her defense, was allowed no advocate or adviser, and must conduct
her case by herself against a hostile judge and a packed jury. In
two hours she would be hopelessly entangled, routed, defeated,
convicted. Nothing could be more certain that this–so they
thought. But it was a mistake. The two hours had strung out into
days; what promised to be a skirmish had expanded into a siege;
the thing which had looked so easy had proven to be surprisingly
difficult; the light victim who was to have been puffed away like a
feather remained planted like a rock; and on top of all this, if
anybody had a right to laugh it was the country-lass and not the
court.
She was not doing that, for that was not her spirit; but others were
doing it. The whole town was laughing in its sleeve, and the court
knew it, and its dignity was deeply hurt. The members could not
hide their annoyance.
And so, as I have said, the session was stormy. It was easy to see
that these men had made up their minds to force words from Joan
to-day which should shorten up her case and bring it to a prompt
conclusion. It shows that after all their experience with her they
did not know her yet.
They went into the battle with energy. They did not leave the
questioning to a particular member; no, everybody helped. They
volleyed questions at Joan from all over the house, and sometimes
so many were talking at once that she had to ask them to deliver
their fire one at a time and not by platoons. The beginning was as
usual:
“You are once more required to take the oath pure and simple.”
“I will answer to what is in the procЉs verbal. When I do more, I
will choose the occasion for myself.”
That old ground was debated and fought over inch by inch with
great bitterness and many threats. But Joan remained steadfast, and
the questionings had to shift to other matters. Half an hour was
spent over Joan’s apparitions–their dress, hair, general appearance,
and so on–in the hope of fishing something of a damaging sort out
of the replies; but with no result.
Next, the male attire was reverted to, of course. After many
well-worn questions had been re-asked, one or two new ones were
put forward.
“Did not the King or the Queen sometimes ask you to quit the male
dress?”
“That is not in your procЉs.”
“Do you think you would have sinned if you had taken the dress of
your sex?”
“I have done best to serve and obey my sovereign Lord and
Master.”
After a while the matter of Joan’s Standard was taken up, in the
hope of connecting magic and witchcraft with it.
“Did not your men copy your banner in their pennons?”
“The lancers of my guard did it. It was to distinguish them from
the rest of the forces. It was their own idea.”
“Were they often renewed?”
“Yes. When the lances were broken they were renewed.”
The purpose of the question unveils itself in the next one.
“Did you not say to your men that pennons made like your banner
would be lucky?”
The soldier-spirit in Joan was offended at this puerility. She drew
herself up, and said with dignity and fire: “What I said to them
was, ‘Ride those English down!’ and I did it myself.”
Whenever she flung out a scornful speech like that at these French
menials in English livery it lashed them into a rage; and that is
what happened this time. There were ten, twenty, sometimes even
thirty of them on their feet at a time, storming at the prisoner
minute after minute, but Joan was not disturbed.
By and by there was peace, and the inquiry was resumed.
It was now sought to turn against Joan the thousand loving honors
which had been done her when she was raising France out of the
dirt and shame of a century of slavery and castigation.
“Did you not cause paintings and images of yourself to be made?”
“No. At Arras I saw a painting of myself kneeling in armor before