Threatened with prosecution for his religious opinions he went to Geneva, where he spent the year 1701; he returned to the Cévennes on the eve of the rebellion of the Camisards, who by the murder of the Abbé du Chayla at Pont-de-Monvert on the night of 24 July 1702 raised the standard of revolt.

Within a period of two years he was to hold in check Count Victor Maurice de Broglie and Marshal Montrevel, generals of Louis XIV, and to carry on one of the most terrible partisan wars in French history.

As an orator he derived his inspiration from the prophets of Israel, and raised the enthusiasm of his rude mountaineers to a pitch so high that they were ready to die with their young leader for the sake of liberty of conscience.

It was at this moment that Marshal Villars, wishing to put an end to the terrible struggle, opened negotiations, and Cavalier was induced to attend a conference at Pont d'Avne near Alais on 11 May 1704, and on 16 May he made submission at Nîmes.

Cavalier wrote later (10 July 1707): "The only consolation that remains to me is that the regiment I had the honour to command never looked back, but sold its life dearly on the field of battle.

[2] On his return to England a small pension was given him and he settled at Dublin, where he published Memoirs of the Wars of the Cévennes under Col. Cavalier, written in French and translated into English with a dedication to Lord Carteret (1726).

Though Cavalier received, no doubt, assistance in the publication of the Memoirs, it is nonetheless true that he provided the materials, and that his work is the most valuable source for the history of his life.

Malesherbes, the courageous defender of Louis XVI, bears the following eloquent testimony to this young hero of the Cévennes: "I confess," he says, "that this warrior, who, without ever having served, found himself by the mere gift of nature a great general, this Camisard who was bold to punish a crime in the presence of a fierce troop which maintained itself by little crimes—this coarse peasant who, when admitted at twenty years of age into the society of cultivated people, caught their manners and won their love and esteem, this man who, though accustomed to a stormy life, and having just cause to be proud of his success, had yet enough philosophy in him by nature to enjoy for thirty-five years a tranquil private life—appears to me to be one of the rarest characters to be found in history.