Joan of Arc
by Lord Ronald Sutherland Gower · English · Gutenberg #16933 · 501,898 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Joan of Arc
Author: Lord Ronald Sutherland Gower
Release date: October 24, 2005 [eBook #16933]
Most recently updated: December 12, 2020
Language: English
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[Illustration: TOUR COUDRAY--CHINON.]
JOAN OF ARC
BY
LORD RONALD GOWER, F.S.A.
A TRUSTEE OF THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY
WITH TEN ILLUSTRATIONS
SEVEN ETCHINGS AND THREE PHOTO-ETCHINGS
LONDON
JOHN C. NIMMO
14 KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND
MDCCCXCIII
DEDICATION.
My mother had what the French call a _culte_ for the heroine whose
life I have attempted to write in the following pages.
It was but natural that one who loved and admired all that is good and
beautiful and high-minded should have a strong feeling of admiration
for the memory of Joan of Arc. On the pedestal of the bronze statue,
which my mother placed in her house at Cliveden, are inscribed those
words which sum up the life and career of the Maid of Orleans:--
'_La grande pitié qu'il y avait au royaume de France._'
Thinking that could my mother have read the following pages she would
have approved the feeling which prompted me to write them, I inscribe
this little book to her beloved memory.
R.G.
ARCACHON,
_November 29._
PREFACE.
The authors whose works I have chiefly used in writing this Life of
Joan of Arc, are--first, Quicherat, who was the first to publish at
length the Minutes of the two trials concerning the Maid--that of her
trial at Rouen in 1430, and of her rehabilitation in 1456, and who
unearthed so many chronicles relating to her times; secondly, Wallon,
whose Life of Joan of Arc is of all the fullest and most reliable;
thirdly, Fabre, who has within the last few years published several
most important books respecting the life and death of Joan. Fabre was
the first to make a translation in full of the two trials which
Quicherat had first published in the original Latin text.
Thinking references at the foot of the page a nuisance to the reader,
these have been avoided.
The subjects for the etched illustrations in this volume have been
kindly supplied by my friend, Mr. Lee Latrobe Bateman, during a
journey we made together to places connected with the story of the
heroine.
R.G.
LONDON, _January, 1893._
CONTENTS.
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
THE CALL 1
CHAPTER II.
THE DELIVERY OF ORLEANS 39
CHAPTER III.
THE CORONATION AT RHEIMS 70
CHAPTER IV.
THE CAPTURE 100
CHAPTER V.
IMPRISONMENT AND TRIAL 138
CHAPTER VI.
MARTYRDOM 242
CHAPTER VII.
THE REHABILITATION 253
APPENDIX.
I. JOAN OF ARC IN FRENCH AND ENGLISH HISTORY 289
II. JOAN OF ARC IN POETRY 301
FRENCH BIBLIOGRAPHY 311
ENGLISH BIBLIOGRAPHY 320
INDEX 323
List of Illustrations
(_SEVEN ETCHINGS, THREE PHOTO-ETCHINGS_).
TOUR COUDRAY--CHINON FRONTISPIECE
CHINON To face page 16
STREET IN CHINON " 20
HALL OF AUDIENCE--CHINON " 28
TOUR D'HORLOGE--CHINON " 32
WEST PORTAL--RHEIMS " 80
INTERIOR--RHEIMS " 96
FIFTEENTH-CENTURY HOUSES--COMPIÈGNE " 112
TOUR DE LA PUCELLE--COMPIÈGNE " 128
ST. OUEN--ROUEN " 224
_JOAN OF ARC._
CHAPTER I.
_THE CALL._
Never perhaps in modern times had a country sunk so low as France,
when, in the year 1420, the treaty of Troyes was signed. Henry V. of
England had made himself master of nearly the whole kingdom; and
although the treaty only conferred the title of Regent of France on
the English sovereign during the lifetime of the imbecile Charles VI.,
Henry was assured in the near future of the full possession of the
French throne, to the exclusion of the Dauphin. Henry received with
the daughter of Charles VI. the Duchy of Normandy, besides the places
conquered by Edward III. and his famous son; and of fourteen provinces
left by Charles V. to his successor only three remained in the power
of the French crown. The French Parliament assented to these hard
conditions, and but one voice was raised in protest to the
dismemberment of France; that solitary voice, a voice crying in a
wilderness, was that of Charles the Dauphin--afterwards Charles VII.
Henry V. had fondly imagined that by the treaty of Troyes and his
marriage with a French princess the war, which had lasted over a
century between the two countries, would now cease, and that France
would lie for ever at the foot of England. Indeed, up to Henry's
death, at the end of August 1422, events seemed to justify such hopes;
but after a score of years from Henry's death France had recovered
almost the whole of her lost territory.
There is nothing in history more strange and yet more true than the
story which has been told so often, but which never palls in its
interest--that life of the maiden through whose instrumentality France
regained her place among the nations. No poet's fancy has spun from
out his imagination a more glorious tale, or pictured in glowing words
an epic of heroic love and transcendent valour, to compete with the
actual reality of the career of this simple village maiden of old
France: she who, almost unassisted and alone, through her intense love
of her native land and deep pity for the woes of her people, was
enabled, when the day of action at length arrived, to triumph over
unnumbered obstacles, and, in spite of all opposition, ridicule, and
contumely, to fulfil her glorious mission.
Sainte-Beuve has written that, in his opinion, the way to honour the
history of Joan of Arc is to tell the truth about her as simply as
possible. This has been my object in the following pages.
On the border of Lorraine and Champagne, in the canton of the
Barrois--between the rivers Marne and Meuse--extended, at the time of
which we are writing, a vast forest, called the Der. By the side of a
little streamlet, which took its source from the river Meuse, and
dividing it east by west, stands the village of Domremy. The southern
portion, confined within its banks and watered by its stream,
contained a little fortalice, with a score of cottages grouped around.
These were situated in the county of Champagne, under the suzerainty
of the Count de Bar.
The northern side of the village, containing the church, belonged to
the Manor of Vaucouleurs. In this part of the village, in a cottage
built between the church and the rivulet close by, Joan of Arc was
born, on or about the 6th of January, 1412. The house which now exists
on the site of her birthplace was built in 1481, but the little
streamlet still takes its course at its foot. Michelet, in his account
of the heroine, says the station in life of Joan's father was that of
a labourer; later investigations have proved that he was what we
should call a small farmer. In the course of the trial held for the
rehabilitation of Joan of Arc's memory, which yields valuable and
authentic information relating to her family as well as to her life
and actions, it appears that the neighbours of the heroine deposed
that her parents were well-to-do agriculturists, holding a small
property besides this house at Domremy; they held about twenty acres
of land, twelve of which were arable, four meadow-land, and four for
fuel. Besides this they had some two to three hundred francs kept safe
in case of emergency, and the furniture goods and chattels of their
modest home. The money thus kept in case of sudden trouble came in
usefully when the family had to escape from the English to
Neufchâteau. All told, the fortune of the family of Joan attained an
annual income of about two hundred pounds of our money, a not
inconsiderable revenue at that time; and with it they were enabled to
raise a family in comfort, and to give alms and hospitality to the
poor, and wandering friars and other needy wayfarers, then so common
in the land.
Two documents lately discovered prove Joan's father to have held a
position of some importance at Domremy. In the one, dated 1423, he is
styled '_doyen_' (senior inhabitant) of the village, which gave him
rank next to the Mayor. In the other, four years later, he fills a post
which tallies with what is called in Scotland the Procurator-fiscal.
The name of the family was Arc, and much ink has been shed as to the
origin of that name. By some it is derived from the village of d'Arc,
in the Barrois, now in the department of the Haute Marne; and this
hypothesis is as good as any other.
Jacques d'Arc had taken to wife one Isabeau Romée, from the village of
Vouthon, near Domremy. Isabeau is said to have had some property in
her native village. The family of Jacques d'Arc and Isabella or
Isabeau consisted of five children: three sons, Jacquemin, Jean, and
Pierre, and two daughters, the elder Catherine, the younger Jeanne, or
Jennette, as she was generally called in her family, whose name was to
go through the ages as one of the most glorious in any land.
Well favoured by nature was the birthplace of Joan of Arc, with its
woods of chestnut and of oak, then in their primeval abundance. The
vine of Greux, which was famous all over the country-side as far back
as the fourteenth century, grew on the southern slopes of the hills
about Joan's birthplace. Beneath these vineyards the fields were
thickly clothed with rye and oats, and the meadow-lands washed by the
waters of the Meuse were fragrant with hay that had no rival in the
country. It was in these rich fields that, after the hay-making was
over, the peasants let out their cattle to graze, the number of each
man's kine corresponding with the number of fields which he owned and
which he had reaped.
The little maid sometimes helped her father's labourers, and the idea
has become general that Joan of Arc was a shepherdess; in reality, it
was only an occasional occupation, and probably undertaken by Joan out
of mere good-nature, seeing that her parents were well-to-do people.
All that we gather of Joan's early years proves her nature to have
been a compound of love and goodness. Every trait recorded of the
little maid's life at home which has come down to us reveals a mixture
of amiability, unselfishness, and charity. From her earliest years she
loved to help the weak and poor: she was known, when there was no room
for the weary wayfarer to pass the night in her parents' house, to
give up her bed to them, and to sleep on the floor, by the hearth.
She loved her mother tenderly, and in her trial she bore witness
before men to the good influence that she had derived from that
parent. Isabeau d'Arc appears to have been a devout woman, and to
have brought up her children to love work and religion. Joan loved to
sit by her mother's side for the hour together, spinning, and
doubtless listening to the stories of wars with the hereditary enemy.
When she could be of use, Joan was ever ready to lend a hand to help
her father or brothers in the rougher labours of coach-house, stable,
or farmyard, to keep watch over the flocks as they browsed by the
river-side along the meadow-lands.
Joan had not the defect of so many excellent but tedious women, who
love talk for the mere sake of talking: she seems to have been
reserved; but, as she proved later on, she was never at a loss for a
word in season, and with a few words could speak volumes. From her
childhood she showed an intense and ever-increasing devotion to things
holy; her delight in prayer became almost a passion. She never wearied
of visiting the churches in and about her native village, and she
passed many an hour in a kind of rapt trance before the crucifixes and
saintly images in these churches. Every morning saw her at her
accustomed place at the early celebration of her Lord's Sacrifice; and
if in the afternoon the evening bells sounded across the fields, she
would kneel devoutly, and commune in her heart with her divine Master
and adored saints. She loved above all things these evening bells,
and, when it seemed to her the ringer grew negligent, would bribe him
with some little gift--the worked wool from one of her sheep or some
other trifle--to remind him in the future to be more instant in his
office. That this little trait in Joan is true, we have the testimony
of the bell-ringer himself to attest.
This devotion to her religious duties had not the effect of making
Joan less of a companion to her fellow-villagers. She could not have
been so much beloved by them as she was had she held herself aloof
from them: on the contrary, Joan enjoyed to play with the lads and
village lasses; and we hear of her swiftness of foot in the race, of
her gracefulness in the village dance, either by the stream or around
an old oak-tree in the forest, which was said to be the favourite
haunt of the fairies.
Often in the midst of these sports Joan would break away from her
companions, and enter some church or chapel, where she placed garlands
of flowers around statues of her beloved saints.
Thus passed away the early years of the maiden's gentle life, among
her native fields, with nothing especially to distinguish her from her
companions beyond her goodness and piety. A great change, however, was
near at hand. The first of those mysterious and supernatural events
which played so all-important a part in the life of our heroine
occurred in the summer of 1425, when Joan was in her thirteenth year.
In her trial at Rouen, on being asked by her judges what was the first
manifestation of these visions, she answered that the first indication
of what she always called 'My voices' was that of St. Michel. It is
not a little remarkable that this vision of St. Michel, the patron
saint of the French army, should have taken place in the summer of
1425, at the time of a double defeat by land and sea of the enemy of
France, and when the Holy Mount in Normandy, crowned by the chapel
guarded by St. Michel, was once again in the hands of the French. At
the same time, Joan of Arc experienced some of the hardships of war
when the country around Domremy was overrun by the enemy; and the
little household of the Arcs had to fly for shelter to the
neighbouring village of Châteauneuf, in Lorraine.
I will pass somewhat rapidly over the visions, or rather
revelations--for, whatever doubts one may hold as to such heavenly
messengers appearing literally on this earth, no man can honestly
doubt that Joan believed as firmly in these unearthly visitants coming
from Heaven direct as she did in the existence of herself or of her
parents. On the subject of these voices and visions no one has written
with more sense than a distinguished prelate who was a contemporary of
the heroine's--namely, Thomas Basin, Bishop of Lisieux, who, in a work
relating to Joan of Arc, writes thus:--
'As regards her mission, and as regards the apparitions and
revelations that she affirmed having had, we leave to every one the
liberty to believe as he pleases, to reject or to hold, according to
his point of view or way of thinking. What is important regarding
these visions is the fact that Joan had herself no shadow of a doubt
regarding their reality, and it was their effect upon her, and not her
natural inclination, which impelled her to leave her parents and her
home to undertake great perils and to endure great hardships, and, as
it proved, a terrible death. It was these visions and voices, and they
alone, which made her believe that she would succeed, if she obeyed
them, in saving her country and in replacing her king on his throne.
It was these visions and voices which finally enabled her to do those
marvellous deeds, and accomplish what appeared to all the world the
impossible; these voices and visions will ever be connected with Joan
of Arc, and with her deathless fame and glory.'
From the year 1425 till 1428, the apparitions and voices were heard
and seen more or less frequently.
It is the year 1427: all that remains to Charles of his kingdom north
of the Loire, with the exception of Tournay, are a pitiful half-dozen
places. Among these is Vaucouleurs, near Domremy. They are defended by
a body of men under the command of a knight, Robert de Baudricourt,
who is about to play an important part in the history of Joan.
In one of her visions the maid was told to seek this knight, that
through his help she might be brought to the French Court; for the
voices had told her she might find the King and tell him her message,
by which she should deliver the land from the English, and restore him
to his throne. There had not been wanting legends and prophecies upon
the country-side which may have impressed Joan, and helped her to
believe that it was her mission to deliver France. One of the
prophecies was to the effect that a maiden from the borders of
Lorraine should save France, that this maiden would appear from a
place near an oak forest. This seemed to point directly to our
heroine. The old oak-tree haunted by the fairies, the neighbouring
country of Lorraine, were all in help of the tradition. Since the
betrayal of her husband's country by the wife of Charles VI., another
saying had been spread abroad throughout all that remained of that
small portion of France still held by the French King--namely, that
although France would be lost by a woman, a maiden should save it. Any
hope to the people in those distressful days was eagerly seized on;
and although the first prophecy dated from the mythical times of
Merlin, it stirred the people, especially when, later on, Joan of Arc
appeared among them, and her story became known.
These prophecies appear to have struck deeply into Joan's soul; they,
and her voices aiding, made her believe she was the maiden by whom her
country would be delivered from the presence of the enemy. But how was
she to make her parents understand that it was their child who was
appointed by Heaven to fulfil this great deliverance? Her father seems
to have been a somewhat harsh, at any rate a practical, parent. When
told of her intention to join the army, he said he would rather throw
her into the river than allow her to do so. An attempt was made by her
parents to induce her to marry. They tried their best, but Joan would
none of it; and bringing the case before the lawyers at Toul, where
she proved that she had never thought of marrying a youth whom her
parents required her to wed, she gained her cause and her freedom.
In order to take the first step in her mission, Joan felt it necessary
to rely on some one outside her immediate family. A distant relation
of her mother's, one Durand Laxart, who with his wife lived in a
little village then named Burey-le-Petit (now called Burey-en-Vaux),
near Vaucouleurs, was the relation in whose care she placed her fate.
With him and his wife Joan remained eight days; and it might have been
then that the plan was arranged to hold an interview with Baudricourt
at Vaucouleurs, in order to see whether that knight would interest
himself in Joan's mission.
The interview took place about the middle of the month of May (1428),
and nothing could have been less propitious. A soldier named Bertrand
de Poulangy, who was one of the garrison of Vaucouleurs, was an
eye-witness of the meeting. He accompanied Joan of Arc later on to
Chinon, and left a record of the almost brutal manner with which
Baudricourt received the Maid. From this soldier's narrative we
possess one of the rare glimpses which have come down to us of the
appearance of the heroine: not indeed a description of what would be
of such intense interest as to make known to us the appearance and
features of her face; but he describes her dress, which was that then
worn by the better-to-do agricultural class of Lorraine peasant women,
made of rough red serge, the cap such as is still worn by the
peasantry of her native place.
It is much to be regretted that no portrait of Joan of Arc exists
either in sculpture or painting. A life-size bronze statue which
portrayed the Maid kneeling on one side of a crucifix, with Charles
VII. opposite, forming part of a group near the old bridge of Orleans,
was destroyed by the Huguenots; and all the portraits of Joan painted
in oils are spurious. None are earlier than the sixteenth century, and
all are mere imaginary daubs. In most of these Joan figures in a hat
and feathers, of the style worn in the Court of Francis I. From
various contemporary notices, it appears that her hair was dark in
colour, as in Bastien Lepage's celebrated picture, which supplies as
good an idea of what Joan may have been as any pictured representation
of her form and face. Would that the frescoes which Montaigne
describes as being painted on the front of the house upon the site of
which Joan was born could have come down to us. They might have given
some conception of her appearance. Montaigne saw those frescoes on his
way to Italy, and says that all the front of the house was painted
with representations of her deeds, but even in his day they were much
injured.
When Joan at length stood before the knight of Vaucouleurs, she told
him boldly that she had come to him by God's command, and that she was
destined to give the King victory over the English. She even said that
she was assured that early in the following March this would be
accomplished, and that the Dauphin would then be crowned at Rheims,
for all these things had been promised to her through her Lord.
'And who is he?' asked de Baudricourt.
'He is the King of Heaven,' she answered.
The knight treated Joan's words with derision, and Joan herself with
insults; and thus ended the first of their interviews.
It was only in the season of Lent of the next year (March 1427) that
Joan again sought the aid of de Baudricourt. On the plea of attending
her cousin Laxart's wife's confinement, Joan returned to
Burey-le-Petit. She left Domremy without bidding her parents farewell;
but it has been recorded by one of her friends, named Mengeth, a
neighbour of the d'Arcs, that she told this woman of her intention of
going to Vaucouleurs, and recommended her to God's keeping, as if she
felt that she would not see her again. At Burey-le-Petit Joan remained
between the end of January until her departure for Chinon, on the 23rd
of February; and before taking final leave she asked and received her
parents' pardon for her abrupt departure from them.
While with the Laxarts, news reached Vaucouleurs that the English had
commenced the siege of Orleans. This intelligence brought matters to a
crisis, for with the loss of Orleans the whole of what remained to the
French King must fall into the hands of the enemy, and France felt her
last hour of independence had come.
Joan determined on again seeking an interview with Robert de
Baudricourt, and this second meeting between her and the knight, which
took place six months after the first, had far happier results. As M.
Simeon Luce has pointed out in his history of 'Jeanne d'Arc at
Domremy,' the situation both of Charles VI. and of the knight of
Vaucouleurs was far different in 1429 to what it had been when Joan
first saw de Baudricourt at Vaucouleurs in the previous year. The most
important stronghold held by the French in their ever-lessening
territory was in utmost danger of falling into the grasp of the
English; while de Baudricourt was anxiously waiting to hear whether
his protector, the Duc de Bar, whom Bedford had summoned to enter into
a treaty with the English, would not be prevailed upon to do so. If he
consented, this would make the knight's tenure of Vaucouleurs
impracticable. It was probably owing to this state of affairs that, on
her second interview with the knight of Vaucouleurs, Joan of Arc was
favourably received by him. Since the first visit to de Baudricourt by
the Maid of Domremy, her name had become familiar to many of the
people in and about Vaucouleurs. An officer named Jean de Metz has
left some record of his meeting at this time with Joan; for he was
afterwards examined among other witnesses at the time of the Maid's
rehabilitation in 1456. De Metz describes the Maid as being clothed in
a dress of coarse red serge, the same as she wore on her first visit
to Vaucouleurs. When he questioned her as to what she expected to gain
by coming again to Vaucouleurs, she answered that she had returned to
induce Robert de Baudricourt to conduct her to the King; but that on
her first visit he was deaf to her entreaties and prayers. But, she
added, she was still determined to appear before Charles, even if she
had to go to him all the way on her knees.
