The superstitious fears of the English, fears that they had once before succumbed to, now gained new empire over them that seemed justified by the unheard-of audacity of a body of men, once in full flight, suddenly returning to the attack with intrepidity. The front ranks of the English being broken through, the general panic spread all the quicker seeing that, in sharing it, those who stood away from the center of action were wholly in the dark as to the cause of the sudden rout. The English soldiers struck at and trampled one another; the orders of their captains were lost in the frightful tumult; their efforts were powerless to conjure away the defeat. The cry of the first soldiers to flee: "The witch has let loose her fiends upon us!" was carried from mouth to mouth. Finally, and as if to overfill the measure, the English of the bastille of St. Privé, upon arriving to the aid of their fellows, saw the barges, that had shortly left the near shore, now returning from the opposite side filled with fresh French soldiers. The French captains had been compelled by the exasperation of the inhabitants of Orleans to decide to co-operate with the Maid,[91] and they had marched out and reached the river bank just as the barges arrived on that side. At the sight of the re-inforcements, the corps from St. Privé hastened back to its own encampment, while the rest of the panic-stricken English ran to their respective bastilles for shelter behind the entrenchments of the redoubts of the Augustinians and the Tournelles. When the fresh French contingent brought by Marshal St. Sever and other captains disembarked, the martial maid was preparing to attack the Convent of the Augustinians, determined not to allow the enemy time to recover from their panic. Now supported by the reinforcements, Joan threw herself upon the convent, but at the moment when, in the lead of all she set foot upon a narrow passage leading to the palisade that she was to attack, she uttered a piercing cry. The teeth of a man trap had closed above her ankle; it penetrated her jambards and her skin and even reached the bone. It was an English "ruse of war," into which the Maid had put her foot.[92]
The pain was so keen that Joan, exhausted from the fatigues of the day, fainted away, and fell in the arms of her equerry Daulon. When she recovered consciousness, the day was nearing its end; the bastille of the Augustinians had been carried and its defenders were either dead or prisoners. The heroine had been transported to the lodgings of one of the English captains who had been killed in the combat. When Joan returned to consciousness, her equerry wished to remove the armor from her wounded limb and bathe the wound, but blushing at the exposure of even her foot to the surrounding soldiers, Joan obstinately refused all attention, and bestowed all her thought to the best use to be made of the capture of the Augustinian Convent. She forbade that it be set on fire, and ordered it to be held during the night by a strong garrison, that should lead the next day in a determined attack upon the Tournelles. After issuing these and other necessary orders with remarkable military sagacity, the warrior maid had herself conveyed to Orleans in a boat, feeling unable to walk by reason of the pain of her wound. The Augustinian Convent rose almost on the river's edge. Daulon, Master John and a few other cannoniers carried Joan to the river on a stretcher improvised out of the shafts of lances and placed her in a boat. Her page and equerry accompanied her, and she was rowed over to Orleans where she arrived at night. Modestly desiring to escape observation in her transit through the town to the house of her host, especially seeing that all the windows in the houses were illuminated, Joan asked Daulon to spread her cloak over her on the stretcher. Thus, although unseen of all, Joan was the witness of the delirious joy inspired by her last triumph. The town was in gala, hope radiated from all countenances. In two days, the Maid had destroyed or carried three of the most redoubtable fortifications of the English, and set free a large number of prisoners. More than eight hundred of these were found in the Augustinian Convent. By virtue of the confidence that she inspired, there was no doubt entertained on the success of the morrow's assault—the Tournelles would be taken, and, agreeable to the promise she had made in the name of God, the enemy would raise the siege.
Concealed under the cloak that covered her, the Maid was transported to the house of James Boucher. Informed of the victory by the wild cheers of the people, but full of anxiety for the heroine, his wife and daughter were at first thrown into terror seeing her carried on a stretcher. But the Maid soon calmed them, promising that with their help she would soon be restored. Assisted by the two she went up to her room, and there submitted to the tender nursing at which her modesty could take no offence. Madeleine and her mother, like most women of the time, were versed in the tending of wounds. They applied oil, balm and lint to the heroine's hurt after removing her armor, which, much to their alarm, they saw was indented in more than twenty places with sabre blows and lance thrusts. A large number of contusions, discolored and painful, the results of so many strokes, fortunately deadened by her cuirass and arm protectors, marked the body of Joan, who now only felt the reaction of her exertion during the warmly contested battle. She took a little nourishment, performed her evening devotions, thanked God and her saints for having sustained her during the bloody struggle, and implored their aid for the battle of the morrow. The warrior maid was about to compose herself for recuperative sleep, when Master Boucher requested admission to Joan upon an important and urgent matter. She quickly threw one of Madeleine's robes over herself in order to receive her host's visit and was struck by the signs of indignation and anger depicted on his face as he entered. His first words on entering were:
"What impudence! I can hardly believe it possible! Whom do you think I come from this minute, Joan? The Sire of Gaucourt," and answering an interrogating gesture of the heroine, her host proceeded: "Would you believe the man has forgotten the rude lesson of this morning? Would you believe that at his instigation the captains, assembled this evening after supper, decided that—in view of the small number of the mercenary troops in town, the council opposes a battle for the morrow, and declares that the people should be satisfied with the successes they have so far won ... and until the arrival of reinforcements no further measures shall be taken against the English.[93] I was commissioned to inform you of this decision on the spot and demand your submission—"
"It is nothing short of treason!" broke in Dame Boucher, who although ignorant of arms, nevertheless perceived the baseness of the act. "What, remain locked up within our walls, on the eve of the last triumph that is to free our town!"
"I spoke in that sense to the Sire of Gaucourt," replied James Boucher, "and I consented to communicate to Joan the decision of the captains, but declared at the same time that I was positive she would refuse to obey, and that in that case she should not lack the support of the councilmen and the good people of Orleans."
"You have answered, sir, as I myself would have answered," said the warrior maid with a smile of deep sorrow at this further evidence of the captains' perfidy. "Be at ease. Your brave militiamen occupy to-night the Augustinian Convent. I shall join them to-morrow at daybreak to lead them to the assault, and with God's help and their courage we shall carry the Tournelles. As to the captains' ill will, I have a sovereign means to thwart it. It is for that reason that I requested you to have me escorted to-morrow to the sound of the town's trumpets. Good night, sir; have faith and courage. The good town of Orleans will be set free. God so orders it."
James Boucher withdrew, followed by his wife. Madeleine alone remained with the warrior maid. The latter, before taking to her bed, and yielding to a vague presentiment, requested her companion, to whom she frankly avowed her utter ignorance of reading and writing, to write to her mother, Isabelle Darc, a letter that she proceeded to dictate—a simple, touching, respectful letter that revealed at every word her love for her family and the tender recollection of the happy days that she spent in Domremy. In that missive Joan did not forget even her village girl friend, nor the good old sexton who, to oblige her, when she was still little and loved so passionately to listen to the sound of the bells, purposely prolonged the morning chimes or the chimes of the Angelus. This missive, that bore the stamp of serious, religious and tender sentiment, breathed a vague presentiment concerning her chances of safety at the murderous battle contemplated for the morrow. Madeleine, who more than once, while writing the letter, had dried her tears, was struck by these apprehensions and asked her with a trembling voice:
"Oh, Joan, do you apprehend misfortune to yourself?"
