PART THE SECOND: THE STORY OF JOAN OF ARC
In a remote village among some wild hills in the province of Lorraine,there lived a countryman whose name was JACQUES D'ARC. He had adaughter, JOAN OF ARC, who was at this time in her twentieth year. Shehad been a solitary girl from her childhood; she had often tended sheepand cattle for whole days where no human figure was seen or human voiceheard; and she had often knelt, for hours together, in the gloomy, empty,little village chapel, looking up at the altar and at the dim lampburning before it, until she fancied that she saw shadowy figuresstanding there, and even that she heard them speak to her. The people inthat part of France were very ignorant and superstitious, and they hadmany ghostly tales to tell about what they had dreamed, and what they sawamong the lonely hills when the clouds and the mists were resting onthem. So, they easily believed that Joan saw strange sights, and theywhispered among themselves that angels and spirits talked to her.
At last, Joan told her father that she had one day been surprised by agreat unearthly light, and had afterwards heard a solemn voice, whichsaid it was Saint Michael's voice, telling her that she was to go andhelp the Dauphin. Soon after this (she said), Saint Catherine and SaintMargaret had appeared to her with sparkling crowns upon their heads, andhad encouraged her to be virtuous and resolute. These visions hadreturned sometimes; but the Voices very often; and the voices alwayssaid, 'Joan, thou art appointed by Heaven to go and help the Dauphin!'She almost always heard them while the chapel bells were ringing.
There is no doubt, now, that Joan believed she saw and heard thesethings. It is very well known that such delusions are a disease which isnot by any means uncommon. It is probable enough that there were figuresof Saint Michael, and Saint Catherine, and Saint Margaret, in the littlechapel (where they would be very likely to have shining crowns upon theirheads), and that they first gave Joan the idea of those three personages.She had long been a moping, fanciful girl, and, though she was a verygood girl, I dare say she was a little vain, and wishful for notoriety.
Her father, something wiser than his neighbours, said, 'I tell thee,Joan, it is thy fancy. Thou hadst better have a kind husband to takecare of thee, girl, and work to employ thy mind!' But Joan told him inreply, that she had taken a vow never to have a husband, and that shemust go as Heaven directed her, to help the Dauphin.
It happened, unfortunately for her father's persuasions, and mostunfortunately for the poor girl, too, that a party of the Dauphin'senemies found their way into the village while Joan's disorder was atthis point, and burnt the chapel, and drove out the inhabitants. Thecruelties she saw committed, touched Joan's heart and made her worse. Shesaid that the voices and the figures were now continually with her; thatthey told her she was the girl who, according to an old prophecy, was todeliver France; and she must go and help the Dauphin, and must remainwith him until he should be crowned at Rheims: and that she must travel along way to a certain lord named BAUDRICOURT, who could and would, bringher into the Dauphin's presence.
As her father still said, 'I tell thee, Joan, it is thy fancy,' she setoff to find out this lord, accompanied by an uncle, a poor villagewheelwright and cart-maker, who believed in the reality of her visions.They travelled a long way and went on and on, over a rough country, fullof the Duke of Burgundy's men, and of all kinds of robbers and marauders,until they came to where this lord was.
When his servants told him that there was a poor peasant girl named Joanof Arc, accompanied by nobody but an old village wheelwright and cart-maker, who wished to see him because she was commanded to help theDauphin and save France, Baudricourt burst out a-laughing, and bade themsend the girl away. But, he soon heard so much about her lingering inthe town, and praying in the churches, and seeing visions, and doing harmto no one, that he sent for her, and questioned her. As she said thesame things after she had been well sprinkled with holy water as she hadsaid before the sprinkling, Baudricourt began to think there might besomething in it. At all events, he thought it worth while to send her onto the town of Chinon, where the Dauphin was. So, he bought her a horse,and a sword, and gave her two squires to conduct her. As the Voices hadtold Joan that she was to wear a man's dress, now, she put one on, andgirded her sword to her side, and bound spurs to her heels, and mountedher horse and rode away with her two squires. As to her uncle thewheelwright, he stood staring at his niece in wonder until she was out ofsight--as well he might--and then went home again. The best place, too.
Joan and her two squires rode on and on, until they came to Chinon, whereshe was, after some doubt, admitted into the Dauphin's presence. Pickinghim out immediately from all his court, she told him that she camecommanded by Heaven to subdue his enemies and conduct him to hiscoronation at Rheims. She also told him (or he pretended so afterwards,to make the greater impression upon his soldiers) a number of his secretsknown only to himself, and, furthermore, she said there was an old, oldsword in the cathedral of Saint Catherine at Fierbois, marked with fiveold crosses on the blade, which Saint Catherine had ordered her to wear.