'For I alone,' she added, 'and no other person, whether he be King, or
Duke, or daughter of the King of Scots' (alluding to the future wife
of Charles VII.'s son, Louis XI.--Margaret of Scotland) 'can recover
the kingdom of France.'
As far as her own wishes were concerned, she said she would prefer to
return to her home, and to spin again by the side of her beloved
mother; for, she added: 'I am not made to follow the career of a
soldier; but I must go and carry out this my calling, for my Lord has
appointed me to do so.'
'And who,' asked de Metz, 'is your Lord?'
'My Lord,' answered the Maid, 'is God Himself.'
The enthusiasm of Joan seems to have at once gained the soldier's
heart. He took her by the hand, and swore that God willing he would
accompany her to the King. When asked how soon she would be ready to
start, she said that she was ready. 'Better to-day than to-morrow, and
better to-morrow than later on.'
During her second visit to Vaucouleurs, Joan remained with the same
friends as on her former visit; they appear to have been an honest
couple, of the name of Le Royer. One day while Joan was helping in
the domestic work of her hosts, and seated by the side of Catherine Le
Royer, Robert de Baudricourt suddenly entered the room, accompanied by
a priest, one Jean Fournier, in full canonicals. It appeared that the
knight had conceived the brilliant idea of finding out, through the
assistance of the holy man, whether Joan was under the influence of
good or evil spirits, before allowing her to go to the King's Court.
As may be imagined, Joan received the priest with all respect,
kneeling before him; and the good father was soon able to reassure de
Baudricourt that the evil spirits had no part or parcel in the heart
of the maid who received him with so much humility.
[Illustration: CHINON.]
For three weeks Joan was left in suspense at Vaucouleurs, and probably
it was not until a messenger had been sent to Chinon and had returned
with a favourable answer, that at length de Baudricourt gave a
somewhat unwilling consent to Joan's leaving Vaucouleurs on her
mission to Chinon. During those weary weeks of anxious waiting, Joan's
hostess bore witness in after days to the manner in which the time was
passed: of how she would help Catherine in her spinning and other
homely work, but, as when at home, her chief delight was to attend the
Church services, and she would often remain to confession, after the
early communion in the church. The chapel in which she worshipped was
not the parochial church of Vaucouleurs, but was attached to the
castle, and it still exists. In that castle chapel, and in a
subterranean crypt beneath the Collegiate Church of Notre Dame de
Vaucouleurs, Joan passed much of her time. Seven and twenty years
after these events, one Jean le Fumeux, at that time a chorister of
the chapel, a lad of eleven, bore witness, at the trial in which the
memory of Joan was vindicated, to having often seen her kneeling
before an image of the Virgin. This image, a battered and rude one,
still exists. Nothing less artistic can be imagined; but no one, be
his religious views what they may, be his abhorrence of Mariolatry as
strong as that of a Calvinist, if he have a grain of sympathy in his
nature for what is glorious in patriotism and sublime in devotion, can
look on that battered and broken figure without a feeling deeper than
one of ordinary curiosity.
A short time before leaving Vaucouleurs, Joan made a visit into
Lorraine--a visit which proved how early her fame had spread abroad.
The then reigning Duke of that province, Charles II. of Lorraine, an
aged and superstitious prince, had heard of the mystic Maid of
Domremy, and he had expressed his wish to see her, probably thinking
that she might afford him relief from the infirmities from which he
suffered. Whatever the reason may have been, he sent her an urgent
request to visit him, a message with which Joan at once complied.
Accompanied by Jean de Metz, Joan went to Toul, and thence with her
cousin, Durand Laxart, she proceeded to Nancy. Little is known of her
deeds while there. She visited Duke Charles, and gave him some advice
as to how he should regain his character more than his health, over
which she said she had no control. The old Duke appears to have been
rather a reprobate, but whether he profited by Joan's advice does not
appear.
Possibly this rather vague visit of the Maid's to Nancy was undertaken
as a kind of test as to how she would comport herself among dukes and
princes. That she showed most perfect modesty of bearing under
somewhat difficult circumstances seems to have struck those who were
with her at Nancy. She also showed practical sagacity; for she advised
Duke Charles to give active support to the French King, and persuaded
him to allow his son-in-law, young René of Anjou, Duke of Bar, to
enter the ranks of the King's army, and even to allow him to accompany
her to the Court at Chinon. By this she bound the more than lukewarm
Duke of Lorraine to exert all his influence on the side of King
Charles.
Before leaving Nancy on her return to Vaucouleurs, Joan visited a
famous shrine, not far from the capital, dedicated to St. Nicolas,
after which she hastened back to Vaucouleurs to make ready for an
immediate start for Chinon.
Joan's equipment for her journey to Chinon was subscribed for by the
people of Vaucouleurs; for among the common folk there, as wherever
she was known, her popularity was great. She seems to have won in
every instance the hearts of the good simple peasantry, the poorer
classes in general, called by a saintly King of France the 'common
people of our Lord,' who believed in her long before others of the
higher classes and the patricians were persuaded to put any faith in
her. To the peasantry Joan was already the maiden pointed out in the
old prophecy then known all over France, which said that the country
would be first lost by a woman and then recovered by a maiden hailing
from Lorraine. The former was believed to be the Queen-mother, who had
sided with the English; Joan, the Maid out of Lorraine who should save
France, and by whose arm the English would be driven out of the
country.
Clad in a semi-male attire, composed of a tight-fitting doublet of
dark cloth and tunic reaching to the knees, high leggings and spurred
boots, with a black cap on her head, and a hauberk, the Maid was armed
with lance and sword, the latter the gift of de Baudricourt. Her good
friends of Vaucouleurs had also subscribed for a horse. Thus
completely equipped, she prepared for war, ready for her eventful
voyage. Her escort consisted of a knight named Colet de Vienne,
accompanied by his squire, one Richard l'Archer, two men-at-arms from
Vaucouleurs, and the two knights Bertrand de Poulangy and Jean de
Metz--eight men in all, well armed and well mounted, and thoroughly
prepared to defend their charge should the occasion arise. Nor were
precautions and means of repelling an attack unnecessary, for at this
time the country around Vaucouleurs was infested by roving bands of
soldiers belonging to the Anglo-Burgundian party. Especially dangerous
was that stretch of country lying between Vaucouleurs and Joinville,
the first of the many stages on the way to Chinon. Although the
knights and men of the small expedition were not without
apprehension, Joan seems to have shown no sign of fear: calm and
cheerful, she said that, being under the protection of Heaven, they
had nothing to fear, for that no evil could befall her.
There still exists the narrow gate of the old castle of Vaucouleurs
through which that little band rode out into the night; hard by is the
small subterranean chapel, now under repair, where Joan had passed so
many hours of her weary weeks of waiting at Vaucouleurs. The old gate
is still called the French Gate, as it was in the days of the Maid.
[Illustration: STREET IN CHINON.]
It was the evening of the 23rd of February, 1429, that the little band
rode away into the open country on their perilous journey. Joan,
besides adopting a military attire, had trimmed her dark hair close,
as it was then the fashion of knights to do--cut round above the ears.
Even this harmless act was later brought as an accusation against her.
Joan was then in her seventeenth year, and, although nothing but
tradition has reached us of her looks and outward form, it is not
difficult to imagine her as she rides out of that old gate, a comely
maid, with a frank, brave countenance, lit up by the flame of an
intense enthusiasm for her country and people. There can be no doubt
that by her companions in arms--rough soldiers though most of them
were--she was held in veneration; they bore testimony to their
feelings by a kind of adoration for one who seemed indeed to them more
than mortal. Wherever Joan appeared, this feeling of veneration spread
rapidly through the length and breadth of the land; and the
people were wont to speak of the future saviour of France, not by the
name of Joan the Maid, or Joan of Arc, but as the Angelic
One--'l'Angélique.'
Among the crowd who gathered to see Joan depart was de Baudricourt,
who then made amends for his rudeness and churlish behaviour on her
first visit by presenting her with his own sword, and bidding her
heartily god-speed. '_Advienne que pourra!_' was his parting salute.
The journey between Vaucouleurs and Chinon occupied eleven days. Not
only was the danger of attack from the English and Burgundian soldiers
a great and a constant one, but the winter, which had been
exceptionally wet, had flooded all the rivers. Five of these had to be
crossed--namely, the Marne, the Aube, the Seine, the Yonne, and the
Loire: and most of the bridges and fords of these rivers were strictly
guarded by the enemy. The little band, for greater security, mostly
travelled during the night. Their first halt was made at the Monastery
of Saint-Urbain-les-Joinville. The Celibat of this monastery was named
Arnoult d'Aunoy, and was a relative of de Baudricourt. After leaving
that shelter they had to camp out in the open country.
Joan's chief anxiety was that she might be able to attend Mass every
day. 'If we are able to attend the service of the Church, all will be
well,' she said to her escort. The soldiers only twice allowed her the
opportunity of doing so, on one occasion in the principal church of
the town of Auxerre.
They crossed the Loire at Gien; and at that place, in the church
dedicated to one of Joan's special saints--St. Catherine, for whom she
held a personal adoration--she thrice attended Mass.
When the little band entered Touraine, they were out of danger, and
here the news of the approach of the Maid spread like wildfire over
the country-side. Even the besieged burghers of Orleans learned that
the time of their delivery from the English was at hand.
Perhaps it was when passing through Fierbois that Joan may have been
told of the existence in its church of the sword which so
conspicuously figured in her later story, and was believed to have
been miraculously revealed to her.
A letter was despatched from Fierbois to Charles at Chinon, announcing
the Maid's approach, and craving an audience. At length, on the 6th of
March, Joan of Arc arrived beneath the long stretch of castle walls of
the splendid old Castle of Chinon.
That imposing ruin on the banks of the river Vienne is even in its
present abandoned state one of the grandest piles of mediæval building
in the whole of France. Crowning the rich vale of Touraine, with the
river winding below, and reflecting its castle towers in the still
water, this time-honoured home of our Plantagenet kings has been not
inaptly compared to Windsor. Beneath the castle walls and the river,
nestles the quaint old town, in which are mediæval houses once
inhabited by the court and followers of the French and English kings.
When Joan arrived at Chinon, Charles's affairs were in a very perilous
state. The yet uncrowned King of France regarded the chances of being
able to hold his own in France as highly problematical. He had doubts
as to his legitimacy. Financially, so low were his affairs that even
the turnspits in the palace were clamouring for their unpaid wages.
The unfortunate monarch had already sold his jewels and precious
trinkets. Even his clothes showed signs of poverty and patching, and
to such a state of penury was he reduced that his bootmaker, finding
that the King was unable to pay him the price of a new pair of boots,
and not trusting the royal credit, refused to leave the new boots, and
Charles had to wear out his old shoe-leather. All that remained in the
way of money in the royal chest consisted of four gold 'écus.' To such
a pitch of distress had the poor King, who was contemptuously called
by the English the King of Bourges, sunken.
Now that Orleans was in daily peril of falling into the hands of the
English, and with Paris and Rouen in their hold, the wretched
sovereign had serious thoughts of leaving his ever-narrowing territory
and taking refuge either in Spain or in Scotland. Up to this time in
his life Charles had shown little strength of character. His existence
was passed among a set of idle courtiers. He had placed himself and
his broken fortunes in the hands of the ambitious La Tremoïlle, whose
object it was that the King should be a mere cipher in his hands, and
who lulled him into a false security by encouraging him to continue a
listless career of self-indulgence in his various palaces and pleasure
castles on the banks of the Loire. Charles had, indeed, become a mere
tool in the hands of this powerful minister. The historian Quicherat
has summed up George de la Tremoïlle's character as an avaricious
courtier, false and despotic, with sufficient talent to make a name
and a fortune by being a traitor to every side. That such a man did
not see Joan of Arc's arrival with a favourable eye is not a matter of
surprise, and La Tremoïlle seems early to have done his utmost to
undermine the Maid's influence with his sovereign. From the day she
arrived at Chinon, if not even before her arrival there--if we may
trust one story--an ambush was arranged by Tremoïlle to cut her off
with her escort. That plot failed, but her capture at Compiègne may be
indirectly traced to La Tremoïlle's machinations.
Those who have visited Chinon will recall the ancient and picturesque
street, named La Haute Rue Saint Maurice, which runs beneath and
parallel with the castle walls and the Vienne. Local tradition pointed
out till very recently, in this old street, the stone well on the side
of which the Maid of Domremy placed her foot on her arrival in the
town. This ancient well stone has recently been removed by the
Municipality of Chinon, but fortunately the 'Margelle' (to use the
native term) has come into reverent hands, and the stone, with its
deeply dented border, reminding one of the artistic wells in Venice,
is religiously preserved.
Of Chinon it has been said:
Chynon, petit ville,
Grande renom.
Its renown dates back from the early days of our Plantagenets, when
they lived in the old fortress above its dwellings: how Henry III.
died of a broken heart, and the fame of Rabelais, will ever be
associated with the ancient castle and town. Still, the deathless
interest of Chinon is owing to the residence of the Maid of
Domremy--as one has a better right to call her than of Orleans--in
those early days of her short career, in its burgh and castle. In or
near the street La Haute Rue Saint Maurice, hard by a square which now
bears the name of the heroine, Joan of Arc arrived at noon on Sunday,
the 6th of March.
It would be interesting to know in which of the old gabled houses Joan
resided during the two days before she was admitted to enter the
castle. Local tradition reports that she dwelt with a good housewife
('_chez une bonne femme_'). According to a contemporary plan of
Chinon, dated 1430, a house which belonged to a family named La Barre
was where she lodged; and although the actual house of the La Barres
cannot be identified, there are many houses in the street of Saint
Maurice old enough to have witnessed the advent of the Maid on that
memorable Sunday in the month of March 1430. Few French towns are so
rich in the domestic architecture of the better kind dating from the
early part of the fifteenth century as that of Chinon; and now that
Rouen, Orleans, and Poitiers have been so terribly modernised, a
journey to Chinon well repays the trouble. Little imagination is
required to picture the street with its crowd of courtiers and Court
hangers-on, upon their way to and from the castle above; so mercifully
have time and that far greater destroyer of things of yore dealt with
this old thoroughfare.
Two days elapsed before Joan was admitted to the presence of the King.
A council had been summoned in the castle to determine whether the
Maid should be received by the monarch. The testimony of the knights
who had accompanied the Maid from Vaucouleurs carried the day in her
favour.
While waiting to see the King, we have from Joan's own lips a
description of how her time was passed. 'I was constantly at prayers
in order that God should send the King a sign. I was lodging with a
good woman when that sign was given him, and then I was summoned to
the King.'
The church in which she passed her time in prayer was doubtless that
of Saint Maurice, close by the place at which she lodged. It owed its
origin to Henry II. of England; it is a rare and beautiful little
building of good Norman architecture, but much defaced by modern
restoration. Its age is marked by the depth at which its pavement
stands, the ground rising many feet above its present level.
A reliable account of Joan of Arc's interview with King Charles has
come down to us, as have so many other facts in her life's history,
through the witnesses examined at the time of the heroine's
rehabilitation. Foremost among these is the testimony of a priest
named Pasquerel, who was soon to become Joan's almoner, and to
accompany her in her warfare. He tells how, when Joan was on her road
to enter the castle, a soldier used some coarse language as he saw the
young Maid pass by--some rude remark which the fellow qualified with
an oath. Turning to him, the Maid rebuked him for blaspheming, and
added that he had denied his God at the very moment in which he would
be summoned before his Judge, for that within an hour he would appear
before the heavenly throne. The soldier was drowned within the hour.
At least such is the tale as told by Priest Pasquerel.
The castle was shrouded in outer darkness, but brilliantly lit within,
as Joan entered its gates. The King's Chamberlain, the Comte de
Vendôme, received the Maid at the entrance of the royal apartments,
and ushered her into the great gallery, of which fragments still
exist--a blasted fireplace, and sufficient remains of the original
stone-work to prove that this hall was the principal apartment in the
palace. Flambeaux and torches glowed from the roof and from the sides
of this hall, and here the Court had assembled, half amused, half
serious, as to the arrival of the peasant girl, about whom there had
been so much strange gossip stirring. Now the grass grows in wild
luxuriance over the pavement, and the ivy clings to the old walls of
that noble room, in which, perhaps, the most noteworthy of all
recorded meetings between king and subject then took place. A score of
torches held by pages lit the sides of the chamber. Before these were
ranged the knights and ladies, the latter clothed in the fantastically
rich costume of that time, with high erections on their heads, from
which floated long festoons of cloth, and glittering with the emblems
of their families on their storied robes. The King, in order to test
the divination of the Maid, had purposely clad himself in common garb,
and had withdrawn himself behind his more brilliantly attired
courtiers.
Ascending the flight of eighteen steps which led into the hall, and
following Vendôme, Joan passed across the threshold of the hall, and,
without a moment's hesitation singling out the King at the end of the
gallery, walked to within a few paces of him, and falling on her knees
before him--'the length of a lance,' as one of the spectators
recorded--said, 'God give you good life, noble King!' ('_Dieu vous
donne bonne vie, gentil Roi_').
'But,' said Charles, 'I am not the King. This,' pointing to one of his
courtiers, 'is the King.'
Joan, however, was not to be hoodwinked, and, finding that in spite of
his subterfuges he was known, Charles acknowledged his identity, and
entered at once with Joan on the subject of her mission.
[Illustration: HALL OF AUDIENCE--CHINON]
It appears, from all the accounts which have come to us of this
interview, that Charles was at first somewhat loth to take Joan and
her mission seriously. He appears to have treated the Maid as a
mere visionary; but after an interview which the King gave her apart
from the crowded gallery, when she is supposed to have revealed to him
a secret known only to himself, his whole manner changed, and from
that moment Joan exercised a strong influence over the man,
all-vacillating as was his character. It has never been known what
words actually passed in this private interview between the pair, but
the subject probably was connected with a doubt that had long tortured
the mind of the King--namely, whether he were legitimately the heir to
the late King's throne. At any rate the impression Joan had produced
on the King was, after that conversation, a favourable one, and
Charles commanded that, instead of returning to her lodging in the
town, Joan should be lodged in the castle.
The tower which she occupied still exists--one of the large circular
towers on the third line of the fortifications. A gloomy-looking
cryptal room on the ground floor was probably the one occupied by
Joan. It goes by the name of Belier's Tower--a knight whose wife, Anne
de Maille, bore a reputation for great goodness among the people of
the Court. Close to Belier's Tower is a chapel within another part of
the castle grounds, but the church which in those days stood hard by
Joan's tower has long since disappeared--its site is now a mass of
wild foliage.
While Joan was at Chinon, there arrived, from his three years'
imprisonment in England, the young Duke of Anjou. Of all those who
were attached to the Court and related to the French sovereign, this
young Prince was the most sympathetic to Joan of Arc. He seems to have
fulfilled the character of some hero of romance more than any of the
French princes of that time, and Joan at once found in him a
chivalrous ally and a firm friend. That she admired him we cannot
doubt, and she loved to call him her knight.
Hurrying to Chinon, having heard of the Maid of Domremy's arrival, he
found Joan with the King. Her enthusiasm was contagious with the young
Prince, who declared how eagerly he would help her in her enterprise.
'The more there are of the blood royal of France to help in our
enterprise the better,' answered Joan.
Many obstacles had still to be met before the King accorded liberty of
action to the Maid. La Tremoïlle and others of his stamp threw all the
difficulties they could suggest in the way of Joan of Arc's expedition
to deliver Orleans: these men preferred their easy life at Chinon to
the arbitrament of battle. In vain Joan sought the King and pressed
him to come to a decision: one day he said he would consent to her
progress, and the following he refused to give his consent. He
listened to the Maid, but also to the courtiers, priests, and lawyers,
and among so many counsellors he could come to no determination.
Joan during these days trained herself to the vocation which her
career compelled her to follow. We hear of her on one occasion
surprising the King and the Court by the dexterity with which she rode
and tilted with a lance. From the young Duke of Alençon she received
the gift of a horse; and the King carried out on a large scale what de
Baudricourt had done on a small one, by making her a gift of arms and
accoutrements. Before, however, deciding to entrust the fate of
hostilities into the hands of the Maid, it was decided that the advice
and counsel of the prelates assembled at Poitiers should be taken.
It was in the Great Hall of that town that the French Parliament held
its conferences. The moment was critical, for should the decision of
these churchmen be favourable to Joan, then Charles could no longer
have any scruples in making use of her abilities, and of profiting by
her influence.