"The will of God be done, dear Madeleine. I do not know why, but it seems to me I shall be wounded to-morrow again.[94] Oh, I was right! It was a mistake to delay employing me so long. I am not to live long!" Joan then relapsed into silence and presently added: "May God protect you, dear friend; I am going to sleep. I feel very tired and I must be on my feet to-morrow before dawn."
Before daybreak Joan re-armed herself with the help of Madeleine. The wound in her foot pained her severely. Although the distance was short from Orleans to the Convent of the Augustinians she asked for her horse. After tenderly embracing her companion, Madeleine helped her descend to the ground floor. There they found James Boucher, his wife and a female friend named Colette, the wife of the registrar Millet. All three had risen early to bid the warrior maid godspeed. Sadness overspread the faces of all at the thought of the fresh dangers that the heroine was about to brave, but the latter reassured her friends as well as she could, and pressed upon James Boucher the necessity of causing it to be proclaimed throughout the city that, in order to insure a successful issue to the assault on the Tournelles the fort should be attacked by the captains from the side of the bridge the instant that she began the attack from the side of the Augustinian Convent. Thus pressed upon by popular clamor, the captains would be forced to recede from their treasonable decision of the previous evening. Will they, nill they, they would co-operate with her. Joan had just given these last instructions to her host, when a fisherman stopped at the door to offer for sale to Dame Boucher an enormous river shad that he had just caught in the Loire. In order not to leave her hosts under a sad impression, Joan said mirthfully to James Boucher:
"Do buy this shad and keep it for this evening. I shall return by the Orleans bridge after we have carried the Tournelles and I shall bring an English prisoner along to help us finish up the fish."[95]
Saying this Joan mounted her horse and preceded by her page, her equerry and the town trumpeters, who at her orders blew the reveille and the call to arms, she crossed the whole city and rode towards the Bourgogne Gate where she was to be joined by Master John the cannonier, the representative of the carpenters named Champeaux, and the representative of the fishermen, named Poitevin, both of them intelligent and resolute men.
By traversing the town from one end to the other to the sound of trumpets, it was the Maid's purpose to call the townsmen up and out, and to announce to them that she was about to start on the assault; and thus to compel the captains to choose between seconding her in a combat upon which the final deliverance of Orleans depended, or else covering themselves with overwhelming shame and exposing themselves to be killed by an indignant people. Upon arriving at the Bourgogne Gate Joan found Master John together with Champeaux and Poitevin. She ordered the former to gather all the necessary workmen and quickly construct a drop-bridge to be thrown over the arches where the English had cut the bridge for the purpose of isolating the Tournelles from the boulevard of the town and thus turning the Loire into a natural moat for their fortification. The communication being thus re-established it would enable the captains who remained in town to advance with their men to the very foot of the fortress and assail it. The placing of the bridge and the eruption of the soldiers from that side were to be announced by the town belfry. At that signal Joan was to commence the assault from her side. The carpenter promised that all would be ready in two hours. The equerry Daulon was sent by Joan to inform the captains of her dispositions. Nevertheless, preparing against the contingency of the captains' failing to comply, she ordered Poitevin to fill two large barges with tarred and pitched fagots, and in case no attack was made by way of the improvised bridge, Poitevin, assisted by some other intrepid skippers, was to drive the burning barges against the Tournelles and fasten them there against the lower framework of the English fortress. The English were thus to be hemmed in between a conflagration and the lances and pikes of the French.
Obedient to the instructions he had received from Joan the previous evening, Master John carried during the night a large number of scaling ladders to the Augustinian Convent for the attack from that side; moreover, assisted by his two sturdy friends, Champeaux and Poitevin, and their workmen, he had established two pontoon bridges, one from the right bank of the Loire to the small island of St. Aignan, the second from that island to a path on the left bank of the river and almost opposite the ruins of the bastille of St. John-le-Blanc. By opening this path to the foot soldiers, to the cavalry and to the artillery, the Maid facilitated the passage of the troops and cannons of Master John, both of which could thus be easily brought to bear upon the Tournelles; if occasion should arise, the bridge alone offered a safe means of retreat.
Joan was about to step upon the pontoon bridge when she was joined by Dunois and Lahire. Yielding to the point of honor, no less than to the public outcry of the townspeople, who were notified of the departure of Joan to the assault, the two captains came at the head of their companies of troops to take part in the battle. Commander Gireme, Marshal St. Sever and other captains were, according to the Maid's orders, to attack the Tournelles from the side of the bridge. At a signal from the belfry the attack of the fortress was to commence upon both sides. Followed by Lahire and Dunois, the heroine arrived before the Augustinian Convent. Formed in battle line since early morning, the militiamen awaited impatiently the order to march upon the enemy. Loud were the cheers with which they received the Maid. While waiting for the signal for the general assault, she desired to inspect more closely the outer fortifications of the Tournelles, and she approached the fortress which she found protected by a wide moat on the other side of which rose a palisaded embankment, and beyond and above that a rampart equipped with artillery and flanked with frame turrets. The works presented a formidable appearance. Already the pieces of artillery of longest range were showering their projectiles at Master John and his cannoniers, who were training their cannons against the rampart to the end of knocking a breach through for the assault. Unconcerned at the bullets that at times buried themselves in the ground at the feet of her horse, the warrior maid attentively watched the work of Master John, and with a visual precision that threw the old cannonier into confusion and wonder, she pointed out to him more correct positions for several of his pieces. Master John recognized the justice of her opinion and followed her instructions. Suddenly the peals of the belfry reached the ears of Joan's troops. It was to be the signal for the general attack, but it turned out otherwise. Instead of beginning the action from their side, the captains wasted time with false manoeuvres, and left Joan to engage the English alone, in the hope that the latter, not being compelled to divide their forces as Joan had counted that they would, might easily crush her. Ignorant of this fresh act of treason on the part of the captains, the Maid gave Master John orders to open fire upon the ramparts in order to protect the descent of the troops into the moat.
The cannons roared. At their sound, and unable to support the idea of remaining nailed to her horse instead of taking an active part in this decisive combat, the warrior maid, despite the smarting wound of the previous day, jumped to the ground, and soon forgot the stinging pain in the effervescence of the struggle. Her standard in her hand, she marched to the assault.
