We were doomed to suffer tedious waits and delays, and we settled ourselves down to our fate and bore it with a dreary patience, counting the slow hours and the dull days, and hoping for a turn when God should please descend it. The paladin was the only exception, that is to say, he was the only one who was happy and had no heavy times. This was partly owing to the satisfaction he got out of his clothes. He bought them at second hand, a Spanish cavaliers complete suit, wide brimmed hat with flowing plumes, lace collar and cuffs, faded velvet doublet and trunks, short cloak hung from the shoulder, funnel-topped buskins, long rapier and all that, a graceful and picturesque costume, and the paladin's great frame was the right place to hang it for effect. He wore it when off duty, and when he swaggered by with one hand resting on the hilt of his rapier, and twirling his new mustache with the other, everybody stopped to look and admire, and, well, they might, for he was a fine and stately contrast to the small French gentleman of the day squeezed into the trivial French costume of the time. He was King Bee of the little village that snuggled under the shelter of the frowning towers and bastions of Cordray Castle, and acknowledged Lord of the Taproom of the Inn. When he opened his mouth there he got a hearing. Those simple artisans and peasants listened with deep and wondering interest, for he was a traveller and had seen the world, all of it, that lay between Chineau and Dom Rémy at any rate, and that was a wide stretch more of it than they might ever hope to see. And he had been in battle, and knew how to paint its shock and struggle, its perils and surprises with an art that was all his own.  He drew custom as honey-draw flies, so he was the pet of the innkeeper and of his wife and daughter, and they were his obliged and willing servants. Most people who have the narrative gift, that great and rare endowment, have with it the defect of telling their choice things over the same way every time, and this injures them and causes them to sound stale and weariesome after several repetitions. But it was not so with the Paladin, whose art was of a finer sort. It was more stirring and interesting to hear him tell about a battle the tenth time than it was the first time, because he did not tell it twice the same way, but always made a new battle of it and a better one, with more casualties on the enemy side each time, and more general wreck and disaster all around, and more widows and orphans and suffering in the neighborhood where it happened. He could not tell his battles apart himself except by their names, and by the time he had told one of them ten times it had grown so that there wasn't room enough in France for it any more, but was lapping over the edges. But up to that point the audience would not allow him to substitute a new battle, knowing that the old ones were the best, and sure to improve as long as France could hold them. And so, instead of saying to him, as they would have said to another, give us something fresh, we are fatigued with that old thing, they would say, with one voice and with a strong interest, tell about the surprise at Beaulieu again, tell it three or four times. That is a compliment which few narrative experts have heard in their lifetime. At first when the paladin heard us tell about the glories of the royal audience he was brokenhearted because he was not taken with us to it. Next his talk was full of what he would have done if he had been there, and within two days he was telling what he did do when he was there. His mill was fairly started now and could be trusted to take care of its affair. Within three nights afterward all his battles were taking a rest, for already his worshippers in the taproom were so infatuated with the great tale of the royal audience that they would have nothing else, and so besotted with it were they that they would have cried if they could not have gotten it. Nolringesson hid himself and heard it and came and told me, and after that we went together to listen, bribing the in-hostess to let us have her little private parlor where we could stand at the wickets in the door and see and hear. The taproom was large, yet had a snug and cozy look, with its inviting little tables and chairs scattered irregularly over its red brick floor, and its great fire flaming and crackling in the wide chimney. It was a comfortable place to be in on such chilly and blustering March nights as these, and a goodly company had taken shelter there, and were sipping their wine in contentment, and gossiping one with another in a neighbourly way, while they waited for the historian. The host, the hostess, and their pretty daughter were flying here and there in yonder, among the tables, and doing their best to keep up with the orders. The room was about forty feet square, and a space or aisle down the centre of it had been kept vacant and reserved for the paladin's needs. At the end of it was a platform ten or twelve feet wide, with a big chair and a small table on it, and three steps leading up to it. Among the wine-sippers were many familiar faces, the cobbler, the farrier, the blacksmith, the wheel-right, the armourer, the mulster, the weaver, the baker, the miller's man with his dusty coat, and so on, and conscious and important, as a matter of course, was the barber-surgeon, for he is that in all villages, as he has to pull everybody's teeth and purge and bleed all the grown people once a month to keep their health sound, he knows everybody, and by constant contact with all sorts of folk becomes a master of etiquette and manners, and a conversationalist of large facility. There were plenty of carriers, drovers, and their sort, and journeymen artisans. When the paladin presently came sauntering indolently in, he was received with a cheer, and the barber hustled forward and greeted him with several low and most graceful and courtly boughs, also taking his hand and touching his lips to it. Then he called in a loud voice for a stout of wine for the paladin, and when the host's daughter brought it up on the platform and dropped her courtesy and departed, the barber called after her and told her to add the wine to his score. This won him ejaculations of approval, which pleased him very much and made his little rat eyes shine, and such applause is right and proper, for when we do a liberal and gallant thing it is but natural that we should wish to see notice taken of it. The barber called upon the people to rise and drink the paladin's health, and they did it with alacrity and affectionate heartiness, clashing their metal flagons together with a simultaneous crash and heightening the effect with a resounding cheer. It was a fine thing to see how that young swashbuckler had made himself so popular in a strange land, in so little a while, and without other helps to his advancement than just his tongue, and the talent to use it given him by God, a talent which was but one talent in the beginning, but was now become ten through husbandry and the increment and usufruct that do naturally follow that and reward it as by law. The people sat down and began to hammer on the tables with their flagons and call for THE KING'S ODIONS! THE KING'S ODIONS! THE KING'S ODIONS! The paladin stood there in one of his best attitudes, with his plumed great hat tipped over to the left, the folds of his short cloak drooping from his shoulder, and the one hand resting upon the hilt of his rapier and the other lifting his beaker.  The barber jumped for it and set it upon the paladin's table, then the paladin began to walk up and down his platform with a great deal of dignity and quite at his ease, and as he walked he talked, and every little while stopped and stood facing his house, and so standing continued his talk. We went three nights in succession. It was plain that there was a charm about the performance that was apart from the mere interest which attaches to lying. It was presently discoverable that this charm lay in the paladin's sincerity. He was not lying consciously, he believed what he was saying. To him his initial statements were facts, and whenever he enlarged a statement the enlargement became a fact too. He put his heart into his extravagant narrative, just as a poet puts his heart into a heroic fiction, and his earnestness disarmed criticism, disarmed it as far as he himself was concerned. Nobody believed his narrative, but all believed that he believed it. He made his enlargements without flourish, without emphasis, and so casually that often one failed to notice that a change had been made. He spoke of the Governor of Vauculeur the first night, simply as the Governor of Vauculeur. He spoke of him the second night as his uncle, the Governor of Vauculeur. The third night he was his father. He did not seem to know that he was making these extraordinary changes. They dropped from his lips in a quite natural and effortless way. By his first night's account the Governor merely attached him to the maid's military escort in a general and unofficial way. The second night his uncle, the Governor, sent him with the maid as lieutenant of her rearguard. The third night his father, the Governor, put the whole command made and all in his special charge. The first night the Governor spoke of him as a youth without name or ancestry, but destined to achieve both. The second night his uncle, the Governor, spoke of him as the latest and worthiest lineal descendant of the chiefest and noblest of the twelve paladins of Charlemagne. The third night he spoke of him as the lineal descendant of the whole dozen. In three nights he promoted the count of Vendôme from a fresh acquaintance to a schoolmate, and then brother-in-law. At the king's audience everything grew in the same way. First the four silver trumpets were twelve, then thirty-five and finally ninety-six, and by that time he had thrown in so many drums and cymbals that he had to lengthen the hall from five hundred feet to nine hundred to accommodate them. Under his hand the people present multiplied in the same large way. The first two nights he contented himself with merely describing and exaggerating the chief dramatic incident of the audience, but the third night he had an illustration to description. He thrown the barber in his own high chair to represent the sham king. Then he told how the court watched the maid with intense interest and suppressed merriment, expecting to see her fooled by the deception and get herself swept permanently out of credit by the storm of scornful laughter which would follow. He worked this scene up till he got his house in a burning fever of excitement and anticipation. Then came his climax. Turning to the barber he said, But mark you what she did! She gazed steadfastly upon that sham's villain face as I now gaze upon yours, this being her noble and simple attitude just as I stand now. Then turned she, thus, to me, and stretching her arm out, so, and pointing with her finger she said, in that firm calm tone which she was used to use in directing the conduct of a battle, pluck me this false nave from the throne. I, striding forward as I do now, took him by the collar and lifted him out and held him aloft, thus, as if he had been but a child. The house rose, shouting, stamping, and banging with her flagans, and went fairly mad over this magnificent exhibition of strength, and there was not the shadow of a laugh anywhere, though the spectacle of the limp but proud barber hanging there in the air like a puppy held by the scruff of its neck was a thing that had nothing of solemnity about it. Then I set him down upon his feet, thus, being minded to get him by a better hold, and heave him out of the window, which she bid me for bear, so by that error he escaped with his life. Then she turned her about and viewed the throng with those eyes of hers which are the clear shining windows whence her immortal wisdom looketh out upon the