It was, therefore, determined that Joan should be examined by the
Parliament and clergy assembled at Poitiers. The King in person
accompanied the Maid to the Parliament. The majestic hall, which still
calls forth the admiration of all travellers at Poitiers, is little
changed in its appearance since the time of that memorable event. It
is one of the noblest specimens of domestic architecture in France:
its graceful pillars and arched roof, and immense fireplace, remain as
they were in the early days of the fifteenth century.
Of the proceedings of that examination unfortunately no complete
report exists. Within a tower connected with the Parliament Hall is
still pointed out a little chamber, said to have been occupied by the
Maid while undergoing this, the first of her judicial and clerical
examinations. But later investigations point to her having been lodged
in a house within the town belonging to the family of the
Parliamentary Advocate-General, Maître Jean Rabuteau.
It must have been a solemn moment for Joan when summoned for the first
time into the presence of the Court of bishops, judges, and lawyers,
whom Charles had gathered together to examine her on her visions and
on her mission. The orders had been sent out by the King and the
Archbishop of Rheims; Gerard Machot, the Bishop of Castres and the
King's confessor; Simon Bonnet, afterwards Bishop of Senlis; and the
Bishops of Macquelonne and of Poitiers. Among the lesser dignitaries
of the Church was present a Dominican monk, named Sequier, whose
account of the proceedings, and the notes kept by Gobert Thibault, an
equerry of the King, are the only records of the examination extant.
The scantiness of these accounts is all the more to be regretted,
inasmuch as Joan frequently referred to the questions made to her, and
her answers, at this trial at Poitiers, during her trial at Rouen; and
they would probably have thrown much light on the obscure passages of
her early years, for at Poitiers she had not to guard against hostile
inquisition, and, doubtless, gave her questioners a full and free
record of her past life.
[Illustration: TOUR D'HORLOGE--CHINON.]
The first conference between these prelates, lawyers, and Joan lasted
two hours. At first they appeared to doubt the Maid, but her frank and
straightforward answers to all the questions put her impressed them
with the truth of her character. They were, according to the old
chronicles, 'grandement ebahis comme une ce simple bergère jeune fille
pouvait ainsi repondre.'
One of her examiners, Jean Lombard by name, a professor of theology
from the University of Paris, in asking Joan what had induced her to
visit the King, was told she had been encouraged so to do by 'her
voices'--those voices which had taught her the great pity felt by her
for the land of France; that although at first she had hesitated to
obey them, they became ever more urgent, and commanded her to go.
'And, Joan,' then asked a doctor of theology named William Aymeri,
'why do you require soldiers, if you tell us that it is God's will
that the English shall be driven out of France? If that is the case,
then there is no need of soldiers, for surely, if it be God's will
that the enemy should fly the country, go they must!'
To which Joan answered: 'The soldiers will do the fighting, and God
will give the victory!'
Sequier, whose account of the proceedings has come down to us, then
asked Joan in what language the Saints addressed her.
'In a better one than yours,' she answered.
Now Brother Sequier, although a doctor of theology, had a strong and
disagreeable accent which he had brought from his native town of
Limoges, and, doubtless, the other clerks and priests tittered not a
little at Joan's answer. Sequier appears to have been somewhat
irritated, and sharply asked Joan whether she believed in God.
'Better than you do,' was the reply; but Sequier, who is described as
a 'bien aigre homme,' was not yet satisfied, and returned to the
charge. Like the Pharisees, he wished for a sign, and he declared that
he for one could not believe in the sacred mission of the Maid, did
she not show them all a sign, nor without such a sign could he advise
the King to place any one in peril, merely on the strength of Joan's
declaration and word.
To this Joan said that she had not come to Poitiers to show signs, but
she added:--
'Let me go to Orleans, and there you will be able to judge by the
signs I shall show wherefore I have been sent on this mission. Let the
force of soldiers with me be as small as you choose; but to Orleans I
must go!'
For three weeks did these conferences last. Nothing was neglected to
discover every detail regarding Joan's life: of her childhood, of her
family and her friends. And one of the Council visited Domremy to
ferret out all the details that could be got at. Needless to say, all
that he heard only redounded to the Maid's credit; nothing transpired
which was not honourable to the Maid's character and way of life, and
in keeping with the testimony Jean de Metz and Poulangy had given the
King at Chinon.
One day she said to one of the Council, Pierre de Versailles, 'I
believe you have come to put questions to me, and although I know not
A or B, what I do know is that I am sent by the King of Heaven to
raise the siege of Orleans, and to conduct the King to Rheims, in
order that he shall be there anointed and crowned.'
On another occasion she addressed the following words in a letter
which John Erault took down from her dictation--to write she knew
not--to the English commanders before Orleans: 'In the name of the
King of Heaven I command you, Suffolk [spelt in the missive Suffort],
Scales [Classidas], and Pole [La Poule], to return to England.'
One sees by the above missive that the French spelling of English
names was about as correct in the fifteenth as it is in the nineteenth
century.
What stirred the curiosity of Joan's examiners was to try and discover
whether her reported visions and her voices were from Heaven or not.
This was the crucial question over which these churchmen and lawyers
puzzled their brains during those three weeks of the blithe
spring-tide at Poitiers. How were they to arrive at a certain
knowledge regarding those mystic portents? All the armoury of
theological knowledge accumulated by the doctors of the Church was
made use of; but this availed less than the simple answers of Joan in
bringing conviction to these puzzled pundits that her call was a
heavenly one. When they produced piles of theological books and
parchments, Joan simply said: 'God's books are to me more than all
these.'
When at length it was officially notified that the Parliament approved
and sanctioned the mission of the Maid, and that nothing against her
had appeared which could in any way detract from the faith she
professed to follow out her mission of deliverance, the rejoicing in
the good town of Poitiers was extreme. The glad news spread rapidly
over the country, and fluttered the hearts of the besieged within the
walls of Orleans. The cry was, 'When will the angelic one arrive?' The
brave Dunois--Bastard of Orleans--in command of the French in that
city, had ere this sent two knights, Villars and Jamet de Tilloy, to
hear all details about the Maid, whose advent was so eagerly looked
forward to. These messengers of Dunois had seen and spoken with Joan,
and on their return to Orleans Dunois allowed them to tell the
citizens their impressions of the Maid. Those people at Orleans were
now as enthusiastic about the deliverance as the inhabitants at
Poitiers, who had seen her daily for three weeks in their midst. All
who had been admitted to her presence left her with tears of joy and
devotion; her simple and modest behaviour, blended with her splendid
enthusiasm, won every heart. Her manner and modesty, and the gay
brightness of her answers, had also won the suffrage of the priests
and lawyers, and the military were as much delighted as surprised at
her good sense when the talk fell on subjects relating to their trade.
It was on or about the 20th of April 1429 that Joan of Arc left
Poitiers and proceeded to Tours. The King had now appointed a military
establishment to accompany her; and her two younger brothers, John and
Peter, had joined her. The faithful John de Metz and Bertrand de
Poulangy were also at her side. The King had selected as her esquire
John d'Aulon; besides this she was followed by two noble pages, Louis
de Contes and Raimond. There were also some men-at-arms and a couple
of heralds. A priest accompanied the little band, Brother John
Pasquerel, who was also Joan's almoner. The King had furthermore made
Joan a gift of a complete suit of armour, and the royal purse had
armed her retainers.
During her stay at Poitiers Joan prepared her standard, on which were
emblazoned the lilies of France, in gold on a white ground. On one
side of the standard was a painting representing the Almighty seated
in the heavens, in one hand bearing a globe, flanked by two kneeling
angels, each holding a fleur-de-lis. Besides this standard, which Joan
greatly prized, she had had a smaller banner made, with the
Annunciation painted on it. This standard was triangular in form; and,
in addition to those mentioned, she had a banneret on which was
represented the Crucifixion. These three flags or pennons were all
symbolic of the Maid's mission: the large one was to be used on the
field of battle and for general command; the smaller, to rally, in
case of need, her followers around her; and probably she herself bore
one of the smaller pennons. The names 'Jesu' and 'Maria' were
inscribed in large golden letters on all the flags.
The national royal standard of France till this period had been a dark
blue, and it is not unlikely that the awe and veneration which these
white flags of the Maid, with their sacred pictures on them, was the
reason of the later French kings adopting the white ground as their
characteristic colour on military banners.
Joan never made use of her sword, and bore one of the smaller banners
into the fight. She declared she would never use her sword, although
she attached a deep importance to it.
'My banner,' she declared, 'I love forty times as much as my sword!'
And yet the sword which she obtained from the altar at Fierbois was in
her eyes a sacred weapon.
CHAPTER II.
_THE DELIVERY OF ORLEANS._
It will be now necessary to go back in our story to the commencement
of the siege by the English of the town of Orleans, in order to
understand the work which Joan of Arc had promised to accomplish.
Orleans was the place of the utmost importance; not merely as being
the second city in France, but as forming the 'tête du pont' for the
passage of the river Loire. The French knew that were it to fall into
the hands of the English the whole of France would soon become subject
to the enemy.
The town was strongly fortified; huge towers of immense thickness, and
three stories in height, surrounded by deep and wide moats, encircled
the city. The only bridge then in existence was also strongly defended
with towers, called 'Les Tournelles,' while at the end of the town
side of the bridge were large 'bastilles,' powerful fortresses which
dated from the year 1417, when Henry V. threatened Orleans after his
triumphal march through Normandy. In 1421 the Orleanists defied the
victor of Agincourt: again they were in the agony of a desperate
defence against their invaders, ready to sustain all the horrors of a
siege.
Equally keen and determined were the English leaders to take Orleans,
which they rightly considered as the key of what remained unconquered
to them in France. Both countries looked anxiously on as the siege
progressed. Salisbury commanded the English; he had been up to this
point successful in taking all the places of importance in the
neighbourhood of Orleans, and that portion of the valley of the Loire
was commanded by his forces, both above and below Orleans.
On the approach of the enemy, the inhabitants of Orleans turned out to
strengthen the outer fortifications, and to place cannon and catapults
on the walls and ramparts. The priests on this occasion worked as hard
as the other citizens, and even the women and children helped with a
will.
Besides Dunois, who commanded the besieged garrison, was Raoul de
Gaucourt, who had defended Harfleur in 1415; he had but recently
returned from imprisonment in England, and was burning to avenge his
captivity. La Hire, Xaintrailles, Coulant, Coaraze, and Armagnac were
among the defenders of Orleans. Many Gascons belonging to the
Marshal-Saint Sévère and soldiers from Brittany helped to swell the
forces of the besieged.
It was on the 12th day of October (1428) that Salisbury crossed the
Loire and established his besieging force at the village of Portereau,
in front of the strongly defended bridge. In the meanwhile the
besieged had razed the houses and the convent of St. Augustin, in
order to prevent the enemy from entrenching themselves so near the
city gates. Salisbury, however, threw up fortifications on the site of
St. Augustin's, and placed a battery of guns opposite to the bridge
and its 'bastilles,' whence he was able to bombard the town with huge
stones. The English also placed mines below the bridge and the
fortresses of the Tournelles.
On the 21st, an assault was made on the bridge and its defences, which
was vigorously repulsed; the whole population were in arms, and manned
the walls; the women fought by the side of their husbands and
brothers. After a severe fight of four hours, the besiegers were
forced to withdraw.
The Tournelles were now mined and counter-mined, and were soon found
to be untenable. The besieged then abandoned this fortification, and
retired further back towards the centre of the bridge, which, as well
as its approaches, was defended by towers. Part of the bridge on the
side near the English was blown up, and a drawbridge, which could be
raised or lowered at pleasure, was thrown across the open space.
Salisbury was satisfied with the result of that day's fighting, for he
knew that, once he had the command of the northern side of the tower,
he could take it when necessary from that quarter. What he aimed at
for the present was to prevent all communication between the town and
the south of France. Holding the bridge, he could prevent relief from
coming to the city, and when the moment arrived he would be able to
throw his men with certain success upon it from the northern side.
The evening of the day in which he had made so successful an attack,
Salisbury mounted into the Tournelles in order to inspect thence the
city which lay beneath him. While gazing on it, a stray cannon shot
struck him on the face; he was carried, mortally wounded, from the
place. That fatal shot was said to have been fired by a lad, who,
finding a loaded cannon on the ramparts, had discharged it. For the
English, it was the deadliest shot of the whole war.
Readers of Shakespeare will remember that, in the first part of _Henry
VI._, the Master Gunner (no doubt that very 'Maître Jean' whose fame
was great in the besieged town) and his boy are introduced on the
scene, and that the boy fires the shot which proved fatal both to
Salisbury and Sir Thomas Gargrave. The prominent place given to this
French Master Gunner in the English play shows what a high reputation
Maître Jean must have had, even among the English, at the siege.
Salisbury's death, occurring a few days after he received the wound,
caused the siege to languish. Glansdale succeeded Salisbury in the
command; but it was not until the doughty Talbot and Lord Scales
appeared on the scene that siege operations recommenced with vigour.
The great pounding match then began again; the huge stone shot of the
English, which weighed one hundred and sixty-four livres, came
tumbling about the heads of the besieged, to which cannonade the
French promptly replied by a heavy fire. They had a kind of bomb, of
which they were not a little proud, wherefrom they fired iron shot of
one hundred and twenty livres in weight. The Master of Gunners of
Shakespeare's play, whose name was John de Monsteschère, made also
extraordinary practice with his culverin; and he could pick off marked
men in the Tournelles, as, for the misfortune of the English, had been
proved in the case of Salisbury. At times Master John would sham dead,
and, just as the English were congratulating themselves on his demise,
would reappear, and again use his culverin with deadly effect.
On the last day but one of the year (1428), the English had been
reinforced, and were now commanded by William de la Pole, Earl, and
afterwards Duke of Suffolk, under whose command acted Suffolk's
brother, John de la Pole, Lord Scales, and Lancelot de Lisle. In order
to maintain touch with his troops posted at the Tournelles, Suffolk
threw up flanking batteries on the northern side of the town. To
Suffolk's already large force Sir John Fastolfe brought a force of
twelve hundred men, in the month of January (1429).
The number of troops mustered by the besieged and besiegers was as
follows:--
On the side of the English, there were quartered at the Tournelles
five hundred men, under the command of Glansdale; three hundred under
Talbot; twelve hundred with Fastolfe. Including those who had come
with Suffolk at the commencement of the siege, the English force
amounted to four thousand five hundred men.
On the side of the besieged, excluding the armed citizens, who were
from three to four thousand strong, was a garrison numbering between
six and seven hundred men; also some thousand soldiers had been thrown
into the city between the middle of October 1428 and the January
following.
Both in strength of position, and as regards the number of their
troops, the French had the advantage. The comparative weakness of the
English force--which, all told, could only count about four thousand
men to carry on the siege--is to be accounted for by the garrisons
which were left in the conquered places over the north and south of
the country.
The siege was weakly conducted during the winter--a series of
skirmishes from the bastilles or towers thrown up by the besiegers led
to little result on either side; and it was not till the month of
February that a decisive engagement took place.
Near Rouvray a battle was fought, which is known by the singular
appellation of the Battle of the Herrings, from the circumstance that,
at that Lenten season, a huge convoy of fish was being taken from the
coast to Paris. In the fight, the fish-laden barrels were overthrown,
and their contents scattered over the field; whence the name of the
Battle of the Herrings. During this engagement, in which the French
were defeated, fell, on the side of the French, two noble Scots--John
Stuart, the Constable of Scotland, and his brother William.
After this action, the position of the besieged in Orleans became more
perilous, and the citizens, despairing of help coming to them from
Charles, were inclined to call in aid from the Duke of Burgundy. The
east, north, and west of the city were covered by the bastilles or
huge towers which the besiegers had thrown up, and from which they
could bombard the place; and the pressure on the devoted city waxed
ever stronger. By the month of April, Orleans was girdled by a chain
of fortresses, from which the cannonade was incessant. The English
gave names of French towns to these huge towers which threatened
Orleans on every side; one they named Paris, another Rouen, and one
other they called London.
The thirty thousand men, women, and children within the city walls
were now beginning to suffer from the horrors of a long siege. In the
town disturbances broke out, and the cry of treachery was heard--that
sure precursor of the fears of the strong that the hardships of the
siege would undermine the patriotism of their weaker citizens. But
when things seemed at their worst, succour was near at hand.
During those winter months the Queen-mother, who had warmly interested
herself in Joan of Arc's mission, had, in the Castle of Blois, been
collecting troops and securing the services of some notable officers,
including the Duke of Alençon. Towards the end of April Joan arrived
at Blois from Poitiers, accompanied by the Archbishop of Rheims,
Regnault de Chartres. On the 27th of April she left Blois on her first
warlike expedition.
No certain account of the numbers of troops which accompanied the Maid
has been kept. Monstrelet gives the numbers at seven thousand; but
Joan, during her trial, asserted that she had between ten and twelve
thousand men committed to her charge by the King. Joan's historian, M.
Wallon, points out that this may be an incorrect entry made in the
interest of the English at the trial, as they naturally would wish the
relieving force to appear as large as possible. It has even been
placed as low as three thousand. Among the officers who accompanied
the Maid was a Gascon knight, named La Hire, half freebooter, half
condottiere, a brave and reckless soldier, of whom it is recorded
that, before making a raid, he would offer up the following prayer:--
'I pray my God to do for La Hire what La Hire would do for Him, if He
were Captain and La Hire was God.'
From having been a mighty swearer, owing to Joan of Arc's influence La
Hire broke off this habit, but, in order to give him some scope for
venting his temper, Joan allowed him to swear by his stick.
These are but trivial details: still, they are of interest as showing
what influence a simple village maiden like Joan was able to exert on
those who, from their position and habits of life, might have been
thought to be the last to tolerate such interference. So changed, it
is said, had this rough warrior, La Hire, and many of his
fellow-soldiers become in their habits while with the Maid, that they
were happy to be able to kneel by the side of the sainted maiden and
partake in her Lord's Sacrament of the Eucharist; and then to confess
themselves to her good father confessor, Peton de Xaintrailles, the
Marshal de Boussac, and the Seigneur de Rais.
Joan had the following letter despatched to the Duke of Bedford:--
'In the name of Jesus and Mary--You, King of England; and you, Duke of
Bedford [Bethfort], who call yourself Regent of France; you, William
de la Pole; you, Earl of Suffolk; you, John Lord Talbot [Thalebot];
and you, Thomas Lord Scales, who call yourselves Lieutenants of the
said Bedford, in the name of the King of Heaven, render the keys of
all the good towns which you have taken and violated in France, to the
Maid sent hither by the King of Heaven. She is ready to make peace if
you will consent to return and to pay for what you have taken. And all
of you, soldiers, and archers, and men-at-arms, now before Orleans,
return to your country, in God's name. If this is not done, King of
England, I, as a leader in war, whenever I shall meet with your people
in France, will oblige them to go whether they be willing or not; and
if they go not, they will perish; but if they will depart I will
pardon them. I have come from the King of Heaven to drive you out
[_bouter_] of France. And do not imagine that you will ever
permanently hold France, for the true heir, King Charles, shall
possess it, for it is God's wish that it should belong to him. And
this has been revealed to him by the Maid, who will enter Paris. If
you will not obey, we shall make such a stir [_ferons un si gros
hahaye_] as hath not happened these thousand years in France. The Maid
and her soldiers will have the victory. Therefore the Maid is willing
that you, Duke of Bedford, should not destroy yourself.'
And Joan finishes this strange effusion by proposing to Bedford that
they should combine in making a holy war for Christianity!
This letter, written 'in the name of the Maid,' was dated on a Tuesday
in Holy Week. The address ran thus: 'To the Duke of Bedford, so called
Regent of the Kingdom of France, or to his Lieutenants, now before the
town of Orleans.'
Doubtless the reference to the deed of arms which, once again at peace
together, might be accomplished by the combined English and French
armies, was an idea which seems to have floated in Joan's enthusiastic
imagination, that the day might come when the two foremost nations in
Christendom would fight together for the recovery of the Holy
Sepulchre.
As might be expected, this letter was received by the English with
gibes and jeers, which was pardonable; but what was not so was the
bad treatment of the messenger who had brought it to the English
camp. He was kept prisoner, and, if some rather doubtful French
writers of the day are to be believed, it was seriously debated
whether or not he should be burnt. Let us trust this is but an
invention of the enemy.
