed in their pontifical vestments, uttered sentence of excommunication against the despoilers. The rout went on with ever-increasing ardor. It is to the credit of the French bar of the time that it refused to concur in the shameful acts. M. Chesnelong, in 1891, writes: "After the decrees of March 29, 1880, more than three hundred magistrates abandoned their career rather than sacrifice the least particle of their honor; these heroes of duty displayed a magnificent spirit of sacrifice to the very end." Against the Congregations not attainted by the decrees, recourse was had to tactics slower but more perfidious. They were rounded up in a pitiless circle of taxes and assessments to such an extent as to rob the Congregations of one-fifth of their net revenues. Once more the Holy Father sent forth his vigorous protestations. In an open letter to Cardinal Guibert of Paris, dated October 22, 1880, after reviewing the situation he writes: "But today, in the midst of these new disasters, our emotion is great, our anguish is extreme; and we cannot help but grieve and protest against the injury done to the Catholic Church." The great Pope ended by declaring that "in the presence of this license, the duties of his office commanded him to safeguard with invincible constancy the institutions of the Church, and to defend her rights with a courage that would not end at any peril." Following this letter of the Sovereign Pontiff the Apostolic Nuncio, Mgr. Czacki, proceeded in a few weeks, November 25, to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and placed before him a ministerial declaration of November 9, which glorified in having dispersed two hundred and sixty-one non-authorized establishments, together with a note protesting against these avowed and cowardly persecutions.