Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/98

 §2 LANGUEDOC. who was as energetic and unsparing as his predecessor, and who brought royal letters, dated January 1, 1303, ordering all officials to render him the customary obedience. Popular excitement grew more and more threatening, and as Albi had no local inquis- itors of its own, being within the jurisdiction of the tribunal of Carcassonne, the discontent vented itself on the Dominicans, who were regarded as the representatives of the hated tribunal. On the first Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1302, when the friars went as usual to preach in the churches they were violently eject- ed and assailed with cries of " Death to the traitors !" and deemed themselves at length fortunate in being able to regain their con- vent. This state of things continued for several years, during which they scarce dared to show themselves in the streets, and were never secure from insult. All alms and burial -fees were withdrawn, and the people refused even to attend mass in their church. The names of Dominic and Peter Martyr were erased from the crucifix at the principal gate of the town, and were re- placed with those of Pequigny and Nepveu, and of two citizens who were leaders in the disturbances— Arnaud Garsia and Pierre Probi of Castres."^ The prisoners of Albi were still as far as ever from liberation, and Bernard Delicieux urged Pequigny to come to Carcassonne and consider their case on the spot. In the summer of 1303 he did so, and was met by a large number of the people of Albi, men and women, praying him to liberate them. While he was inves- tigating the subject he came upon the instrument of pacification between l^icholas d' Abbeville and the consuls of Carcassonne in 1299. This was communicated to the people by Frere Bernard in a fiery sermon, and a knowledge of its conditions aroused them almost to frenzy. Plots ensued in which the houses of some of the old consuls and of those who were regarded as friends of the Inquisition were destroyed ; the Dominican church was assailed, its windows broken, the statues in its' porch overthrown, and the friars maltreated. To violate the prisons of the Inquisition was so serious a matter that Pequigny seems to have wished the backing of an enraged populace before he would venture on the step ; and fol. 165.— Bern. Guidon. Hist. Con v. Prsedic. (Martene Ampl. Coll. VI. 511).
 * Vaissette, Ed. Privat, X. Pr. 409. — MSS. Bib. Nat., fonds latin, No. 4270.