of horror in his picture of the massacre as he had authentically ascertained it, and added, “Were all the Neros of all times and ages alive again (I would be understood to say it with out any offence to your Highness, inasmuch as we believe that none of these things was done by any fault of yours), they would be ashamed at finding that they had contrived nothing that was not even mild and humane in comparison.  Meanwhile angels are horrorstruck, mortals amazed!” The Duchess-mother, replying for her son, could hardly avoid hinting that Mr. Morland had been rather rude.  She was, nevertheless, profuse in expressions of respect for the Lord Protector, who had no doubt received very exaggerated representations of what had happened, but at whose request she was sure her son would willingly pardon his rebellious subjects and restore them to their privileges.  During the rest of Morland’s stay in Turin or its neighbourhood the object of the Duke’s counsellors, and also of the French minister, was to furnish him with what they called a more correct account of the facts, and induce him to convey to Cromwell a gentler view of the whole affair.  Morland kept his own counsel; but, having had a second audience, and received the Duke’s submissive but guarded answer to Cromwell, and also several other papers, he left Turin on the 19th of July and proceeded, according to his instructions, to Geneva.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Morland, 563-583; and Letters between Pell and Thurloe given in Vaughan’s Protectorate.]

Meanwhile Cromwell, dissatisfied with the coolness of the French King and Mazarin, and also with the shuffling and timidity of the Swiss Cantons, had been taking the affair more and more into his own hands.  He had despatched, late in July, another Commissioner, Mr. GEORGE DOWNING, to meet Morland at Geneva, help Morland to infuse some energy into the Cantons, and then proceed with him to Turin to bring matters to a definite issue.  He had been inquiring also about the fittest place for landing an invading force against the Duke, and had thought of Nice or Villafranca.  Blake’s presence in the Mediterranean was not forgotten.  All which being known to Mazarin, that wily statesman saw that no time was to be lost.  While Mr. Downing was still only on his way to Geneva through France, Mazarin had instructed M. Servien, the French minister at Turin, to insist, in the French King’s name, on an immediate settlement of the Vaudois business.  The result was a Patente di Gratia e Perdono, or “Patent of Grace and Pardon,” granted by Charles Emanuel to the Vaudois Protestants, Aug. 19, in terms of a Treaty at Pignerol, in which the French Minister appeared as the real mediating party and certain Envoys from the Swiss Cantons as more or less assenting.  As the Patent substantially retracted the Persecuting Edict and restored the Vaudois to all their former privileges, nothing more was to be done.  Cromwell, it is true, did not conceal that he was disappointed.