THE MAID AT POITIERS
For fourteen years the town of Poitiers had been the capital of that
part of France which belonged to the French. The Dauphin Charles had
transferred his Parlement there, or rather had assembled there those
few members who had escaped from the Parlement of Paris. The Parlement
of Poitiers consisted of two chambers only. It would have judged as
wisely as King Solomon had there been any questions on which to
pronounce judgment, but no litigants presented themselves--they were
afraid of being captured on the way by freebooters and captains in the
King's pay; besides, in the disturbed state of the kingdom justice had
little to do with the settlement of disputes. The councillors, who for
the most part had lands near Paris, were hard put to it for food and
clothing. They were rarely paid and there were no perquisites. In vain
they had inscribed their registers with the formula: _Non deliberetur
donec solvantur species_; no payments were forthcoming from the
suitors.[721] The Attorney General, Messire Jean Jouvenel des Ursins,
who owned rich lands and houses in Ile-de-France, Brie, and Champagne,
was filled with pity at the sight of that good and honourable lady
his wife, his eleven children, and his three sons-in-law going
barefoot and poorly clad through the streets of the town.[722] As for
the doctors and professors who had followed the King's fortunes, in
vain were they wells of knowledge and springs of clerkly learning,
since, for lack of a University to teach in, they reaped no advantage
from their eloquence and their erudition. The town of Poitiers, having
become the first city in the realm, had a Parlement but no University,
like a lady highly born but one-eyed withal, for the Parlement and the
University are the two eyes of a great city. Thus in their doleful
leisure they were consumed with a desire, if it were God's will, to
restore the King's fortunes as well as their own. Meanwhile, shivering
with cold and emaciated with hunger, they groaned and lamented. Like
Israel in the desert they sighed for the day when the Lord, inclining
his ear to their supplications, should say: "At even ye shall eat
flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread: and ye shall
know that I am the Lord your God." _Vespere comedetis carnes et mane
saturabimini panibus: scietisque quod ego sum Dominus deus vester._
(Exodus xvi, 12.) It was from among these poor and faithful servants
of a poverty-stricken King that were chosen for the most part the
doctors and clerks charged with the examination of the Maid. They
were: the Lord Bishop of Poitiers;[723] the Lord Bishop of
Maguelonne;[724] Maitre Jean Lombard, doctor in theology, sometime
professor of theology at the University of Paris;[725] Maitre
Guillaume le Maire, bachelor of theology, canon of Poitiers;[726]
Maitre Gerard Machet, the King's Confessor;[727] Maitre Jourdain
Morin;[728] Maitre Jean Erault, professor of theology;[729] Maitre
Mathieu Mesnage, bachelor of theology;[730] Maitre Jacques
Meledon;[731] Maitre Jean Macon, a very famous doctor of civil law and
of canon law;[732] Brother Pierre de Versailles, a monk of Saint-Denys
in France, of the order of Saint Benedict, professor of theology,
Prior of the Priory of Saint-Pierre de Chaumont, Abbot of Talmont in
the diocese of Laon, Ambassador of his most Christian Majesty the King
of France;[733] Brother Pierre Turelure, of the Order of Saint
Dominic, Inquisitor at Toulouse;[734] Maitre Simon Bonnet;[735]
Brother Guillaume Aimery, of the Order of Saint-Dominic, doctor and
professor of theology;[736] Brother Seguin of Seguin of the Order of
Saint Dominic, doctor and professor of theology;[737] Brother Pierre
Seguin, Carmelite;[738] several of the King's Councillors,
licentiates of civil as well as of canon law.
[Footnote 721: Neuville, _Le Parlement royal a Poitiers_, in the
_Revue historique_, vol. vi, p. 18. De Beaucourt, _Histoire de Charles
VII_, vol. ii, pp. 571 _et seq._]
[Footnote 722: Louis Battifol, _Jean Jouvenel, prevot des marchands de
la ville de Paris_, Paris, 1894, in 8vo. Juvenal des Ursins, _Histoire
de Charles VI_, pp. 359, 360.]
