Page:Protestant Exiles from France Agnew vol 1.djvu/360

 infinitely obliged for the good offices which you have rendered to our churches, and for the zeal with which you have succoured them in difficult times. We shall reckon it as an important boon that you have given to the churches your son in your place. May God render the rest of your life happy, and load all your house with His best blessings. We are, &c.”

During the war, young Ruvigny had become acquainted with the “handsome Englishman,” Colonel Churchill. On the accession of James II. the same officer, Lord Churchill, came as an Envoy to France, and renewed his acquaintance with Henri de Ruvigny. It was to him that Churchill then made his celebrated declaration as to King James, “If the king is ever prevailed on to alter our religion, I will serve him no longer but will withdraw from him.” [Churchill rose to be the great Duke of Marlborough.]

In Benoist’s invaluable History there is a bird’s-eye view of young Ruvigny’s French life, and its transition into the life of a refugee. “The Deputy-General demitted his office, and through his interest with the king, his eldest son was appointed in his place. He was a young lord whose fine qualities were known to all the world. He was handsome in person, and mentally he was affable, sagacious and intelligent, brave without temerity, prudent without meanness, agreeable to the king, beloved by all the court, and on excellent terms with the ministers. He had so thoroughly prepossessed all the court in his favour, that his merits procured him neither enemies nor detractors. At first the churches were uneasy on account of his youth. They thought that in the confusion of their affairs, a deputy of more weight and experience was wanted. But the father promised not only to aid his son with his advice, and to interest himself in all the business put into his hands, but also to continue publicly to discharge the functions of the office, when the service of the church required this. For the latter, the churches had not only his own word, but also the king’s permission, which he had taken care to obtain. However, as soon as they had had some experience of the capacity of the young lord, they found that the churches had lost nothing by the change. They found him to be always accessible, always prepared for action, full of expedients and overtures, finding his greatest pleasure in his duties, and though residing at a court where a thousand agreeable amusements might enervate a young man, giving to the diversions of persons of his years only the time which remained after the hours of business. Even those who had not done entire justice to his father’s reputation, because it seemed to them that his prudence and circumspection savoured of timidity, found in his son no occasion for complaint. And his diligence, in obliging all those who sought interviews with him, always prevented the apprehension that he would let his work get into arrear. Hardly one instance of procrastination could be alleged against him. It was in the exercise of that office, during the most rough and vexatious period, that his mind was matured in the qualities of a great man, and that he acquired those merits which give him in the present day so large a share of the confidence and friendship of one of the greatest kings that ever wore a crown (King William III).”

Except on a few occasions young Ruvigny was the acting Deputy-General from 1678 to the extinction of the office in 1685. “It was,” he said to Burnet, “a melancholy post.” He daily saw new injustices done, and was suffered to inform against the wrong-doers, only for form’s sake and with no hope of success.

By the special favour of the king, he was allowed to leave France on the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, without forfeiting his property or his rights as his father’s heir. To the last moment he showed his zeal for Protestantism, braving the wrath of the king by allowing the Consistory of Charenton to meet in his house, for the distribution of their charitable funds among the poor of the flock.  

He had been selected for embassies to England, partly on account of the great friendship that subsisted between him and the Russells. During her long widowhood, Rachel Lady Russell looked upon her cousin Ruvigny as her best friend. It is in her letters that we find the first mention of him in his refugee life, and that in connection with an act of characteristic generosity. “Some French Protestants were taken going into Holland, and were made slaves in Algiers. They are now redeemed, four ministers or five, and the rest proposants. My cousin Ruvigny has paid the money, and I am to gather to reimburse him the greatest part if I can, 26th Jan. 1689.” At this date she was fifty-two years of age, and Ruvigny was in his fortieth year. In the following July, when his father’s sudden illness and death took