The English were commanded by their most illustrious captains—Lord Talbot, the Earl of Suffolk, Gladescal and many more. Violent at their recent defeats, these warriors were bent upon wiping out the stain on their arms. This supreme day would decide the fate of Orleans, perchance also of the English domination of Gaul. It was necessary for the English to restore by a brilliant victory the drooping courage of their troops. The captains gathered their best men, veterans of scores of battles, reminded them of their past victories, pricked their national pride, fired their military ardor, and succeeded once more in overcoming the terror that the Maid filled them with. The French met with a furious and dogged resistance. Three times they mounted to the assault, here through the breach, yonder by means of their scaling ladders. Three times they were repelled and their ladders thrown down with all who were climbing them. A hailstorm of balls, bolts and arrows showered down upon the French. The bottom of the moat was covered with the dead and dying. The breach having been opened, Master John hastened to join the Maid and reached her side at the moment when she rushed at a ladder that her intrepid followers raised for the fourth time at the foot of one of the turrets. Master John followed the Maid. She had mounted several rungs when she was struck at the juncture of her gorget and cuirass by a "vireton," a long and sharp steel arrow, that was ejected with such force from a ballista that, piercing her armor, it entered near her right breast and partly issued under her shoulder.[96]
Thrown back by the force of the projectile, the Maid fell into the arms of the cannonier who followed close behind her, and who, with the aid of a few militiamen, carried her fainting beyond the moat. There they laid her on the grass near a tree that protected her from the enemy's fire. She felt, she said, as if she were dying, but still retaining her full presence of mind she deplored the slowness of the captains, who, not having attacked the Tournelles from the side of the town, endangered by their treason an otherwise certain victory. Informed of the wound received by Joan, her equerry Daulon hastened to her and realizing the seriousness of her condition informed her that in order to avoid being choked by the flowing blood, her cuirass had to be instantly unfastened and the dart extracted. At these words, Joan's pale face turned purple. Her modesty revolted at the thought of exposing her shoulder and bosom to the eyes of the men who surrounded her; and so painful was the thought that her tears—touching tears, not drawn by the physical pain that she was suffering from, welled up to her eyes and rolled down her cheeks.[97]
Master John, who also had considerable experience in wounds, confirmed the equerry's opinion—to allow the dart to remain longer in the wound was to expose the heroine's precious life. Indeed, feeling more and more suffocated, Joan believed her last hour had struck, still she did not wish as yet to die. Her mission was not yet fulfilled. She invoked her saints, gathered strength from the mental prayer and mustered up the necessary resolution to submit to a necessity that cruelly wounded her modesty. Before, however, allowing her wound to be attended, Joan ordered the assault to be suspended in order to give the troops some rest. She ordered Dunois, who ran to her, together with Lahire and Xaintrailles, to send one of their orderlies into Orleans on the spot, in order to ascertain the cause of the fatal inaction of the other chiefs, and to enjoin them to commence the attack from the side of the town within an hour, or else to order the barges with combustibles to be set on fire and pushed against the Tournelles. Again the belfry was to give the signal for a general attack. The trumpets sounded a retreat amidst the triumphant cheers of the English, who were intoxicated with their first triumph. Thanks, however, to the exaltation that the heroine had produced in her soldiers, they clamored to be allowed to return to the assault. A cordon of sentinels, placed at a little distance from the tree at whose base Joan had been laid, kept back the alarmed, trembling and desolate crowd of soldiers. Blushing with confusion, the warrior maid allowed her equerry to unfasten her cuirass, and with a steady hand herself extracted the dart from her breast, emitting, however, in doing so, a piercing cry of pain. Dunois and the other captains wished to have her transported to Orleans, where, said they, she would receive the best of care, and they proposed to adjourn the battle for the next day. Joan opposed both propositions, and maintained that, even then, if the captains would support her from the side of Orleans, success was certain.
"Let our people take some food," she said to Dunois; "we shall return to the assault; the Tournelles will be ours!"[98]
Once the dart was extracted from the wound, the warrior maid allowed herself to be tended. The mental tortures that she underwent at the moment by far exceeded her physical pain. When, her cuirass and padded jacket having been taken off, she felt her linen shirt, wet with blood and the sole cover on her shoulder and breast, respectfully removed by her equerry, a shudder ran through Joan's body and she involuntarily closed her eyes. She seemed to wish to close her eyes to the looks that she feared might be cast at her. But so sacred was the nation's virgin to all the troops that not even the shadow of an improper thought stained the purity of the pious offices of any of the men who saw the beautiful warrior maid thus semi-nude.[99]
Like all other professional equerries, Daulon was expert in surgery. He carried about him, in a leather case suspended from his shoulder, lint, bandages and a bottle of balm. With these he tended the wound which he pronounced so serious that he considered it highly imprudent for Joan to return to the combat. But on that point she remained inflexible. So great was the relief she speedily experienced, that she said she hardly felt the wound. Tightly laced, her armor would keep the bandage in position. All she wanted was a few mouthfuls of water to slake her burning thirst. Master John ran to a nearby streamlet, filled up full a pouch that was half full of wine and returned with it to the Maid. She drank and felt better, rose, put on her armor and took a few steps to test her strength. Her celestial face, grown pale with the loss of blood, speedily recovered its serene and resolute expression. She requested those near her to step aside for a moment, whereupon she knelt down near the old oak tree, joined her hands, prayed, thanked her good saints for having delivered her from a mortal danger, and besought them further to sustain and protect her. Immediately she heard the mysterious voices murmur in her ear:
"Go, daughter of God. Courage! Combat with your wonted audacity. Heaven will give you victory. By you Gaul will be delivered."
Inspired anew the heroine rose, put on her casque, seized her banner that had been placed against the tree, and cried out aloud:
"Now, to the assault! Ours will the Tournelles be, by the order of God! To arms! Be brave! Forward, victory to Gaul!"[100]
The cry was repeated from mouth to mouth with a tremor of impatient bravery. The quick peals from the belfry rent the air. The detonations of the artillery resounded from the side of the town, announcing the execution of the Maid's orders, however tardy. The Tournelles was assailed by the captains from the bridge at the moment when the Maid marched to the attack of the fortress in front. The happy plan redoubled the already exalted ardor of the assailants under the Maid. Led by her they resumed the assault with irresistible impetus. After a stubborn and bloody struggle that lasted until night the Tournelles was carried. As on the previous day, the sinking rays of the sun cast the gleam of their ruddy aureola upon the folds of Joan Darc's standard, planted by herself upon the battlements of the fortress. The enemy was vanquished again.
Gladescal, who had so outrageously insulted Joan, was killed during the combat, as also the Seigneurs of Moulin and Pommiers and the Bailiff of Trente, together with a great number of English noblemen. Almost all their men who were not killed were made prisoners, the rest were either burned or drowned in the attempt to flee when the assailants were upon them. They sought to escape by the improvised bridge under which Poitevin let his burning barges float. The bridge took fire and broke under the feet of the fleeing soldiers who thus perished either in the flames or the river.
As Joan had calculated, the garrisons of the other bastilles, to the number of from eight to ten thousand men, decamped in haste during the very first night that followed the capture of the Tournelles. They left in terror and consternation. At break of the next day, the warrior maid mounted her horse, assembled the town militiamen and a few companies of the captains' troops and marched out to offer battle to the English whom they supposed to be still there. But these were gone, they were beating a precipitate retreat towards Meung and Beaugency, fortified places held by the English.
On that day, Sunday, May 8, 1429, Joan re-entered Orleans at the head of the troops, and attended noon mass at the Church of St. Croix in the midst of an immense concourse of people, delirious with joy and gratitude to the warrior maid—the redeeming angel of Orleans.
Such was the "Week of Joan Darc." In eight days and with three battles she caused the raising of the siege that had lasted nearly a year. The deed achieved by the peasant girl of Domremy dealt a mortal blow to the rule of England in Gaul.
But not yet was Joan's secret martyrdom at an end; it increased from day to day with her glory. Charles VII, that poltroon and ingrate prince, unnerved and plunged in ignoble effeminacy, was yet to cause the shepherdess of Domremy to undergo all the tortures and all the disappointments that a soul inflamed with patriotism can not choose but undergo when it has devoted itself to a prince whose baseness is equal to his selfishness and cowardice.
Immediately upon the raising of the siege of Orleans, Joan hastened to the Castle of Loches. The fame of her triumphs ran ahead heralding her approach. The gates of the palace flew open before her. She was told the King was closeted in his private cabinet with his council. Thither Joan walked resolutely, knocked at the door and intrepidly addressed Charles VII:
"Sire, pray do not hold such long conferences with these seigneurs. The siege of Orleans is raised. The good town is now restored to you. You must now march boldly to Rheims and be consecrated. The consecration will crown you King of France in the eyes of the French. The English will then be impotent against you."