[Footnote 723: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 92. _Gallia Christiana_, vol. ii,
col. 1198.]
[Footnote 724: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 92. Le P. Ayroles, _La Pucelle
devant l'Eglise de son temps_, p. 6.]
[Footnote 725: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 203, 204.]
[Footnote 726: _Ibid._, pp. 19, 203.]
[Footnote 727: _Ibid._, pp. 74, 75. Launoy, _Historia Collegii
Navarrici_, lib. ii, _passim_.]
[Footnote 728: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 92, 102.]
[Footnote 729: _Ibid._, pp. 74, 75.]
[Footnote 730: _Ibid._, pp. 74, 92, 102.]
[Footnote 731: _Ibid._, vol. ii, p. 203.]
[Footnote 732: _Ibid._, vol. iii, pp. 27, 28.]
[Footnote 733: _Ibid._, pp. 19, 74, 92, 203. _Gallia Christiana_, vol.
iii, col. 1128.]
[Footnote 734: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 203. _Gallia Christiana_, vol.
iii, col. 1129.]
[Footnote 735: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 92.]
[Footnote 736: _Ibid._, pp. 19, 83, 203.]
[Footnote 737: _Ibid._, pp. 19, 203. Le P. Chapotin, _La guerre de
cent ans; Jeanne d'Arc et les Dominicains_, p. 132.]
[Footnote 738: Canon Dunand, _La legende anglaise de Jeanne_, Paris,
1903, in 8vo, p. 118.]
Here was a large assembly of doctors for the cross-examination of one
shepherdess. But we must remember that in those days theology subtle
and inflexible dominated all human knowledge and forced the secular
arm to give effect to its judgment. Therefore, as soon as an ignorant
girl caused it to be believed that she had seen God, the Virgin, the
saints, and the angels, she must either pass from miracle to miracle,
through an edifying death to beatification, or from heresy to heresy
through an ecclesiastical prison, to be burnt as a witch. And, as the
holy inquisitors were fully persuaded that the Devil easily entered
into a woman, the unhappy creature was more likely to be burnt alive
than to die in an odour of sanctity. But Jeanne before the doctors at
Poitiers was an exception; she ran no risk of being suspected in
matters of faith. Even Brother Pierre Turelure himself had no desire
to find in her one of those heretics he zealously sought to discover
at Toulouse. In her presence the illustrious masters drew in their
theological claws. They were churchmen, but they were Armagnacs, for
the most part business men, diplomatists, old councillors of the
Dauphin.[739] As priests, doubtless they were possessed of a certain
body of dogma and morality, and of a code of rules for judging matters
of faith. But now it was a question not of curing the disease of
heresy, but of driving out the English. Jeanne was in favour with my
Lord the Duke of Alencon and with my Lord the Bastard; the inhabitants
of Orleans were looking to her for their deliverance. She promised to
take the King to Reims; and it happened that the cleverest and the
most powerful man in France, the Chancellor of the kingdom, my Lord
Regnault de Chartres, was Archbishop and Count of Reims; and that had
great weight.[740]
[Footnote 739: O. Raguenet de Saint-Albin, _Les juges de Jeanne d'Arc
a Poitiers, membres du Parlement ou gens d'Eglise_, Orleans, 1894, in
8vo, 46 pages.]
[Footnote 740: See _ante_, pp. 153, 154.]
If it should be as she said, if God had verily sent her to the aid of
the Lilies, to the mind of whomsoever possessed sense and learning it
appeared marvellous but not incredible. No one denied that God could
directly intervene in the affairs of kingdoms, for he himself had
said: _Per me reges regnant_.
In this Church holy and indivisible, there were the doctors of
Poitiers who deliberately pronounced God to be on the side of the
Dauphin, while the University of Paris as deliberately pronounced God
to be on the side of the Burgundians and the English. His messenger
need not necessarily be an angel. He might employ a creature human or
not human, like the raven that fed Elijah. And that a woman should
engage in war accorded with what was written in books concerning
Camilla, the Amazons, and Queen Penthesilea, and with what the Bible
says of the strong women, Deborah, Jahel, Judith of Bethulia, raised
up by God for the salvation of Israel. For it is written: "The mighty
one did not fall by the young men, neither did the sons of Titans
smite him, nor high giants set upon him; but Judith the daughter of
Merari weakened him with the beauty of her countenance."[741]
[Footnote 741: Judith, xvi, 7 (W.S.).]
