Great were the expectations of the people. Right was at length to
prevail over Might. The Day of Judgment was coming on the oppressors.
The Mighty would be put down from their seat and the humble would be
exalted in their room. A peasant wearing his cap before a noble, the
latter knocked it off his head "Pick it up," said the peasant, "or the
King will cut off your head." The seigneur obeyed.

But the result was disappointing. Only one noble had his head cut off.
Few executions were carried into effect, many were on paper. One of the
latter, a ruffian steeped in blood, defied the sentence and was
banished. Flechier in his amusing and instructive book, _Les grands
Jours d'Auvergne_, has given us a dramatic account of the trial.

Every description of intrigue was had recourse to, in order to
neutralise the effect of justice. The fair ladies of Clermont, _les
chats fourres_, as Flechier calls them, did their utmost to reduce
the severity of the judges. The Great Days lasted three months, and
ended in disappointment. Many of the worst offenders, convicted of
atrocious crimes, entered the Royal service and fought in the armies of
the King.

But if justice spared the culprits, the opportunity was accorded to
destroy their strongholds, and now little remains of these Towers of
Iniquity but the foundations, and some fragments of their massive
walls, which were generally constructed of basaltic prisms taken from
the rock that sustained the castles, laid horizontally. "Puzzolana was
mixed with the mortar used in these constructions, and without the
binding quality communicated by this ingredient, probably no cement
would have taken effect on the smooth a rid iron surfaces of the
prisms." [Footnote: Poulette Scrope, "The Extinct Volcanoes of Central