{Joan of Arc: p158.jpg}
Now, nobody knew anything about this old, old sword, but when thecathedral came to be examined--which was immediately done--there, sureenough, the sword was found! The Dauphin then required a number of gravepriests and bishops to give him their opinion whether the girl derivedher power from good spirits or from evil spirits, which they heldprodigiously long debates about, in the course of which several learnedmen fell fast asleep and snored loudly. At last, when one gruff oldgentleman had said to Joan, 'What language do your Voices speak?' andwhen Joan had replied to the gruff old gentleman, 'A pleasanter languagethan yours,' they agreed that it was all correct, and that Joan of Arcwas inspired from Heaven. This wonderful circumstance put new heart intothe Dauphin's soldiers when they heard of it, and dispirited the Englisharmy, who took Joan for a witch.
So Joan mounted horse again, and again rode on and on, until she came toOrleans. But she rode now, as never peasant girl had ridden yet. Sherode upon a white war-horse, in a suit of glittering armour; with theold, old sword from the cathedral, newly burnished, in her belt; with awhite flag carried before her, upon which were a picture of God, and thewords JESUS MARIA. In this splendid state, at the head of a great bodyof troops escorting provisions of all kinds for the starving inhabitantsof Orleans, she appeared before that beleaguered city.
When the people on the walls beheld her, they cried out 'The Maid iscome! The Maid of the Prophecy is come to deliver us!' And this, andthe sight of the Maid fighting at the head of their men, made the Frenchso bold, and made the English so fearful, that the English line of fortswas soon broken, the troops and provisions were got into the town, andOrleans was saved.
Joan, henceforth called THE MAID OF ORLEANS, remained within the wallsfor a few days, and caused letters to be thrown over, ordering LordSuffolk and his Englishmen to depart from before the town according tothe will of Heaven. As the English general very positively declined tobelieve that Joan knew anything about the will of Heaven (which did notmend the matter with his soldiers, for they stupidly said if she were notinspired she was a witch, and it was of no use to fight against a witch),she mounted her white war-horse again, and ordered her white banner toadvance.
The besiegers held the bridge, and some strong towers upon the bridge;and here the Maid of Orleans attacked them. The fight was fourteen hourslong. She planted a scaling ladder with her own hands, and mounted atower wall, but was struck by an English arrow in the neck, and fell intothe trench. She was carried away and the arrow was taken out, duringwhich operation she screamed and cried with the pain, as any other girlmight have done; but presently she said that the Voices were speaking toher and soothing her to rest. After a while, she got up, and was againforemost in the fight. When the English who had seen her fall andsupposed her dead, saw this, they were troubled with the strangest fears,and some of them cried out that they beheld Saint Michael on a whitehorse (probably Joan herself) fighting for the French. They lost thebridge, and lost the towers, and next day set their chain of forts onfire, and left the place.
But as Lord Suffolk himself retired no farther than the town of Jargeau,which was only a few miles off, the Maid of Orleans besieged him there,and he was taken prisoner. As the white banner scaled the wall, she wasstruck upon the head with a stone, and was again tumbled down into theditch; but, she only cried all the more, as she lay there, 'On, on, mycountrymen! And fear nothing, for the Lord hath delivered them into ourhands!' After this new success of the Maid's, several other fortressesand places which had previously held out against the Dauphin weredelivered up without a battle; and at Patay she defeated the remainder ofthe English army, and set up her victorious white banner on a field wheretwelve hundred Englishmen lay dead.
She now urged the Dauphin (who always kept out of the way when there wasany fighting) to proceed to Rheims, as the first part of her mission wasaccomplished; and to complete the whole by being crowned there. TheDauphin was in no particular hurry to do this, as Rheims was a long wayoff, and the English and the Duke of Burgundy were still strong in thecountry through which the road lay. However, they set forth, with tenthousand men, and again the Maid of Orleans rode on and on, upon herwhite war-horse, and in her shining armour. Whenever they came to a townwhich yielded readily, the soldiers believed in her; but, whenever theycame to a town which gave them any trouble, they began to murmur that shewas an impostor. The latter was particularly the case at Troyes, whichfinally yielded, however, through the persuasion of one Richard, a friarof the place. Friar Richard was in the old doubt about the Maid ofOrleans, until he had sprinkled her well with holy water, and had alsowell sprinkled the threshold of the gate by which she came into the city.Finding that it made no change in her or the gate, he said, as the othergrave old gentlemen had said, that it was all right, and became her greatally.
So, at last, by dint of riding on and on, the Maid of Orleans, and theDauphin, and the ten thousand sometimes believing and sometimesunbelieving men, came to Rheims. And in the great cathedral of Rheims,the Dauphin actually was crowned Charles the Seventh in a great assemblyof the people. Then, the Maid, who with her white banner stood besidethe King in that hour of his triumph, kneeled down upon the pavement athis feet, and said, with tears, that what she had been inspired to do,was done, and that the only recompense she asked for, was, that sheshould now have leave to go back to her distant home, and her sturdilyincredulous father, and her first simple escort the village wheelwrightand cart-maker. But the King said 'No!' and made her and her family asnoble as a King could, and settled upon her the income of a Count.
Ah! happy had it been for the Maid of Orleans, if she had resumed herrustic dress that day, and had gone home to the little chapel and thewild hills, and had forgotten all these things, and had been a good man'swife, and had heard no stranger voices than the voices of littlechildren!