Jeanne was taken to the mansion where dwelt Maitre Jean Rabateau, not
far from the law-courts, in the heart of the town.[742] Maitre Jean
Rabateau was Lay Attorney General; all criminal cases went to him,
while civil cases went to the ecclesiastical Attorney General, Jean
Jouvenel. Alike King's advocates, in the King's service, they both
represented him in cases wherein he was concerned. The King was an
unprofitable client. For representing him in criminal trials Maitre
Jean Rabateau received four hundred livres a year. He was forbidden to
appear in any but crown cases; and no one suspected him of receiving
many bribes. If in addition he held the office of Councillor to the
Duke of Orleans he gained little by it. Like most Parlement officials
he was for the moment very poor. A stranger in Poitiers, he had no
house there, but lodged in a mansion, which, because it belonged to a
family named Rosier, was called the Hotel de la Rose. It was a large
dwelling. Witnesses whom it was necessary to keep securely and deal
with honourably were entertained there. Jeanne was taken there
although the Parlement had nothing to do with her cross-examination.[743]
Once again she was placed in charge of a man who served both the Duke
of Orleans and the King of France.
[Footnote 742: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 19, 74, 82, 203. _Chronique de
la Pucelle_, p. 275. B. Ledain, _Jeanne d'Arc a Poitiers_,
Saint-Maixent, 1891, in 8vo.]
[Footnote 743: Nevertheless see _Le mistere du siege_, pp. 397-406.]
Jean Rabateau's wife, in common with the wives of all lawyers, was a
woman of good reputation.[744] While she was at La Rose, Jeanne would
stay long on her knees every day after dinner. At night she would
rise from her bed to pray, and pass long hours in the little oratory
of the mansion. It was in this house that the doctors conducted her
examination. When their coming was announced she was seized with cruel
anxiety. The Blessed Saint Catherine was careful to reassure her.[745]
She likewise had disputed with doctors and confounded them. True,
those doctors were heathen, but they were learned and their minds were
subtle; for in the life of the Saint it is written: "The Emperor
summoned fifty doctors versed in the lore of the Egyptians and the
liberal arts. And when she heard that she was to dispute with the wise
men, Catherine feared lest she should not worthily defend the Gospel
of Jesus Christ. But an angel appeared unto her and said: 'I am the
Archangel Saint Michael, and I am come to tell thee that thou shalt
come forth from the strife victorious and worthy of Our Lord Jesus
Christ, the hope and crown of those who strive for him.' And the
Virgin disputed with the doctors."[746]
[Footnote 744: There can be no reason for suspecting this lady of not
living up to her reputation, for nothing is known of her, not even
whether she were Maitre Jean Rabateau's first or second wife, for he
had two. The first was the daughter of Benoit Pidelet. Cf. B. Ledain,
_La maison de Jeanne d'Arc a Poitiers, Maitre Jean Rabateau_ (_Revue
du Bas-Poitou_, April, 1891, pp. 48, 66). A. Barbier, _Jeanne d'Arc et
l'hotellerie de la Rose_, Poitiers, 1892, in 8vo.]
[Footnote 745: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 82.]
[Footnote 746: Voragine, _La legende doree_ (Vie de Sainte
Catherine).]
The grave doctors and masters and the principal clerks of the
Parlement of Poitiers, in companies of two and three, repaired to the
house of Jean Rabateau, and each one of them in turn questioned
Jeanne. The first to come were Jean Lombard, Guillaume le Maire,
Guillaume Aimery, Pierre Turelure, and Jacques Meledon. Brother Jean
Lombard asked: "Wherefore have you come? The King desires to know what
led you to come to him."