Joan, before leaving Blois, insisted on the dismissal of all camp
followers--such bad baggage was certainly well left behind, and could
not have followed an army led by one who, night and morning, had an
altar erected, around which her hallowed flags were placed, and where
the Maid, and those willing, took the Sacrament at the head of the
army. It must have been a striking sight during that spring-time--that
army, led by a maiden all clad in white armour, and mounted on a black
charger, surrounded by a brilliant band of knights, riding along the
pleasant fields of Touraine, then in their first livery of brilliant
green. And a striking sight it must have been, when, at the close of
the long day's march, the tents were pitched and the altar raised, the
officiating priests grouped about it and the sacred pictured standards
waving above, while the solemn chant was raised, and the soldiers
knelt around.
One can well think how ready were those soldiers to follow Joan
wherever she would lead them, and it is not improbable that such a
crusade as she dreamt of, had it been possible, in which the two
nations, so closely connected by religious feeling, and so closely
united by position, but so long enemies owing to the rapacity and
greed of their kings, might have again placed the cross on the
battlements of the Holy City, under the leadership of her whom her
countrymen rightly called 'The Angelic.'
Joan rode out of Blois bearing her pennon in her hand, and as she rode
she chanted the '_Veni Creator_.' The sacred strain was taken up by
those who followed, and thus passed the Maid forth on her first great
deed of deliverance.
During the whole of the first night Joan remained, as was her custom
when she had no women about her, in her armour.
It was the Maid's wish to enter Orleans from the northern side, but
the officers with her thought this would be a great imprudence, and
followed the opposite bank of the river. Passing through Beaugency and
Meung, they went on by Saint Die, Saint Laurent, and Clery, without
meeting with any attack from the enemy who occupied these places. On
arriving at a place called Olivet, they were within the neighbourhood
of the beleaguered city. Below them rose the English bastille towers;
beyond, the walls, towers, and steeples of Orleans.
Joan had hoped that the city could have been entered without further
difficulty; she now found that not only the river lay between her and
the town, but that the English were in force on all sides. She wished
that the nearest of these bastilles, at Saint Jean le Blanc, should be
stormed, and the river forded there; but this scheme was judged by her
companions-in-arms to be too perilous, and Joan had again to comply
with the opinion of the officers.
Riding to the eastwards, and skirting the river some four miles below
the town, she and her knights forded it at a spot where some low long
islands, or 'eyots' as we call them on the Thames, lay in this part of
the Loire. On one of these, called l'Isle aux Bourdons, the provisions
and stores for the beleaguered city were shipped and transhipped, and
carried down to Orleans when the wind lay in that quarter.
It was at Reuilly that Dunois met the Maid, still chafing from her
thwarted plan of attacking the English in their stronghold at Saint
Jean le Blanc, and she appears to have shown him her displeasure.
While this interview took place the wind changed, and the provision
boats, which, owing to the wind being contrary, had not been able to
make the islands, were now enabled to leave the city. They soon
arrived, were laden with provisions, corn, and even cattle embarked on
them, and, when thus provisioned, returned to Orleans by the canal on
the left bank of the Loire, and successfully arrived at the city end
of the broken bridge, whence the provisions and live stock were passed
into the town.
The river was too much in flood to allow of the army being taken
across, nor could a bridge of boats be made, owing to the height of
the waters. Joan, however, was determined to enter Orleans, flood or
no flood, for she knew what the moral effect of her appearing to the
townspeople would be. Accompanied by Dunois, La Hire, and some two
hundred lances, just after darkness had hidden her movements from the
enemy, she left Reuilly and entered the city.
Preceded by a great banner, the Maid of Orleans, as she may now be
called, with Dunois by her side, and followed by her knights and
men-at-arms, rode slowly through the streets, filled with a crowd
almost delirious in its joy at welcoming within its walls its
long-looked-for Deliverer. The people clung to her, kissing her knees
and feet, and, according to the old chroniclers, behaved as if God
Himself had appeared among them. So eager was the throng to approach
her, that in the press one of her standards was set on fire by a
flambeau. After returning thanks for the delivery of her countrymen in
the cathedral, Joan was made welcome at the house of the treasurer of
the imprisoned Duke of Orleans. This citizen's name was James Boucher;
and here she lodged, with her brothers, and the two faithful knights
who had accompanied her during her journey from Vaucouleurs to Chinon.
A vaulted room in this house is still shown, which purports to have
been that occupied by the Maid of Orleans. If it is the same building
it has been much modernised, although a beautiful specimen of the
domestic Gothic of the early part of the fifteenth century, known as
the house of Agnes Sorel, remains much in the condition that it must
have been in during the famous year of deliverance, 1429.
Although Orleans, by the action of Joan of Arc, had been succoured for
the time, the enemy was still at its gates, and Joan's mission was but
half accomplished. The aspect of affairs since the 29th of April was,
however, greatly changed in favour of the French, and the _rôles_ of
besieged and besiegers changed. Joan's arrival had infused a fresh
spirit of enthusiasm and patriotism into the citizens, and the English
were no longer feared. We have Dunois's authority for the fact that
whereas, up to that time, two hundred English could put eight hundred
French to the rout, now five hundred French soldiers were prepared to
meet the entire English army.
On the 13th of April, hostilities had recommenced. Four hundred men,
commanded by Florent d'Illiers, made a sortie against the English near
the trenches at Saint Pouair, driving them into their quarters. But
the success was not followed up, and appears to have been undertaken
without Joan of Arc's advice. To the heralds that she sent into the
English camp only jeers and taunts were returned; and already the
threat of burning her when caught was made use of. Joan was, however,
not to be deterred by menaces and insults from doing all she could to
prevent unnecessary loss of life. On one occasion she rode out
half-way across the bridge, to where there stood a crucifix called La
Belle Croix, within speaking distance of the English in the
Tournelles. Thence she summoned Glansdale and his men to surrender,
promising that their lives should be spared. They answered with
derisive shouts and villainous abuse. Still commanding her patience,
which was only equalled by her courage, and before returning to the
town, she told them that, in spite of their boasting, the time was
near at hand when they would be driven forth, and that their leader
would never see England again. That they feared the Maid was evident,
in spite of the insults with which they greeted her; at any rate, no
attempt was made to attack her: even when almost alone, she came close
to their fortifications.
Meanwhile Dunois left for Blois to bring up the bulk of the army,
while Joan remained in Orleans, encouraging its inhabitants by her
confidence, faith, and courage. The people, writes the chronicler of
the siege, were never sated with the sight of the Maid: 'ils ne
pouvaient saouler de la voir,' he graphically says.
A second ineffectual effort was made by Joan, this time at a place
called the Croix Morin, to negotiate with the English, she again
promising them quarter if they would capitulate, but, as might be
expected, with no better result than before.
On the 2nd of May, followed by a vast throng, Joan of Arc rode out
along the enemy's forts, and after closely inspecting their defences
returned to vespers at the Church of Sainte-Croix. Certainly among the
people there was no want of belief in, and enthusiastic devotion to,
the Maid; but she had already enemies among the _entourage_ of the
King. We have already alluded to Tremoïlle's feelings with regard to
her and her mission. A still more formidable enemy was the Chancellor
of France, the Archbishop of Rheims, Regnault de Chartres; he and
Tremoïlle worked in concert to undermine all the prestige which Joan's
success in revictualling Orleans had caused at Court. The historian
Quicherat, whose work on Joan of Arc is by far the most complete and
reliable, considers this man to have been an astute politician,
without any moral strength or courage. When with Joan of Arc, he seems
to have shown firmness and even enthusiasm in her mission, but he sank
into the _rôle_ of a poltroon when her influence was withdrawn.
Instead of hastening the despatch of the reinforcements from Blois to
Orleans, he threw delay in the way; he seems to have hesitated in
letting these troops join those under the Maid, for fear that were she
to gain a thorough success his influence at Court would be weakened.
When Joan fell into the hands of her foes, the Archbishop had the
incredible baseness publicly to show his pleasure, declaring that her
capture by the enemy was a proof of Divine justice.
It was not till the 4th of May, and not until Dunois had ridden in hot
haste from Blois, that at length the aid, so long and eagerly
expected, arrived.
Joan rode to meet the succouring army some two miles out of the city,
bearing her flag, accompanied by La Hire and others of her knights.
After a joyful meeting, they turned, riding right through the enemy's
lines and along the fortified bastilles occupied by the English.
Whether it was fear, or superstition mixed with fear, not a man from
the English side stirred, although the English outnumbered the French.
It seemed that a terror had seized on the enemy as they saw her, whom
they called the Sorceress, ride by in her white panoply, bearing aloft
her mystic banner.
The English had now run short of supplies, and eagerly awaited the
arrival of Sir John Fastolfe, who was on his road to Orleans. Joan of
Arc felt uneasy, lest she might not be able to cut off Fastolfe and
his supplies, and she playfully threatened Dunois with his instant
execution if he failed to tell her of the moment he learnt of his
approach. Her anxiety was well founded, for the attack commenced
before she had been apprised of it. She had lain down for a short
repose one afternoon, when she heard the sounds of a cannonade. She
instantly ordered her squire d'Aulon to arm her, as she must
immediately attack the English; but whether those at the Tournelles,
or the advancing force under Fastolfe, she could not yet tell.
While arming, a great clamour rang through the town: the enemy were
said to be at hand, and the battle already engaged. Hastily throwing
on her armour, with the assistance of her hostess and d'Aulon, she
dashed off on her horse, and had only time to snatch her flag, as it
was handed to her from a window, so impetuous was she to enter the
fray.
As she galloped down the street the sparks flew from the stones,
through the High Street and past the cathedral, and out by the
Burgundy Gate. The action had already been raging, and the wounded
were being borne back into the town. It was the first time the Maid
came face to face with such grisly sights--the agony of the wounded,
the blood and gaping wounds. Her squire, d'Aulon, who has left some
record of that day, says how much she grieved over the wounded as they
were carried past her; her beloved countrymen bleeding and dying
affected her deeply. As her page writes, she said she could not see
French blood without her hair rising with horror at the sight.
Before she reached the field the day had been lost and won, the
English were in full retreat, and the battle now lay around the
bastilles of Saint Loup. About a mile to the north-east of the town
were the Englishmen; strongly entrenched, the place commanded that
portion of the river which Talbot had garrisoned with some three
hundred of his best troops. Joan now gave instructions that no aid
should reach this portion of the English defences from the adjacent
bastilles. All around the fight raged, and Joan was soon in the
hottest of the engagement, encouraging her soldiers, her flag in her
hand. Dismounting, she stood on the edge of the earthwork, beyond
which the English were at bay.
Talbot, seeing his men hard pressed, gave orders for a sortie to be
made from one of the other towers, named Paris, and thus cause a
diversion, while another force attacked the French in their rear. This
expedient, however, failed, for a fresh force appeared at this
juncture from Orleans, led by Boussac and De Graville, who beat back
the attack of the English. The English troops within the fortress of
Saint Loup were slain or taken. Joan herself rescued some of these,
and placed them under her protection; caring for them in the house she
was staying in.
At the close of the day, on returning into the town, Joan told the
people that they might count on being free from the enemy in five
days' time, and that by that time not a single Englishman would remain
before Orleans. No wonder that the joy-bells rang out in victorious
clamour during all that night in May, the eve of the Ascension.
On the following day no hostilities occurred. Joan again had a letter
sent to the English, summoning them as before to surrender and to quit
their forts; she said this was the third and the last time that she
could give them a chance of escaping with their lives. On this
occasion she made use of a new way of communicating with the foe; she
tied the letter to an arrow, which was discharged into the English
lines. No answer was received in return.
It was now determined that the next attack against the English should
be made from the left bank of the river, where they were strongly
fortified at the Bastille des Augustins, a little further down the
Loire than the Tournelles. On the opposite side this fortress
communicated with the Boulevard of Saint Privé, as well as with the
strong fortress of Saint Laurent, near which a small island, which
exists no longer, called the Isle of Charlemagne, kept open their
connections on both sides of the Loire. To the east, on the same side
of the river, a fortress, that of Saint Jean le Blanc, which had been
abandoned on the approach of Joan, had since been reoccupied by the
English. It was at this spot that the next and all-important attack
was directed to be made.
The French forces crossed the river over an island called Saint
Aignan. The distance was so narrow between the river bank on the town
side and this island, that a couple of boats moored together served as
a bridge. When Saint Jean le Blanc was reached, it was found deserted
by the English, Glansdale having left it in order to concentrate his
forces at the Tournelles. Joan led the attack. At first the French
fought badly; they had been seized by a panic, believing that a strong
force of the enemy were coming down on them from Saint Privé. Rallying
her men, Joan threw herself on the English, and drove them back into
the Augustins. She was now eagerly followed by the soldiers.
The first barricade was carried in a hand-to-hand fight, and soon the
French flags waved above the fortress so long held by the enemy. The
few English able to escape retired to the Tournelles. Eager to carry
on the success of the attack, and to prevent delay, Joan ordered that
the fort of the Augustins be fired, with the booty it contained.
The victors, who only numbered three thousand strong, captured six
hundred prisoners, one third were slain of the English, and two
hundred French prisoners recovered.
This was the second occasion on which the Maid had carried all before
her.
The day was closing, and the attack on the Tournelles had to be
deferred for that evening. That night Joan of Arc said to her almoner:
'Rise early to-morrow, for we shall have a hard day's work before us.
Keep close to me, for I shall have much to do, more than I have ever
had to do yet. I shall be wounded; my blood will flow!'
This prophetic speech of the Maid is among the most curious facts
relating to her life; for not only did she, during her trial at Rouen,
tell her judges that she had been aware that she would be wounded on
that day, and even knew the position beforehand of the wound, but that
she had known it would occur a long time before, and had told the King
about it. A letter is extant in the Public Library at Brussels,
written on the 22nd of April (1429), by the Sire de Rotslaer, dated
from Lyons, in which Joan's prophecy regarding her wound is mentioned.
This letter was written fifteen days before the date (7th of May) of
the engagement when that event occurred. A facsimile of the passage in
this letter referring to Joan's prophecy appears in the illustrated
edition of M. Wallon's _Life of Joan of Arc_.
Very early on the following day, Saturday, the 7th of May, it appears
that an attempt was made to prevent the Maid from starting for the
field, as, at a council held on the evening before by the officers, it
had been considered more prudent, before renewing the attack on the
English fortifications, to await fresh reinforcements from the King.
When this was reported to Joan, she said: 'You have taken your
counsel, and I have received mine,' and at break of day she was ready,
armed and prepared for the attack. Before starting, her host wished
her to eat some fish, an 'alose,' which had just been brought to him.
'Keep it,' said Joan with a smile, 'till the evening, and I will bring
with me a "Godon" who will, eat his share of it.' This sobriquet of
'Godon' was evidently the generic term for the English, as far back as
the early years of the fifteenth century, and may have been centuries
before the French designation for our countrymen.
Thus, full of spirits and with a brave heart, the Maid rode off to
meet the foe. When she reached the gate called Burgundy, she found it
closed by order of De Gaucourt, Grand Master of the King's Household,
who had done so at the instigation of those officers who wished the
attack on the English deferred until fresh reinforcements arrived.
But the Maid was not to be beaten and kept back even by barred gates.
'You are doing a bad deed,' she indignantly said to those about the
gate, 'and whether you wish it or not, my soldiers shall pass.'
The gate was opened, and Joan, followed by her men, galloped to where
some troops who had been left in possession of the fortifications
taken on the previous day were stationed. The attack on the Tournelles
commenced as soon as Joan arrived--it was then between six and seven
in the morning. Meanwhile Dunois, La Hire, and the principal forces
from the town came up. A desperate struggle ensued; both sides knew
that, whatever the result, that day would decide the fate of
Orleans--even that of the war.
The French were fighting under the eyes of their countrymen, who
manned the walls, and under the guidance of a leader they already
regarded as more than human--and never had they fought so well, during
that long and bloody century of warfare, as they did on that day.
The English, on the other hand, knew that if they were beaten out of
the Tournelles their defeat would be complete, and they too fought
with desperate courage.
Down into the ditches rushed the French, and up the sides of the
glacis; scaling-ladders were placed against the walls, to which the
men upon them clung like a swarm of bees. The defenders met them with
showers of arrows and shot, and hurled them back with lance and
hatchets. Constantly beaten back, they returned as constantly to the
charge. For six hours this fight lasted, and weariness and
discouragement fell on the French. Joan, who had been all these hours
in the thick of the engagement, seeing her men were losing heart,
redoubled her efforts; and, helping to raise a scaling-ladder, she
placed it against the parapet of one of the towers. While thus engaged
she was struck by a bolt from a cross-bow, between her shoulder and
neck. The wound was a severe one; she fell, and was carried out of the
press. Although she suffered acutely, she had the nerve to draw the
arrow from the wound. She refused to have the wound 'charmed,' as some
of those standing around her suggested, saying she would sooner die
than do anything that might be displeasing in the sight of Heaven. A
compress, steeped in oil, was then applied, and it staunched the
bleeding. She was faint and unnerved, and, as she seemed to feel her
death was near, made her confession to her priest.
Still the Tournelles held out in spite of these repeated attacks, and
Dunois, as the shadows lengthened, was on the point of calling back
his forces and sounding the retreat. Joan, in the meanwhile, had been
withdrawn from the fighting, and placed in a meadow at some distance
from the carnage; but when she heard that the troops were about to be
recalled from their attack on the Tournelles, she seemed to forget
her wound, and, making her way to Dunois, implored him not to give up
the fight. She assured him that she was certain they would even yet be
victorious. In a few stirring sentences she rallied the men to fresh
efforts, and told them that now or never would they conquer; the
English, she declared, could not hold out much longer. Mounting her
horse, and with flag unfurled, she again led the van; to those near
her she said, 'Watch my standard; when it reaches the walls the place
will be ours.'
The struggle that ensued was fierce and decisive. Inspired by the
valour of Joan, the French, who appeared as fresh as before her wound,
stormed the bastions and towers of the Tournelles with tremendous
energy. Reinforcements had meanwhile arrived from the town, and these
attacked the Tournelles in the rear. Passing over the broken arches of
the bridge by means of ladders thrown across the masonry, the first
man to reach the other bank was a knight of Rhodes, Nicolas de
Giresme. Attacked from two sides, the English still held the
Tournelles with bull-dog tenacity; but the sight of the witch and
sorceress, as they considered Joan, and who they thought had met with
a mortal hurt, leading the soldiers with unabated courage, caused a
panic to spread through their ranks; and when a sudden shout of
victory proclaimed that the white and golden banner had at length
struck the walls of the fortress, the doom of the Tournelles had
arrived.
Clear above the din of battle rang out the triumphant voice of the
Maid: 'The victory is ours!' she cried.
Seeing the day was lost, the English now attempted to escape
destruction by swimming the river; others threw themselves on a
bridge, which, however, having been set on fire by the French, only
caused those who hoped to cross to fall either into the flames or into
the river below.
Glansdale, the English leader, who had grossly insulted Joan but a few
days before, was among those who were drowning in the Loire. Seeing
his peril, Joan of Arc attempted to save him, but Glansdale was swept,
before her aid could reach him, down the stream, never more to return
to his own land again, as Joan had prophesied.
Five hundred English perished either in the Tournelles or were drowned
in attempting to escape; the rest were made prisoners by the French.
Darkness had now fallen, and although Joan had been taking part in the
battle for more than a dozen hours, and had besides been grievously
hurt, she would not leave the field till late in the night, in case
the English at the Bastille of Saint Laurent should be inclined to
avenge the fall of the Tournelles, and the victory over their
comrades. But for that day, at all events, the English had had enough
of fighting: 'ils n'en avaient une vouloir' for more, as the old
chronicler quaintly expresses himself.
Riding back across the bridge which the citizens had in the meanwhile
partially restored, Joan re-entered the city which her splendid
courage had rescued from the English. 'God knows,' writes Perceval de
Cagny, 'with what joy she was received'; and our English historian of
those days, Hall, has left the following graphic account of the joy
that went out from the people of Orleans to their saviour:--
'After the siege was thus broken up, to tell you what triumphs were
made in the city of Orleans, what wood was spent in fire, what wine
was drunk in houses, what songs were sung in the streets, what melody
was made in taverns, what rounds were danced in large and broad
places, what lights were set up in the churches, what anthems were
sung in chapels, and what joy was showed in every place--it were a
long work, and yet no necessary cause. For they did as we in like case
would have done; and we, being in like estate, would have done as they
did.'
