Before we enter upon the dreadful tragedy which took place in the valleys during the regency of the Duchess Christina, sister to the king of France, (which succeeded the reign of Victor Amadeus;) it is necessary to call the attention of the reader to the state of the valleys at this period. For years, the continual partial and individual persecutions had held them in a state of alarm, even in the midst of peace, and now they had suffered most severely by pestilence, and were reduced to want or poverty by the great scarcity of provisions which succeeded it. After a calm of thirteen years, under the regency, what must have been their dismay to hear that councils, for the propagation of the faith and extirpation of heresy, had been established in all Catholic countries, after the model of that at Rome; and that one was now instituted at Turin, in 1650.

This establishment was divided into two bodies of supporters; the archbishop being the head of the male, and the Marchioness di Pia-nezza of the female, devotees.

The eagerness of the ladies engaged in this pious enterprise can hardly be imagined, they sent forth spies to promote dissensions in private families, offered money to new converts, and even penetrated into the prisons to make proselytes. To support their expenses, they went round even to the shops and inns to collect contributions. The secular arm also assisted them, if required, in their labours to deserve the plenary indulgence for all their sins granted them by the court of Rome.

The council of men formed still greater designs, in the execution of which they were indefatigable, and sent spies and missionaries into the valleys, who were always at hand to excite quarrels, rebellion against church discipline, and even to carry off women and children from the Vaudois, and attack the pastors. They cited the principal people to appear before the tribunal at Turin, whence they scarcely ever escaped without having been imprisoned, ill treated, or nearly ruined; nay, often were they condemned to confiscation and banishment. Such were the means used by the Propaganda to harass the Vaudois. An unfortunate accident happened in 1603, which gave them more power of doing mischief. A convent of monks had been some years established at Villar, when an infamous traitor, whom they had engaged in their service, undertook to excite the Vaudois to expel these missionaries; having persuaded the wife of the pastor Manget to further the plan, she had influence enough to induce her husband, and two others of the name of Pellene, to call an assembly, where this subject was discussed, and the project of Manget highly disapproved of and censured. The wife of Manget made a false report of the decision to the two young Pellenes, who succeeded that very evening in driving out the monks and setting fire to the convent. It may well be supposed that the inquisitors did not lose so favourable an opportunity; and the fact having been represented in the blackest colours to the Duchess Regent, they obtained five or six thousand men, under the command of Count Tedesco, who marched immediately with orders to surprise and burn down the town of Villar.

In the mean time Leger, then moderator of the valleys, with the principal members of his own and the neighbouring churches, repaired to the chief magistrate at Luzerne, and protesting the innocence of the assembly, and even the parish of Villar, offered to bring the offenders to justice. The Count Tedesco nevertheless proceeded to Villar, and made his attack; but a storm of rain prevented the muskets of his soldiers from going off, and the Vaudois then having given every where the alarm, the approach of darkness induced him to return to Luzerne without having accomplished his purpose.

The Propaganda being thus defeated, had recourse, in 1654, to a still more sanguinary plot for the destruction of the Vaudois, by means of the French army under Marshal GrancÉ. The court of Savoy had offered to provide this army with winter quarters in our valleys, at a much less sum than had been demanded elsewhere, in consequence, the troops appeared before Pignerol, demanding their quarters; in the mean time, the monks and other agents of the Propaganda had artfully persuaded the Vaudois, that it was contrary to the intention of the Duchess, that these troops had entered her states, and excited them to take up arms. The main body of these forces was already before the fort of La Tour, and all the inhabitants of the val de Luzerne were drawn up to oppose them, when Leger, the moderator, throwing himself at the feet of the Marshal, explained the trick played upon him, and requested he would suspend hostilities until a written order could arrive from the Duchess Regent for the cantonment of the troops. This was assented to, and on the arrival of the order, on the morrow, the army quietly took possession of their quarters.

This plot was afterwards more fully proved by two officers in De GrancÉ's army,* and its details were lodged with the other MSS. by Leger, in the Cambridge library.

A year had scarcely elapsed when another motive was added to the zealous labours of the propaganda, which was the wish of establishing in the valleys those Irish whom Cromwell had banished in consequence of the massacres they had committed among their Protestant countrymen.

This eager desire to obtain possession of the valleys, and all that the Vaudois possessed in them, excited a series of intrigues, which ended in an order to Gastaldo, auditor of Luzerne, to enjoin and command the Vaudois inhabitants of Briqueiras, S. Second, Bubiana, Fenil, Campillon, Luzerne, St. Jean, and La Tour, to abandon those places within three days, or receive the mass, under pain of death and confiscation of their property.

What makes this step still more cruel and unjust, if possible, is, that it took place in the winter of 1654, when Charles Emanuel II. had, by an edict of 3rd December, just confirmed all their privileges, &c.* In this, and in the one of the preceding year, they were mentioned as faithful and obedient subjects; nay more, at the very time the lawyers were employed in verifying the original charters, the last decree was about to be enrolled, and the sum of money exacted on these occasions had long been paid.

It will easily be imagined that no time was lost in sending deputies to Turin, and trying every means to obtain a mitigation of this dreadful sentence. These deputies were amused by an affected deliberation on their petition, and were referred sometimes from the Duke to his mother, sometimes from the Duchess to the Marquis di Pianezza, and from him to the Propaganda, till they received information on the 16th of April (though they were promised a final audience on the 17th) that the Marquis was already at Luzerne with his forces, and that they had better provide for their own safety.

Thus, by a series of base treachery, duplicity, and cruelty, was the way prepared for those dreadful massacres, which have cast so foul a stain on the reign of Charles Emanuel the Second.**