The sound sense and political acumen of Joan traced to Charles VII in these few words the only path that wisdom dictated. His consecration at Rheims, a divine attestation of his contested rights, would impart in the eyes of the ignorant and credulous mass a powerful prestige to a royalty thus reconstituted, rehabilitated, rejuvenated and breaking forth in renewed splendor. The step was moreover a bold challenge flung at the English, whose King claimed also to be King of France, and the challenge had the proper threatening ring coming swiftly upon the victory of Orleans. But Joan had counted without the pusillanimity of a prince who doted on his idleness, who was jealous of his pleasures, who hated the bare thought of physical exertion, and who considered only his personal comfort. In order to be consecrated at Rheims he would have to mount on horseback and place himself at the head of the army. It would be necessary to confront considerable danger seeing that from Orleans to Rheims the whole country still was in the hands of the English.
"Go to Rheims! Why, the project is insane, criminal!" cried La Tremouille and the Bishop of Chartres. "Does it not endanger the life, at least the health of the King?"
And the sorry King joined his council:
"I, risk myself out of my Castles of Loches and Chinon! And do so when the English still are in possession of Meung, Beaugency, Jargeau and other strongholds on the frontier of Touraine! Why, at the first step that I take out of my retreat they will gobble me up!" and to himself he cursed his luck and wished the possessed Maid to the devil, seeing her more interested than himself in the honor of the crown.
Disappointed and grieved Joan hardly repressed her indignation. The brave Maid answered that if Charles's departure for Rheims only depended upon the capture of the strongholds held in Touraine by the English, she would capture these fortresses and drive the enemy so far, so very far that they could not then inspire the King with the slightest fear.[101] She then appointed Gien for their rendezvous, implored the King to meet her there in a week, and promised him that he would then be able to undertake the journey to Rheims without danger. The Maid forthwith left the court and rejoined the army.
On the 12th of June, 1429, Joan took the fortified town of Meung; on the 17th of the same month she captured Jargeau, and the next day Beaugency. In all these assaults the Maid displayed the same bravery, the same military genius that distinguished her at the siege of Orleans. At the capture of Jargeau she came near being killed. This second series of triumphs was crowned by the battle of Patay, where all the English forces were assembled under the command of Warwick and their most illustrious captains, most of whom were taken prisoner. At this bloody and hotly contested battle Joan showed herself the peer of the most famous captains by the boldness of her manoeuvres, the quickness of her eye, the use that she put the artillery to, by the enthusiasm that she knew how to fire her soldiers with, and by her imperturbable good nature. Just before the battle she said to the Duke of Alençon with a cheerfulness and terseness worthy of the best passages of antiquity:
"Gallant sir, are your spurs good?"
"What?" asked the Duke in surprise. "Spurs? To flee?"
"No, sir—to pursue!" was the answer.[102]
Indeed, after their defeat, the enemy was pursued at the point of the lance for over three leagues. But these victories were won by the warrior maid not over the English merely, they were won also over the ill will of most of the French captains, whose envy of her increased in the same measure as her triumph. Accordingly she no longer doubted their secret animosity, and a vague presentiment told her she would be eventually betrayed by them to the enemy. The foreboding did not affect her conduct. Long before had she made a sacrifice of her life.
Considering that these last triumphs must have finally put an end to Charles's hesitancy, Joan returned to him, and said:
"Sire, Meung, Beaugency, Jargeau have all been carried by assault, is that enough? The English have been defeated in pitched battle at Patay, is that enough? Talbot, Warwick, Suffolk, are either captured or forced to flee, is that enough? Would you still hesitate to follow me to Rheims and be consecrated King by the command of God?"
The royal coward did not now hesitate, he declined point blank. The English had been driven out of Touraine, but still they held the provinces that had to be crossed in order to reach Rheims.
Joan was unable to overcome her disgust. No longer expecting anything from the coward, she was of a mind to give him up to his fate. In despair she took off her armor, left the court, and communicating her designs to none, she took to the woods where she wandered the whole day intending to return to Domremy. Towards evening, and noticing that she had lost her way, she asked for hospitality at a poor peasant house of Touraine.[103] Unarmed and in her male attire, Joan looked like a young page. She was received as such by the good people who gladly gave her shelter, treated her at their best and made room for her at their hearth. Joan sat down. The peaceful aspect of the rustic home recalled to her mind the happy days of her childhood spent in Domremy. The sweet recollections of the paternal home drew involuntary tears. Struck by her sadness, her hosts questioned her with timid and respectful interest.
"How can you cry in such happy days as these," they asked naïvely, "in these days of the deliverance of Gaul? They are happy days, especially for us peasants! For us who are now at last delivered from the English by the grace of the Lord and the bravery of Joan the Maid, our redeeming angel!"
In the enthusiasm of their gratitude, the peasant hosts showed the tenderly touched warrior maid a bit of parchment fastened to the wall above the hearth. On the parchment the name of "Joan" was inscribed, surmounted with a cross. In default of the image of their beloved liberatrix, these poor people had inscribed her name and thus gave token of the sincere reverence that they rendered the heroine. The questions were innumerable that they plied their young guest with regarding Joan. Perhaps he had seen her, seen that holy maid, the new Our Lady of the peasants who had suffered so grievously at the hands of the English before she drove them away. The questions were tantamount to a choir of benedictions mixed with passionate adoration of the Maid. More and more touched by these words, Joan began to reproach herself severely for her momentary weakness. To abandon Charles VII to his fate was to abandon France; it was above all to expose these poor peasants, the humble and industrious race of which she was herself born, to fall back under the yoke of the stranger; it was to re-deliver the poor wretches to all the horrors of a war which it was her mission to put an end to. These thoughts re-invigorated her; they inspired her with the resolve to struggle onward for the accomplishment of her projects, to struggle doggedly even against the King, against his councilors, against the captains who pursued her with their hatred and whom she perhaps stood in greater fear of than of the English. The latter fought in arms in the open; the former labored in the dark, and plotted treason. Absorbed in these meditations, Joan threw herself upon a bed of fresh cut grass, the only couch that her hosts could offer her. She invoked the support and the advice of her saints, and their dear voices speedily whispered in her ear:
"Go, daughter of God; no weakness; fulfil your mission; heaven will not forsake you!"
Early the next morning, the heroine left her hosts, who remained in ignorance that their humble roof had sheltered the country's savior. Resolved to conceal from the King the contempt she entertained for him and to see in him only an instrument for the welfare of Gaul, Joan returned to court. The Maid's disappearance had caused alarm, alarm among those whose every wish was for the termination of the English domination. Joan's project—the King's consecration at Rheims—spread abroad by the councilors in the hope of giving the widest publicity to its absurdity, met, on the contrary, with a large number of supporters, all of whom were impressed with the political grandeur and the audacity, withal, of the idea. The Maid's return was looked upon as providential, and so powerful did the popular outcry wax that the craven monarch finally resigned himself to the idea of departing at the head of his troops that were constantly swelling in numbers, thanks to the fame of the Maid. The march to Rheims was decided on and undertaken.