world, resolving its falsities and coming at the colonel of truth that is hid within them, and presently they fell upon a young man modestly clothed, and him she proclaimed for what he truly was, saying, I am thy servant, thou art the king. Then all were astonished, and a great shout went up, the whole six thousand joining in it, so that the walls rocked with the volume and the tumult of it. He made a fine and picturesque thing of the march out from the audience, augmenting the glories of it to the last limit of the impossibilities. Then he took from his finger and held up a brass nut from a bolt-head, which the head-ostler at the castle had given him that morning, and made his conclusion thus. Then the king dismissed the maid most graciously, as indeed was her dessert, and, turning to me, said, Take this signet ring, son of the paladins, and command me with it in your day of need, and look you, said he, touching my temple. Preserve this brain, France has use for it, and look well to its casket also, for I foresee that it will be hooped with a ducal coronet one day. I took the ring and melted and kissed his hand, saying, Sire, where glory calls, there will I be found. Where danger and death are thickest, that is my native heir. When France and the throne need help, well, I say nothing for I am not of the talking sort. Let my deeds speak for me, it is all I ask. So ended the most fortunate and memorable episode, so big with future wheel for the crown and the nation, and unto God be the thanks. Rise, fill your flagans! Now to France and the king, drink!" They emptied them to the bottom, then burst into cheers and hazzaz, and kept it up as much as two minutes, the paladins standing at stately ease the while, and smiling benignantly from his platform. CHAPTER VIII. When Joan told the king what that deep secret was that was torturing his heart, his doubts were cleared away. He believed she was sent of God, and if he had been let alone, he would have set her upon her great mission at once. But he was not let alone. Tremue and the holy fox of reams knew their man. All they needed to say was this, and they said it.  How can you know that her voices are not of Satan, and she is his mouthpiece? For does not Satan know the secrets of men and use his knowledge for the destruction of their souls? It is a dangerous business, and your Highness will do well not to proceed in it without probing the matter to the bottom. That was enough.  The king's relative, the Duke of Valençon, three years prisoner of war to the English, was in these days released from captivity through promise of a great ransom, and the name and fame of the maid having reached him, for the same filled all mouths now and penetrated to all parts, he came to Chinon to see with his own eyes what manner of creature she might be. The king sent for Joan and introduced her to the Duke. She said in her simple fashion, You are welcome. The more of the blood of France that is joined to this cause, the better for the cause and it. Then the two talked together, and there was just the usual result. When they departed, the Duke was her friend and advocate. Joan attended the king's mass the next day and afterward dined with the king and the Duke. The king was learning to prize her company and value her conversation, and that might well be for, like other kings, he was used to getting nothing out of people's talk but guarded phrases, colorless and non-committal, or carefully tinted to tally with the color of what he said himself, and so this kind of conversation only vexes and bores and is wearisome. But Joan's talk was fresh and free, sincere and honest, and unmarred by timorous self-watching and constraint. She said the very thing that was in her mind and said it in a plain, straightforward way. One can believe that to the king this must have been like fresh cold water from the mountains, to parched lips used to the water of the sun-baked puddles of the plain. After dinner Joan so charmed the Duke with her horsemanship and lance practice in the meadows by the castle of Chineau, whether the king also had come to look on, that he made her a present of a great black war-steed. Every day the commission of bishops came and questioned Joan about her voices and her mission and then went to the king with their report. These pryings accomplished but little. She told as much as she considered advisable and kept the rest to herself. Both threats and trickeries were wasted upon her. She did not care for the threats and the traps caught nothing. She was perfectly frank and childlike about these things. She knew the bishops were sent by the king, that their questions were the king's questions, and that by all law and custom a king's questions must be answered. Yet she told the king in her naive way at his own table one day that she answered only such of those questions as suited her. The bishops finally concluded that they couldn't tell whether Joan was sent by God or not. They were cautious, you see. There were two powerful parties at court. Therefore to make a decision either way would infallibly embroil them with one of those parties, so it seemed to them wisest to roost on the fence and shift the burden to other shoulders. And that is what they did. They made final report that Joan's case was beyond their powers, and recommended that it be put into the hands of the learned and illustrious doctors at the University of Poitiers. Then they retired from the field, leaving behind them this little item of testimony rung from them by Joan's wise reticence. They said she was a gentle and simple little shepherdess, very candid, but not given to talking. It was quite true, in their case. But if they could have looked back and seen her with us in the happy pastures of Dom Rémy, they would have perceived that she had a tongue that could go fast enough when no harm could come of her words. So we travelled to Poitiers to endure there three weeks of tedious delay while this poor child was being daily questioned and badgered before a great bench of—what—military experts? Since what she had come to apply for was an army, and the privilege of leading it to battle against the enemies of France? Oh, no! It was a great bench of priests and monks, profoundly leaned and astute casuettes, renowned professors of theology. Instead of setting a military commission to find out if this valorous little soldier could win victories, they set a company of holy hair-splitters and phrase-mongers to work to find out if the soldier was sound in her piety, and had no doctrinal leaks. The rats were devouring the house, but instead of examining the cat's teeth and claws, they only concerned themselves to find out if it was a holy cat. If it was a pious cat, a moral cat, all right, never mind about the other capacities, they were of no consequence. Joan was as sweetly self-possessed and tranquil before this grim tribunal with its robed celebrities, its solemn state and imposing ceremonials, as if she were but a spectator and not herself on trial. She sat there, solitary on her bench, untroubled, and disconcerted the science of the sages with her sublime ignorance, an ignorance which was a fortress. Arts, wiles, the learning drawn from books, and all, like missiles, rebounded from its unconscious masonry and fell to the ground harmless. They could not dislodge the garrison which was within. Joan's serene great heart and spirit, the guards and keepers of her mission. She answered all questions frankly, and she told all the story of her visions and of her experiences with the angels and what they said to her, and the manner of the telling was so unaffected and so earnest and sincere, and made it all seem so lifelike and real, that even that hard practical court forgot itself and sat motionless and mute, listening with a charmed and wondering interest to the end. And if you would have other testimony than mine, look in the histories, and you will find where an eyewitness, giving sworn testimony in the rehabilitation process, says that she told that tale with a noble dignity and simplicity, and as to its effect, says in substance what I have said. In team she was, seventeen and all alone on her bench by herself, yet was not afraid, but faced that great company of erudite doctors of law and theology, and by the help of no art learned in the schools, but using only the enchantments which were hers by nature, of youth, sincerity, of voice soft and musical, and in eloquence whose source was the heart, not the head, she laid that spell upon them. Now was not that a beautiful thing to see. If I could, I would put it before you just as I sought, then I know what you would say. As I have told you, she could not read. One day they harried and pestered her with arguments, reasonings, objections, and other windy and wordy trivialities gathered out of the works of this and that and the other great theological authority, until at last her patience vanished and she turned upon them sharply and said, I don't know, A, from B, but I know this, that I am come by command of the Lord of Heaven, to deliver Orléans from the English power and crown the King of Rams, and the matters ye are puttering over are of no consequence. Necessarily those were trying days for her and wearing for everybody that took part. But her share was the hardest, for she had no holidays, but must be always on hand and stay the long hours through, whereas this, that, and the other inquisitor could absent himself and rest up from his fatigues when he got worn out. And yet she showed nowhere, no weariness, and but seldom let fly her temper. As a rule she put her day through calm, alert, patient, fencing with those veteran masters of scholarly sword play, and coming out always without a scratch.  The sly Dominican began in this way in a sort of indolent fashion, as if the thing he was about was a matter of no moment. You assert that God has willed to deliver France from this English bondage? Yes, he has willed it. You wish for men-at-arms so that you may go to the relief of Orléans, I believe? Yes, and the sooner the better. God is all-powerful and able to do whatsoever thing he wills to do, is it not so? Most surely, none doubts it. The Dominican lifted his head suddenly, and sprung that question I have spoken of with exaltation. Then answer me this! If he has willed to deliver France and is able to do whatsoever he wills, where is the need for men-at-arms? There was a fine stir and commotion when he said that, and a sudden thrusting forward of heads and putting up of hands to ears to catch the answer, and the Dominican wagged his head with satisfaction and looked about him collecting his applause for its shan in every face. But Joan was not disturbed. There was no note of disquiet in her voice when she answered. He helps who help themselves. The sons of France will fight the battles, but he will give the victory. You could see a light of admiration sweep the house from face to face like a ray from the sun. Even the Dominican himself looked pleased to see his master stroke so neatly parried, and I heard a venerable bishop mutter in the phrasing common to priests and people in that robust time. By God! the child has said true! He willed that Goliath should be slain, and he sent a child like this to do it. Another day when the Inquisition had dragged along until everybody looked drowsy and tired but Joan, Brother Siguin, Professor of Theology at the University of Poitiers, who was a sour and sarcastic man, fell to plying Joan with all sorts of nagging questions in his bastard limousin, French, for he was from Limoges. Finally he said, How is it that you understand those angels? What language did they speak? French. Indeed. How pleasant to know that our language is so honoured. Good French? Yes. Perfect. Perfect, eh? Well, certainly you ought to know. It was even better than your own, eh? As to that, I—I believe I cannot say, said she, and was going on, but stopped. Then she added almost as if she were saying it to herself. Still, it was an improvement on yours. I knew there was a chuckle-back of her eyes for all their innocence. Everybody doubted. Brother Siguin was netled and asked brusquely, Do you believe in God? Joan answered with an irritating nonchalance. Oh, well, yes. Better than you, it is likely. Brother Siguin lost his patience and heaped sarcasm after sarcasm upon her, and finally burst out in angry earnest exclaiming, Very well, I can tell you this. You whose belief in God is so great, God has not willed that any shall believe in you without a sign. Where is your sign? Show it! This row's Joan, and she was on her feet in a moment, and flung out her retort with spirit. I have not come to Poitiers to show signs and do miracles. Send me to Orléans, and you shall have signs enough. Give me men at arms, few or many, and let me go!"  