It was not to be, and she continued helping the King (she did a world forhim, in alliance with Friar Richard), and trying to improve the lives ofthe coarse soldiers, and leading a religious, an unselfish, and a modestlife, herself, beyond any doubt. Still, many times she prayed the Kingto let her go home; and once she even took off her bright armour and hungit up in a church, meaning never to wear it more. But, the King alwayswon her back again--while she was of any use to him--and so she went onand on and on, to her doom.
When the Duke of Bedford, who was a very able man, began to be active forEngland, and, by bringing the war back into France and by holding theDuke of Burgundy to his faith, to distress and disturb Charles very much,Charles sometimes asked the Maid of Orleans what the Voices said aboutit? But, the Voices had become (very like ordinary voices in perplexedtimes) contradictory and confused, so that now they said one thing, andnow said another, and the Maid lost credit every day. Charles marched onParis, which was opposed to him, and attacked the suburb of Saint Honore.In this fight, being again struck down into the ditch, she was abandonedby the whole army. She lay unaided among a heap of dead, and crawled outhow she could. Then, some of her believers went over to an oppositionMaid, Catherine of La Rochelle, who said she was inspired to tell wherethere were treasures of buried money--though she never did--and then Joanaccidentally broke the old, old sword, and others said that her power wasbroken with it. Finally, at the siege of Compiegne, held by the Duke ofBurgundy, where she did valiant service, she was basely left alone in aretreat, though facing about and fighting to the last; and an archerpulled her off her horse.
O the uproar that was made, and the thanksgivings that were sung, aboutthe capture of this one poor country-girl! O the way in which she wasdemanded to be tried for sorcery and heresy, and anything else you like,by the Inquisitor-General of France, and by this great man, and by thatgreat man, until it is wearisome to think of! She was bought at last bythe Bishop of Beauvais for ten thousand francs, and was shut up in hernarrow prison: plain Joan of Arc again, and Maid of Orleans no more.
I should never have done if I were to tell you how they had Joan out toexamine her, and cross-examine her, and re-examine her, and worry herinto saying anything and everything; and how all sorts of scholars anddoctors bestowed their utmost tediousness upon her. Sixteen times shewas brought out and shut up again, and worried, and entrapped, and arguedwith, until she was heart-sick of the dreary business. On the lastoccasion of this kind she was brought into a burial-place at Rouen,dismally decorated with a scaffold, and a stake and faggots, and theexecutioner, and a pulpit with a friar therein, and an awful sermonready. It is very affecting to know that even at that pass the poor girlhonoured the mean vermin of a King, who had so used her for his purposesand so abandoned her; and, that while she had been regardless ofreproaches heaped upon herself, she spoke out courageously for him.
It was natural in one so young to hold to life. To save her life, shesigned a declaration prepared for her--signed it with a cross, for shecouldn't write--that all her visions and Voices had come from the Devil.Upon her recanting the past, and protesting that she would never wear aman's dress in future, she was condemned to imprisonment for life, 'onthe bread of sorrow and the water of affliction.'
But, on the bread of sorrow and the water of affliction, the visions andthe Voices soon returned. It was quite natural that they should do so,for that kind of disease is much aggravated by fasting, loneliness, andanxiety of mind. It was not only got out of Joan that she consideredherself inspired again, but, she was taken in a man's dress, which hadbeen left--to entrap her--in her prison, and which she put on, in hersolitude; perhaps, in remembrance of her past glories, perhaps, becausethe imaginary Voices told her. For this relapse into the sorcery andheresy and anything else you like, she was sentenced to be burnt todeath. And, in the market-place of Rouen, in the hideous dress which themonks had invented for such spectacles; with priests and bishops sittingin a gallery looking on, though some had the Christian grace to go away,unable to endure the infamous scene; this shrieking girl--last seenamidst the smoke and fire, holding a crucifix between her hands; lastheard, calling upon Christ--was burnt to ashes. They threw her ashesinto the river Seine; but they will rise against her murderers on thelast day.
From the moment of her capture, neither the French King nor one singleman in all his court raised a finger to save her. It is no defence ofthem that they may have never really believed in her, or that they mayhave won her victories by their skill and bravery. The more theypretended to believe in her, the more they had caused her to believe inherself; and she had ever been true to them, ever brave, ever noblydevoted. But, it is no wonder, that they, who were in all things falseto themselves, false to one another, false to their country, false toHeaven, false to Earth, should be monsters of ingratitude and treacheryto a helpless peasant girl.
In the picturesque old town of Rouen, where weeds and grass grow high onthe cathedral towers, and the venerable Norman streets are still warm inthe blessed sunlight though the monkish fires that once gleamed horriblyupon them have long grown cold, there is a statue of Joan of Arc, in thescene of her last agony, the square to which she has given its presentname. I know some statues of modern times--even in the World'smetropolis, I think--which commemorate less constancy, less earnestness,smaller claims upon the world's attention, and much greater impostors.