The journey to the royal town displayed the genius of the heroine from a side not before dreamed of. Matchlessly energetic and intrepid in her desperate combats with the foreign enemy of Gaul, she now showed herself endowed with an inexpressible power of persuasion. She undertook and succeeded in inducing the towns of the English or Burgundian party to become French again and to open their gates to Charles VII, from whom she had obtained, not without much trouble, a written promise of absolute amnesty for the dissidents. Without drawing her sword, Joan reconquered for the King all the fortified places on the route to Rheims. The heroine found in her soul, in her aversion to civil war, in her patriotism, such treasures of naïve eloquence that, coupled with her fame, her words penetrated the spirits of all, unarmed all hands, and won over all hearts to the cause of the miserable prince whom she protected, whom she covered with the splendor of her own plebeian glory, and whom she caused the people to love by speaking in his name.
Upon the arrival of the royal army before a fortified town, Joan would approach the barriers alone, her standard in her hand. She swore to God she did not wish to shed French blood; she besought and implored those who heard her to renounce the English domination that was so disgraceful and so fatal to the country, to recognize the sovereignty of Charles VII, if not out of loyalty to him at least out of hatred for the foreigner, out of love for the motherland that for so many years had bled and been dishonored by an atrocious yoke. The heroine's beauty, her emotion, her sweet and vibrant voice, the immense stir made by her victories, the irresistible charm of the virginal and martial being, all combined to operate prodigies. The old Gallic blood, cold for so long a time, boiled again in the veins of even the least valorous at the cry of national deliverance uttered by the maid of seventeen, whose sword was fleshed in the victory of so many battles. The barriers of the towns fell down at her voice.
Amazed and above all delighted at not having to incur danger, the royal coward made his triumphant entry into the good towns that acclaimed the Maid. One day, however, he had a great fright. A strong English garrison occupied the town of Troyes, whose councilmen were bitter partisans of Burgundy. The gates were barricaded, the ramparts manned, and the cannons opened fire upon the royal vanguard. Charles already spoke of plying his spurs, but was with difficulty restrained by Joan, who advanced unescorted towards the barrier and requested a parley with the councilmen. The English captains answered her with insults accompanied with a shower of missiles. The soldier who bore the heroine's banner was killed at her side. A few townsmen of Troyes belonging to the French party, who happened to be on the ramparts and heard Joan's request for a parley, spread the news among the townsmen, most of whom were tired and dissatisfied with the foreign rule, but were held under by the obstinate Burgundian councilmen. A great and increasing agitation manifested itself in the town. A few English companies attempted a sally against the royal vanguard commanded by Joan and were beaten back. Encouraged by the defeat, the French party within the walls gathered courage and ran to arms. Their numbers proved unexpectedly large. The Burgundian councilmen were overthrown, a new set of municipal magistrates was set up and they immediately took measures against the English who entrenched themselves in a fort that dominated the town. Frightened at the threatening attitude of the people, the English evacuated the citadel over night and drew away. The new councilmen asked for a parley with Joan, and in their turn they experienced the irresistible charm of her beauty, her mildness and her eloquence. Assured by her that none of the inhabitants would be troubled on the score of past acts, the magistrates placed the keys of the town in the hands of Joan, who took them to the King, and he thus resumed possession of one of the most important towns of his empire.
The King's march continued triumphal unto Rheims, thanks to the marvelous influence of Joan. At Chalons a delightful surprise was in store for the heroine's heart. She there met four peasants of Domremy. Informed by public rumor that Joan was to traverse Champagne, they boldly started out to see her at her passage. Among them was Urbain, the one-time general of the boys' army, that owed its famous victory over the boys of Maxey to Jeannette's bravery. These and many other memories of the village were exchanged between the heroine and the companions of her youth. During the conversation that they had a few words of sinister augury escaped from Joan's lips. Urbain had ingenuously asked her how she had the strength and the courage to face all the dangers of battle. A painful smile played around her lips, she remained pensive for a moment, and then as if moved by the presentiment of the evil days that were approaching for her through the machinations of the captains, she answered Urbain:
"I fear nothing—except—TREASON!"[104]
Poor girl of Domremy! Her apprehensions did not deceive her. But before climbing her Calvary to its summit, and there experiencing her martyrdom, she was first to accomplish the sacred mission that she had assumed—deal a fatal blow to English rule in Gaul by awakening the national spirit that had lain in a stupor for over fifty years, and having Charles VII consecrated King at Rheims. It was not the man, contemptible in her eyes, that Joan wished to consecrate in the face of the world; it was the living incarnation of France in the person of the sovereign, an incarnation visible to the eyes of the people.
The warrior maid fulfilled her promise. Charles VII was led to Rheims. He arrived there on July 16, 1429, thirty-five days after the siege of Orleans was raised—the signal for the long series of English routs that followed and that culminated with the breakdown of English rule. At Rheims Joan conceived the noble thought of putting an end to the civil strife—the furious strife that had raged between the Burgundians and the Armagnacs, and that for so many years had desolated and exhausted the land, and delivered it over to the foreigner. On the day of the consecration of Charles VII she dictated the following beautiful and touching letter addressed to the Duke of Burgundy, the chief of the party that bore his name:
High and redoubtable prince, Duke of Burgundy:—I, Joan, call upon you, by orders of the King of heaven, my sovereign Lord, to make a good, firm and sincere peace with the King of France, a peace that shall last long. Pardon one another with a full heart and entirely, as all loyal Christians should. If you take pleasure in war, war against the Saracens.
Duke of Burgundy, I pray you and implore you, as humbly as I can implore, do no longer wage war against the holy kingdom of France! Do promptly order your men, who still hold several fortresses in the kingdom, to withdraw. The King of France is ready to accord you peace, without detriment to his honor! I notify you in the name of God that you will win no battle against the loyal French, none. So, then, do no longer wage war against us. Believe me, whatever the number of soldiers may be that you take to field, they will accomplish nothing. And it would be a great pity still to shed so much blood in fresh battles.
May God protect you and give us all peace!
Written at Rheims, before the consecration of King Charles, on the seventeenth day of July, 1429.
Joan.[105]
This letter, to which, being unable to write, the warrior maid attached her "cross in God," as was her custom, was sent by a herald to Philip of Burgundy. Thereupon, putting on her white armor, mounting her fine white charger, and with her casque on her head, her sword at her side and her standard in her hand, the Maid rode on the right side of Charles VII at the head of the captains and splendidly accoutred courtiers to the ancient Cathedral of Rheims. The procession marched through a vast concourse of people who saw in the consecration of the King the end of the foreigner's rule and the termination of the misfortunes of France. The ceremony was performed with all the pomp of the Catholic Church. By the light of thousands of wax candles, across the clouds from gold censers, in front of the high altar that was resplendent with candles and where Charles VII knelt down, the Bishop of Rheims consecrated him King to the ringing of bells, the sounding of trumpets and the booming of cannon.
A witness to the imposing spectacle, the young peasant girl of Domremy stood in the choir of the basilica; pensively as she leaned on the staff of her standard, her recollections wandered four years back. A tear dropped from her eyes in memory of her god-mother Sybille, and the passage of Merlin's prophecy, now fulfilled, recurred to her mind:
"For the martial maid the steed and the armor!
But for whom the royal crown?
The angel with wings of azure holds it in his hands.
The blood has ceased to run in torrents,
The thunder to peal, the lightning to flash.—
I see a serene sky; the banners float;
The clarions sound; the bells ring.
Cries of joy! Chants of victory!
The martial virgin receives the royal crown
From the hands of the angel of light; a man,
Wearing a long mantle of ermine
Is crowned by the warrior virgin.—
"It matters little what may happen—
What must be, shall be.