Ah, the heroic little figure! Can't you see her? There was a great burst of acclamations, and she sat down blushing, for it was not in her delicate nature to like being conspicuous. This speech, and that episode about the French language, scored two points against Brother Siguin, while he scored nothing against Joan. Yet, sour man as he was, he was a manly man and honest, as you can see by the histories, for at the rehabilitation he could have hidden those unlucky incidents if he had chosen, but he didn't do it, but spoke them right out in his evidence. On one of the latter days of that three-week session the gown scholars and professors made one grand assault, all along the line, fairly overwhelming Joan with objections and arguments culled from the writings of every ancient and illustrious authority of the Roman Church. She was well nice-mothered, but at last she shook herself free and struck back, crying out, Listen! The book of God is worth more than all these ye sight, and I stand upon it, and I tell you, there are things in that book that not one among ye can read, with all your learning. From the first she was the guest, by invitation of the Dame de Rabatou, wife of the councillor of the Parliament of Poitiers, and to that house the great ladies of the city came nightly to see Joan and talk with her, and not these only, but the old lawyers, councillors, and scholars of the Parliament and the University. And these grave men, accustomed to weigh every strange and questionable thing, and cautiously consider it, and turn it about this way and that, and still doubt it, came night after night and night after night, falling ever deeper and deeper under the influence of that mysterious something, that spell, that elusive and unwordable fascination which was the supremest endowment of Joan of Arc, that winning and persuasive and convincing something which high and low alike recognized and felt, but which neither high nor low could explain or describe, and one by one they all surrendered, saying, "'This child is sent of God!' All day long Joan, in the great court, and subject to its rigid rules of procedure, was at a disadvantage. Her judges had things their own way. But at night she held court herself, and matters were reversed, she presiding, with her tongue free and her same judges there before her. There could not be but one result, and all the objections and hindrances they could build around her with their hard labours of the day, she would charm away at night. In the end she carried her judges with her in a mass, and got her great verdict, without a dissenting voice. The court was a sight to see when the president of it read it from his throne, for all the great people of the town were there who could get admission and find room. First there were some solemn ceremonies, proper and usual at such times, then when there was silence again the reading followed, penetrating the deep hush, so that every word was heard in even the remotest parts of the house. It is found, and is hereby declared, that Joan of Arc, called the maid, is a good Christian, and a good Catholic, that there is nothing in her person or her words contrary to the faith, and that the king may and ought to accept the succour she offers, for to repel it would be to offend the Holy Spirit, and render him unworthy of the air of God. The court rose, and then the storm of plaudits burst forth unrebuke'd, dying down and bursting forth again and again, and I lost sight of Joan, for she was swallowed up in a great tide of people who rushed to congratulate her, and pour out benedictions upon her, and upon the cause of France, now solemnly and irrevocably delivered into her little hands. It was indeed a great day, and a stirring thing to see. She had won. It was a mistake of Troumouie and her other ill-wishers to let her hold court those nights. The commission of priests sent to Lorraine, ostensibly to inquire into Joan's character, in fact, to weary her, with delays and wear out her purpose and make her give it up, arrived back and reported her character perfect. Our affairs were in full career now, you see. The verdict made a prodigious blizzard. Dead France woke suddenly to life wherever the great news travelled, whereas before the spiritless and cowed people hung their heads and slunk away of one mentioned war to them. Now they came clamouring to be enlisted under the banner of the maid of Vauculeur, and the roaring of war-songs and the thundering of the drums filled all the air. I remembered now what she had said that time there in our village, when I proved by facts and statistics that France's case was hopeless and nothing could ever rouse the people from their lethargy, they will hear the drums, and they will answer. They will march. It has been said that misfortunes never come one at a time, but in a body. In our case it was the same with good luck. Having got a start it came flooding in, tide after tide. Our next wave of it was of this sort. There had been grave doubts among the priests as to whether the Church ought to permit a female soldier to dress like a man, but now came a verdict on that head. Two of the greatest scholars and theologians of the time, one of whom had been Chancellor of the University of Paris, rendered it. They decided that since Joan must do the work of a man and a soldier it is just and legitimate that her apparel should conform to the situation. It was a great point gained. The Church's authority to dress as a man. Oh, yes, wave on wave the good luck came sweeping in. Never mind about the smaller waves. Let us come to the largest one of all, the wave that swept us small fry quite off our feet and almost drowned us with joy. The day of the great verdict couriers had been dispatched to the King with it, and the next morning bright and early the clear notes of a bugle came floating to us on the crisp air, and we pricked up our ears and began to count them. One, two, three, pause. One, two, pause. One, two, three, again. And out we skipped and went flying, for that formula was used only when the King's heralded arms would deliver a proclamation to the people. As we hurried along, people came racing out of every street and house and alley. Men, women and children all flushed, excited, and throwing lacking articles of clothing on as they ran. Still those clear notes peeled out, and still the rush of people increased till the whole town was abroad and streaming along the principal street. At last we reached the square which was now packed with citizens, and there, high on the pedestal of the great cross, we saw the herald in his brilliant costume with his servitors about him. The next moment he began his delivery in the powerful voice proper to his office. No all men, and take heed, therefore, that the most high, the most illustrious Charles, by the grace of God King of France, hath been pleased to confer upon his well-beloved servant, Joan of Arc, called the maid, the title, Immonuluments, Authorities, and Dignity of General-In-Chief of the Armies of France. Here a thousand caps flew in the air, and the multitude burst into her hurricane of cheers that raged and raged till it seemed as if it would never come to an end. But at last it did. Then the herald went on and finished. And hath appointed to be her lieutenant and chief of staff, a prince of his royal house, his grace, the duke of Alancourt. That was the end, and the hurricane began again, and was split up into innumerable strips by the blowers of it, and wafted through all the lanes and streets of the town. General of the Armies of France, with the prince of the blood for subordinate. Yesterday she was nothing, today she was this. Yesterday she was not even a sergeant, not even a corporal, not even a private. Today, with one step, she was at the top. Yesterday she was less than nobody to the newest recruit. Today her command was law to lair, sainterre, the bastard of Orleans, and all those other veterans of old renown, illustrious masters of the trade of war. These were the thoughts I was thinking. I was trying to realize this strange and wonderful thing that had happened, you see. My mind went travelling back and presently lighted upon a picture, a picture which was still so new and fresh in my memory that it seemed a matter of only yesterday, and indeed its date was no further back than the first days of January. This is what it was—a peasant girl in a far-off village, her seventeenth year not yet quite completed, and herself and her village as unknown as if they had been on the other side of the globe. She had picked up a friendless wanderer somewhere and brought it home, a small gray kitten in a forlorn and starving condition, and had fed it and comforted it, and got its confidence and made it believe in her, and now it was curled up in her lap asleep, and she was knitting a coarse stalking and thinking, dreaming, about—what? One may never know. And now the kitten had hardly had time to become a cat, and yet already the girl is general of the armies of France, with the prince of the blood to give orders to, and out of her village obscurity her name has climbed up like the sun and is visible from all corners of the land. It made me dizzy to think of these things, they were so out of the common order, and seemed so impossible. END OF CHAPTER IX Joan's first official act was to dictate a letter to the English commanders at Orléans, summoning them to deliver up all strongholds in their possession, and depart out of France.  