Jeanne's reply greatly impressed these clerks: "As I kept my flocks a
_Voice appeared to me_. The Voice said: 'God has great pity on the
people of France. Jeanne, thou must go into France.' On hearing these
words I began to weep. Then the Voice said unto me: 'Go to
Vaucouleurs. There shalt thou find a captain, who will take thee
safely into France, to the King. Fear not.' I did as I was bidden, and
I came to the King without hindrance."[747]
[Footnote 747: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 204 (evidence of Brother
Seguin).]
Then the word fell to Brother Guillaume Aimery: "According to what you
have said, the Voice told you that God will deliver the people of
France from their distress; but if God will deliver them he has no
need of men-at-arms."
"In God's name," replied the Maid, "the men-at-arms will fight, and
God will give the victory."
Maitre Guillaume declared himself satisfied.[748]
[Footnote 748: _Ibid._, pp. 203, 204.]
On the 22nd of March, Maitre Pierre de Versailles and Maitre Jean
Erault went together to Jean Rabateau's lodging. The squire, Gobert
Thibault, whom Jeanne had already seen at Chinon, came with them. He
was a young man and very simple, one who believed without asking for a
sign. As they came in Jeanne went to meet them, and, striking the
squire on the shoulder, in a friendly manner, she said: "I wish I had
many men as willing as you."[749]
[Footnote 749: _Ibid._, p. 74.]
With men-at-arms she felt at her ease. But the doctors she could not
tolerate, and she suffered torture when they came to argue with her.
Although these theologians showed her great consideration, their
eternal questions wearied her; their slowness and heaviness
exasperated her. She bore them a grudge for not believing in her
straightway, without proof, and for asking her for a sign, which she
could not give them, since neither Saint Michael nor Saint Catherine
nor Saint Margaret appeared during the examination. In retirement, in
the oratory, and in the lonely fields the heavenly visitants came to
her in crowds; angels and saints, descending from heaven, flocked
around her. But when the doctors came, immediately the Jacob's ladder
was drawn up. Besides, the clerks were theologians, and she was a
saint. Relations are always strained between the heads of the Church
Militant and those devout women who communicate directly with the
Church Triumphant. She realised that the revelations granted to her so
abundantly inspired her most favourable judges with doubts, suspicion,
and even mistrust. She dared not confide to them much of the mystery
of her Voices, and when the Churchmen were not present she told
Alencon, her fair Duke, that she knew more and could do more than she
had ever told all those clerks.[750] It was not to them she had been
sent; it was not for them that she had come. She felt awkward in their
presence, and their manners were the occasion of that irritation which
is discernible in more than one of her replies.[751] Sometimes when
they questioned her she retreated to the end of her bench and sulked.
[Footnote 750: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 92.]
[Footnote 751: _Chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 275.]
"We come to you from the King," said Maitre Pierre de Versailles.
She replied with a bad grace: "I am quite aware that you are come to
question me again. I don't know A from B."[752] But to the question:
"Wherefore do you come?" she made answer eagerly: "I come from the
King of Heaven to raise the siege of Orleans, and take the King to be
crowned and anointed at Reims. Maitre Jean Erault, have you ink and
paper? Write what I shall tell you." And she dictated a brief
manifesto to the English captains: "You, Suffort, Clasdas, and La
Poule, in the name of the King of Heaven I call upon you to return to
England."[753]
[Footnote 752: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 74 (evidence of Gobert
Thibault).]
[Footnote 753: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 74. Boucher de Molandon and A. de
Beaucorps, _L'armee anglaise_, p. 111. La Poule, as he is called here,
is identical with Suffort, and is none other than William Pole, Earl
of Suffolk, unless John Pole, William's brother, be intended, but he
was not one of the three organisers of the siege. As for Clasdas or
Glasdale, as the French called him, he served under the orders of the
Commander of Les Tourelles. These errors may have been Jeanne's, or
possibly they were made by the witness. They do not recur in the
letter to the English.]