Gaul, lost by a woman,
Is saved by a virgin
From the borders of Lorraine and a forest of oaks!—"
In these my days, so-called "mysteries"—dialogued recitals between men and women who figure as historic personages—are frequently written and performed. These "mysteries" are imitations of the dramatic works of antiquity, such as were also the so-called "plays" of the Thirteenth Century, of which my ancestor Mylio the Trouvere left a sample behind. Therefore, I, Jocelyn the Champion, who write this chronicle of Joan Darc, have decided to conclude it in the form of these "mysteries," now so much in vogue. I shall therein trace the "Passion" of the plebeian heroine—for Joan, like Christ, also underwent her "Passion," crowned with martyrdom.
The first scene is placed in a hall of the palace of the Archbishop of Rouen, an ancient building where, eight centuries and more ago, King Charles the Simple married his daughter Ghisèle to old Rolf, and relinquished one of his best provinces to the Northman pirates. These bandits later invaded the country of England under William the Conqueror and there raised the breed of English captains who for so many years have been ravaging and enslaving Gaul. Normandy thus became a province of England. The Duke of Bedford, Regent, occupies Rouen. The archbishop's palace of the town serves as the residence of Peter Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais, sold, body and soul, mitre and crosier, to the English party. The month of February, 1431, approaches its end. Daintily wadded in a robe of violet silk, Peter Cauchon is seated in an arm-chair near an open fire-place whence both heat and light radiate into the sumptuously furnished apartment. Cheerful reflections play upon the Oriental rug on the floor and the painted and gilded roof-beams overhead. A table, covered with parchment scrolls, and placed near the sculptured chimney, is lighted by a candelabrum of massive silver furnished with burning wax candles. A chair, vacant at the moment, and on the back of which lies a black furred cloak, faces on the other side of the table the seat occupied by the Bishop. Peter Cauchon's face, at once striking and repulsive, betokens a mixture of audacity, wile and extraordinary stubbornness. His small light blue eyes, that sparkle with craftiness and occasionally glisten with ferocity, almost disappear under the folds of his fat red cheeks and heavy eyebrows, grey like his hair that is almost wholly covered under his violet skull cap. His forehead is furrowed with purplish veins. His flat nose, bored with large and hairy nostrils, helps to set off the singular prominence of his chin and jaws. When he laughs, his cruel laughter exposes two broken rows of uneven and yellowish teeth. At times he leans over the table, reads a parchment covered with a fine and close writing and rubs his hirsute hands with manifest pleasure; other times he looks impatiently towards the door as if he would hasten with his wishes the return of some absent personage. The door finally opens and another prelate appears. He is a canon of the name of Nicolas Loyseleur. His face is long and worn; his eyes are covered like a reptile's. His red eyelids are stripped of their lashes. A colorless fissure barely indicates the location of his lips whose smile bears the imprint of hypocrisy. It is at once the face of a hypocrite and a gallows-bird.
Bishop Peter Cauchon (half rising and with deep interest)—"What news? What news? Good or bad?"
Canon Loyseleur—"The messenger sent by Captain Morris left the Maid in the prison of Breville."
Bishop Cauchon—"What is the man's errand?"
Canon Loyseleur—"He came by orders of Captain Morris to request the Earl of Warwick to have the dungeon of the old tower prepared to receive Joan Darc, who is to arrive at Rouen under a strong escort to-morrow morning at the latest."
Bishop Cauchon—"Did Captain Morris follow my instructions accurately?"
Canon Loyseleur—"From point to point, monseigneur. The captive travels in a closed litter, with irons on her feet and hands. When a town has to be crossed, the said Joan is gagged. No one has been able to approach her. The guards of the escort informed all inquirers that they were taking to Rouen an old witch who throttled little children to accomplish her evil deeds."
Bishop Cauchon (laughing)—"And the good people forthwith crossed themselves and gave the litter a wide berth? Stupid plebs!"
Canon Loyseleur—"It was just as you say. That notwithstanding, at Dieppe, the exasperation of the mob at what they really took for a witch became so violent that the people sought to tear her from our hands and trample her to death."
Bishop Cauchon—"The idiots! What would have been left for us?"
Canon Loyseleur—"This incident excepted, the journey went smooth. No one along the route thought for a moment that the prisoner was Joan the Maid."
Bishop Cauchon—"That was of the highest importance. The girl's renown is such in Gaul at present, even in the provinces that are subject to our English friends, that if it had been learned that she was being taken in chains, the town and country plebs would have been greatly agitated, they might even have taken the she-devil away from her keepers. Well, at any rate, we got her now!"
Canon Loyseleur (pointing to the parchments)—"Shall we now proceed with the reading of the condensed acts of the Maid?"
Bishop Cauchon (taking up a parchment on which he has made a large number of notes)—"Yes; these facts and acts are to be the basis of the process. While you, canon, read, I shall mark down the acts upon which the said Joan is to be particularly interrogated. This report, which my brother in God the Bishop of Chartres secretly sent me by orders of the Sire of La Tremouille, is very full and accurate. It is attributed to one Percival of Cagny, equerry of the Duke of Alençon[106] and a partisan of the Maid, or to be more accurate, he does her justice. The justice done to her in the report does not trouble me. Her acts have been witnessed by such a large number of people, that it would be tactless to deny or alter the truth on that head, all the more seeing that the very acts carry with them their own condemnation. Where did we break off in our reading?"
Canon Loyseleur—"At the departure from Rheims after the consecration."
Bishop Cauchon—"Continue." (He dips his pen in the ink-horn and makes ready to take notes.)
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'After being consecrated, the King remained at Rheims until the following Thursday. He left Rheims bound for the Abbey of St. Marcoul where he took supper and slept over night. The keys of Laon were there brought to him. On Saturday, July 23, 1429, the King went to dine and sleep at Soissons. He was very well received, the Maid having preceded him and harangued the people at the barrier of the town, conjuring them to renounce the English party and become again French. Her words were received with enthusiasm. Several women who were about to go to child bed, or whose children had not yet been baptized, prayed the Maid to choose their baptismal names, which, said they, would be to them a pledge of divine protection—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing rapidly)—"This must be noted—very important—excellent! Excellentissime!"
