The people who had been chanting the Psalms of David through the town, without having decided what should be their course of action, at last determined to rescue the victims.

A vast throng, after much hesitation, accordingly directed their steps to the prison.

"You should have seen this vile populace," says an eye-witness, "moving, pausing, recoiling, sweeping forward, swaying to and fro like the waves of the sea when it is agitated by contending winds." The attack was vigorous, the defence was weak--for the authorities had expected no such fierce demonstration, notwithstanding the menacing language which had been so often uttered.
The prisoners were rescued, and succeeded in making their escape from the city.

The day in which the execution had been thus prevented was called, thenceforward, the "day of the ill-burned," (Journee des mau-brulez).

One of the ministers, however, Simon Faveau, not discouraged by this near approach to martyrdom, persisted in his heretical labors, and was a few years afterwards again apprehended.