All that day Joan of Arc had eaten nothing, and her strength must have
been more than mortal to have sustained the heat, fatigue, and, above
all, the anguish of her wound. At length she was able to find some
repose with her kind hosts, and, after taking a little bread dipped in
wine, she retired to enjoy her well-earned rest.
Orleans was now delivered, as the citizens found on waking the next
morning after the battle, when the joyful news spread through the
town that the English had abandoned the bastilles on the northern side
of the city, leaving all their sick, stores, artillery, and
ammunition. That day Lord Talbot must have used expressions probably
not as poetical as those put into his mouth in the play of _Henry
VI._; but doubtless far more forcible--for it was now that he, for the
first time, felt the bitterness of defeat, the shame of turning his
back on his enemy; that enemy whom, until now, he had, after so many
victories, almost grown to despise.
'My thoughts are whirled like a potter's wheel;
I know not where I am, nor what I do:
A witch, by fear, not force, like Hannibal,
Drives back our troops, and conquers as she lists.'
But although retire he had to, Talbot's retreat was made in perfect
order, and in a kind of defiant fashion. Ranging his forces near to
and facing the town, he seemed inclined to make a further stand, if
not to carry out an attack against the city. Joan was prepared to
repel such an attack, but the English contented themselves with a mere
feint, a military demonstration.
The day was a Sunday, and Joan, ever loath to fight on that day,
refused to give the signal for attack, saying that if the enemy chose
to begin an engagement they would be met and defeated; but that she
could not sanction fighting on that holy day. Prepared for whatever
might occur, the Maid of Orleans then ordered that Mass should be
said at the head of her troops.
When the religious act was over:
'Look,' she said, 'whether the English have their faces or their backs
turned to us.'
And when she heard that they were in full retreat on Mehun-sur-Loire,
she added, 'Let them depart, in God's name: it is not His wish that
you should attack them to-day, and you will meet them again.'
After an hour's halt, the English continued to retreat, previously
setting fire to their bastilles, and carrying their prisoners with
them.
The day that saw the deliverance of Orleans was held for centuries as
a national day of rejoicing in the town, and seldom have the citizens
of any place had better cause for celebrating so joyful and honourable
an event. The siege which Joan had thus brought to an end began on the
12th of October (1428), and ended on the 8th of May (1429). Ten days
had sufficed for the heroic Maid to raise the English blockade.
Throughout France the effect of the news of the deliverance of Orleans
was prodigious; and although most of the English, no doubt, believed
that the result was owing to the instrumentality of the powers of
darkness, many saw in it the finger of God.
When the great news reached Paris on the 10th of May, Fauconbridge, a
clerk of Parliament, made the following note in his register:--'Quis
eventus fuerit novit Deus bellorum'; and on the margin of the
register he has traced a little profile sketch of a woman in armour,
holding in her right hand a pennon on which are inscribed the letters
I.H.S. In the other hand she holds a sword. This parchment may still
be seen in the National Archives in Paris.
Joan, having accomplished her undertaking, lost no time in returning
to the King at Chinon.
CHAPTER III.
_THE CORONATION AT RHEIMS._
Leaving the now free and happy town to jubilate in its deliverance
from the enemy, Joan of Arc went by Blois and Tours to Chinon. At
Tours the King had come to meet the Maid. When within sight of the
King, Joan dismounted and knelt before him. Charles came forward
bareheaded to meet her, and embraced her on the cheek; and, to use the
words of the chronicler, made her '_grande chère_'. It was on this
occasion that the King bestowed on Joan of Arc the badge of the Royal
Lily of France to place in her coat-of-arms. The cognizance consisted
of a sword supporting a royal crown, with the fleur-de-lis on either
side.
Joan now strongly urged the King to lose no time, but at once go to
Rheims, to be crowned. The fact of his being crowned and proclaimed
King of France would add infinitely to his prestige and authority; he
would then no longer be a mere Dauphin or King of Bourges, as the
English and Burgundians styled him. But now Joan found how many at
Court were lukewarm. The council summoned to deliberate on her
proposal alleged that the King's powers and purse would not enable
him to make so long and hazardous an expedition. Joan used every
argument in favour of setting out forthwith for Rheims: she declared
that the time given to her for carrying out her mission was short,
and, according to the Duke of Alençon's testimony, she said that after
the King was crowned she would deliver the Duke of Orleans from his
captivity in England, but that she had only one year in which to
accomplish this task; and therefore she prayed that there might be no
delay in starting for Rheims.
Charles was now staying at the Castle of Loches, that gloomy
prison-fortress whose dungeons were to become so terribly notorious in
the succeeding reign. Joan, whose impatience for action carried her
beyond the etiquette of the Court, entered on one occasion into the
King's private apartment, where the feeble and irresolute monarch was
consulting with his confessor the Bishop of Castres, Christophe
d'Harcourt, and Robert de Maçon. Kneeling, the Maid said:--
'Noble Dauphin, hold not such long and so many councils, but start at
once for Rheims, and there receive your crown.'
'Do your voices inspire this advice?' asked the King's confessor.
'Yes,' was the answer, 'and with vehemence.'
'Then,' said the Bishop, 'will you not tell us in the King's presence
in what way your voices communicate with you?'
To this Jesuitical query, Joan, in her simple and straightforward
manner, answered the priest, that when she met with people who doubted
the truth of her mission she would retire to her room and pray, and
then voices returned and spoke to her:--'Go forward, daughter of God,
and we will assist you,' and how hearing those voices and those words
she would rejoice and take courage, and only long that her then state
of happiness might last always. While telling them these things she
seemed a being transformed, surrounded by a something Divine and holy.
It was not unnatural that the King and his councillors should hesitate
before making up their minds to undertake the journey to Rheims, for
the English were posted in force at Beaugency, at Meun, where Talbot
was encamped, and at Jargeau. They also held a strong position on the
Loire; it would be difficult to reach Rheims without encountering some
of their forces. Jargeau had been attacked, indeed, by Dunois and
Xaintrailles, but unsuccessfully; and there was real danger in going
northwards while the English were still so plentiful and so strongly
entrenched in the towns of the centre and south of France. Another
reason for delaying the journey to Rheims and the ceremony of the
coronation, was that some time must elapse before the princes and
great nobles, who would have to take part in the coronation, could
assemble at Rheims.
Joan, thus thwarted in her wish of marching directly on to Rheims,
suggested driving the English from their fortresses and encampments
on the Loire. To this scheme the royal consent was obtained, and the
Duke of Alençon was placed in command of a small force of soldiers.
Joan directed the expedition, and it was ordered that nothing should
be done without the sanction of the Maid.
In a letter, dated the 8th June, 1429, written by the young Count of
Laval, who met Joan of Arc in Selles in Berri, the place of rendezvous
for the expedition, is a pleasant notice of the impression the heroine
caused him. He describes her as being completely armed, except that
her head was bare. She entertained the Count and his brother at
Selles. 'She ordered some wine,' he writes, 'and told me that I should
soon drink wine with her in Paris.' He adds that it was marvellous to
see and hear her. He also describes her leaving Selles that same
evening for Romorantin, with a portion of her troops. 'We saw her,' he
writes, 'clothed all in white armour excepting her head; her charger,
a great black one, plunged and reared at the door of her lodging, so
that she could not mount him. Then she said, "Lead him to the Cross,"
which cross stood in front of the church on the high road. And then he
stood quite still before the cross, and she mounted him; then as she
was riding away she turned her face to the people who were standing
near the door of the church; in her clear woman's voice she
said:--"You priests and clergy, make processions, and pray to God for
our success." Then she gave the word to advance, and with her banner
borne by a handsome page, and with her little battle-axe in her hand,
she rode away.'
The church before which this scene took place at Selles-sur-Cher still
exists, a fine massive building, dating from between the eleventh and
thirteenth centuries; but the old cross that stood before it, to which
Joan of Arc's black charger was led, has long ago disappeared.
In my opinion, this graphic description of the Maid of Orleans,
written by Guy de Laval to his parents, is the best that has come down
to our day of the heroine. There is to us a freshness about it which
proves how deeply the writer must have been stirred by that wonderful
character; it shows too that, with all her intensely religious and
mystic temperament, Joan of Arc had a good part of sprightliness and
_bonhomie_ in her character, which endeared her to those whose good
fortune it was to meet her.
The incident of the black charger standing so still beside the cross,
and the figure of the Maid, mystic, wonderful, in her white panoply,
with her head bare--that head which, in spite of no authentic portrait
having come down to us, we cannot but imagine a grand and noble
one--make up a living picture of historic truth, far above the fancies
evolved out of the brains of any writer of fiction--for is it not
romance realised?
The eagerness to accompany Joan of Arc in this expedition of the Loire
was great. The Duke of Alençon wrote to his mother to sell his lands
in order that money might be raised for the army. The King was unable
or unwilling to pay out of his coffers the expenses of the campaign.
From all sides came officers and men eager for new victories under the
banner of the Maid.
Joan led the vanguard, followed by Alençon, de Rais, Dunois, and
Gaucourt. At Orleans they were joined by fresh forces under Vendôme
and Boussac. On the 11th of June the army amounted to eight thousand
men. Jargeau was the first place to be attacked. Here Suffolk, with
between six and seven thousand men, all picked soldiers, had
established himself. Inferior in numbers, the English had the
advantage over the French in their artillery. In the meanwhile,
Bedford, who had news of Suffolk's peril, sent Fastolfe to Jargeau,
with a fresh force of five thousand men. But for some reason or other
Fastolfe seemed in no hurry to come to Suffolk's assistance; he lost
four days at Etampes, and four more at Jauville. Some alarm seems to
have been felt among the French troops at the news of Fastolfe's
approach. Joan mildly rebuked those who showed anxiety by saying to
them: 'Were I not sure of success, I would prefer to keep sheep than
to endure these perils.'
The faubourgs of the town of Jargeau were attacked and taken, but
before storming the place, Joan, according to her habit, sent a
summons to the army. She bade the enemy surrender: doing so, he would
be spared, and allowed to depart with his side-arms; if he refused,
the assault should be made at once. The English demanded an armistice
of fifteen days: hardly a reasonable request when it is remembered
that Fastolfe, with his reinforcements, might any day arrive before
Jargeau. Joan said they might leave, taking their horses with them,
but within the hour. To this the English would not consent, and it was
decided to attack upon the following morning.
The next day was a Tuesday; the signal was given at nine in the
morning. Joan had the trumpets sounded, and led on the attacking
column in person. Alençon appears to have thought the hour somewhat
early; but Joan overruled him by telling him that it was the Divine
will that the engagement should then take place. 'Travaillez,' she
repeated, 'Travaillez! et Dieu travaillera!'
These words may well be called Joan of Arc's life motto, and the
secret of her success. 'Had she,' she asked Alençon, 'ever given him
reason to doubt her word?' And she reminded him how she had promised
his wife to bring him, Alençon, back safe and sound from this
expedition. Joan seems throughout that day's fighting to have watched
over the Duke's safety with much anxious care; at one hour of the day
she bade him leave a position from which he was watching the attack,
as she told him that if he remained longer in that place he would get
slain from some catapult or engine, to which she pointed on the walls.
Hardly had the Duke left the spot when a Seigneur de Lude was struck
and killed by a shot from the very engine about which Joan had warned
Alençon.
Hour after hour raged the attack; both Joan and Alençon directed the
storming parties under a heavy fire. A stone from a catapult struck
Joan on her helmet as she was in the act of mounting a ladder--she
fell back, stunned, into the ditch, but soon revived, and rising, with
her undaunted courage, she turned to hearten her followers, declaring
that the victory would be theirs. In a few more moments the place was
in possession of the French. Suffolk fled to the bridge which spanned
the Loire: there he was captured. A soldier named William Regnault
beat him to the ground, but Suffolk refused to yield to one so low in
rank, and is said to have dubbed his victor knight before giving him
up his sword. Besides Suffolk, a brother of his was taken, and four or
five hundred men were killed or captured. The place was pillaged. The
most important of the prisoners were shipped to Orleans.
The following day Joan returned to Orleans with Alençon, where they
remained two days to rest their men, after which they proceeded to
Meun. This was a strongly fortified town on the Loire, about an equal
distance from Orleans on the west and from Jargeau on the east.
The first success of the French was the occupation of a bridge held by
the English. They then descended the river, and attacked the town of
Beaugency. This town had been abandoned by the English garrison, who
had thrown themselves into the castle. Here it was that the army of
the Loire was joined by the Constable de Richemont, who could be
almost considered as a little monarch in his own territory of
Brittany. This magnate appears to have been a somewhat unwelcome
addition to Joan and Alençon's army. He was, however, tolerated, if
not welcomed. Alençon and the Constable, who had till now been at
enmity, were reconciled by Joan's influence, and she paved the way for
a reconciliation between Richemont and the King.
It was high time that all the French princes should be reconciled, for
the danger from the invaders was still great even in the immediate
circle of the Court and army. A strong body of men was known to be on
the way from Paris, under the command of Fastolfe, and Talbot was
marching to meet him with a force from the Loire district; they soon
met, and together proceeded directly upon Orleans. Fastolfe appears to
have been disinclined to attack, his force being smaller than that of
the French; but Talbot was beside himself with rage at having to
retreat from Orleans, and swore by God and St. George that, even had
he to fight the enemy alone, fight he would. Fastolfe had to give way
to the fiery lord, although he told his commander that they had but a
handful of men compared to the French; and that if they were beaten,
all that King Henry V. had won in France with so much loss of life
would be again lost to the English.
Leaving some troops to watch the English garrisons in the castle of
Beaugency, Joan marched against the English. The hostile armies met
some two miles between Beaugency and Meun. The English had taken up a
place of vantage on the brow of a hill; their archers as usual were
placed in the front line, and before them bristled a stockade. The
French force numbered about six thousand, led by Joan of Arc, the Duke
of Alençon, Dunois, Lafayette, La Hire, Xaintrailles, and other
officers.
It was late in the day when heralds from the English lines arrived
with a defiant message for the French. Joan's answer was firm and
dignified. 'Go,' she said to the heralds, 'and tell your chiefs that
it is too late for us to meet to-night, but to-morrow, please God and
our Lady, we shall come to close quarters.'
The English were still strongly fortified in the little town of Meun.
A portion of their army left Beaugency in order to effect a junction
with their other comrades, and in perfect order Talbot commenced his
retreat on Paris, taking the northern road through the wooded land of
La Beauce. They were closely followed by the French, but neither army
had any idea how near they were to one another till a stag, startled
by the approach of the French, crossed the English advanced guard. The
shouts of the English soldiers on seeing the stag gallop by was the
first sign the French had of the propinquity of their foes. A hasty
council of war was held by the French commanders. Some were for delay
and postponing the attack until all their forces should be united; and
these, the more prudent, pointed out the inferiority of their force to
that of the enemy, arguing that a battle under the circumstances, in
the open country, would be hazardous. Joan of Arc, however, would not
listen to these monitions. 'Even,' she cried, 'if they reach up to the
clouds we must fight them!' And she prophesied a complete victory.
Although, as ever, anxious to command the attack, she allowed La Hire
to lead the van. His orders were to prevent the enemy advancing, and
to keep him on the defensive till the entire French force could reach
the ground. La Hire's attack proved so impetuous that the English
rearguard broke and fled back in confusion. Talbot, who had not had
time, so sudden and unexpected had been the French attack, to place
his archers and defend the ground, as was his wont, with palisades and
stockades, turned on the enemy like a lion at bay. Fastolfe now came
up to Talbot's succour; but his men were met by the rout of the
rearguard of the broken battle, and the fugitives caused a panic among
the new-comers. In vain did Sir John attempt to rally his men and face
the enemy. After a hopeless struggle, he too was borne off by the tide
of fugitives. One of these, an officer named Waverin, states the
English loss that day to have amounted to two thousand slain and two
hundred taken, but Dunois gives a higher figure, and places the
English killed at four thousand.
[Illustration: RHEIMS CATHEDRAL--WEST DOOR.]
This battle of Patay was the most complete defeat that the English had
met with during the whole length of that war of a hundred years
between France and England; and, to add to its completeness, the
hitherto undefeated Talbot was himself amongst the taken.
'You little thought,' said Alençon to him, when brought before him,
'that this would have happened to you!'
''Tis the fortune of war,' was the old hero's laconic answer.
The effects of this victory of Patay on the fortunes of the English in
France were greater than the deliverance of Orleans, and far more
disastrous, for the French had now for the first time beaten in the
open field their former victors. The once invincible were now the
vanquished, and the great names of Crecy, Poitiers, and Agincourt had
lost their glamour. When the news was known that the English under
Talbot and Fastolfe had been beaten, and that the great commander for
so many years the terror of France had been made a prisoner, and that
these mighty deeds had been accomplished by the advanced guard of the
French army under the inspiration of the Maid of Orleans, the whole
country felt that the knell of doom of the English occupation in
France had rung.
There is an anecdote relating to Joan of Arc at Patay that should find
a place here. After the battle, and while the prisoners were being
marched off by the French, Joan was distressed to see the brutality
with which those captives unable to pay a ransom were treated. One
poor fellow she saw mortally wounded by his captors. Flinging herself
from her saddle, she knelt by the side of the dying man, and, having
sent for a priest to shrive him, she remained by the poor fellow's
side and attended to him to the end, and by her tender ministrations
helped him to pass more gently over the dark valley of death.
Michelet discovered this story in the deposition of Joan of Arc's
page, Louis de Contes, who was probably an eye-witness of the scene.
With this brilliant victory at Patay closed Joan of Arc's short but
glorious campaign on the Loire. Briefly, this was the career of her
victories:--On the 11th of June the Maid attacked Jargeau, which
surrendered the next day. On the 13th she re-entered Orleans, where
she rallied her troops. On the 15th she occupied the bridge at Meun,
and the following day she attacked Beaugency, which yielded on the day
after. The English had in vain hoped to relieve Jargeau: they arrived
too late. After the fall of Beaugency they fell back, and were
defeated at Patay on the 18th.
A wonderful week's work was this campaign, ordered and led by a maiden
of eighteen. What made Joan of Arc's success more remarkable is the
fact that among the officers who served under her many were lukewarm
and repeatedly foiled her wishes. And it is not difficult to trace the
feeling of jealousy that existed among her officers; for here was one
not knight or noble, not prince, or even soldier, but a village
maiden, who had succeeded in a few days in turning the whole tide of
a war, which had lasted with disastrous effects for several
generations, into a succession of national victories. This
professional jealousy, as one may call it, among the French military
leaders was fomented and aggravated by the perfidious counsellors
about the King. The only class who thoroughly appreciated and were
really worthy of the Maid and her mission, were the people. And it is
still by the people that everlasting gratitude and love of the heroic
Maid are most deeply felt.
While Joan was gaining a succession of victories on the Loire, the
indolent King was on a visit to La Tremoïlle at his castle of
Sully-sur-Loire. Accompanied by Alençon and the Constable Richemont,
Joan repaired to Sully. She had promised to make the peace between
Charles and Richemont, and as the Constable had brought with him from
his lands in Brittany fifteen hundred men as a peace-offering, the
reconciliation was not a matter of much difficulty. La Tremoïlle saw
with an evil feeling the ever-growing popularity of Joan, and feared
her daily increasing influence with the King; but he could not prevent
the march on Rheims, much as he probably wished to do so. It was
arranged that the army should be concentrated at Gien. From Gien, Joan
addressed a letter to the citizens of Tournay, a town of doubtful
loyalty to Charles, and much under the influence of the Burgundian
party. She summoned in this letter those who were loyal to Charles to
attend the King's forthcoming coronation.
On the 28th of June the King and Court left Gien, on their northern
march. That march was not a simple matter, for a country had to be
traversed in which the towns and castles still bristled with English
garrisons, or with doubtful allies. Auxerre belonged to the Burgundian
party, always in alliance with the English; Troyes was garrisoned with
a mixed force of English and Burgundians; and the strongly fortified
places on the Loire, such as Marchenois, Cosne, and La Charité, were
still held by the English troops. Charles' army had no artillery; it
was therefore out of the question to storm or besiege towns however
hostile, and the counsellors and creatures of the King urged him not
to risk the dangers of a journey to Rheims under such disadvantageous
circumstances.
Joan, wearied out by the endless procrastination and hesitation of the
King, left him, and preferred a free camp in the open fields to the
purlieus of the Court, with its feeble sovereign and plotting
courtiers. Joan of Arc on this occasion may be said to have 'sulked,'
but she showed her usual common sense in what she did, and her leaving
the Court seems to have given the vacillating King a momentary feeling
of shame and remorse. Orders were issued that the Court should be
moved on the 29th of June.