Canon Loyseleur (continuing to read)—"'On Friday, July 29, the King presented himself before Chateau-Thierry. The Maid ordered the banners to be unfurled, spoke to the people, and the town opened its gates. The King remained there until the following Monday, August 1. That day he slept at Montmirail in Brie. On Tuesday, August 2, the King made his entry into Provins, where he was received no less well than in the other towns. He remained there until Friday the 5th. On Sunday, the 7th of August, he slept at Coulommiers; on Wednesday, the 10th, at Ferté-Milon; on Thursday at Crespy in Valois; on Friday, the 12th, in Lagny-le-sec. In this town a woman in tears pressed through the crowd that surrounded the Maid and implored her to come to a little dying child, whom, the mother said, the Maid could with one word recall to life. In her naïve admiration for the Maid, the poor mother attributed to her divine powers comparable to those of Jesus of Nazareth—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing with ghoulish glee)—"I would not sell that fact for a hundred gold sous! (Inflating his wide and hairy nostrils) Oh! What a delectable smell of fagots and roast flesh I begin to scent. Proceed, canon. The process is taking shape."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'On Saturday, August 13, being instructed by her forerunners that the enemy was only at a little distance, the Maid, with her wonted promptness, drew up the army in order of battle in the plain of Dammartin-in-Gouelle, assigned his post to each, and issued her orders with the consummate skill of a captain. But frightened at the attitude of the royal army the English did not dare to give battle, although much stronger in numbers—'"
Bishop Cauchon (in a hollow voice)—"Oh, in order to save the honor of our friends from the other side of the water, it will be absolutely necessary to attribute their cowardice to Joan's witchery."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'Sunday, August 14, 1429, the Maid, the Duke of Alençon, the Count of Vendome and other captains, accompanied by six or seven thousand soldiers, encamped near Montepilloy, two leagues from Senlis. The Duke of Bedford with eight or nine thousand soldiers defended the approaches of Senlis. They were posted half a league in front of the town, having before them the little River of Nonette and to their right a village of the name of Notre Dame de la Victoire. Both sides skirmished. When night fell both retired to their camps to the great displeasure of the Maid, who, contrary to the opinion of the King and his captains, wished to enter into a general engagement. The English profited by the delay. They threw up earthworks during the night, dug moats and set up palisades, and utilized even their carts to cover themselves. At break of day, and despite the opposition of the captains, the Maid marched at the head of a few determined companies that always obeyed her and pushed up to the foot of the enemy's entrenchments. Arrived there she learned that the English had decamped over night, given up Senlis, and withdrawn to Paris, the earthworks they had thrown up being intended merely to delay their pursuit—'"
Bishop Cauchon—"Witchcraft! Devil's work! The girl is possessed!"
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'On Wednesday, August 17, the keys of Compiegne were brought to the King, and on Thursday he made his entry into the town amidst the acclamations of the people who cried frantically: "Blessings on the daughter of God!"—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing)—"'Daughter of God!' You have rather imprudent fanatics among your admirers, my little girl!"
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'When the King left Crespy, he ordered Marshals Boussac and Retz to summon the inhabitants of Senlis to surrender. They answered that they would surrender, not to the King, but to the Maid, whom they considered sent by God and to be a sister of the angels-'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing)—"'Sister of the angels!' 'Sent by God!' Well, the scamps will have contributed their fagots to the pyre."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'Much to the annoyance of the Maid, the King wished to stop at Senlis instead of pushing forward. He seemed satisfied with the success he had so far had, and to wish for nothing more. His council was of his opinion; the Maid, however, held that it would be enough for the King to show himself before Paris for the town to open its gates to its sovereign. "Fear not," Joan said to the King; "I shall speak so sweetly to the Parisians that they will prefer to become French again rather than to remain English"—'"
Bishop Cauchon—"What an impudence on the part of the she cowherd. She is certain of everything. Well, she shall pay dearly for her infernal vanity!"
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'On Tuesday, August 23, despite the opposition of the King and his council, the Maid left Compiegne together with the Duke of Alençon, leaving the prince behind with the bulk of the army. The following Friday, August 26, without striking a blow, the Maid entered St Denis, which declared itself royalist. At this news, the King decided, not without considerable hesitation to proceed to that town, where he arrived in safety. The King's council now opposed the Maid more doggedly than ever before. Joan, however, affirmed that if she was listened to she would render the Parisians to the King by the command of God, and without shedding a drop of blood—'"
Bishop Cauchon (in a rage)—"The execrable hypocrite! To hear her speak she is all honey—and yet at her homicidal voice the French have been turned into the butchers of the English! (writing) We must not forget above all to designate her as a furious monster of carnage."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'Learning of the capture of Senlis and of the Maid's march upon Paris, the Duke of Bedford reinforced his garrison, and took vigorous measures against those of the Armagnac or royalist party who wished to surrender the town. The Duke picked out only Englishmen and bitter Burgundians to guard the gates, men who were expected to be able to resist the charm of the Maid's sweet words. Several times she advanced alone on horseback near the barriers of the town, imploring all those who were French like herself no longer to tolerate the rule of the English, who had inflicted so much damage upon the poor people of France. But the men of the Burgundian party and the English answered her with insults and threatened to fire at her although she came for a parley. She would then return weeping over the hard-heartedness or the blindness of men, who, although French, wished to remain English. This notwithstanding, she every day heard "her voices" assure her that Gaul would not be saved until all the English were driven from her soil, or were exterminated—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing)—"Again 'her voices.' Let us note that important fact. It is capital in the framing of the process."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'Seeing that the King continued to refuse to draw nearer to Paris and to present himself before the gates, as the Maid desired, she declared to the Duke of Alençon, who placed great confidence in her, that St. Marguerite and St. Catherine, having again appeared before her, ordered her to demand of the King that he put forth all his efforts to regain the good town of Paris by coming in person and by promises of his clemency and a general amnesty—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing)—"Again St. Marguerite and St. Catherine. Let us jot down the fact. It is no less capital than the one about the 'voices.' Ah, you double-dyed witch! You see visions! Apparitions! (laughing) You will have to roast for it, my daughter!"
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'Yielding to the wishes of the Maid, the Duke of Alençon returned to the King, who promised him that on August 27 he would proceed to Chapelle-St. Denis and march from there to Paris. But he did not keep his promise. The Duke of Alençon returned to him on Monday, September 5. Thanks to the pressure that he exercised, after long hesitating and against the advice of his council, the King came to Chapelle-St. Denis on September 7 to the great joy of the Maid. Everybody in the army said: "The Maid will restore Paris to the King, if he but consents to show himself before the gates." On Thursday, the 8th of September, the Duke of Alençon together with a few captains whom the Maid carried away with her persuasion, started from Chapelle-St. Denis towards eight in the morning with flying colors but leaving behind the King, who did not wish to accompany them. The Maid advanced toward the St. Honoré Gate, which was defended by a body of English soldiers, because, said she, she had a horror of seeing Frenchmen fighting Frenchmen. She took her standard in her hand and boldly leaped at the head of all into the moat, near the swine market. The assault was long and bloody; the English defended themselves bravely; the Maid was wounded by an arrow that ran through her thigh; she fell, but in falling cried out that the attack had to be kept up with all the greater vigor. But despite her feeble efforts, the Sire of Gaucourt and others carried her to a place of safety seeing that she was losing much blood. She was placed on a cart and taken back to Chapelle-St Denis—'"
Bishop Cauchon (writing)—"Let us underscore once more the bloodthirsty nature of the she-devil, who against the advice of all insists upon fighting. We must emphasize her thirst for carnage. She recommends the extermination of the English."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'On Monday, September 12, and still hardly able to keep herself in the saddle, the Maid wished to ride out towards St. Denis in order to assure herself that a bridge over the Seine, the construction of which she had ordered in order to facilitate the passage of the troops, had been properly built. The bridge had been built, but was afterwards cut by orders of the King, who had decided to make no further attempts against Paris. On Tuesday, the 13th of September, 1429, and with the advice of his council, the King left St. Denis after dinner, intending to retreat towards the Loire. In despair at the King's departure the Maid wept bitterly, and carried away by the first impulse of her grief she decided to renounce his service. She took off her armor and deposited it ex voto before the statue of Our Lady in the basilica of St. Denis—'"
Bishop Cauchon (rubs his hands and writes)—"Excellent! Very excellent! Idolatry! Sacrilege! In her infernal pride, she offers her armor to the adoration of the simple-minded!"
