WITH A SKETCH OF THEIR REMARKABLE HISTORY AS A CHURCH AND PEOPLE TO THE PRESENT DATE. With Map of the Valleys. BY...

Vicar of Christ Church, Somers Town, London. "TRITUNTUR MALLEI REMANET INCUS." LONDON: J. F. SHAW & CO., 48, PATERNOSTER ROW. 1873....

An eminent living scholar, Dr. Tischendorf, has remarked, that in these days there is need of "little books on great subjects." It was something of that feeling which led me to the idea of supplementing the large and learned works of Muston, Monastier, Gilly, and others, by a pocket volume, so small that the tourist might not feel it an incumbrance, and yet so comprehensive, that those who have not the leisure for larger works, might obtain useful knowledge of the Waldenses. Whether I shall have

Early on the morning of Easter Monday, 1871, in company with a devoted Italian pastor, I left my temporary home in the comfortable "Grand Hotel," in the little town of Pallanza, to gratify a long-felt desire of visiting that part of Europe made sacred by ages of heroic suffering and courageous endurance for faith and fatherland—the valleys of Piedmont. As we steamed up the lake Maggiore the thin mist of early morn cleared off, and by the time we had passed the far-famed Borromean Islands the eye

Before narrating my personal adventures in the valleys, I fancy I may consult the profit of my readers if I give a brief topographical outline of the district of which La Torre is the chief town. It lies about thirty miles south-west of Turin, having Mont Viso and the French province of Dauphiny for its south-western border. Mont Genevre is the extreme point in the north-westerly direction, and from its sides the boundary of the upper portions of the valleys turns in a north-easterly direction a

After enquiring as to the geographical position of the Waldensian valleys, the next most frequent questions which arise are: Who are the Waldenses? how long have they been in the valleys of Piedmont? what circumstances led to their taking up their abode there? and what has given to their history that peculiar characteristic which makes every detail both of their past and present so intensely interesting to all the lovers of piety and patriotism wherever the story of their high-souled courage or

During the struggles of the papacy for temporal aggrandizement and political usurpation, which marked its character from the seventh to the twelfth centuries, anything so religious as even the attempt to convert heretics by fire and sword seems little attended to. But in the twelfth century arose the epoch in which men were to be thrown into a burning fiery furnace who would not bow down to the tyranny of him who sat enthroned in the city of the seven hills. Otho IV., Emperor of Germany by favou

Although the story of the long-continued and heroically endured sufferings of the Vaudois may have been the most prominent thought in the minds of those who recall their history, yet it is at least to the Christian as important to remember their works of faith and labours of love in the cause of Christ. Indeed were it not for the latter we should never have known the former. It would seem as if the missionary zeal of the Waldenses was one of the chief causes (or at least occasions) of the persec

The event to which allusion is made in the close of the foregoing chapter recalls my thoughts and observation, as I stood in the streets of La Torre on what was, as regards the ecclesiastical season, the very anniversary period of that frightful tragedy perpetrated some 214 years before, and remembered still as the "Bloody Pascha." The coincidence seemed to bring home the remembrance of the awful event with a more realizing emphasis. And it was in this train of thought that I cast my eyes upward

In order to reach this spot, my companion and I left the town of La Torre by a street bounded on one side by Trinity College. We then crossed the Pelice by a somewhat rustic bridge, and found ourselves very quickly immersed in woods on the mountain side with numberless bye-paths. These paths were very circuitous, and we had occasion often to ask our way from some friendly woodman or inhabitant of a wayside chalêt. Every now and then we came to a kind of table-land, where we could indulge in a pa

Although the Vaudois were not wholly despoiled of the fruit of their heroic efforts in fighting their way back to their native valleys, yet the cruel banishment of the French Protestants, and the removal of so many of their gifted and devoted leaders, was a very heavy calamity. It placed almost insuperable difficulties in the way of their reorganization. Furthermore, they were greatly harassed by the imposition of taxes far beyond their means, and most unjustly levied only on the Protestants. Ve

Our last chapter closed with a brief sketch of the life of Beckwith, so that in the present I might be free to speak of the work done, without interpolations as to the personal movements of him who was in several respects the chief worker. To those who desire to read the full particulars of General Beckwith's life, I very earnestly commend the deeply interesting work of Pastor J. P. Meille, to whose pages I am greatly indebted. Beckwith was early impressed with the conviction that God had provid

The first exercise of evangelical liberty accorded to the Vaudois Church was shown in the attempt to preach the gospel and establish a place of Protestant worship, at what, in point of geographical nearness, was the neighbouring city, but not in the past the neighbourly city of Pinerolo. The work was, however, accomplished chiefly by the munificence of American Protestants. Then came the opening of the edifice, which so worthily represents the Vaudois cause in Turin. Beckwith took a very energet

WORKS BY EMILY S. HOLT. ROBIN TREMAYNE. A Tale of the Marian Persecution. Crown 8vo, cloth extra, with Frontispiece, Five Shillings. "The book is extremely well written."— Athenæum. "As charming as it is instructive."— Record. THE WELL IN THE DESERT. An Old Legend of the House of Arundel. Small 8vo, with Frontispiece, cloth extra, Two Shillings and Sixpence. "A tale of the Middle Ages, showing that there were beautiful gleams of light in those dark days even. It is a touching story."— Watchman.