The citizens were naturally curious to know why their senators were thus browbeaten and insulted by a party of insolent young Catholic nobles.

The old politician at their head, who, in spite of many services, was not considered a friend to the nation, inspired them with distrust.
Being informed of the presentation of the petition, the multitude loudly demanded that the document should be read.

This was immediately done.

The general drift of the remonstrance was anything but acceptable, but the allusion to Paris, at the close, excited a tempest of indignation.
"Paris! Paris! Saint Bartholomew! Saint Bartholomew! Are we to have Paris weddings in Brussels also ?" howled the mob, as is often the case, extracting but a single idea, and that a wrong one; from the public lecture which had just been made.

"Are we to have a Paris massacre, a Paris blood-bath here in the Netherland capital?
God forbid! God forbid! Away with the conspirators! Down with the Papists!" It was easily represented to the inflamed imaginations of the populace that a Brussels Saint Bartholomew had been organized, and that Champagny, who stood there before them, was its originator and manager.