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'In her despair, the Maid wished to return to her own country of Lorraine, to her family, and forever renounce war. But the King ordered her to follow him to Gien, where, said he, he would need her services. They arrived in that town on September 29. The Maid offered the Duke of Alençon to aid him in reconquering his duchy of Normandy. The Duke communicated the project to the King. He refused his consent. He wished to keep the Maid near him in Touraine to defend the province in case the English should return to attack it. The Maid took several fortified towns in the neighborhood of Charité-on-the-Loire and then laid siege to that place. But as the royal council sent neither provisions nor money to the Maid for the soldiers, she was, much to her sorrow, forced to give up the attack, and on March 7, 1430, she went to the Castle of Sully, the property of the Sire of La Tremouille, where the King was sojourning. The Maid expressed in the presence of the prince her unqualified indignation against the royal councilors and the captains, and bitterly reproached them with traitorously putting obstacles in the way of the complete recovery of the realm. Fully aware of the uselessness of her further services to the King, but still hoping to serve France, she left Charles VII forever, and without taking leave of him she departed under the pretext of exercising outside of the castle a company of determined men attached to her fortunes. She went with them to Crespy in Valois. There she was soon called for by the Sire of Flavy who wished her aid in Compiegne, a town that the Duke of Burgundy and the Count of Arundel had jointly besieged. The Maid was not a little perplexed what to do in the matter. She was not ignorant of the proverbial perfidy and ferocity of the Sire of Flavy. But the inhabitants of the place that he commanded had, at the time of her first visit to the town, received Joan with so much affection, that, overcoming her apprehensions, she decided to go to the aid of the good people. On the 23rd of May, 1430, Joan departed from Crespy at the head of her company, two or three hundred men strong. Thanks to the darkness and to the skilful precautions in which she wrapped her nocturnal march, her troops passed unperceived between the Burgundian and English camps and entered Compiegne with her before daylight. She immediately went to mass in the parish church of St. James. It was barely day, but a large number of the inhabitants had learned of the arrival of their emancipatrix and went to church to see her. After mass, Joan retired near one of the pillars of the nave, and addressing herself to several of the people who were gathered there together with their children, all anxious to see her, she said to them in sad accents: "My friends, I have been sold and betrayed, I shall soon be taken and put to death—my voices have for some time been warning me of the contemplated treason"—'"
Bishop Cauchon—"What a lucky thing it was for us that Joan did not hearken to these presentiments! The she-devil so often escaped the snares vainly laid for her by the captains, whose vindictive jealousy so well served our purposes and the purposes of the Sires of La Tremouille and of Gaucourt and of my companion in God, the Bishop of Chartres!"
Canon Loyseleur—"Indeed, the emissary whom Monseigneur the Bishop of Chartres sent here secretly and whom I visited in your name, informed me that it was in concert with the Sire of La Tremouille that the Sire of Flavy invited the Maid to Compiegne, meaning to deliver her to the English."
Bishop Cauchon (laughing)—"I shall give Flavy, whenever he wishes it, full absolution for all his crimes in return for the capture of Joan. Proceed, canon. I shall presently tell you more fully what my projects are."
Canon Loyseleur (reading)—"'When it was full daylight the Maid made preparations for a vigorous sally. The town of Compiegne is situated on the left bank of the Oise. On the right bank is a wide meadow about a quarter of a league in length and bounded by crags on the side of Picardy. This low meadow, which often is under water, is crossed by a road that starts at Compiegne and ends at the foot of the hill that bounds the horizon on that side of the town. Three villages border on the meadow: Margny, at the extreme end of the road; Clairoy about three-fourths of a league up the river at the confluence of the Aronde and the Oise; and Venette about half a league below on the road to Pont St. Maxence. The Burgundians had a camp at Margny and one at Clairoy. The English occupied Venette. The defences of Compiegne consisted of a redoubt raised at the head of the bridge and the boulevards. The redoubt was zigzagged and strongly palisaded. The Maid's plan of attack was first to carry the village of Margny, then that of Clairoy, and, mistress of the two positions, to await in the valley of the Aronde the troops of the Duke of Burgundy, who, so soon as he heard the noise of the action, would not fail to hasten to the help of the English. Foreseeing the movement and wishing to keep her retreat free, the Maid demanded of the Sire of Flavy to charge himself with keeping the Duke of Burgundy in check, should he turn into the valley before the capture of Margny and Clairoy, and also to keep a reserve of troops on the front and the flanks of the redoubt, ready to cover her retreat. Furthermore, covered barges, placed on the Oise, were to stand ready to receive the footmen in case of a reverse. Having given these orders, the Maid, despite her sinister forebodings, hastened to mount her horse, and, at the head of her company, marched straight upon the village of Margny, which, although vigorously defended, she swiftly carried. The English encamped at Clairoy rushed to the defence of their allies and were thrown back; but they thrice returned to the attack with maddening fury. This battle was fought in the low meadow and was dragging along. The Duke of Burgundy was not long in entering the valley of the Aronde with his men and he reached the jetty. It was in order to guard against such a move that Joan had charged Flavy to keep the Burgundians in check. Her order was not executed. The Burgundians entered the valley by the road. At the sight of these hostile reinforcements, some cowards or traitors cried: "Run for your lives! Run to the barges!" The Maid's auxiliary troops, commanded by Flavy's lieutenants, broke ranks and rushed to the barges that lay at the river's bank, leaving Joan and her small band to sustain alone the shock of the combined English and Burgundian forces. She sustained it bravely, and assailed by fresh presentiments at the sight of the rout of her auxiliaries, whose captains had failed to execute her orders, she decided to die rather than fall alive into the hands of the English. She drew her sword and rushed temerariously upon an enemy a hundred times more numerous than the handful of heroes who stood by her. After prodigies of valor, and seeing the battle lost, the latter wished to save the Maid's life at the cost of their own. Two of them seized her horse by the bit, and despite her prayers, despite even her resistance, sought to force her back to the city while their companions were to allow themselves to be cut down to the last man in order to cover her retreat. Already were they near a drawbridge, thrown over a moat that separated the redoubt from the road, when the bridge was raised by orders of the Sire of Flavy. Thus vilely betrayed and delivered to the enemy, the Maid and her soldiers fell upon the surging foe with the fury of despair. Struck by several simultaneous blows, Joan was thrown from her horse and was immediately surrounded by a mass of English and Burgundians who disputed with each other the possession of the glorious capture. Joan remained in the power of an archer, who was a banneret of the Bastard of Vendome, an equerry, a native of the county of Artois and lieutenant of Sire John of Luxembourg of the Burgundian party. Pinioned on the field of battle, the Maid was tied fast to a horse and taken to the Castle of Beaurevoir, belonging to the Sire of Luxembourg, the sovereign of the Bastard of Vendome, whose archer had made the capture. After remaining some time a prisoner in the castle, Joan learned that the Sire of Luxembourg had sold her as a prisoner of war to the English Regent for the sum of ten thousand gold sous. Despair seized her at the thought of being delivered to the English, and whether she hoped to escape, or whether she meant to put an end to her life, she threw herself out of one of the towers of the Castle of Beaurevoir. But the fall did not prove fatal. Picked up unconscious and severely hurt, Joan was thrown into a dungeon and soon thereupon was surrendered to the English captain who was commissioned to deliver to the Sire of Luxembourg the ten thousand gold sous—the price agreed upon for the blood of the Maid. She was taken under a strong escort to the Castle of Dugy near St. Riquier. Thus was Joan the Maid betrayed and sold, to the deep sorrow of the loyal French.'" (The canon lays down on the table the chronicle that he has just read to the end.)