It flowed from her lips so smoothly and framed itself into such vivacious and forcible language. Still, it might not have been so. She always had a quick mind and a capable tongue, and her faculties were constantly developing in these latter weeks. This letter was to be forwarded presently from Bois. Men, provisions, and money were offering in plenty now, and Joan appointed Bois as a recruiting station and depot of supplies, and ordered up La Hire from the front to take charge. The great bastard, him of the Ducal House and Governor of Orléans, had been clamoring for weeks for Joan to be sent to him, and now came another messenger, old Dolan, a veteran officer, a trusty man and fine and honest. The king kept him and gave him to Joan to be chief of her household, and commanded her to appoint the rest of her people herself, making their number and dignity accord with the greatness of her office, and at the same time he gave order that they should be properly equipped with arms, clothing, and horses. Meantime, the king was having a complete suit of armor made for her at Tour. It was of the finest steel, heavily plated with silver, richly ornamented with engraved designs and polished like a mirror. Joan's voices had told her that there was an ancient sword hidden somewhere behind the altar of St. Catherine's of Fierroix, and she sent Demets to get it. The priests knew of no such sword, but a search was made, and sure enough it was found in that place, buried a little way under the ground. It had no sheath and was very rusty, but the priests polished it up and sent it to Tour whether we were now to come. They also had a sheath of crimson velvet made for it, and the people of Tour equipped it with another, made of cloth of gold. But Joan meant to carry this sword always in battle, so she laid the showy sheaths away and got one made of leather. It was generally believed that this sword had belonged to Charlemagne, but that was only a matter of opinion. I wanted to sharpen that old blade, but she said it was not necessary, as she should never kill anybody, and should carry it only as a symbol of authority. At Tour she designed her standard, and a scotch painter named James Power made it. It was of the most delicate white boucassin with fringes of silk. For device it bore the image of God the Father thrown in the clouds and holding the world in his hand. Two angels knelt at his feet, presenting lilies. Inscription, Jesus, Maria. On the reverse the crown of France supported by two angels. She also caused a smaller standard or penane to be made, whereon was represented an angel offering a lily to the Holy Virgin. Everything was humming there at Tour. Every now and then one heard the bray and crash of military music. Every little while one heard the measured tramp of marching men, squads of recruits leaving Fort Blois. Songs and shoutings and hazzas filled the air night and day. The town was full of strangers. The streets and inns were thronged, the bustle of preparation was everywhere, and everybody carried a glad and cheerful face. Around Jones' headquarters a crowd of people was always massed, hoping for a glimpse of the new general. When they got it they went wild. But they seldom got it, for she was busy planning her campaign, receiving reports, giving orders, dispatching couriers, and giving what odd moments she could spare to the companies of great folk waiting in the drawing-rooms. As for us boys, we hardly saw her at all, she was so occupied. We were in a mixed state of mind, sometimes hopeful, sometimes not—mostly not. She had not appointed her household yet, that was our trouble. We knew she was being overrun with applications for places in it, and that these applications were backed by great names and weighty influence, whereas we had nothing of the sort to recommend us. She could fill her humblest places with titled folk, folk whose relationships would be a bulwark for her and a valuable support at all times. In these circumstances would policy allow her to consider us? We were not as cheerful as the rest of the town, but were inclined to be depressed and worried. Sometimes we discussed our slim chances and gave them as good an appearance as we could, but the very mention of the subject was anguished to the paladin, for whereas we had some little hope, he had none at all. As a rule, Nolringeson was quite willing to let the dismal matter alone, but not when the paladin was present. Once we were talking the thing over when Nol said, Cheer up, paladin! I had a dream last night, and you were the only one among us that got an appointment. It wasn't a high one, but it was an appointment, anyway, some kind of a lackey or body servant, or something of that kind. The paladin roused up and looked almost cheerful, for he was a believer in dreams, and in anything and everything of a superstitious sort, in fact, he said with a rising hopefulness, I wish it might come true. Do you think it will come true? Certainly! I might almost say I know it will, for my dreams hardly ever fail. Nol, I could hug you if that dream could come true. I could, indeed! To be servant of the first general of France, and have all the world hear of it, and the news go back to the village, and make those gawks stare, that always said I wouldn't ever amount to anything. Wouldn't it be great? Do you think it will come true, Nol? Don't you believe it will? I do. There's my hand on it. No, if it comes true, I'll never forget you. Shake again. I should be dressed in a noble livery, and the news would go to the village, and those animals would say, him lackey to the general-in-chief, with the eyes of the whole world on him admiring. Well, he has shot up into the sky now, hasn't he? He began to walk the floor, and pile castles in the air so fast and so high that we could hardly keep up with him. Then, all of a sudden, all the joy went out of his face, and misery took its place, and he said, Oh, dear! it is all a mistake. It will never come true. I forgot that foolish business, that tool. I have kept out of her sight as much as I could all these weeks, hoping she would forget that and forgive it. But I know she never will. She can't, of course. And, after all, I wasn't to blame. I did say she promised to marry me, but they put me up to it and persuaded me. I swear they did." The vast creature was almost crying. Then he pulled himself together and said remorsefully, It was the only lie I've ever told, and he was drowned out with a chorus of groans and outraged exclamations. And before he could begin again, one of Dolon's liveried servants appeared and said we were required at headquarters. We rose, and Noel said, There! What did I tell you? I have a presentiment. The spirit of prophecy is upon me. She is going to appoint him, and we are to go there and do him homage. Come along! But the paladin was afraid to go, so we left him. When we presently stood in the presence, in front of the crowd of glittering officers of the army, Joan greeted us with a winning smile and said she appointed all of us to places in her household, for she wanted her old friends by her. It was a beautiful surprise to have ourselves honoured like this when she could have had people of birth and consequence instead. But we couldn't find our tongues to say so. She was become so great and so high above us now. One at a time we stepped forward and each received his warrant from the hand of our chief, Dolon. All of us had honourable places. The two knights stood highest, then Joan's two brothers. I was first page and secretary. A young gentleman named Raymond was second page. Noel was her messenger. She had two heralds, and also a chaplain and almoner, whose name was Jean Pascal. She had previously appointed a maître d'hôtel in a number of domestics. Now she looked around and said, but where is the paladin? The sir Bertrand said, he thought he was not sent for your excellency. Now that is not well. Let him be called. The paladin entered humbly enough. He ventured no farther than just within the door. He stopped there, looking embarrassed and afraid. Then Joan spoke pleasantly and said, I watched you on the road. You began badly but improved. Of old you were a fantastic talker, but there is a man in you, and I will bring it out. It was fine to see the paladin's face light up when she said that. Will you follow where I lead? Into the fire, he said, and I said to myself, by the ring of that I think she has turned this braggart into a hero. It is another of her miracles. I make no doubt of it. I believe you, said Joan. Here, take my banner. You will ride with me in every field, and when France is saved, you will give it me back. He took the banner, which is now the most precious of the memorials that remain of Joan of Arc, and his voice was unsteady with emotion when he said, if I ever disgrace this trust, my comrades here will know how to do a friend's office upon my body, and this charge I lay upon them as knowing they will not fail me. CHAPTER X Noel and I went back together, silent at first, and impressed. Finally Noel came up out of his thinking and said, The first shall be last, and the last first. There is authority for this surprise. But at the same time, wasn't it a lofty hoist for our big bull? It truly was. I am not over being stunned yet. It was the greatest place in her gift. Yes, it was. There are many generals and she can create more, but there is only one standard bearer. True, it is the most conspicuous place in the army after her own, and the most coveted and honourable. Sons of two dukes tried to get it, as we know, and of all the people in the world this majestic windmill carries it off. Well, isn't it a gigantic promotion when you come to look at it? There's no doubt about it. It's a kind of copy of Joan's own in miniature. I don't know how to account for it to you. Yes, without any trouble at all. That is, I think I do. Noel was surprised at that and glanced up quickly as if to see if I was an earnest. He said, I thought you couldn't be an earnest, but I see you are. If you can make me understand this puzzle, do it. Tell me what the explanation is. I believe I can. You have noticed that our Chief Knight says a good many wise things and has a thoughtful head on his shoulders. One day, riding along, we were talking about Joan's great talents, and he said, But greatness of all her gifts, she has the seeing eye. I said, like an unthinking fool, the seeing eye? I shouldn't count on that for much. I suppose we all have it. No, he said, very few have it. Then he explained, and made his meaning clear. He said the common eye sees only the outside of things and judges by that, but the seeing eye pierces through and reads the heart and the soul, finding their capacities which the outside didn't indicate or promise and which the other kind of eye couldn't detect. He said the mightiest military genius must fail and come to nothing if it have not the seeing eye, that is to say, if it cannot read men and select its subordinates with an infallible judgment. It sees as by intuition that this man is good for strategy, that one for dash and daredevil assault, the other for patient bulldog persistence, and it appoints each to his right place and wins, while the commander without the seeing eye would give to each the other's place and lose. He was right about Joan, and I saw it. When she was a child and the tramp came one night, her father and all of us took him for a rascal, but she saw the honest man through the rags. When I dined with the governor of Vauculeur so long ago, I saw nothing in our two nights, though I sat with them and talked with them two hours. Joan was there five minutes, and neither spoke with them nor heard them speak, yet she marked them for men of worth and fidelity, and they have confirmed her judgment. Whom has she sent for, to take charge of this thundering rabble of new recruits at Blois, made up of old disbanded armeniac raiders, unspeakable hellions, every one? Why, she has sent for Satan himself, that is to say, lair, that military hurricane, that godless swashbuckler, that lurid conflagration of blasphemy, that vissuvius of profanity, for ever interruption. Does he know how to deal with that mob of roaring devils?  He is the match of the whole of them combined, and probably the father of most of them. She places him in temporary command until she can get to Blois herself, and then, why, then she will certainly take them in hand personally, or I don't know her as well as I ought to, after all these years of intimacy. That will be a sight to see, that fair spirit in her white armor delivering her will to that muck-heap, that rag-pile, that abandoned refuse of perdition. Lair, cried Noel, our hero of all these years, I do want to see that man. I too. His name stirs me just as it did when I was a little boy. I want to hear him swear. Of course, I would rather hear him swear than another man pray. He is the frankest man there is, and the naivest. Once when he was rebuked for pillaging on his raids he said it was nothing. Said he, if God the father were a soldier he would rob. I judge he is the right man to take temporary charge there at Blois. Joan has cast the seeing eye upon him, you see. Which brings us back to where we started. I have an honest affection for the Paladin, and not merely because he is a good fellow, but because he is my child. I made him what he is, the windiest bluster and most Catholic liar in the kingdom. I'm glad of his luck, but I hadn't the seeing eye. I shouldn't have chosen him for the most dangerous post in the army.  