During the confirmation the diseased redoubled their howls and infernal vociferations, and tried to spit in the face of the bishop and to tear off his pastoral raiment.

At the moment when the prelate gave his benediction a still more outrageous scene took place.

The violence of the diseased was carried to fury, and from all parts of the church arose yells and fearful howling; so frightful was the din that tears fell from the eyes of many of the spectators, and many strangers were thrown into consternation." Among the very large number of these diseased persons there were only two men; of the remainder only two were of advanced age; the great majority were young women between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five years.
The public authorities shortly afterward intervened, and sought to cure the disease and to draw the people out of their mania by singing, dancing, and sports of various sorts, until at last it was brought under control.( 406) (406) See Tissot, L'Imagination: ses Bienfaits et ses Egarements sutout dans le Domaine du Merveilleux, Paris, 1868, liv.

iv, ch.

vii, S 7: Les Possedees de Morzine; also Constans, Relation sur une Epidemie de Hystero-Demonopathies, Paris, 1863.
Scenes similar to these, in their essential character, have arisen more recently in Protestant countries, but with the difference that what has been generally attributed by Roman Catholic ecclesiastics to Satan is attributed by Protestant ecclesiastics to the Almighty.