Perth Amboy evening news., 1906-11-27

and boosted that they would eat Ge-
%neva."
This guerilla warfare nearly ruin
ed the trade of the city, and the mer-
chants, who took more interest in
selling goods than in fighting for lib
erty, offered Bonivard a pension OF
eighty crowns a year if he would quit
politics and live in peace. He agreed
to do so, and, after having obtained a
safe conduct from the duke, set out
to visit his mother at the village or
Seyssel, on the Rhone. But he was
arrested on the way nd taken to the
Castle of Chillon again.
He says that he was treated well
there for the first two years and lived
very comfortably. M. de Beaufort.
the commandant of the castle, gave
him a good roo and a good bed, re-
ceived him at his own table and treat
ed him as an honored guest, but in
1882, after a visit from the Duke of
Savoy, Bonivard says: 1.-THE captain
thrust me into a dungeon below the
level of the lake, where | remained
AOul JCdiS. 4 uO nOb hhOW "hOtiiOi
he did this at the dukes command or
not, but I do know that l had such
abundant leisure for walking that |
wore a little pathway in the rock
which forms the pavement of the
dungeon just as though 1t had beer
knocked out with a hammer
He says that he occupied himself
writing trifing fancies and ballads,
both in the French and Latin IAN
guages," and several of them have
been preserved. One of them was a
simple little satire upon his enemy,
the duke:
"If your case with him be just,
Tremble then you surely must.
If it be not just or true,
There's no need to worry you.
Go to sleep without a fear,
He will hold your interests dear.
Never let him know you can
Perceive that he's a ~treacherous
man,
For then he'll either have your
head,
Or lock you up in Jail instead.
Honest men he doth confine,
And asks the wicked men to n
These are not very brilliant verses,
but there is a cheerful sort of humor
in then which speaks well for a man
who had spent four years in a dun
geon where he could only move to
and fro within the length of his
chain. Evidently his buoyant spirit
was not broken by treachery or m
prisonment.
Bonivard was rescued in 1886 by
an army of 5000 Berne soldiers, who
captured the castle and found four
prisoners in the dungeons. Two of
them were eminent citizens of &C.
neva, whom the Duke of Savoy had
sent to the castle because they waited
upon him with a deputation from
Geneva several years before to pro-
test against some of his cruelties. The
fourth was Bonivard, who was es-
corted back to Geneva in triumph,
presented with the freedom of the
city and granted by the town council
a pension annually of 200 crowns
and lodging for himself and his male
legitimate children" Where the men,
bers of the council expected his wife
and daughters to live is not stated.
Disguised with this parsimony of
his fellow townsmen, after all his
sufferings, he shook the dust of &C.
neva from his feet and went to Bernc
with the army of rescue. His treat
ment became a public issue in Geneva
politics, and after a year or so of the
bitterest kind of controversy and re-
elimination, the town council invited
him to come home and become the
official historian of Geneva, with a
salary of 500 crowns, a little less than
$500 a year.. The council also paid
his debts and redeemed his library,
which had been pawned, with ali
agreement that 1t should become the
property of the city after his death,
and that library was the nucleus of
the present public library of Geneva.
The records of the city council
which are very much in detail and
well preserved, contain several refer
ences to him thereafter. In 1914 a
iSSOlulloH was pdSScu SelllnS lOTtu
that Francois de Bonivard is in
structed to commence work upon the
chronicles of Geneva as agreed upon"
The entry appears in the minutes up
on the same page with a resolution d.
recting the city vintager to supply the
Rev. John Calvin with a cask of wine
in consideration of his feeble health
and public service.
In June, 1919, it is recorded that a
box of sweetmeats was voted to Fran
co.'s de Bonivard, "who is working at
the chronicles, and his servant, who
writes at his dictation, is hereby vot-
ed a pair of new boots"
In 1852 Bonivard finished his great
work, "The History of Geneva From
the Earliest Times" and the manu-
script was submitted for review to
John Calvin, who reported to the city
fathers that ut Is not consistent with
the dignity of history and l recom-
mend that the said Bonivard be re-