Well, we shall see. Joan probably knows what is in him better than we do, and I'll give you another idea. When a person in Joan of Arc's position tells a man he is brave, he believes it, and believing it is enough. In fact, to believe yourself brave is to be brave. It is the one only essential thing. "'Now you've hit it,' cried Noel. She's got the creating mouth as well as the seeing eye. Ah, yes, that is the thing. France was cowed and a-coward. Joan of Arc has spoken, and France is marching with her head up. I was summoned now to write a letter from Joan's dictation. During the next day and night our several uniforms were made by the tailors, and our new armor provided. We were beautiful to look upon now whether closed for peace or war. Clothed for peace in costly stuff and rich colors, the paladin was a tower dyed with the glories of the sunset. Plumed and sashed and ironclad for war, he was a still, statelyer thing to look at. Orders had been issued for the march toward Blois. It was a clear, sharp, beautiful morning, as our showy, great company trotted out in column, writing two and two, Joan and the Duke Valençon in the lead, Dolan and the big standard bearer next, and so on, we made a handsome spectacle, as you may well imagine. And as we plowed through the cheering crowds with Joan bowing her plumed head to the left and right, and the sun glinting from her silver mail, the spectators realized that the curtain was rolling up before their eyes upon the first act of a prodigious drama, and their rising hopes were expressed in an enthusiasm that increased with each moment, until at last one seemed to even physically feel the concussion of the hazzas as well as hear them. Far down the street we heard the softened strains of wind-blown music, and saw a cloud of lancers moving, the sun glowing, with a subdued light upon the masked armor, but striking bright upon the soaring lanceheads, a vaguely luminous nebula, so to speak, with a constellation twinkling above it, and that was our guard of honor. It joined us, the procession was complete. The first war march of Joan of Arc was begun. The curtain was up. CHAPTER XII Joan puts heart in her army. We were at Blois three days. Oh, that camp! It is one of the treasures of my memory. Order! There was no more order among those brigands than there is among the wolves and the hyenas.   It was in the midst of this wild mob that Noel and I had our first glimpse of lair. He answered to our dearest dreams. He was of great size and of martial bearing. He was cased in mail, from head to heel, with a bushel of swishing plumes on his helmet, and at his side the vast sword of the time. He was on his way to pay his respects and state to Joan, and as he passed through the camp he was restoring order and proclaiming that the maid had come, and he would have no such spectacle as this exposed to the head of the army. His way of creating order was his own, not borrowed. He did it with his great fists. As he moved along swearing and admonishing, he let drive this way, that way, and the other, and wherever his blow landed, a man went down.  And he laid the man flat. What his idea of straightening up was, was his own secret. We followed the veteran to headquarters, listening, observing, admiring. Yes, devouring, you may say, the pet hero of the boys of France from our cradles up to that happy day, and their idol and ours. I called to mind how Joan had once rebuked the Paladin, there in the pastures of Dom Remy, for uttering lightly those mighty names, La Hire, and the Bastard of Orléans, and how she said that if she could but be permitted to stand afar off and let her eyes rest once upon those great men, she would hold it a privilege. They were to her and the other girls just what they were to the boys. Well, here was one of them at last, and what was his errand? It was hard to realize, and yet it was true, he was coming to uncover his head before her and take her orders. While he was quieting a considerable group of his brigands in his soothing way near headquarters, we stepped on ahead and got a glimpse of Joan's military family, the great chiefs of the army, for they had all arrived now. There they were, six officers of wide renown, handsome men and beautiful armour. But the Lord High Admiral of France was the handsomest of them all and had the most gallant bearing. When La Hire entered, one could see the surprise in his face at Joan's beauty in extreme youth, and one could see too, by Joan's glad smile, that it had made her happy to get sight of this hero of her childhood at last. La Hire bowed low, with his helmet in his gauntlet at hand, and made a bluff but handsome little speech with hardly an oath in it, and one could see that those two took to each other on the spot. The visit of ceremony was soon over, and the others went away, but La Hire stayed, and he and Joan sat there, and he sipped her wine, and they talked and laughed together like old friends. And presently she gave him some instructions in his quality as Master of the Camp, which made his breath stand still. For, to begin with, she said that all those loose women must pack out of the place at once. She wouldn't allow one of them to remain. Next, the rough carousing must stop. Drinking must be brought within proper and strictly defined limits, and discipline must take the place of disorder. And finally she climaxed the list of surprises with this, which nearly lifted him out of his armor. Every man who joins my standard must confess before the priest and absolve himself from sin, and all accepted recruits must be present at divine service twice a day. La Hire could not say a word for a good part of a minute, then he said in deep dejection, Oh, sweet child, they were littered in hell, these poor darlings of mine. Attend mass? Why, dear heart, they'll see us both damned first! And he went on pouring out a most pathetic stream of arguments and blasphemy, which broke Joan all up and made her laugh as she had not laughed since she played in domini pastures. It was good to hear. But she stuck to her point. So the soldier yielded and said all right, if such were the orders he must obey, and would do the best that was in him. Then he refreshed himself with a lurid explosion of oaths, and said that if any man in the camp refused to renounce sin and lead a pious life he would knock his head off. That started Joan off again. She was really having a good time, you see. But she would not consent to that form of conversions. She said they must be voluntary. La Hire said that that was all right he wasn't going to kill the voluntary ones but only the others. No matter, none of them must be killed Joan couldn't have it. She said that to give a man a chance to volunteer on pain of death if he didn't, left him more or less trampled, and she wanted him to be entirely free. So the soldier sighed and said he would advertise the mass, but said he doubted if there was a man in camp that was any more likely to go to it than he was himself. Then there was another surprise for him, for Joan said, but, dear man, you are going. I? Impossible! Oh, this is lunacy! Oh, no, it isn't. You are going to the service, twice a day. Oh, am I dreaming? Am I drunk?  Why, I would rather go to—never mind where. In the morning you are going to begin, and after that it will come easy. Now, don't look down hard it like that. Soon you won't mind it. La Hire tried to cheer up but he was not able to do it. He sighed like a zepher and presently said, Well, I'll do it for you. But before I would do it for another, I swear I—but don't swear. Break it off. Break it off! It is impossible! I beg you to—why—oh, my general, it is my native speech! He begged so hard for grace for his impediment that Joan left him one fragment of it. She said he might swear by his baton, the symbol of his generalship. He promised that he would swear only by his baton when in her presence, and would try to modify himself elsewhere, but doubted he could manage it, now that it was so old and stubborn a habit and such a solace and support to his declining years. That tough old line went away from there a good deal tamed and civilized, not to say softened and sweetened, for perhaps those expressions would hardly fit him. Noel and I believed that when he was away from Joan's influence his old aversions would come up so strong in him that he could hardly master them, and so wouldn't go to mass. But we got up early in the morning to see. Satan was converted, you see. Well, the rest followed. Joan rode up and down that camp, and wherever that fair young form appeared in its shining armor, with that sweet face to grace the vision and perfect it, the rude host seemed to think they saw the God of War in person, descended out of the clouds, and first they wondered, then they worshipped. After that she could do with them what she would. In three days it was a clean camp and orderly, and those barbarians were herding to divine service twice a day like good children. The women were gone. Laird was stunned by these marvels. He could not understand them. He went outside the camp when he wanted to swear. He was that sort of a man, sinful by nature and habit, but full of superstitious respect for holy places. The enthusiasm of the reformed army for Joan, its devotion to her, and the hot desire she had aroused in it to be led against the enemy, exceeded any manifestations of this sort which Laird had ever seen before in his long career. His admiration of it all and his wonder over the mystery and miracle of it were beyond his power to put into words. He had held this army cheap before, but his pride and confidence in it knew no limits now. He said, Two or three days ago it was afraid of a hen roost. One could storm the gates of hell with it now. Joan and he were inseparable, an acquaint and pleasant contrast they made. He was so big, she so little. He was so gray and so far along in his pilgrimage of life, she so youthful. His face was so bronzed and scarred, hers so fair and pink, so fresh and smooth. She was so gracious, and he so stern. She was so pure, so innocent, he such a cyclopedia of sin. In her eye was stored all charity and compassion, in his lightnings. When her glance fell upon you it seemed to bring benediction and the peace of God, but with his it was different generally. They rode through the camp a dozen times a day visiting every corner of it, observing, inspecting, perfecting, and wherever they appeared the enthusiasm broke forth. They rode side by side, he a great figure of brawn and muscle, she a little masterwork of roundness and grace, he a fortress of rusty iron, she a shining statuette of silver, and when the reformed raiders and bandits caught sight of them they spoke out with affection and welcome in their voices and said, there they come, Satan and the page of Christ! All the three days that we were in Bois, Joan worked earnestly and tirelessly to bring Lair to God, to rescue him from the bondage of sin, to breathe into his stormy heart the serenity and peace of religion. She urged, she begged, she implored him to pray. He stood out, three days of our stay, begging about piteously to be let off, to be let off from just that one thing, that impossible thing. He would do anything else, anything, command, and he would obey. He would go through the fire for her, if she said the word, but spare him this, only this, for he couldn't pray, had never prayed. He was ignorant of how to frame a prayer. He had no words to put it in. And yet, can any believe it? She carried even that point. She won that incredible victory. She made Lair pray. It shows, I think, that nothing was impossible to Joan of Arc. Yes, he stood there before her and put up his mailed hands and made a prayer. And it was not borrowed, but was his very own. He had none to help him frame it. He made it out of his own head, saying, Fair Sir God, I pray you to do by Lair as he would