Darkness, but not the blanket of the dark. This was a sinister darkness, beset by smoke and flames, by the clash of steel, by screams, by terror, by horror. The victims were Huguenots on the quayside at La Rochelle in 1688. They had heard the good news. James II had been overthrown, so it was safe for French Protestants to seek refuge in England. Others wished to violate their safety.
For the previous three years, since the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (which had helped to cost King James his throne), the Huguenots had been persecuted. Swaggering, bullying dragoons had been billeted in their homes. Now, as the oppressed waited for a sea passage to asylum, their tormentors had a final opportunity to inflict pain. They wielded a branding iron. One girl, Mademoiselle Ogier, lost an eye and had her nose destroyed.
Such injuries would seem to have precluded marriage.
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