The stranger stooped to look more closely, but saw nothing: and it was only when the others dropped on their knees that he understood the hint and hastened to follow the example.

The soldiers bent their heads while the sergeant recited a prayer for the safety of the city.

He did this reverently, while the evening light--which fell grey between walls and sobered those who had that moment left the open sky and the open country--cast its solemn mantle about the party.
Such was the pious usage observed in that age at the opening and the closing of the gates of Geneva: nor had it yet sunk to a form.

The nearness of the frontier and the shadow of those clutching arms, ever extended to smother the free State, gave a reality to the faith of those who opened and shut, and with arms in their hands looked back on ten years of constant warfare.

Many a night during those ten years had Geneva gazed from her watch-towers on burning farms and smouldering homesteads; many a day seen the smoke of Chablais hamlets float a dark trail across her lake.