do by you if you were Lair and he were God. Footnote number one. This prayer has been stolen many times and by many nations in the past four hundred and sixty years, but it originated with Lair, and the fact is of official record in the National Archives of France. We have the authority of Michelet for this. Translator. End of footnote number one. Then he put on his helmet and marched out of Joan's tent, as satisfied with himself as anyone might be who had arranged a perplexed and difficult business to the content and admiration of all the parties concerned in the matter. If I had known that he had been praying I could have understood why he was feeling so superior, but of course I could not know that. I was coming to the tent at that moment and saw him come out, and saw him march away in that large fashion, and indeed it was fine and beautiful to see. But when I got to the tent door I stopped and stepped back, grieved and shocked, for I heard Joan crying, as I mistakenly thought, crying as if she could not contain nor endure the anguish of her soul, crying as if she would die. But it was not so. She was laughing, laughing at Lair's prayer. It was not until six and thirty years afterward that I found that out, and then, oh, then I only cried when that picture of young, carefree mirth rose before me out of the blur and mists of that long vanished time, for there had come a day between when God's good gift of laughter had gone out from me to come again no more in this life. CHAPTER XIII We marched out in great strength and splendor, and took the road toward Orléans. The initial part of Joan's great dream was realizing itself at last. It was the first time that any of us youngsters had ever seen an army, and it was a most stately and imposing spectacle to us. It was indeed an inspiring sight, that interminable column, stretching away into the fading distances and curving itself in and out of the crookedness of the road like a mighty serpent. Joan rode at the head of it with her personal staff. Then came a body of priests singing the Veni Créateur, the banner of the cross rising out of their mits. After these the glinting forest of spears. The several divisions were commanded by the great Armaignac Generals, Laïr and Marshal de Boussac, the Cyr de Retz, Florent de Lierre, and Poton de Saint-Raye. Each in his degree was tough, and there were three degrees. Tough, tougher, toughest. And Laïr was the last by a shade, but only a shade. They were just illustrious official brigands the whole party, and by long habits of lawlessness they had lost all acquaintanceship with obedience, if they had ever had any. But what was the good of saying that? These independent birds knew no law. They seldom obeyed the king. They never obeyed him when it didn't suit them to do it. Would they obey the maid? In the first place they wouldn't know how to obey her or anybody else, and in the second place it was of course not possible for them to take her military character seriously. That country girl of seventeen who had been trained for the complex and terrible business of war? How? By tending sheep. They had no idea of obeying her, except in cases where their veteran military knowledge and experience showed them that the thing she required was sound and right when gauged by the regular military standards. Were they to blame for this attitude? I should think not. Old war-worn captains are hard-headed practical men. They do not easily believe in the ability of ignorant children to plan campaigns and command armies. No general that ever lived could have taken Joan seriously, militarily, before she raised the siege of Orleans and followed it with a great campaign of the Loire. Did they consider Joan valueless? Far from it. They valued her as the fruitful earth values the sun. They fully believed she could produce the crop, but that it was in their line of business not hers to take it off. They had a deep and superstitious reverence for her as being endowed with a mysterious supernatural something that was able to do a mighty thing which they were powerless to do, blow the breath of life and valor into the dead corpses of cowed armies and turn them into heroes. To their minds, they were everything with her, but nothing without her. She could inspire the soldiers and fit them for battle, but fight the battle herself? Oh, nonsense! That was their function. They, the generals, would fight the battles. Joan would give the victory. That was their idea, an unconscious paraphrase of Joan's reply to the Dominican. So they began by playing a deception upon her. She had a clear idea of how she meant to proceed. It was her purpose to march boldly upon Orléans by the north bank of the Loire. She gave that order to her generals. They said to themselves, The idea is insane. It is blunder number one.   He also recognized the insanity of it, and privately advised the generals to get around the order in some way. They did it by deceiving Joan. She trusted those people. She was not expecting this sort of treatment, and was not on the lookout for it. It was a lesson to her. She saw to it that the game was not played a second time. Why was Joan's idea insane, from the general's point of view, but not from hers? Because her plan was to raise the siege immediately, by fighting, while theirs was to besiege the besiegers, and starve them out by closing their communications, a plan which would require months in the consummation. The English had built a fence of strong fortresses called Bastilles, around Orléans, fortresses which closed all the gates of the city but one. To the French generals, the idea of trying to fight their way past those fortresses and lead the army into Orléans was preposterous. They believed that the result would be the army's destruction. One may not doubt that their opinion was militarily sound. No, would have been, but for one circumstance which they overlooked. That was this. The English soldiers were in a demoralized condition, though superstitious terror. They had become satisfied that the maid was in league with Satan. By reason of this, a good deal of their courage had oozed out and vanished. On the other hand, the maid's soldiers were full of courage, enthusiasm, and zeal. Joan could have marched by the English forts. However, it was not to be. She had been cheated out of her first chance to strike a heavy blow for her country. In camp that night she slept in her armour on the ground. It was a cold night, and she was nearly as stiff as her armour itself when we resumed the march in the morning, for iron is not good material for a blanket. However, her joy and being now so far on her way to the theatre of her mission was fire enough to warm her, and it soon did it. Her enthusiasm and impatience rose higher and higher with every mile of progress. But at last we reached Olivette, and down it went. An indignation took its place. For she saw the trick that had been played upon her. The river lay between us and Orléans. She was for attacking one of the three Bastilles that were on our side of the river, and forcing access to the bridge which it guarded, a project which, if successful, would raise the siege instantly. But the long ingrained fear of the English came upon her generals, and they implored her not to make the attempt. The soldiers wanted to attack, but had to suffer disappointment. So we moved on and came to a halt at a point opposite Chez-y, six miles above Orléans. Dunois, Bastard of Orléans, with a body of knights and citizens, came up from the city to welcome Joan. Joan was still burning with resentment over the trick that had been put upon her, and was not in the mood for soft speeches, even to revered military idols of her childhood. She said, Are you the Bastard? Yes, I am he, and am right glad of your coming. And did you advise that I be brought by this side of the river, instead of straight to Talbot and the English? Her high manner abashed him, and he was not able to answer with anything like a confident promptness. But with many hesitations and partial excuses he managed to get out the confession that for what he and the council had regarded as imperative military reasons they so advised. In God's name, said Joan, my Lord's council is safer and wiser than yours. You thought to deceive me, but you have deceived yourselves, for I bring you the best help that ever knight or city had, for it is God's help, not sent for love of me, but by God's pleasure. At the prayer of Saint Louis and Saint Charlemagne he has had pity on Orléans, and will not suffer the enemy to have both the Duke of Orléans and his city. The provisions to save the starving people are here. The boats are below the city. The wind is contrary. They cannot come up hither.  Dunois and the rest fumbled around the matter a moment, then gave in and conceded that a blunder had been made. Yes, a blunder has been made, said Joan. And except God take your proper work upon himself and change the wind and correct your blunder for you, there is none else that can devise a remedy. Some of these people began to perceive that with all her technical ignorance she had practical good sense, and that with all her native sweetness and charm she was not the right kind of person to play with. Presently God did take the blunder in hand, and, by his grace, the wind did change. So the fleet of boats came up and went away loaded with provisions and cattle, and conveyed that welcome sucker to the hungry city, managing the matter successfully under protection of a sortee from the walls against the Bastille of Saint-Lou. Then Joan began on the bastard again. You see here the army? Yes. It is here on this side by advice of your counsel. Yes. Now, in God's name can that wise counsel explain why it is better to have it here than it would be to have it in the bottom of the sea? Dinois made some wandering attempts to explain the inexplicable and excuse the inexcusable, but Joan cut him short and said, Answer me this, good sir. Has the army any value on this side of the river? The bastard confessed that it hadn't, that is, in view of the plan of campaign which she had devised and decreed. And yet, knowing this, you had the hardiness to disobey my orders. Since the army's place is on the other side, will you explain to me how it is to get there? The whole size of the needless muddle was apparent. Evasions were of no use. Therefore Dinois admitted that there was no way to correct the blunder, but to send the army all the way back to Blois and let it begin over again and come up on the other side this time according to Joan's original plan. Any other girl, after winning such a triumph as this over a veteran soldier of old renown, might have exalted a little and been excusable for it, but Joan showed no disposition of this sort. She dropped a word or two of grief over the precious time that must be lost, then began at once to issue commands for the march back. She sorrowed to see her army go, for she said its heart was great and its enthusiasm high, and that with it, at her back, she did not fear to face all the might of England. All arrangements, having been completed for the return of the main body of the army, she took the bastard and la ire and a thousand men and went down to Orleans, where all the town was in a fever of impatience to have sight of her face. It was eight in the evening when she and the troops rode in at the burgundy gate, with the paladin preceding her, with her standard.  You should have seen Orleans then.  