The royal army which started on that day for Rheims numbered twelve
thousand men; but this force was greatly increased on its march. By
the side of the King rode the Maid of Orleans; on the other side of
the King, Alençon. The Counts of Clermont, of Vendôme, and of
Boulogne--all princes of the blood--came next. Dunois, the Maréchal de
Boussac (Saint-Sevère), and Louis Admiral de Culan followed. And then,
in a crowd of knights and captains, rode the Seigneurs de Rais, de
Laval, de Loheac, de Chauvigny, La Hire, Xaintrailles, La Tremoïlle,
and many others.
Before the town of Auxerre a halt was called: it was still under the
influence of the English and Burgundians. A deputation waited upon
Charles, provisions were sent to the army, but the town was not
entered. Outside its fortifications the army rested three days, after
which it continued its march to Saint-Florentin, whose gates swung
open to the King; thence on to Brinon l'Archevêque, whence Charles
forwarded a messenger with a letter to his lieges at Rheims,
announcing his approach.
On the 4th of July the royal force had reached Saint-Fal, near Troyes.
Joan of Arc despatched a messenger summoning that place to open its
gates to the King; but Troyes was strongly garrisoned by a force of
half English half Burgundian soldiers, and these had sent for succour
to the English Regent, the Duke of Bedford. The army of the King
arrived before the gates of the town on the 4th of July; a sally was
made by the hostile garrison, but this was driven back. _Pour-parlers_
ensued. The King's heralds were informed by the garrison officers that
they had sworn to the Duke of Burgundy not to allow, without his
leave, any other troops to enter their gates. They went further, and
insulted the Maid of Orleans in gross terms, calling her a
'_cocquarde_'--whatever that ugly term may mean.
The situation was embarrassing. How could the town be taken without a
siege train and artillery? But to leave it in the rear, with its
strong garrison, would be madness. The King's men were in favour of
retiring and abandoning the expedition to Rheims. There happened to be
within the town of Troyes at this time a famous monk of the preaching
kind, named Father Richard. Father Richard had been a pilgrim, and had
visited the Holy Land, and had made himself notorious by interminable
sermons, for he was wont to preach half-a-dozen hours at a time.
Crowds had listened to him in Paris and other places. The English, who
probably thought his sermons insufferably long, or too much leavened
with French sympathies, drove him out of Paris, and he had taken
refuge at Troyes. The monk had heard much of Joan of Arc, and was
eager to see and speak with her, but his enthusiasm was mixed with a
religious and even superstitious fear in regard to the heroine. He was
allowed to enter the royal precincts, and approached the Maid of
Orleans with many a sign of the cross, and with sprinkling of holy
water. Seeing the good man's terror, Joan told him to approach her
without fear.
'Come forward boldly!' she said to the monk. 'I shall not fly away!'
And after convincing him that she was not a demon in any way, she made
him the bearer of a letter from her to the people in the town. The
negotiations between the army and the burghers lasted five days; the
town refusing to admit the King, and the King unwilling to pass the
town, but unable to take it by force. Charles was on the point of
giving up the attempt to reach Rheims when one of his Council pointed
out that as the expedition had been undertaken at the instigation of
Joan of Arc, it was only fair her judgment should now be followed, and
not that of any one else. Joan was summoned before the Council, when
she solemnly assured the King that in three days' time the place would
be taken.
'If we were sure of it,' said the Chancellor, 'we would wait here six
days.'
'Six days!' said the Maid. 'You will enter Troyes to-morrow.'
Mounting her horse, the Maid rode into the camp, and ordered all to
prepare to carry out a general assault on the next morning. Anything
that could be used in the shape of furniture and fagots, to make a
bridge across the town ditches, was collected. Joan, who had now her
tent moved up close to the moat, worked harder, says an eye-witness,
than any two of the most skilful captains in preparing the attack. She
directed that fascines should be thrown into the moat, across which
the troops were to pass to the town.
Early next day everything was in readiness for the attack, but at this
juncture, just as she was preparing to lead the storming party, the
Bishop of Troyes, John Laiguise, attended by a deputation of the
principal citizens, came from the town with offers of capitulation.
The people were ready to place themselves at the King's mercy, owing
probably to the terror the preparations made by Joan of Arc on the
previous evening had inspired them with, mixed, too, with the
superstitious dread they felt for her presence. Had not even the
English soldiers declared that, when attacked by the terrible Maiden,
they had seen what appeared to be flights of white butterflies
sparkling all around her form! How could these good people of Troyes
hope to withstand such a power? To add to this fear, it was remembered
by the citizens of Troyes that in it had been signed and concluded the
shameful treaty by which Charles VII. had been disinherited from his
crown and possessions. The people therefore gave in without further
struggle. The conditions of capitulation were soon arranged. The
burghers were granted the immunity of their persons and their goods,
and certain liberties for their commerce. All those traders who held
any office at the hands of the English government were to continue the
enjoyment of these offices or benefices, with the condition of taking
them up again at the hands of the King of France. No garrison would be
quartered upon the town, and the English and Burgundian soldiers were
to be allowed to depart with their goods.
The next day--the 10th of July--Charles and his host entered Troyes in
state, the Maid of Orleans riding by the side of the King, her banner
displayed as was her custom.
When, as had been arranged in the treaty of capitulation, the foreign
soldiers began to leave the place with bag and baggage (goods), Joan
was indignant at finding that some of these so-called goods were
nothing less than French prisoners. This was a thing that she could
not tolerate, treaty or no treaty; and, placing herself at the gate of
the town, she insisted that her imprisoned countrymen should be left
in her charge. The King naturally felt obliged to gratify her; so he
released the captives, and paid their ransom down. Before leaving
Troyes the next day, William Bellier, who had been Joan's host at
Chinon, was left as bailiff of the place, along with other officers.
Thence the army moved on by way of Châlons. Though still in the hands
of the English, a deputation of clergy and citizens met the King, and
placed themselves at his orders.
While in the neighbourhood of Châlons, Joan of Arc met some friends
who had arrived from Domremy; among them were two old village
companions, Gerardin d'Epinal and John Morel, to whom she gave her red
dress. In conversation with these she said that the only dread she had
in the future was treachery: a dread which seems to point in some
strange prophetic manner to the fate which was so soon to meet her at
Compiègne.
It was on the evening of the 16th of July that the royal host at
length came in sight of the massive towers of the great cathedral
church of Rheims. It was at Sept Saulx, about eight miles' distance
from Rheims, that the King waited for a deputation to reach him from
the town. Rheims was still filled with the English and Burgundian
adherents, and had Bedford chosen to throw, as he could well have
done, a force into that place, Charles might yet have been prevented
from entering its gates. Perhaps Bedford did not believe in the
possibility of Charles arriving at his goal, and had counted on the
King's well-known weakness and indecision, and on the hesitation of
such men as La Tremoïlle and others of his Council. The Regent had
received assurances from the officials in Rheims that they would not
admit Charles. But after what passed at Troyes and at Châlons, Charles
had not long to wait for a favourable answer from his lieges at
Rheims. Indeed, the deputation which met him at Sept Saulx were
effusive in their good offices and entreaties that the King should
forthwith enter his good city of Rheims.
The Archbishop (Regnault de Chartres), who had preceded the King by a
few hours to his town, came out to meet the King at the head of the
corporation and civic companies. From all sides flocked crowds eager
to welcome the King, and even more the Maid of Orleans. In those days
the people's cry of joy and triumph was '_Noël!_'--but why that cry of
Christmas joy had become the popular hosanna, it is not easy to
conjecture.
Throughout that night the preparations for the coronation were
feverishly made both within and without the cathedral. On the 17th of
July, with all the pomp and ceremony that the church and army could
bestow, the King was crowned and anointed with the holy oil which four
of his principal officers had brought to the cathedral from the
ancient abbey church of Saint-Remy.
There exist few grander fanes in Christendom than the great cathedral
of Rheims. The thirteenth century, so prolific of splendid churches,
had expended all its wealth of lavish decoration on the gorgeous
portal, with its array of saints and sovereigns, under which passed
Charles VII. of France, with the Maid of Orleans on his right hand.
Hurried as had been the preparations for the ceremonial, the even then
ancient and venerable rites must have deeply impressed the spectators,
and the semi-sacred act was carried out with scrupulous care--the King
crowned and anointed with the holy oil, surrounded on his throne by
the ecclesiastical peers and high dignitaries of the Church, and
waited on by the secular peers during the crowning and after at the
coronation banquet.
At length was accomplished the darling wish of Joan of Arc's heart,
for now her King was regarded and sanctioned by all true French
persons as King of France, by the grace of God and Holy Church.
When the King received the crown from the hands of the Archbishop, a
peal of trumpets rang out, with such a mighty volume of sound that the
very roof of the cathedral seemed to shake again. Ingres, in his
striking picture of Joan of Arc, now in the gallery of the Louvre,
represents her standing by the high altar, clad in her white panoply
of shining steel, her banner held on high; below bows in prayer her
confessor, the priest Pasquerel, in his brown robes of the Order of
Augustin; and beyond stand her faithful squire and pages. The
heroine's face is raised, and on it sits a radiant look of mingled
gratitude and triumph. It is a noble idea of a sublime figure.
When the long-drawn-out ceremony came to an end, and after the people
had shouted themselves hoarse in crying 'Noël!' and 'Long live King
Charles!'--Joan, who had remained by the King throughout the day,
knelt at his feet and, according to one chronicle, said these words:
'Now is finished the pleasure of God, who willed that you should come
to Rheims and receive your crown, proving that you are truly the King,
and no other, to whom belongs this land of France.'
Many besides the King are said to have shed tears at that moment.
That seemed indeed the moment of Joan of Arc's triumph. The _Nunc
Dimittis_ might well have then echoed from her lips; but in the midst
of all the rejoicing and festivity at this time Joan had saddened
thoughts and melancholy forebodings as to the future. While the
people shouted 'Noël!' as she rode through the jubilant streets by the
side of the King, she turned to the Archbishop, and said: 'When I die
I should wish to be buried here among these good and devout people.'
And on the prelate asking her how it was that at such a moment her
mind should set itself on the thought of death, and when she expected
her death to happen, she answered: 'I know not--it will come when God
pleases; but how I would that God would allow me to return to my home,
to my sister and my brothers! For how glad would they be to see me
back again. At any rate,' she added, 'I have done what my Saviour
commanded me to do.'
Her mission was indeed accomplished: that is to say, if her mission
consisted of the two great deeds which while at Chinon she had
repeatedly assured her listeners she was born to accomplish. These
were, first, to drive the English out of Orleans, and thereby deliver
that town; the second, to take the King to Rheims, where he would
receive his crown. The other enterprises, such as the wish to deliver
the Duke of Orleans from his captivity in England, and then to wage a
holy war against the Moslems, may be left out of the actual task
which, encouraged by her voices, Joan had set herself to accomplish.
But the two great deeds had now been carried out--and with what
marvellous rapidity! In spite of all the obstacles placed in her path,
not only by the enemies of her country, but by those nearest to the
ear of the King, Orleans had been delivered in four days' time, the
English host had been in a week driven out of their strongholds on the
Loire, and defeated in a pitched battle! The King unwillingly, and
with many of his Court opposed to the enterprise, after passing
through a country strongly occupied by the enemy without having lost a
man, had by the tact and courage of Joan of Arc been enabled to reach
Rheims; and after this successful march he had received his crown
among his peers and lieges, as though the country were again at peace,
and no English left on the soil of France. What was still more
surprising was, that all these things should have been accomplished at
the instigation and by the direction of a Maid who only a few months
before had been an unknown peasant in a small village of Lorraine. How
had she been able not only to learn the tactics of a campaign, the
rudiments of the art of war, but even the art itself? No one had shown
in these wars a keener eye for selecting the weakest place to attack,
or where artillery and culverin fire could be used with most effect,
or had been quicker to avail himself of these weapons. No one saw with
greater rapidity--(that rarest of military gifts)--when the decisive
moment had arrived for a sudden attack, or had a better judgment for
the right moment to head a charge and assault. How indeed must the
knights and commanders, bred to the use of arms since their boyhood,
have wondered how this daughter of the peasants had obtained the
knowledge which had placed her at their head, and enabled her to gain
successes and reap victories against the enemy, which until she came
none of them had any hope of obtaining. They indeed could not account
for it, except that in Joan of Arc was united not only the soul of
patriotism and a faith to move mountains, but the qualities of a great
captain as well. That, it seems to us, must have been the conclusion
that her comrades in arms arrived at regarding the Maid of Orleans.
Dunois stated that until the advent of the Maid the French had no
longer the courage to attack the English in the open field, but that
since she had inspired them with her courage they were ready to attack
any force of the army, however superior it might be. This testimony
was confirmed by Alençon also: he declared that in things outside the
province of warfare she was in every respect as simple as a young
girl; but in all that concerned the science of war she was thoroughly
skilled, from the management of a lance in rest to that of marshalling
an army; and that as regarded the use of artillery she was eminently
qualified. All the military commanders, he said, were amazed to see in
her as much skill as could be expected in a seasoned captain who had
profited by a training of from twenty to thirty years. 'But,' added
the Duke, 'it is principally in her use of artillery that she
displays her most complete talent.' And he proceeds to bear his high
tribute to her goodness of heart, which she displayed on every
possible occasion.
[Illustration: RHEIMS CATHEDRAL INTERIOR]
Although her physical courage enabled her to face the greatest perils
and personal risks, she had a horror of bloodshed, and though her
spirit was 'full of haughty courage, not fearing death nor shrinking
distress, but resolute in most extremes,' she never entered battle but
bearing her banner in her hand; and to the last day of her appearance
on the field she strove with all her great moral force to induce the
rude and brutal men around her to become more humane even in the
hurly-burly of the din of battle. All unnecessary cruelty and
bloodshed made her suffer intensely, and we have seen how she
ministered to the English wounded who had fallen in fight. As far as
she could she prevented pillage, and she would only promise her
countrymen success on the condition that they should not prey upon the
citizens of the places they conquered. Even when she had passed the
day fasting on horseback, Joan would refuse any food unless it had
been honourably obtained. As a child she had been taught to be
charitable and to give to the needy, and she carried out these
Christian principles when at the head of armies; the 'quality of
mercy' with her was ever present. She distributed to the poor all she
had with her, and would say, with what truth God knows, 'I have been
sent for the consolation of the poor and the relief of the needy.' She
would take upon herself the charge of the wounded; indeed, she
may be considered as the precursor of all the noble hearts who in
modern warfare follow armies in order to alleviate and help the sick
and wounded. And she tended with equal care and sympathy the wounded
among the enemy, as well as those of her own side.
This is no invention, no fancy of romance, but the plain truth; for
there can be no disputing the testimony of those who followed Joan of
Arc and saw her acts.
Regarding herself, Joan of Arc said she was but a servant and an
instrument under Divine command. When people would avow that such
works as she had carried out had never been done in former times, she
would simply say: 'My Saviour has a book in which no one has ever
read, however learned a scholar he may be.'
In all things she was pure and saint-like, and her wonderful life, as
Michelet has truly said of it, was a living legend. Had she not been
inspired by her voices and her visions to take up arms for the
salvation of her country, Joan of Arc would probably have lived and
ended her obscure life in some place of holy retreat. An all-absorbing
love for all things sacred was her ruling idiosyncrasy. From her
childhood her delight was to hear the church bells, the music of
anthems, the sacred notes of the organ. Never did she miss attending
the Church festivals. When within hail of a church it was her wont,
however hurried the march, to enter, attended by any of the soldiers
whom she could induce to follow her, and kneel with them before the
altar. At the close of some stirring day passed in the midst of the
din of battle, and after being for hours in the saddle, she would, ere
she sought rest, always return thanks to her God and His saints for
their succour.
Joan also loved to mix in the crowd of poor citizens, and begged that
the little children should be brought to her. Pasquerel, her
confessor, was always told to remind Joan of Arc of the feast days on
which children were allowed to receive the Communion, in order that
she too might receive it with these innocents.
The army has probably ever been the home of high swearing: the
expression in French of '_ton de garnison_' is an amiable way of
referring to that habit of speech; and we all know ancient warriors
whose conversation is thickly larded with oaths and profanity. This
habit Joan of Arc seems to have held in great abhorrence. We have seen
how she got La Hire to swear only by his stick; to another officer of
high rank, who had been making use of some strong oaths, she said:
'How can you thus blaspheme your Saviour and your God by so using His
name?' Let us hope her lesson bore fruit.
Throughout the land Joan of Arc was now regarded as the Saviour of
France. Nor at this time did the King prove ungrateful. In those days
nobility was highly regarded. It brought with it great prestige, and
much benefit accrued to the holders of titles. Charles now raised the
Maid of Orleans to the equal in rank of a Count, and bestowed upon
her an establishment and household. The grateful burghers of Orleans,
too, loaded her with gifts, all which honours Joan received with quiet
modesty. For herself she never asked anything. After the coronation at
Rheims, when the King begged her to make him a request, the only thing
she asked was, that the taxes might be taken off her native village.
Her father, who came to see her at Rheims, had the satisfaction of
carrying back this news to Domremy.
Although both King and nobles vied in paying honours to Joan of Arc,
it was from the common people, from the heart of the nation, that she
received what seems to have amounted to a feeling approaching
adoration. Wherever she passed she was followed by crowds eager to
kiss her feet and her hands, and who even threw themselves before her
horse's feet. Medals were struck and worn as charms, with her effigy
or coat-of-arms struck on them. Her name was introduced into the
prayers of the Church.
Joan, although touched by these marks of affection, never allowed the
people, as far as in her power lay, to ascribe unearthly influence to
her person. When in the course of her trial the accusation that the
people had made her an object of adoration was brought as a proof of
her heresy, she said: 'In truth I should not have been able to have
prevented that from being so, had God not protected me Himself from
such a danger.'
CHAPTER IV.
_THE CAPTURE._
We must now glance at the movements of the English since the
deliverance of Orleans and their defeat at Patay, and the French
King's coronation.
What proves the utter demoralisation of the English at this time is
that the Regent Bedford was not only afraid of remaining in Paris, but
had also taken refuge in the fortress of Vincennes. He was so poor
that he could not pay the members of Parliament sitting in Paris. Like
other bodies receiving no pay, the Parliament declined to work. So
restricted were all things then in Paris that when the child-king
(Henry VI.) was brought from London to be crowned there, not enough
parchment could be found on which to register the details of his
arrival.
For want of a victim to assuage his ire, the Regent disgraced Sir John
Fastolfe, whom he unknighted and ungartered, in order to punish him
for the defeat at Patay; and he wrote that the English reverses had
been caused by 'a disciple and lyme of the Feende, called the Pucelle,
that used fals enchantements and sorcerie.'
The Regent, whose degrading of Fastolfe and vituperation of Joan of
Arc did not serve to help, applied to his powerful brother-in-law, the
Duke of Burgundy, for aid. Burgundy came to the Regent's assistance,
bringing a small force with him from Picardy. Then Bedford bethought
him of his powerful relation in England, Henry Beaufort, the Bishop of
Winchester. Most opportunely for the Regent, the Bishop had collected
an army for the suppression of the Bohemian Hussites. The Regent
implored his uncle, the Bishop, to send this army for the defence of
the English and their interests, now in such dire jeopardy. Winchester
was a mean, avaricious prince, and his aid had to be bought. A treaty
was signed on the 1st of July, in which Winchester promised to bring
his troops to his nephew's assistance; but he delayed stirring till
the middle of that month. It pleased the crafty Bishop to know that
his great wealth made him all-powerful in England; for the English
Protector, the Duke of Gloucester, was a mere cipher compared to
Winchester; and now that his other nephew, the Protector of France,
was in distress, he could dictate his own terms to both. It was not
until the 25th of July that Winchester at length arrived with his army
in Paris. Then Bedford breathed more freely, and left the capital with
an army of observation to watch the movements of the French King.
It was now the earnest wish of Joan of Arc that Charles should march
direct on Paris, and perhaps had he done so he might have entered
that city with as little difficulty as he had entered Rheims; for if
once the King of France had appeared in person, many of the wealthy
citizens, as well as the majority of the common people, would have
welcomed him. Charles, however, as usual vacillated, and the precious
moment slipped by.