Maitre Jean Erault, who wrote at her dictation, was, like most of the
clerks, favourably disposed towards her. Further, he had his own
ideas. He recollected that Marie of Avignon, surnamed La Gasque, had
uttered true and memorable prophecies to King Charles VI. Now La
Gasque had told the King that the realm was to suffer many sorrows;
and she had seen weapons in the sky. Her story of her vision had
concluded with these words: "While I was afeard, believing myself
called upon to take these weapons, a voice comforted me, saying: 'They
are not for thee, but for a Virgin, who shall come and with these
weapons deliver the realm of France.'" Maitre Jean Erault meditated on
these marvellous revelations and came to believe that Jeanne was the
Virgin announced by Marie of Avignon.[754]
[Footnote 754: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 83.]
Maitre Gerard Machet, the King's Confessor, had found it written that
a Maid should come to the help of the King of France. He remarked on
it to Gobert Thibault, the Squire, who was no very great
personage;[755] and he certainly spoke of it to several others.
Gerard Machet, Doctor of Theology, sometime Vice Chancellor of the
University, from which he was now excluded, was regarded as one of the
lights of the Church. He loved the court,[756] although he would not
admit it, and enjoyed the favour of the King, who had just rewarded
his services by giving him money with which to purchase a mule.[757]
All doubts concerning the disposition of these doctors are removed by
the discovery that the King's Confessor himself put into circulation
those prophecies which had been distorted in favour of the Maid from
the Bois-Chenu.
[Footnote 755: _Ibid._, p. 75.]
[Footnote 756: _Lettres de Gerard Machet_, Bibl. nat. Latin documents,
no. 8577. Launoy, _Regii Navarrae Gymnasii Parisiensis historia_,
Paris, 1682 (2 vols. in 4to), vol. ii, pp. 533, 557. Du Boulay, _Hist.
Univ. Parisiensis_, vol. v, p. 875. Vallet de Viriville, in _Nouvelle
biographie generale_.]
[Footnote 757: De Beaucourt, _Extrait du catalogue des actes de
Charles VII_, p. 18.]
The damsel was interrogated concerning her Voices, which she called
her Council, and her saints, whom she imagined in the semblance of
those sculptured or painted figures peopling the churches.[758] The
doctors objected to her having cast off woman's clothing and had her
hair cut round in the manner of a page. Now it is written: "The woman
shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man
put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the
Lord thy God" (Deuteronomy xxii, 5). The Council of Gangres, held in
the reign of the Emperor Valens, had anathematised women who dressed
as men and cut short their hair.[759] Many saintly women, impelled by
a strange inspiration of the Holy Ghost, had concealed their sex by
masculine garb. At Saint-Jean-des-Bois, near Compiegne, was preserved
the reliquary of Saint Euphrosyne of Alexandria, who lived for
thirty-eight years in man's attire in the monastery of the Abbot
Theodosius.[760] For these reasons, and because of these precedents,
the doctors argued: since Jeanne had put on this clothing not to
offend another's modesty but to preserve her own, we will put no evil
interpretation on an act performed with good intent, and we will
forbear to condemn a deed justified by purity of motive.
[Footnote 758: _Trial_, vol. i, pp. 71, 72, 73, 171.]
[Footnote 759: Labbe, _Sacro-Sancta Consilia_ (1671), vol. ii, pp.
413, 434.]
[Footnote 760: Surius, _Vitae S.S._ (1618), vol. i, pp. 21-24. Gabriel
Brosse, _Histoire abregee de la vie et de la translation de Sainte
Euphrosine, Vierge d'Alexandrie, patronne de l'abbaye de
Beaulieu-les-Compiegne_, Paris, 1649, in 8vo.]
Certain of her questioners inquired why she called Charles Dauphin
instead of giving him his title of King. This title had been his by
right since the 30th of October, 1422; for on that day, the ninth
since the death of the King his father, at Mehun-sur-Yevre, in the
chapel royal, he had put off his black gown and assumed the purple
robe, while the heralds, raising aloft the banner of France, cried:
"Long live the King!"
She answered: "I will not call him King until he shall have been
anointed and crowned at Reims. To that city I intend to take
him."[761]
[Footnote 761: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 20.]