Such black seas of people, such a starry firmament of torches, such roaring whirlwinds of welcome, such booming of bells and thundering of cannon! It was as if the world was come to an end. There in the glare of the torches one saw rank upon rank of upturned white faces, the mouths wide open, shouting, and the unchecked tears running down. Joan forged her slow way through the solid masses, her mailed form projecting above the pavement of heads like a silver statue. The people about her struggled along, gazing up at her through their tears with the rapt look of men and women who believe they are seeing one who is divine, and always her feet were being kissed by grateful folk, and such as failed of that privilege touched her horse and then kissed their fingers. Nothing that Joan did escaped notice. Everything she did was commented upon and applauded. You could hear the remarks going all the time. There! She's smiling, see?  Ah, it's fine and graceful. She's patting that woman on the head with her gauntlet. Oh, she was born on a horse. See her turn in her saddle and kiss the hilt of her sword to the ladies in the window that threw the flowers down? Now there's a poor woman lifting up a child. She's kissed it. Oh, she's divine! What a dainty little figure it is, and what a lovely face, and such color and animation! Joan's slender long banner streaming backward had an accident. The fringe caught fire from a torch. She leaned forward and crushed the flame in her hand. She's not afraid of fire nor of anything, they shouted, and delivered a storm of admiring applause that made everything quake. She rode to the cathedral and gave thanks to God, and the people crammed the place and added their devotions to hers. Then she took up her march again and picked her slow way through the crowds and the wilderness of torches to the house of Jacques Boucher, treasurer of the Duke of Orleans, where she was to be the guest of his wife as long as she stayed in the city, and have his young daughter for comrade and roommate. The delirium of the people went on the rest of the night, and with it the clamour of the joy-bells and the welcoming canon. Joan of Arc had stepped upon her stage at last, and was ready to begin. END OF CHAPTER XIII This is CHAPTER XIV of Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain, recording by John Greenman. Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc by Mark Twain. Volume I, Book II, CHAPTER XIV. What the English answered. She was ready, but must sit down and wait until there was an army to work with. Next morning, Saturday, April 30, 1429, she set about inquiring after the messenger who carried her proclamation to the English from Blois, the one which she had dictated at Poitiers. Here is a copy of it. It is a remarkable document, for several reasons, for its matter-of-fact directness, for its high spirit and forcible diction, and for its naive confidence in her ability to achieve the prodigious task which she had laid upon herself, or which had been laid upon her—which you please. All through it you seem to see the pumps of war and hear the rumbling of the drums. In it Joan's warrior soul is revealed, and for the moment the soft little shepherdess has disappeared from your view. This untaught country damsel, unused to dictating anything at all to anybody, much less documents of state to kings and generals, poured out this procession of vigorous sentences as fluently as if this sort of work had been her trade from childhood. Jesus, Maria, King of England, and you, Duke of Bedford, who call yourself Regent of France, William de la Paul, Earl of Suffolk, and you, Thomas Lord Scales, who style yourselves lieutenants of the said Bedford, do right to the King of Heaven, render to the maid who is sent by God the keys of all the good towns you have taken and violated in France. She is sent hither by God to restore the blood royal. She is very ready to make peace, if you will do her right by giving up France and paying for what you have held. And you, archers, companions of war, noble and otherwise, who are before the good city of Orléans, be gone into your own land in God's name, or expect news from the maid who will shortly go to see you to your very great hurt. King of England, if you do not so, I am chief of war, and whenever I shall find your people in France I will drive them out, willing or not willing, and if they do not obey I will slay them all, but if they obey I will have them to mercy. I am come hither by God, the King of Heaven, body for body, to put you out of France, in spite of those who would work treason and mischief against the kingdom. Think not, you shall ever hold the kingdom from the King of Heaven, the Son of the Blessed Mary. King Charles shall hold it, for God wills it so, and has revealed it to him by the maid. If you believe not the news sent by God through the maid, wherever we shall meet you, we will strike boldly, and make such a noise as has not been in France these thousand years. Be sure that God can send more strength to the maid than you can bring to any assault against her and her good men-at-arms, and then we shall see who has the better right, the King of Heaven, or you. Duke of Bedford, the maid prays you not to bring about your own destruction. If you do her right you may yet go in her company where the French shall do the finest deed that has been done in Christendom, and if you do not, you shall be reminded shortly of your great wrongs. In that closing sentence she invites them to go on crusade with her to rescue the Holy Sepulchre. No answer had been returned to this proclamation, and the messenger himself had not come back. So now she sent her two heralds with a new letter warning the English to raise the siege and requiring them to restore that missing messenger. The heralds came back without him. All they brought was notice from the English to Joan that they would presently catch her and burn her if she did not clear out now while she had a chance, and go back to her proper trade of minding cows. She held her peace only saying it was a pity that the English could persist in inviting present disaster and eventual destruction when she was doing all she could to get them out of the country with their lives still in their bodies. Presently she thought of an arrangement that might be acceptable and said to the heralds, Go back and say to Lord Talbot this from me. Come out of your Bastille with your host, and I will come with mine.   I did not hear this, but Dunois did and spoke of it. The challenge was refused. Sunday morning her voices or some instinct gave her a warning, and she sent Dunois to Blois to take command of the army and hurry it to Orléans. It was a wise move, for he found Renaud de Chartres and some more of the king's pet rascals there trying their best to disperse the army and crippling all the efforts of Joan's generals to head it for Orléans. They were a fine lot, those miscreants. They turned their attention to Dunois now, but he had balked Joan once with unpleasant results to himself, and was not minded to meddle in that way again. He soon had the army moving. END OF CHAPTER XIV This is Chapter 15 of Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc by Mark Twain. Volume 1, Book II, Chapter 15. My exquisite poem goes to Smash. We of the personal staff were in Fairyland now during the few days that we waited for the return of the army. We went into society. To our two nights this was not a novelty, but to us young villagers it was a new and wonderful life. Any position of any sort near the person of the maid of Voculaire conferred high distinction upon the holder, and caused his society to be courted. And so the Dark Brothers and Noel and the Paladin, humble peasants at home, were gentlemen here, personages of weight and influence. It was fine to see how soon their country diffidences and awkwardnesses melted away under this pleasant sun of deference, and disappeared, and how lightly and easily they took to their new atmosphere. The Paladin was as happy as it was possible for any one in this earth to be. His tongue went all the time, and daily he got new delight out of hearing himself talk. He began to enlarge his ancestry and spread it out all around, and ennoble it right and left, and it was not long until it consisted almost entirely of dukes. He worked up his old battles and tricked them out with fresh splendors, also with new terrors, for he added artillery now. We had seen cannon for the first time at Blois. A few pieces. Here there was plenty of it. And now and then we had the impressive spectacle of a huge English Bastille hidden from sight in a mountain of smoke from its own guns, with lances of red flame darting through it, and this grand picture, along with the quaking thunders pounding away in the heart of it, inflamed the Paladin's imagination and enabled him to dress out those ambuscade skirmishes of ours, with a sublimity which made it impossible for any to recognize them at all, except people who had not been there. You may suspect that there was a special inspiration for these great efforts of the Paladins, and there was. It was the daughter of the house, Catherine Boucher, who was 18, and gentle and lovely in her ways, and very beautiful. I think she might have been as beautiful as Joan herself, if she had had Joan's eyes. But that could never be. There was never but that one pair. There will never be another. Joan's eyes were deep and rich and wonderful beyond anything merely earthly. They spoke all the languages. They had no need of words. They produced all effects, and just by a glance, just a single glance, a glance that could convict a liar of his lie and make him confess it, that could bring down a proud man's pride and make him humble, that could put courage into a coward, and strike dead the courage of the bravest, that could appease resentments and real hatreds, that could make the doubter believe and the hopeless hope again, that could purify the impure mind, that could persuade, ah, there it is, persuasion. That is the word. What or who is it that it couldn't persuade? The maniac of Dom Rémy, the fairy banishing priest, the reverent tribunal of Toul, the doubting and superstitious Luxart, the obstinate veteran of Vauculeur, the characterless heir of France, the sages and scholars of the Parliament and University of Poitiers, the darling of Satan, Laïr, the masterless bastard of Orleans accustomed to acknowledge no way as right and irrational but his own. These were the trophies of that great gift that made her the wonder and mystery that she was. We mingled companiably with the great folk who flocked to the big house to make Jones acquaintance, and they made much of us and we lived in the clouds, so to speak. But what we preferred even to this happiness was the quieter occasions, when the formal guests were gone, and the family and a few dozen of its familiar friends were gathered together for a social good time. It was then that we did our best—we five youngsters—with such fascinations as we had, and the chief object of them was Catherine. None of us had ever been in love before, and now we had the misfortune to all fall in love with the same person at the same time, which was the first moment we saw her. She was a merry heart and full of life, and I still remember tenderly those few evenings that I was permitted to have my share of her dear society and of comradeship with that little company of charming people. The paladin made us all jealous the first night, for when he got fairly started on those battles of his he had everything to himself, and there was no use in anybody else's trying to get any attention. Those people had been living in the midst of real war for seven months, and to hear this windy giant lay out his imaginary campaigns and fairly swim in blood and spatter it all around entertained them to the verge of the grave. Catherine was like to die for pure enjoyment. She didn't laugh loud—we, of course, wished she would—but kept in the shelter of a fan, and shook until there was danger that she would unhitch her ribs from her spine. Then, when the paladin had got done with a battle, and we began to feel thankful and hope for a change, she would speak up in a way that was so sweet and persuasive that it wrinkled in me, and ask him about some detail or other in the early part of his battle which she said had greatly interested her, and