Philip (called 'the Good'), Duke of Burgundy, was at this time one of
the most powerful princes of Christendom. In addition to his titular
domain, he held the wealthy provinces of Burgundy, including Brabant,
Flanders, Franche-Comté, Holland, Namur, Lower Lorraine, Luxembourg,
Artois, Hainault, Zealand, Friesland, Malines, and Salines. This
much-territoried potentate was at the present juncture coquetting both
with Bedford and with Charles, playing one against the other. To the
former he promised an army, but only contributed a handful of men; to
the latter he made advances of friendship, as false as the man who
made them.
Joan had despatched two letters of a conciliatory tone to the Duke of
Burgundy from Rheims. The original of one of these is to be seen in
the archives at Lille. Like most of Joan of Arc's letters, it
commences with the name of Jesus and Mary. As Joan could not write,
the only portion of this letter which bears the mark of her hand is
the sign of the Cross placed at the left of those names at the top of
the document. She strongly urged the Duke in these letters to make
peace with the King; she appeals on the score of his relationship with
Charles, to his French blood, in order to prevent further bloodshed,
and to aid the rightful King. While waiting some definite answer from
the Duke, the King went to Vailly-sur-Aisne from Rheims. He arrived at
Soissons on the 28th of July, and Château Thierry on the next day.
Montmirail was reached on the 1st of August, Provins on the 2nd. It
will be seen that, instead of marching straight upon Paris, the King
was making a mere detour from Rheims towards the Loire.
It was soon evident that Charles and his civil councillors had no
intention of advancing direct upon Paris, and were merely marching and
counter-marching until they could, as they trusted, get the Duke of
Burgundy to join them.
In the meanwhile, Bedford saw his opportunity, and made prompt use of
it. Early in the month of August he issued a proclamation calling on
all the subjects of Henry of England in France and Normandy to rally
round their liege lord. Leaving Paris on the 25th of July, Bedford
marched to Melun with a force of ten thousand men. Melun was reached
on the 4th of August. On the day after Bedford's arrival at Melun a
letter was sent by Joan of Arc to her friends at Rheims, announcing
that the King's retreat on the Loire would not be continued by his
Majesty. The King had, in fact, met with a check to his advanced guard
at Bray-sur-Seine. Charles had, she informed her correspondents,
concluded a truce of fifteen days with the Duke of Burgundy, at the
expiration of which the Duke had promised to surrender Paris to the
King. But, she adds, it could not be certain whether the Duke would
keep to his promise. She concludes her letter by saying that should
the treaty not hold good, then the army of the King would be able to
take active measures.
This letter is vaguely dated from a lodging on the road to Paris. It
was, she knew, necessary to be near the capital at the close of the
period stipulated by Burgundy, and the royal army accordingly took the
northern road, leading to Paris.
On the 7th of August the royal force reached Coulommiers; on the 10th
La Ferté Milon, and on the 11th Crespy-en-Valois. Bedford, apprised of
this change in the movements of his foe, sent off an insulting letter
to Charles, whom he addressed as 'Charles who called himself Dauphin,
and now calls himself King!' The Regent reproaches the King for having
taken the crown of France, which he said belonged to the rightful King
of France and of England, King Henry; and he then styles the Maid of
Orleans 'an abandoned and ill-famed woman, draped in men's clothes and
leading a corrupt life.' He bids Charles to make either his peace with
him or to meet him face to face. Altogether a most rude, abusive, and
ungallant letter for one prince to send to another. This letter
reached Charles at Crespy-en-Valois on the 11th of August. Bedford was
then close at hand, and eager to provoke the King into attacking him.
Charles contented himself with pushing on his advanced guard as far as
Dammartin, remaining himself at Lagny-le-Sec.
During the 13th of August skirmishes took place between the advanced
guards of the armies, but without any result.
Bedford now returned to Paris--in order to collect more troops, some
said, others that he had found the French too strong to attack. The
towns and villages around Paris, hearing of these events, and that the
English had returned to the capital, showed now their readiness to
join the French cause.
On his way to Compiègne news reached the French King that Bedford had
left Paris and marched on Senlis. On the 15th of August the French
attacked the English at dawn. Their army, formed into companies, was
commanded by Alençon, René d'Anjou, the King, who had with him La
Tremoïlle, and Clermont. Joan of Arc was at the head of a detachment
with Dunois and La Hire. The English held a strong position, which
they had made still more so by throwing up palisades and digging
ditches.
What appeared destined to be a great engagement ended in a mere
skirmish. Neither Charles nor Bedford were eager to pit all on a
stake, and both preferred to play a waiting game. Charles retired on
Crecy, while Joan of Arc remained in the field. She had done all that
courage and audacity could to induce the English to attack. She had
ridden up to their palisades and struck them with the staff of her
banner. But nothing would make the English fight that day; and the
next, Joan had the mortification of watching the retreat of the
English upon Paris. Joan had nothing now left her to do but to rejoin
the King at Crecy.
On the 17th the King received the keys of the town of Compiègne, and
there he was welcomed on the next day with much loyalty. It was during
his stay at Compiègne that Charles heard the welcome news that the
people of Senlis had admitted the Count of Vendôme within their walls,
and had bestowed on him the governorship of their town. Beauvais had
also shown its loyalty, had made an ovation in honour of the King, and
had ordered the _Te Deum_ to be sung, greatly to the annoyance of the
Bishop of that place--Peter Cauchon--a creature of the Anglo-Burgundian
faction, of whom we shall hear a good deal later on.
Charles remained at Compiègne until the expiration of the term during
which the treaty with the Duke of Burgundy relating to the disposal of
Paris remained open; but the negotiations ended in Burgundy contenting
himself with sending to Charles, John of Luxembourg and the Bishop of
Arras with words of peace. Arrangements were projected that in order
to come to a general peace the Duke of Savoy was to be called in as
mediator. In the meanwhile a truce was proposed, which was to last
until Christmas, with the proviso that the town of Compiègne should be
ceded to Burgundy during the continuance of the armistice. No allusion
appears to have been made regarding the fate of Paris.
Joan of Arc, knowing that without Paris all that she had fought for
and obtained would soon again be lost, resolved to see what she could
do without coming to the King for assistance. She bade Alençon be
ready to accompany her, as she wished, so she expressed it, to see
Paris at closer quarters than she had yet been able to do.
Joan of Arc left Compiègne accompanied by the Duke of Alençon on the
23rd of August, taking a strong force with them. At Senlis they
collected more troops; on the 26th they arrived at Saint Denis. Here
they were joined by the King, who may be supposed to have felt some
shame at not having started with them from Compiègne; he came very
unwillingly, it is said, for all that.
Bedford left Paris precipitately for Normandy, owing to the discovery
of a plot having been started to make over Rouen to the French. This
event must have opened the Regent's eyes to the uncertain tenure the
English held even in the old duchy of their kings. Bedford had left
Louis of Luxembourg in Paris to command its garrison of two thousand
English soldiers. De L'Isle Adam was in command of the Burgundian
soldiers. In addition to Luxembourg, who was a bishop (of Thérouanne)
as well as a soldier, Bedford had given charge of the joint command to
an English officer named Radley. The Bishop summoned the Parliament in
order that it should swear fealty to King Henry VI. The town walls and
ditches were carefully repaired and renewed. Guns were placed on the
towers, walls, and batteries; immense quantities of ammunition of iron
and stone were piled ready at hand, to be used for the defence of all
the gates and approaches of the city. The moats were deepened, and by
dint of threats and menace, and by frightening the people as to the
terrible revenge the French King would take on the town and its people
when it fell into his power, the citizens were cajoled into being made
the agents of their natural enemies, and in sheer terror helped to
strengthen the defences of their town.
During the first days of the siege only a few unimportant skirmishes
took place between besieged and besiegers. Joan of Arc was
indefatigable, and with her keen eye sought out the likeliest place
where an assault might be successfully carried; but she lacked troops
for storming such strong outworks as Paris then had. The capital was
not only defended by walls and towers, but the English held both the
upper and lower banks of the Seine.
From Saint Denis no assistance came from the King, and it was only on
the 8th of September that, having received reinforcements, Joan of Arc
was at length enabled to make a determined attack. It was a very high
and holy day in the Church Calendar--the Feast of the Virgin's
Nativity--and, not unmindful of the sacredness of that feast-day, Joan
of Arc had determined to make a general attack; for 'the better the
day the better the deed!' was her feeling on that anniversary. In
those times the western limit of Paris was where now the wide
thoroughfare of the Avenue de l'Opéra runs from north to south. The
walls of the city erected under Charles V., flanked by huge moats and
protected by double fortress towers, each tower having a double
drawbridge, made any attack almost a forlorn hope. The Regent's
departure from Paris points to the little fear he felt that Paris
could be taken by assault; and in this matter Bedford judged rightly.
Whether or not Joan felt that some Divine assistance would enable her
to surmount the barriers that lay between her and the town she was so
determined to win back for her King, we cannot say. She fought below
the walls with a courage which, if the others had equalled, might have
made Paris their own. The attacking force was divided into two
parts--one, commanded by Joan, Rais, and De Gaucourt, was to attack
the city at the Gate of Saint Honoré; the other, led by Alençon and
Clermont, was to cover the assailants, and prevent any sorties being
made by the garrison.
Joan's impetuous onslaught successfully carried the first barriers and
the boulevard in front of the gate; but here she met with a check--the
heavy gates were barred, nor could she prevail on the enemy to make a
sortie.
Joan of Arc, carrying her flag, dashed, under a heavy fire, into the
ditch, followed by a few of the most courageous of the soldiers. The
ditch was a deep but a dry one; and rising on the further side, close
beneath the town walls, was a second and a wider moat, full of water.
Here, unable to advance, but unwilling to retire, Joan of Arc and her
followers were exposed to a murderous hail of shot, arrows, and other
missiles. Sending for fagots and fascines to be cast into the moat, in
order to enable a kind of bridge to be thrown across, while probing
with the staff of her banner the depth of the water, Joan was struck
by a cross-bow bolt, which made a deep wound in her thigh. Refusing to
leave the spot, she urged on the soldiers to fill the ditch. The day
was waxing late, and the men, who had been fighting since noon, were
nearly exhausted. The news of Joan having been wounded caused a kind
of panic among the French. There came a lull in the fighting, and the
recall was sounded. Joan had almost to be forced back from before the
walls by the Duke of Alençon and other of the officers. Placed upon
her horse, she was led back to the camp, Joan protesting the whole
time that if the attack had only been continued it would have been
crowned with success. The spot where the heroine is supposed to have
been wounded is near where now stands Fremiet's spirited statue of the
Maid of Orleans, between the Rue Saint Honoré--named in later days
after the gate she had so gallantly attacked--and the Gardens of the
Tuileries.
Within the town a great fear had fallen on the citizens, divided as
they were between the hope of their countrymen forcing their way into
the city and fear as to how they would be treated by Charles should he
be victorious. Perhaps, had Joan of Arc's urgent entreaties of
continuing the attack been more vigorously responded to by the other
French commanders, she might have been in the end successful. At any
rate Joan herself was of that opinion.
The following day she was, in spite of the previous evening's failure
and her wound, as urgent as ever for further fighting; and again and
again implored Alençon to renew the attack. It seems the Duke was on
the point of complying, when there appeared on the scene René d'Anjou
and Clermont, sent by the King with the order for the Maid's immediate
return to Saint Denis. There was nothing to do but to obey, but it
must have been a bitter disappointment to the brave maiden when she
turned her back on Paris. Alençon did his best to encourage her in the
hope that it might yet fall. He gave orders for a bridge to be thrown
across the Seine at Saint Denis, in order to make a fresh attack on
the city from that quarter. However, on the next night this bridge was
ordered by Charles to be removed, and with its destruction fell any
hopes Joan might still have entertained of being able to take Paris.
All the blame of the want of success of the army before Paris was now
laid at the door of Joan of Arc; and the creatures of the Court, who
had long waited for an opportunity of this kind to show their bitter
jealousy of the heroine, now made no secret of their enmity. Foremost
of these was the Archbishop of Rheims, who now, in spite of Joan of
Arc's entreaties, was allowed by the King to make a truce with the
enemy. Another powerful foe was La Tremoïlle, who (as has been
pointed out by Captain Marin in his work on Joan of Arc) thought it to
be against his personal influence that the French should take Paris.
La Tremoïlle had shown, from Joan's first appearance at Court, his
entire want of confidence in her mission. He had unwillingly, after
the examination of the Maid by the doctors and lawyers at Poitiers,
conformed to the King's wish that a command should be given her in the
army. He had done all in his power to induce the King not to undertake
the expedition to Rheims. He had told the King, when nothing else
could be urged against the journey, that there was no money in the
royal coffers, and that consequently the soldiers would not receive
their pay. As it turned out, volunteers offered their services
gratuitously to escort Charles to his crowning. At Auxerre, La
Tremoïlle concluded a treaty with the citizens, which prevented Joan
from taking that town. At Troyes he tried to create a like impediment;
but here he was foiled, for Troyes capitulated. After the coronation,
he persuaded Charles not to go to Paris, but to go instead to linger
in his castle on the Loire; and thereby prevented what might then have
proved a successful attack on the capital. And he again succeeded in
thwarting the Maid of Orleans when he resisted her wish to make a
second attack upon Paris. Later on it was La Tremoïlle who tried to
make Joan of Arc fail at the siege of Saint Pierre-le-Moutier. When
she was unsuccessful before La Charité-sur-Loire, and when the blame
of that failure was laid at Joan's door, La Tremoïlle for very
shame was obliged publicly to acknowledge the heroic zeal with which
she had carried out the operations of that siege. The higher Joan's
popularity rose among the people and in the army, the more her two
bitter enemies, La Tremoïlle and the Archbishop of Rheims, shared
between them their jealous dislike.
[Illustration: XV CENTURY HOUSE--COMPIÈGNE.]
Thus, even before her capture and trial, Joan of Arc met with some of
her worst foes among those whose duty it was to have been her
staunchest friends and helpers; and, deplorable to say, among her own
countrymen.
Charles left Saint Denis on the 13th of September. Before his
departure, Joan of Arc performed an act which indicated that she felt
her mission to be finished. In the old fane of Saint Denis, the
tomb-house of the long line of French kings, she solemnly placed her
armour and arms at the foot of an image of the Holy Mother, near the
spot where were kept the relics of the Patron Saint of France. By that
act of humility she seemed to wish to show her abnegation of any
further earthly victory by the aid of arms.
We have now arrived at the turning-point of Joan of Arc's successes,
and although the heroine is even more admirable in her days of
misfortune and suffering than in those of her triumphs, when she led
her followers on from victory to victory, the course of her brief life
now darkens rapidly, and the approaching fate of the brave-hearted
maiden is so terrible that it requires some courage to follow her to
the very end, glorious as that end was, and bright with its sainted
heroism.
The King's return journey from Compiègne to Gien was so hurried that
it almost resembled a flight. Avoiding the towns still doubtful in
their loyalty to him, Charles sped from Lagny to Bovins, then to Bray,
Courtenay, Château-Regnaut, and Montargis, arriving at Gien on the
21st of September. Ere this time there could be little doubt of the
Duke of Burgundy's unwillingness to abide by his pledge, and restore
Paris to Charles. The Duke and Bedford had in fact already come to
terms. The Regent resigned to Burgundy the Lieutenancy of the country,
keeping only the now empty title of Regent and the charge of Normandy.
The result of the King's withdrawal from the neighbourhood of Paris,
and his hurried march, or rather retreat, to Gien, was that the
English felt that there was now no longer any fear of their being
drawn out of the capital. They promptly marched on and occupied Saint
Denis, pillaging that town and carrying off as a trophy the arms which
Joan of Arc had placed by the shrine of Saint Denis, in the ancient
basilica of Dagobert.
The other towns, which had so recently returned to their allegiance to
Charles, were again abandoned to the English, who punished them by
levying large ransoms on the citizens. The surrounding country was
laid waste, and Joan of Arc had the mortification of seeing that,
without any attempt being made to defend her people, the places which
had so shortly before been the scene of her triumphs were now allowed
to be reoccupied by the English and their allies. Normandy, Picardy,
and Burgundy were once more in possession of the enemy.
At length Joan obtained Charles' permission to attack La Charité,
where the enemy were in force, and from whence they threatened the
French forts on the Loire. At Bourges she assembled a few troops, and
in company with the Sire d'Albret she laid siege to Saint
Pierre-le-Moutier. Then, although feebly supported, Joan led the first
column of attack. This attacking column might have been called a
forlorn hope, so few men had she with her. The little party were
repulsed, and at one moment her squire, d'Aulon, saw that his brave
mistress was fighting alone, surrounded by the English. At great peril
she was rescued from the mêlée. Asked how she could hope to succeed in
taking the place with hardly any support, she answered, while she
raised her helmet, 'There are fifty thousand of my host around me,'
alluding to the vision of angels that in moments of extreme peril she
relied on. D'Aulon in vain urged her to beat a retreat, and retire to
a place of safety; she insisted on renewing the attack, and gave
orders for crossing the moat on logs and fascines. A roughly
constructed bridge over the fosse was then made, and after a desperate
struggle the fortress was taken.
This occurred early in the month of November (1429). A few years ago a
stained-glass window commemorative of the Maid of Orleans having saved
the church in Saint Pierre-le-Moutier (it had been converted by the
besieged into a warehouse for the goods and chattels of the citizens)
was placed in the building she had preserved from destruction.
The next siege undertaken by Joan of Arc was that of La Charité--a far
larger and more strongly garrisoned town than the other. La Charité was
held by one Peter Grasset, who had been its governor for seven years.
It was not only strongly defended by fortifications, but fully
victualled for a prolonged siege. Joan and her little army had not the
material necessary for carrying on such a siege as that of La Charité
would require--the very sinews of war were wanting. Charles would not
or could not contribute a single écu d'or, and Joan had to solicit help
and funds from the towns. In the public library at Riom is preserved
the original letter addressed by the Maid of Orleans to 'My dear and
good friends the clergy, burghers, and citizens of the town of Riom.'
It was sent to that place on the 9th of November from Moulins. In this
letter, the only one to which is affixed the Maid's signature, spelt
'Jehonne,' possibly signed by herself, she says that her friends at
Riom are aware of how the town of Saint Pierre-le-Moutier had been
taken, and she adds that she has the intention of driving out (_de
faire vider_) the other towns hostile to King Charles. She begs the
citizens of Riom, in order to accomplish this, to provide her with the
means of pushing forward the siege of La Charité, and asks them to
supply her with powder, saltpetre, sulphur, bows and arrows,
cross-bows, and other material of war, having exhausted all her stock
of such things in the late siege. Whether or not the burghers of Riom
were able to carry out Joan's wishes is not known. The town of Bourges,
however, provided funds out of its customs, and Orleans also sent
soldiers and artillerymen ('_joueurs de coulverines_') to the Maid's
army for the siege of La Charité.
But in spite of all efforts Joan of Arc was destined to fail in this
undertaking. No doubt her enemies at Court helped to thwart all her
attempts at raising a sufficient force to beleaguer so strong a place
of arms, and seeing her hopes of taking La Charité by assault vanish,
Joan of Arc relinquished the undertaking.
The remainder of that winter Joan of Arc passed in what must have
tried her high spirit sorely--inaction.
Accompanying the Court, she went from Bourges to Sully-sur-Loire, and
revisited Orleans. In the latter town we find some traces of her
passage, and some further traits of her sweet nature, and of that
simplicity which had endeared her so deeply to the hearts of the
people: a disposition no success altered, no disappointment
embittered. What was the chief charm of her character was this
simplicity, her entire freedom from self-glorification, her horror of
it being imagined that she was a supernatural or miraculous being,
even when those supernatural and miraculous powers were considered as
coming direct to her from Heaven--in fact, to use a slang but
expressive phrase, her utter freedom from humbug. This is one of the
most marked features of her character, although not the most glorious
or salient to those who are dazzled by her triumphs and extraordinary
career.
When she was told by people that they could well understand how little
she feared being in action and under fire, knowing that she had a
charmed life, she answered them that she had no more assurance of not
being killed than the commonest of her soldiers; and when some foolish
creatures brought her their rosaries and beads to touch, she told them
to touch these themselves, and that their rosaries would benefit quite
as much as if she had done so.
On one occasion at Lagny she was asked to resuscitate a dead child.