Without this anointing there was no king of France for her. Of the
miracles which had followed that anointing she had heard every year
from the mouth of her priest as he recited the glorious deeds of the
Blessed Saint Remi, the patron saint of her parish. This reply was
such as to satisfy the interrogators because, both for things
spiritual and temporal, it was important that the King should be
anointed at Reims.[762] And Messire Regnault de Chartres must have
ardently desired it.
[Footnote 762: It may be noticed that during the consultation of the
doctors, according to the report of it given by Thomassin in _Le
registre Delphinal_, Charles of Valois is designated alike by the
title of King and by that of Dauphin (_Trial_, vol. iv, p. 303).]
Contradicted by the clerks, she opposed the Church's doctrine by the
inspiration of her own heart, and said to them: "There is more in the
Book of Our Lord than in all yours."[763]
[Footnote 763: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 86.]
This was a bold and biting reply, which would have been dangerous had
the theologians been less favourably inclined to her. Otherwise they
might have held it to be trespassing on the rights of the Church, who,
as the guardian of the Holy Books, is their jealous interpreter, and
does not suffer the authority of Scripture to be set up against the
decisions of Councils.[764] What were those books, which without
having read she judged to be contrary to those of Our Lord, wherein
with mind and spirit she seemed to read plainly? They would seem to be
the Sacred Canons and the Sacred Decretals. This child's utterance
sapped the very foundations of the Church. Had the doctors of Poitiers
been less zealously Armagnac they would henceforth have mistrusted
Jeanne and suspected her of heresy. But they were loyal servants of
the houses of Orleans and of France. Their cassocks were ragged and
their larders empty;[765] their only hope was in God, and they feared
lest in rejecting this damsel they might be denying the Holy Ghost.
Besides, everything went to prove that these words of Jeanne were
uttered without guile and in all ignorance and simplicity. No doubt
that is why the doctors were not shocked by them.
[Footnote 764: Le Pere Didon, _Vie de Jesus_, vol. i, Preface.]
[Footnote 765: Juvenal des Ursins, _Histoire de Charles VI_, p. 359.]
Brother Seguin of Seguin in his turn questioned the damsel. He was
from Limousin, and his speech betrayed his origin. He spoke with a
drawl and used expressions unknown in Lorraine and Champagne. Perhaps
he had that dull, heavy air, which rendered the folk of his province
somewhat ridiculous in the eyes of dwellers on the Loire, the Seine,
and the Meuse. To the question: "What language do your Voices speak?"
Jeanne replied: "A better one than yours."[766]
[Footnote 766: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 204.]
Even saints may lose patience. If Brother Seguin did not know it
before, he learnt it that day. And what business had he to doubt that
Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret, who were on the side of the
French, spoke French? Such a doubt Jeanne could not bear, and she gave
her questioner to understand that when one comes from Limousin one
does not inquire concerning the speech of heavenly ladies.
Notwithstanding he pursued his interrogation: "Do you believe in God?"
"Yes, more than you do," said the Maid, who, knowing nothing of the
good Brother, was somewhat hasty in esteeming herself better grounded
in the faith than he.
But she was vexed that there should be any question of her belief in
God, who had sent her. Her reply, if favourably interpreted, would
testify to the ardour of her faith. Did Brother Seguin so understand
it? His contemporaries represented him as being of a somewhat bitter
disposition. On the contrary, there is reason to believe that he was
good-natured.[767]
[Footnote 767: It seems to have been the fate of the inhabitants of
Limousin to be jeered at by the French of Champagne and of l'Ile de
France. After Brother Seguin we have the student from Limousin to whom
Pantagruel says: "Thou art Limousin to the bone and yet here thou wilt
pass thyself off as a Parisian." It is the lot of M. de Pourceaugnac.
La Fontaine, in 1663, writes from Limoges to his wife that the people
of Limousin are by no means afflicted; neither do they labour under
Heaven's displeasure "as the folk of our provinces imagine." But he
adds that he does not like their habits. It would seem that at first
Brother Seguin was annoyed by Jeanne's mocking vivacious repartees.
