[Massacres Of The South (1551-1815) I by Alexandre Dumas Pere]@TWC D-Link bookMassacres Of The South (1551-1815) I CHAPTER VI 5/32
Have you not often heard of the cruelties practised on them? It was a slight thing when the Protestants inflicted death alone, unaccompanied by the most horrible tortures.
Such as they were such they are." It may easily be imagined that such attacks soon embittered minds already disposed to find new causes for the old hatred, and besides the Catholics did not long confine themselves to resolutions and pamphlets. Froment, who had already got himself appointed Receiver-General of the Chapter and captain of one of the Catholic companies, insisted on being present at the installation of the Town Council, and brought his company with him armed with pitchforks, in spite of the express prohibition of the colonel of the legion.
These forks were terrible weapons, and had been fabricated in a particular form for the Catholics of Nimes, Uzes, and Alais.
But Froment and his company paid no attention to the prohibition, and this disobedience made a great impression on the Protestants, who began to divine the hostility of their adversaries, and it is very possible that if the new Town Council had not shut their eyes to this act of insubordination, civil war might have burst forth in Nimes that very day. The next day, at roll-call, a sergeant of another company, one Allien, a cooper by trade, taunted one of the men with having carried a pitchfork the day before, in disobedience to orders.
He replied that the mayor had permitted him to carry it; Allien not believing this, proposed to some of the men to go with him to the mayor's and ask if it were true.
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