the Spirit to all. Then they marched in a solid body against the soldiers, shouting Tartara! Some were armed with guns, most carried large stones. They fought valiantly, but their ranks were broken; three hundred were left dead on the field, fifty who were wounded were taken to Privas, and those who recovered were hung.
The prophetic inspiration was really nothing more than an epidemic malady, such as is found among the North American Indians, the tribes in Siberia, and such as broke out among the early Quakers and Wesleyans. It is a nervous disorder, as natural as chicken-pox, though not so common. Roman Catholic nuns have it, so had the pagan prophetesses of old.
Some Calvinist women professed to have received the gift of shedding tears of blood, and showed the crimson streaks washing their cheeks. This was by no means necessarily a fraud. Roman Catholic ecstatics have had the same, and the stigmata as well.
Fléchier, a contemporary, thus describes the ecstasy of Isabeau Charras, one of the principal prophetesses, and not to be confounded with la belle Isabeau. He gives it from the relation of an ecclesiastic who with some friends entered her cottage to see what really took place.
"Ils furent surpris du spectacle qui s'offrit à leurs yeux. La prophetesse était couchée à la renverse dans une cuisine, les jambes nues et l'estomac tout à fait découvert. Tous les assistants, à genoux autour d'elle, étaient attentifs à ces pieuses nudités. Le prêtre voulut faire quelque remontrance à la fille, mais la mère indignée lui dit: 'Quoi! malheureux que tu êtes, vous ne respectez pas ma fille qui a le Saint Esprit dans l'estomac!'"