But he cherished no ill-will against her. "The Limousin's good nature
does not permit the endurance of any unfriendly feeling," says Abel
Hugo in _La France pittoresque: Haute-Vienne_. Cf. A. Precicou,
_Rabelais et les Limousins_, Limoges, 1906, in 8vo.]
"But after all," he said, "it cannot be God's will that you should be
believed unless some sign appear to make us believe in you. On your
word alone we cannot counsel the King to run the risk of granting you
men-at-arms."
"In God's name," she answered, "it was not to give a sign that I came
to Poitiers. But take me to Orleans and I will show you the signs
wherefore I am sent. Let me be given men, it matters not how many, and
I will go to Orleans."
And she repeated what she was continually saying: "The English shall
all be driven out and destroyed. The siege of Orleans shall be raised
and the city delivered from its enemies, after I shall have summoned
it to surrender in the name of the King of Heaven. The Dauphin shall
be anointed at Reims, the town of Paris shall return to its allegiance
to the King, and the Duke of Orleans shall come back from
England."[768]
[Footnote 768: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 205.]
Long did the doctors and masters, following the example of Brother
Seguin of Seguin, urge her to show a sign of her mission. They thought
that if God had chosen her to deliver the French nation he would not
fail to make his choice manifest by a sign, as he had done for Gideon,
the son of Joash. When Israel was sore pressed by the Midianites, and
when God's chosen people hid from their enemies in the caves of the
mountains, the Angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon under an oak, and
said unto him: "Surely I will be with thee and thou shalt smite the
Midianites as one man." To which Gideon made answer: "If now I have
found grace in thy sight, then shew me a sign that thou talkest with
me." And Gideon made ready a kid and kneaded unleavened cakes; the
flesh he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot and brought
the pot and the basket beneath the oak. Then the Angel of God said
unto him: "Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes, and lay them upon
this rock, and pour out the broth." And he did so. Then the angel of
the Lord put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and
touched the flesh and the unleavened cakes; and there rose up fire out
of the rock, and consumed the flesh and the unleavened cakes. When
Gideon perceived that he had seen an angel of the Lord, he cried out:
"Alas, O Lord God! for because I have seen an angel of the Lord face
to face."[769] With three hundred men Gideon subdued the Midianites.
This example the doctors had before their minds.[770]
[Footnote 769: Judges, ch. vi. (W.S.).]
[Footnote 770: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 20.]
But for the Maid the sign of victory was victory itself. She said
without ceasing: "The sign that I will show you shall be Orleans
relieved and the siege raised."[771]
[Footnote 771: _Ibid._, pp. 20, 205. _Chronique de la Pucelle_, p.
278. _Journal du siege_, p. 49.]
Such persistency made an impression on most of her interrogators. They
determined to make of it, not a stone of stumbling, but rather an
example of zeal and a subject of edification. Since she promised them
a sign it behoved them in all humility to ask God to send it, and,
filled with a like hope, joining with the King and all the people, to
pray to the God, who delivered Israel, to grant them the banner of
victory. Thus were overcome the arguments of Brother Seguin and of
those who, led away by the precepts of human wisdom, desired a sign
before they believed.
After an examination which had lasted six weeks, the doctors declared
themselves satisfied.[772]
[Footnote 772: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 19, 20.]
There was one point it was necessary to ascertain; they must know
whether Jeanne was, as she said, a virgin. Matrons had indeed already
examined her on her arrival at Chinon. Then there was a doubt as to
whether she were man or maid; and it was even feared that she might be
an illusion in woman's semblance, produced by the art of demons, which
scholars considered by no means impossible.[773] It was not long since
the death of that canon who held that now and again knights are
changed into bears and spirits travel a hundred leagues in one night,
then suddenly become sows or wisps of straw.[774] Suitable measures
had therefore been taken. But they must be carried out exactly,
wisely, and cautiously, for the matter was of great importance.
[Footnote 773: _Ibid._, vol. i, p. 95; vol. iii, p. 209.]
[Footnote 774: Mary Darmesteter, _Froissart_, Paris, 1894, in 12mo, p.
96.]