One of the greatest of the French nobles wrote to ask her which of the
rival Popes was the true one. When asked on the eve of a battle who
would be victor, she answered that she could no more tell than any of
the soldiers could. A woman named Catherine de la Rochelle, who
assumed the power of knowing where money was hidden, was commanded by
the King to take Joan of Arc into her confidence. The latter soon
discovered that Catherine was a fraud, and refused to have anything
to do with her. Catherine had suggested going to the Duke of Burgundy
to arrange a peace between him and the French King, to which
proposition Joan of Arc very sensibly said that it seemed to her that
no peace could be made between them but at the lance's point. Joan had
seen too much of the duplicity of the Duke to believe in any of his
treaties and promises.
The early months of the year 1430 were months of anxiety for the
citizens of Orleans and the other towns which had thrown off the
English allegiance. The truce made between Burgundy and France expired
at Christmas of the former year, but was renewed till Easter. Early in
the year, the burghers of Rheims implored help of Joan of Arc, and not
of the King, thus proving how far greater trust was placed in the
hands of the Maid of Orleans, by such a town as Rheims, than in the
goodwill of the King.
Twice during the month of March did Joan have letters written to
reassure them of aid in case of need. 'Know,' she says in a letter
dated the 16th of March, 'that if I can prevent it you will not be
assailed; and if I cannot come to your rescue, close your gates, and I
will make them [the English] buckle on their spurs in such a hurry
that they will not be able to use them.'
In the second letter to the people of Rheims, written at Sully on the
28th of March, Joan tells them that they will soon hear some good
news about herself. This good news referred no doubt to her return to
the field, for we find that by the end of that month she was again on
the march.
It was early in the month of April, 1430, that Joan of Arc left the
Court and rode to the north, on what was to prove her last expedition.
It is said that while at Melun, during Easter week, she was told by
her voices that she would be taken prisoner before St. John's Day.
It was at Lagny that an incident occurred which formed one of the
accusations brought against the Maid by her judges, and to which
reference may now be made. A freebooter, named Franquet d'Arras, had,
at the head of a band of about three hundred English freelances, held
all the country-side in terror round about Lagny. Hearing of this,
being in the neighbourhood of Lagny, Joan of Arc gave orders that
Franquet and his band should be attacked. The French were in number
about equal to the English. After a stubborn fight, the English were
all killed or captured. Among the latter was the chief of the robbers,
Franquet d'Arras. It was proved before the bailiff and justices of
Lagny that Franquet had not only been a thief, but a murderer, and he
was consequently condemned to die. Joan of Arc wished that he should
be exchanged for a French prisoner, but this French prisoner had
meanwhile died. The justices of Lagny insisted on having their
sentence carried out, to which Joan at length unwillingly gave way,
and Franquet met with his deserts. We cannot see how the Maid was to
blame in this affair; but this thing was one of the accusations which
helped to bring her to the stake.
On the 17th of April the truce agreed to between King Charles and
Burgundy came to an end. At this time the town of greatest strategical
importance to Burgundy was that of Compiègne. Holding Compiègne, the
Duke of Burgundy held the key of France. King Charles, with his
habitual carelessness, had been on the point of handing over Compiègne
to the Duke as a pledge of peace; and no doubt he would have done so
had not the inhabitants protested. Charles then surrendered the town
of Pont Sainte-Maxence to Burgundy instead of Compiègne. But this sop
did not at all satisfy the greedy Duke, whose mouth watered for
Compiègne, which he was determined to obtain by fair or by foul means.
At Soissons the Duke had succeeded in gaining the Governor by a bribe,
and had, through this bribe, obtained the place; and there is little
reason not to suppose that he was still more ready to offer a still
greater bribe to obtain Compiègne. The Governor of Compiègne, William
de Flavigny--a man very deeply suspected, writes Michelet of him--was
not likely to refuse a bribe; and, as we shall see, he acted in a
manner that has made the accusation of his treachery to his country
and Joan of Arc almost a certainty.
It was to prevent, if possible, Compiègne falling into the hands of
Burgundy that Joan of Arc hastened to its defence. On the 13th of May
she reached Compiègne, where she was received with great joy by the
citizens. The Maid lodged in the town with Mary le Boucher, wife of
the _Procureur_ of the King. At Compiègne were some important Court
officials--the Chancellor Regnault de Chartres, no friend to Joan as
we have seen, Vendôme, and others. The country around and the places
of armed strength were all in the occupation of the English and
Burgundians; near Noyon, the town of Pont-l'Evêque was in the
possession of the English. This place Joan of Arc attacked, and she
was on the point of capturing it when a strong force of Burgundians
arrived from Noyon, and Joan had to beat a retreat on Crecy. On the
23rd of May, news reached Joan that Compiègne was threatened by the
united English and Burgundian forces, under the command of the Duke
and the Earl of Arundel. By midnight of that day, Joan of Arc was back
again in Compiègne. She had been warned of the danger of passing, to
gain the town, through the enemies' lines with so small a company.
'Never fear!' she answered, 'we are enough. I must go and see my good
friends at Compiègne.'
These words have been appropriately placed on the pedestal of the
statue of the heroine in front of the Hôtel de Ville in Compiègne.
By sunrise all her troopers were within the town: not a man was
missing.
Compiègne was a strongly fortified place, resting on the left bank of
the river Oise, across which, as at Orleans, one long stoutly defended
bridge connected the right bank with the town. In front of the bridge
was one of those redoubts which were in those days called
'boulevards.' This boulevard was surrounded by a wet moat or ditch
connected with the principal bridge by a drawbridge, closed or opened
from within at pleasure. The town was surrounded and protected by a
broad and deep moat, filled from the river. Behind this moat rose the
town walls, girt with strong towers at short intervals. On the right
bank of the river extended a wide stretch of fertile meadow land,
bounded on the northern horizon by the soft low-lying hills of
Picardy. From the circuit of the walls across the plain the eye rested
on the towns of Margny, of Clairvoix, and of Venette. The Burgundians
were encamped at Margny and at Clairvoix; the English, under the
command of Montgomery, were encamped at Venette.
The evening of the day on which she had arrived at Compiègne (the 24th
of May), Joan of Arc resolved to attack the Burgundians, both at
Margny and also at Clairvoix. Her plan was to draw out the Duke of
Burgundy, should he come to the support of his men at these places. As
to the English at Venette, she trusted that Flavy with his troops at
Compiègne would prevent them from cutting her off after her attack on
the Burgundians, and so intercepting her return to the town; but this
unfortunately was the very disaster which occurred.
In front of the bridge the redoubts were filled by French archers to
keep off any attack made by the English, and Flavy had placed a large
number of boats filled with armed men, principally bowmen, in
readiness along the river to receive their companions should they meet
with a repulse in their attack on the Burgundians.
It was about five o'clock that afternoon when Joan of Arc rode out of
Compiègne at the head of five hundred horsemen and foot soldiers.
Flavy remained within the town, of which he was Governor. The attack
led by the Maid on Margny, with splendid impetuosity, proved a
complete success, and the enemy fled for shelter to their companions
at Clairvoix. Here the resistance made was far more stubborn. While
the French and Burgundians were combating in the meadows at Clairvoix,
the English came from Venette to the assistance of their allies, and
attacked the French in their rear. A panic was created by this attack
among the French troops, and a _sauve qui peut_ ensued, both foot and
horse dashing back in confusion towards Compiègne, and when they
reached the river either taking refuge in the boats or on the redoubts
near the bridge. Mixed among this panic-stricken crowd of fugitives
came the English in hot pursuit, followed by the Burgundians.
Carried away by the throng of frightened soldiers, Joan was among the
last to leave the field, and to those who cried to her to make her
escape she answered that all might yet be saved, and urged her men to
rally. Nevertheless, she was forced back towards the bridge, across
which fugitives were making their escape into the town. In a few
seconds Joan could have been safe across the drawbridge, and under
shelter of the towers which defended it. At this instant, whether
intentionally to exclude the heroine from safety, or through panic and
fear of the Burgundians and English entering the town along with the
French, the drawbridge was lifted, and Joan, with a handful of the
faithful few who were ever at her side in time of peril, was
surrounded by a sea of foemen. In a moment half a dozen soldiers
secured her horse and seized her on every side, trying to drag her out
of the saddle. The long skirts which the heroine wore were soon torn
off by these rough hands. An archer of Picardy, belonging to the army
of John of Luxembourg, wrenched her from her horse and made her
prisoner. Her brother Peter, her faithful squire d'Aulon, and Pothon
de Xaintrailles were all captured at the same time.
Thus fell Joan of Arc into the hands of her enemies, and the question
whether through treachery or not has never been settled.
According to an old work published early in the sixteenth century,
called _Le Miroir des Femmes Vertueuses_, Joan of Arc had taken the
communion in the Church of Saint James at Compiègne, and was standing
leaning against a pillar of that church; a large number of citizens
with many children stood around, to whom she said: 'My children and
dear friends, I bid you to mark that I have been sold and betrayed,
and that I shall be shortly put to death. So I beseech you all to pray
to God for me, for never more shall I be able to be of service to the
King or to the kingdom of France.'
This story, which, whether authentic or not, is surely a touching one,
is full of the spirit of the heroine. It rests upon the testimony of
two persons, one eighty-six and the other eighty-eight years of age,
by whom the author was told the tale in 1498, both affirming that they
had been in the church when Joan of Arc spoke of her betrayal. There
can be but little doubt that Joan had had for some time before she
went to Compiègne a presentiment of her soon falling into her enemies'
power. On the eve of the King's coronation at Rheims she said to her
friends that what she alone feared was treason--a foreboding too soon,
alas! to come true. She never, however, seems to have fixed on any
particular period when the treason she dreaded would occur; and during
her trial she acknowledged that, had she known she would have been
taken prisoner during the sortie on the 24th of May, she would not
have undertaken that adventure.
One of her best historians, M. Wallon, thinks that the words which she
is supposed to have spoken to the people in the Church of Saint James
at Compiègne were owing to her discouragement at not having, a few
weeks previously, been able to cross the river Aisne at Soissons, and
thus finding herself prevented from attacking the Duke of Burgundy at
Choisy, and thence having been obliged to return to Compiègne. Wallon
points out that in coming to defend Compiègne, Joan of Arc came
entirely at her own instigation, and that during the previous six
months Flavy had defended Compiègne against the English and
Burgundians with success and energy; nay more, that, in spite of
bribes from the Duke of Burgundy, Flavy contrived to hold the town
till the close of the war.
On the other side, a recent writer of the heroine's life, especially
as regarded from a military standpoint, M. Marin, gives at great
length his reasons for believing in the treachery of Flavy. M. Marin
points out that, in the first place, Flavy's character was a
notoriously bad one; secondly, that he was very possibly under the
influence of both La Tremoïlle and the Chancellor Regnault de
Chartres, bitter opponents, as we have already shown, of the Maid;
thirdly, that it was in Flavy's interest that the prestige of saving
Compiègne from the Burgundians and English should be entirely owing to
his own conduct; and fourthly, that he, Flavy, with the majority of
the French officers, was affected against Joan of Arc since the
execution of Franquet d'Arras. M. Marin goes on to prove that Joan of
Arc might have been rescued without difficulty, and that the enemy
could not have forced their way into the town alongside of the
retreating French, unless they were ready to be cut up as soon as they
had come within its walls. M. Marin's opinion, having the authority of
a soldier, carries weight with it; and his opinion is that Joan of Arc
was deliberately betrayed by Flavy, and purposely allowed to fall into
the hands of her enemies.
The names of La Tremoïlle and Regnault de Chartres should also be
pilloried by the side of that of Flavy--the two great courtiers who
held the ear of the King, and who had always plotted against Joan of
Arc. As has already been said, it was Regnault de Chartres who had the
effrontery to announce the news of Joan of Arc's capture to the
citizens of Rheims as being a judgment of Heaven upon her. She had,
this mean prelate said, offended God by her pride, and in wearing rich
apparel, and in having preferred to follow her own will rather than
that of God! Verily, and with reason, might poor Joan have prayed to
be delivered from such friends as those creatures and courtiers about
her King, for whom she had done and suffered so much.
* * * * *
The archer who had captured Joan of Arc was in the pay of the Bastard
of Wandome, or Wandoune, and this Wandome was himself in the service
of John de Ligny, a vassal of the Duke of Burgundy, and a cadet of
the princely house of Luxembourg. Like most younger sons, John de
Ligny was badly off, and the temptation of the English reward in
exchange for his prisoner, whose escape he greatly feared, overtopped
any scruples he may have felt in receiving this blood-money.
[Illustration: TOUR DE LA PUCELLE--COMPIÈGNE.]
The historian Monstrelet tells us he was present when Joan of Arc was
brought into the Burgundian camp, at Margny, and before the Duke of
Burgundy. But the old chronicler relates nothing with regard to that
eventful meeting; only he is eloquent on the joy caused by the capture
of the Maid of Orleans among the English and their allies; and he
tells us that in their opinion Joan's capture was equal by itself to
that of five hundred ordinary prisoners, for they had feared her, he
adds, more than all the other French leaders put together. Of the high
opinion held by her enemies of the Maid's influence, one could not ask
for a more remarkable proof than this testimony, coming as it does
from a partisan of her foes.
After three days passed at Margny, Joan of Arc was taken, for greater
security, by Luxembourg to the castle of Beaulieu, in Picardy.
CHAPTER V.
_IMPRISONMENT AND TRIAL._
The news of Joan's capture soon reached Paris, and within a few hours
of that event becoming known, the Vicar-General of the Order of the
Inquisition sent a letter to the Duke of Burgundy, accompanied by
another from the University of Paris, praying that Joan of Arc might
be delivered up to the keeping of Mother Church as a sorceress and
idolatress. That terrible engine, the Inquisition, had, like some
mighty reptile scenting its prey near, slowly unfolded its coils.
Whether Bedford had or had not caused these letters to be sent the
Duke is not known, but the Regent had both in the Church and the
University of Paris the men he wanted--instruments by whom his
vengeance could be worked on Joan of Arc; and he had the astuteness to
see that in calling in the aid of the Church, and treating Joan of Arc
as a heretic and witch, the rules of war could be laid aside. What no
civilised body of men could do, namely, kill a prisoner of war, that
thing could be done in the name and by the authority of the Church and
its holy office; and in the Bishop of Beauvais, the inexorable
Cauchon, Bedford had the tool necessary to his hand whereby this
dastardly plot could be carried out.
The first move that Bedford now was obliged to take was to secure the
victim; and in order to do so the Bishop of Beauvais was applied to.
The name of Peter Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais, will go down to the
latest posterity with the execration of humanity, for the part he
played in the tragedy of the worst of judicial murders of which any
record exists. Let us give even the devil his due. According to
Michelet the Bishop was 'not a man without merit,' although the
historian does not say in what Cauchon's merit consisted. Born at
Rheims, he had been considered a learned priest when at the University
of Paris; but he had the reputation of being a harsh and vindictive
opponent to all who disagreed with his views, within or without the
Church. He was forced to leave Paris, in 1413, for some misconduct. It
was then that Cauchon became a strong partisan of the Duke of
Burgundy. It was through the Duke that he obtained the See of
Beauvais. The English also favoured Cauchon, and obtained for him a
high post in the University of Paris. When the tide of French success
reached Beauvais, in 1429, Cauchon was obliged to escape, and found
shelter in England. There Winchester received him with cordiality.
While in England, Cauchon became a thorough partisan of the English,
and the humble servant of the proud Prince-Cardinal. Winchester
promised Cauchon preferment, and, when the See of Rouen fell vacant,
recommended the Pope to place Cauchon on its throne. The Pope,
however, refused his consent, and the Rouen Chapters would hear naught
of the Anglicised Bishop. At that time the Church at Rouen was at war
with the University of Paris, and did not wish one of the members of
that University placed over it.
Joan of Arc's place of capture happened to be in the diocese of
Beauvais, and although Cauchon was now only nominally Bishop of
Beauvais, he still retained that title. Cauchon now placed himself,
body and soul, at the disposal of the English, hoping thereby sooner
to obtain the long-coveted Archbishopric of Rouen in exchange for
helping his friends to the utmost in his power by furthering their
schemes and in ridding them of their prisoner once and for ever. The
bait held out by Winchester and Bedford was the Archbishopric of
Rouen, and eagerly did Cauchon seize his prey. What added to his zeal
was his wish to gratify base feelings of revenge on those who had
thrust him out of his Bishopric of Beauvais, and on her without whose
deeds he might have still been living in security in his palatial home
there.
After a consultation with the leaders of the University of Paris,
Cauchon arrived at the Burgundian camp before Compiègne on the 14th
of July, and claimed Joan of Arc as prisoner from the keeping of the
Duke of Burgundy. Cauchon justified his demand by letters which he had
obtained from the doctors of the University, and he made the offer in
the name of the child-king of England. The sum handed over for the
purchase of the prisoner was 10,000 livres tournois, equivalent to
61,125 francs of French money of to-day--about £2400 sterling. This
was the ordinary price in that day for the ransom of any prisoner of
high rank. Luxembourg, to his shame and that of his order, consented
to the sale on those terms, and Cauchon soon returned with the news of
his bargain to his English employers.
The whole transaction sounds more like what one might expect to have
occurred amongst an uncivilised nation rather than among a people who
prided themselves on their chivalry and their usages of fair-play in
matters relating to warfare. That a high dignitary of the Church, and
a countryman of Joan of Arc, should have bought her from a prince, the
descendant of emperors and kings, also a countryman of the heroic
Maid's, for English gold, is bad enough; and that the so-called 'good'
Duke of Burgundy should have been a silent spectator of the infamous
transaction, brands all the actors as among the most sordid and
meanest of individuals. But what is infinitely worse is the fact that
no steps appear to have been taken by Charles to rescue the Maid, or
to attempt an exchange of her for any other prisoner or prisoners.
Thus Joan of Arc, bound literally hand and foot, was led like a lamb
to the shambles, not a hand being raised by those for whom she had
done such great and noble deeds.
The University of Paris, whose decisions carried so great a weight in
the issue of the trial of the Maid of Orleans, consisted at this
period of an ecclesiastical body of doctors; but as far as its
attributes consisted it was a body secular, and holding an independent
position owing to its many privileges. The University was a political
as well as an ecclesiastical body, supreme under the Pope above the
whole of the Gallican Church. Although divided into two parties
through the war then raging between England and France, its judicature
was greatly influenced by the Church. It was a matter of certainty
that the Doctors of Theology who sat in the University of Paris, and
who were all, or nearly all, French by birth, would favour the
English, and give an adverse decision to that of those French
ecclesiastics who had examined into Joan's life and character when
assembled at Poitiers, and who then considered her to be acting under
the influence and with the protection of the Almighty.
As a prisoner, Joan of Arc's behaviour was as modest and courageous as
it had been in her days of success and liberty. In the first times of
her durance, d'Aulon, who, as we mentioned, had been captured at the
same time, appears to have been allowed to remain with her. On his
telling her that he feared Compiègne would now probably be taken by
the enemy, Joan of Arc said such a thing could not occur, 'For all the
places,' she added, 'which the King of Heaven has placed in the
keeping of King Charles by my means will never again be retaken by his
enemies, at any rate as long as he cares to keep them.'
Although willing to endure for the sake of her beloved country all the
cruelty her enemies could inflict upon her, Joan was most anxious to
return in order to continue her mission. While in the castle of
Beaulieu she made a desperate attempt to escape. She managed to
squeeze herself between two beams of wood placed across an opening in
her prison, and was on the point of leaving her dungeon tower when one
of the jailers caught sight of her, and she was retaken. Probably in
consequence of this attempt, Joan of Arc, after an imprisonment of
four months at Beaulieu, was transferred thence by Ligny to his castle
of Beaurevoir, near the town of Cambrai, a place far removed from the
neighbourhood of the war, and consequently more secure than Beaulieu.
At Beaurevoir lived the wife and the aunt of Ligny; they showed some
attention and compassion to the prisoner. They offered her some of
their dresses, and tried to persuade her to quit her male attire.
Joan, however, refused: she gave as her reason for not complying with
their request that the time had not yet arrived for her to cease
wearing the clothes she had worn during the time of her mission. That
she had good reason not to don woman's attire even when at Beaurevoir,
and keep to her male attire as a protection, is probable, as she was
not safe from wanton insult at the hands of the rough soldiery placed
about her person. This clinging to her male dress, we shall see, under
similar circumstances at Rouen, was the principal indictment made
against her by her executioners.
At Beaurevoir Joan of Arc was placed in a
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