would he be so good as to describe that part again, and with a little more particularity—which, of course, precipitated the whole battle on us again, with a hundred lies added that had been overlooked before. I do not know how to make you realize the pain I suffered. I had never been jealous before, and it seemed intolerable that this creature should have this good fortune which he was so ill entitled to, and I have to sit and see myself neglected when I was so longing for the least little attention out of the thousand that this beloved girl was lavishing on him. I was near her, and tried two or three times to get started on some of the things that I had done in those battles, and I felt ashamed of myself, too, for stooping to such a business. But she cared for nothing but his battles, and could not be got to listen, and presently when one of my attempts caused her to lose some precious rag or other of his mendacities, and she asked him to repeat, thus bringing on a new engagement, of course, and increasing the havoc and carnage tenfold, I felt so humiliated by this pitiful miscarriage of mine that I gave up and tried no more. The others were as outraged by the Paladin's selfish conduct as I was, and by his grand luck, too, of course. Perhaps indeed that was the main hurt. We talked our trouble over together, which was natural for rivals become brothers when a common affliction assails them, and a common enemy bears off the victory. Each of us could do things that would please and get notice if it were not for this person, who occupied all the time and gave others no chance. I had made a poem, taking a whole night to it, a poem in which I most happily and delicately celebrated that sweet girl's charms without mentioning her name, but any one could see who was meant, for the bare title, The Rose of Orléans, would reveal that, as it seemed to me. It pictured this pure and dainty white rose as growing up out of the rude soil of war, and looking abroad out of its tender eyes upon the horrid machinery of death, and then, note this conceit, it blushes for the sinful nature of man and turns red in a single night. Becomes a red rose, you see, a rose that was white before. The idea was my own and quite new. Then it sent its sweet perfume out over the embattled city, and when the beleaguering forces smelt it, they laid down their arms and wept. This was also my own idea, and new. That closed that part of the poem. Then I put her into the similitude of the firmament, not the whole of it, but only part. That is to say, she was the moon, and all the constellations were following her about, their hearts and flames for love of her, but she would not halt, she would not listen, for Twas thought she loved another. Twas thought she loved a poor unworthy suppliant who was upon the earth, facing danger, death, and possible mutilation in the bloody field, waging relentless war against a heartless foe to save her from an all too early grave and her city from destruction. And when the sad pursuing constellations came to know and realize the bitter sorrow that was come upon them, note this idea, their hearts broke, and their tears gushed forth, filling the vault of heaven with a fiery splendor, for those tears were falling stars. It was a rash idea, but beautiful, beautiful and pathetic, wonderfully pathetic the way I had it, with a rhyme and all to help. At the end of each verse there was a two-line refrain pitying the poor earthly lover separated so far, and perhaps forever, from her he loved so well. And growing all was paler and weaker and thinner in his agony as he neared the cruel grave, the most touching thing. Even the boys themselves could hardly keep back their tears. The way Noel said those lines, there were eight four-line stanzas in the first end of the poem, the end about the rose, the horticultural end, as you may say. If that is not too large a name for such a little poem. And eight in the astronomical end, sixteen stanzas altogether, and I could have made it a hundred and fifty if I had wanted to, I was so inspired, and so all swelled up with beautiful thoughts and fancies. But that would have been too many to sing or recite before a company that way, whereas sixteen was just right and could be done over again if desired. The boys were amazed that I could make such a poem as that out of my own head, and so was I, of course, it being as much a surprise to me as it could be to anybody, for I did not know that it was in me. If any had asked me a single day before if it was in me, I should have told them frankly no, it was not. That is the way with us, we may go on half of our life not knowing such a thing as in us, when in reality it was there all the time, and all we needed was something to turn up that would call for it. Indeed, it was always so with our family, my grandfather had a cancer, and they never knew what was the matter with him till he died, and he didn't know himself. It is wonderful how gifts and diseases can be concealed in that way. All that was necessary in my case was for this lovely and inspiring girl to cross my path, and out came the poem, and no more trouble to me to word it, and rhyme it, and perfect it, than it is to stone a dog. No, I should have said it was not in me, but it was. The boys couldn't say enough about it, they were so charmed and astonished. The thing that pleased them the most was the way it would do the paladin's business for him. They forgot everything in their anxiety to get him shelved and silenced. Noel Régerson was clear beside himself with admiration of the poem, and wished he could do such a thing, but it was out of his line and he couldn't, of course. He had it by heart in half an hour, and there was never anything so pathetic and beautiful as the way he recited it. For that was just his gift, that, and mimicry. He could recite anything better than anybody in the world, and he could take off Lahir to the very life or anybody else for that matter. Now I never could recite worth of farthing, and when I tried with this poem the boys wouldn't let me finish, they would have nobody but Noel. So then, as I wanted the poem to make the best possible impression on Catherine and the company, I told Noel he might do the reciting. Never was anybody so delighted. He could hardly believe that I was in earnest, but I was. I said that to have them know that I was the author of it would be enough for me. The boys were full of exaltation and Noel said, if he could just get one chance at those people it would be all he would ask. He would make them realize that there was something higher and finer than war lies to be had here. But how to get the opportunity? That was the difficulty. We invented several schemes that promised fairly, and at last we hit upon one that was sure. That was to let the paladin get a good start in a manufactured battle, and then send in a false call for him, and as soon as he was out of the room, have Noel take his place and finish the battle himself in the paladin's own style, imitated to a shade. That would get great applause and win the house's favor and put it in the right mood to hear the poem. The two triumphs together would finish the standard bearer, modify him anyway to a certainty, and give the rest of us a chance for the future. So the next night I kept out of the way until the paladin had got his start and was sweeping down upon the enemy like a whirlwind at the head of his core, then I stepped within the door in my official uniform and announced that a messenger from General Laier's quarters desired speech with the standard bearer. He left the room and Noel took his place and said that the interruption was to be deplored, but that fortunately he was personally acquainted with the details of the battle himself, and if permitted would be glad to state them to the company. Then without waiting for the permission he turned himself into the paladin, a dwarf paladin, of course, with manner, tones, gestures, attitudes, everything exact, and went right on with the battle, and it would be impossible to imagine a more perfectly and minutely ridiculous imitation than he furnished to those shrieking people. They went into spasms, convulsions, frenzies of laughter, and the tears flowed down their cheeks in rivulets. The more they laughed, the more inspired Noel grew with his theme and the greater marvels he worked, till really the laughter was not properly laughing any more but screaming. Blessedest feature of all, Catherine Boucher was dying with ecstasies, and presently there was little left of her but gasps and suffocations. Victory! It was a perfect adjunct court. The paladin was gone only a couple of minutes, he found out at once that a trick had been played on him, so he came back. When he approached the door he heard Noel ranting in there and recognized the state of the case, so he remained near the door but out of sight and heard the performance through to the end. The applause Noel got when he finished was wonderful, and they kept it up and kept it up, clapping their hands like mad and shouting to him to do it over again. But Noel was clever, he knew the very best background for a poem of deep and refined sentiment and pathetic melancholy was one where great and satisfying merriment had prepared the spirit for the powerful contrast. So he paused until all was quiet. Then his face grew grave and assumed an impressive aspect, and at once all faces sobered in sympathy and took on a look of wondering and expectant interest. Now he began in a low but distinct voice the opening verses of The Rose. As he breathed the rhythmic measures forth and one gracious line after another fell upon those enchanted ears in that deep hush one could catch on every hand half audible ejaculations of how lovely, how beautiful, how exquisite! By this time the paladin who had gone away for a moment with the opening of the poem was back again and had stepped within the door. He stood there now, resting his great frame against the wall and gazing toward the reciter like one entranced. When Noel got to the second part and that heart breaking refrain began to melt and move all listeners, the paladin began to wipe away tears with the back of first one hand and then the other. The next time the refrain was repeated he got to snuffling and sort of half sobbing and went to wiping his eyes with the sleeves of his doublet.  With the next repetition he broke quite down and began to cry like a calf, which ruined all the effect and started many to the audience to laughing. Then he went on from bad to worse, until I never saw such a spectacle, for he fetched out a towel from under his doublet and began to swab his eyes with it and let go the most infernal bellowings mixed up with sobbings and groanings and wretchings and barkings and coffings and snortings and screamings and howlings. And he twisted himself about on his heels and squirmed this way and that, still pouring out that brutal clamour and flourishing his towel in the air and swabbing again and ringing it out. Here? You couldn't hear yourself think. Noel was wholly drowned out and silenced and those people were laughing the very lungs out of themselves. It was the most degrading sight that ever was. Now I heard the clankity-clank that plate armour makes when the man that is in it is running, and then, alongside my head, there was burst out the most inhuman explosion of laughter that ever rent the drum of a person's ear and I looked, and it was lair.  Only one thing more and worse could happen, and it happened. At the other door I saw the flurry and bustle and bowings and scrapings of officials and flunkies, which means that some great personage is coming. Then Joan of Arc stepped in, and the house rose.  But when it saw the maid herself go to laughing, it thanked God for this mercy and the earthquake that followed. Such things make a life of bitterness, and I do not wish to dwell upon them. The effect of the poem was spoiled.