Page:Georges Eekhoud - Escal Vigor, a novel.djvu/34

10 Protestant, morals. At the time of the conversion of these countries, the barbarians of Smaragdis submitted to baptism, only as the result of a war of extermination which the Christians waged against them to avenge the death of the apostle St. Olfgar, whose martyrdom, with an accompaniment of all sorts of cannabalistic inventions, is scrupulously, and as it were professionally, depicted in frescoes adorning the parish church of Zoutbertinge, the work of a pupil of Thierry Bouts, pourtrayer of men flayed alive. The legend runs that the women of Smaragdis had particularly distinguished themselves in this butchery. They had even added outrageous indecency to ferocity, having wrought with Olfgar even as the Bacchantes had with Orpheus.

Oft-times, in the course of the ages, heresies of sensual and subversive nature had arisen in this country of fiery temperraments and unconquerable independence. In the kingdom of Kerlingalande, now become very Protestant, where strict Lutheranism reigned as the State religion, the deep-sunken and occasionally explosive impiety of the population of Smaragdis was one of the chief cares of the Consistory.