taken! . . . Joan of Arc a prisoner! . . . the savior of France lost to
us!”–and would keep saying that over, as if they couldn’t
understand how it could be, or how God could permit it, poor
creatures!
You know what a city is like when it is hung from eaves to
pavement with rustling black? Then you know what Rouse was
like, and some other cities. But can any man tell you what the
mourning in the hearts of the peasantry of France was like? No,
nobody can tell you that, and, poor dumb things, they could not
have told you themselves, but it was there–indeed, yes. Why, it
was the spirit of a whole nation hung with crape!
The 24th of May. We will draw down the curtain now upon the
most strange, and pathetic, and wonderful military drama that has
been played upon the stage of the world. Joan of Arc will march
no more.
BOOK III TRIAL AND MARTYRDOM
Chapter 1 The Maid in Chains
I CANNOT bear to dwell at great length upon the shameful history
of the summer and winter following the capture. For a while I was
not much troubled, for I was expecting every day to hear that Joan
had been put to ransom, and that the King–no, not the King, but
grateful France–had come eagerly forward to pay it. By the laws of
war she could not be denied the privilege of ransom. She was not a
rebel; she was a legitimately constituted soldier, head of the
armies of France by her King’s appointment, and guilty of no crime
known to military law; therefore she could not be detained upon
any pretext, if ransom were proffered.
But day after day dragged by and no ransom was offered! It seems
incredible, but it is true. Was that reptile Tremouille busy at the
King’s ear? All we know is, that the King was silent, and made no
offer and no effort in behalf of this poor girl who had done so
much for him.
But, unhappily, there was alacrity enough in another quarter. The
news of the capture reached Paris the day after it happened, and
the glad English and Burgundians deafened the world all the day
and all the night with the clamor of their joy-bells and the thankful
thunder of their artillery, and the next day the Vicar-General of the
Inquisition sent a message to the Duke of Burgundy requiring the
delivery of the prisoner into the hands of the Church to be tried as
an idolater.
The English had seen their opportunity, and it was the English
power that was really acting, not the Church. The Church was
being used as a blind, a disguise; and for a forcible reason: the
Church was not only able to take the life of Joan of Arc, but to
blight her influence and the valor-breeding inspiration of her
name, whereas the English power could but kill her body; that
would not diminish or destroy the influence of her name; it would
magnify it and make it permanent. Joan of Arc was the only power
in France that the English did not despise, the only power in
France that they considered formidable. If the Church could be
brought to take her life, or to proclaim her an idolater, a heretic, a
witch, sent from Satan, not from heaven, it was believed that the
English supremacy could be at once reinstated.
The Duke of Burgundy listened–but waited. He could not doubt
that the French King or the French people would come forward
presently and pay a higher price than the English. He kept Joan a
close prisoner in a strong fortress, and continued to wait, week
after week. He was a French prince, and was at heart ashamed to
sell her to the English. Yet with all his waiting no offer came to
him from the French side.
One day Joan played a cunning truck on her jailer, and not only
slipped out of her prison, but locked him up in it. But as she fled
away she was seen by a sentinel, and was caught and brought back.
Then she was sent to Beaurevoir, a stronger castle. This was early