THE GLORIOUS RETURN

A Story of the Vaudois in 1689

BY
CRONA TEMPLE
Author of “The Last House in London,” etc.

T H E   R E L I G I O U S   T R A C T   S O C I E T Y,
56, Paternoster Row; 65, St. Paul’s Churchyard,
and 164, Piccadilly.

PREFACE.

IT is nearly two hundred years since the long persecutions of the Church in the Alpine valleys ended in their ‘Glorious Return’ from exile, and their gain of liberty of conscience and freedom from the yoke of Rome. It is but right that in 1889 Protestant countries should unite in offering sympathy and brotherly help to the Waldensian Church in its time of commemoration. Two hundred years ago, Britain, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, and the Protestants of France vied with each other in showing their generous love for these sorely-tried children of God. And in these happier times it is well to turn back the history page, to learn what it was that stirred the hearts of our forefathers; to learn what manner of woe it was that the Vaudois endured; to read how the God they served did not suffer them to be tempted beyond what they were able to bear, but—giving them the high honour of bearing witness to His truth, He comforted them at last with His gifts of freedom and of peace. It is in such memories that nations may learn their lessons of truest wisdom. Christianity should be national as well as individual: the Heavenly King demands service from nations as well as from hearts. And it is right that, though the Waldenses are foreigners, and a people of but small account on Europe’s muster-roll, their bi-centenary should waken echoes in England; such echoes as God wills that noble deeds should stir throughout all time.

THE GLORIOUS RETURN.

CHAPTER I.

THE sunlight was fading from the hills, and the pine-forests were growing grey in the creeping shadow.

A northerly breeze had been blowing from the mountains, but it had died down, as north winds do, with the sunsetting; a great stillness had fallen upon the valleys.

One could hear the torrent as it leapt from the snows above, rushing and gurgling in the gorge it had graven for itself on its way to the Pélice River. One could hear too, faint and far away, the cry of the ravens as they circled over a meadow; and one might catch the jarring call of a night-hawk as it woke from its daylight sleep.

But these sounds rather blended with than broke upon the silence. And there seemed besides no sign of life or motion in all the width of the valley.

There were traces of cultivation on the hill-sides where careful hands had terraced and tilled the stony soil, winning from the wilderness fields for pastures and for corn.

There were also buildings that had the semblance of cottages, a group of ruins here by the stream-side, and single ones standing yonder beyond the spurs of the pine-woods.

But in those fields were now neither flocks nor herds, nor any sign of corn; and from those broken chimneys no smoke-wreaths drifted to tell of human lives about the warm hearth-stones.

It was the year 1687, and the valley was the Valley of Luserna, in the Piedmontese Alps.

This was the country of the Vaudois, and it was indeed desolate after the bitter persecution which had followed the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.

Storms of cruelty and the bitterness of superstition had swept the valleys at various times, but never a storm so devastating and terrible as this. From Fenestrelle to Rora, from the Pra Pass to the plains of Piedmont, fire and sword had driven forth the remnant of the Vaudois. Hundreds had fallen, fighting for their faith and for their homes; hundreds had perished under the white pall of the winter snows; and hundreds more had died on the scaffold or in the prisons of the plain.

And the remnant, the poor harried and hunted souls, had gone forth to seek an asylum—if such there might be found—where they might worship their God according to His Word.

The sun sank lower yet; the line of light retreated farther up the mountain-peaks. The ravens sullenly stooped and settled on the rocks. The torrent kept its noisy way, charged with the blue snow-water that came glancing from the hills.

Suddenly a woman’s voice rose on the air, clear, and very sweet. It came through the sprays of creeping plants that veiled a crag so steep that one might marvel how human being could have climbed there. It was a haunt fit only for the chamois or the hill-sheep; and on either hand spread dense forests and ravines where the snow-wreaths lay yet unmelted.

The song rang forth. It was no wavering strain, no uncertain sound, but a chant of triumph that held also a note of defiance—

The voice ceased; as the last note died away the last sun-shaft touched the highest peak. The day was done. Night had fallen on the Valley of Luserna.

Behind the ivy-sprays and the clinging rock plants there was a path on the face of the cliff widening as it rose, until—some fifty feet above the stream—it spread into a platform or tiny amphitheatre completely hidden from any prying eye that might search the cliff from below.

From above one might perhaps peer into its recesses; but then no living thing ever did look from above, save the falcons and the ravens, or perhaps a wild goat, tempted by the tufts of mountain flowers which bloomed against the edges of the snow.

Presently, far back in the hill-cleft, a small red flame leaped up, fed on dried grasses and fir-cones.

‘Rénée, Rénée,’ called a woman’s voice, ‘thou art too rash, dear child. May not that light betray us after all?’

‘Oh, no, mother! No one comes here now; we are safe, quite safe. And see where Tutu creeps forward to the blaze! Thou art cold, my poor Tutu? Then rest thee, none will harm thee here.’

MAY NOT THAT LIGHT BETRAY?

A dormouse lifted its beadlike eyes to the speaker’s face, as if well understanding that it was loved and safe. It was a sort of friend to these poor refugees, here in their mountain hiding-place, a creature even more weak and helpless than themselves.

Again the woman’s voice was heard.

‘Dear child, be not stubborn. Have we endured so