She was displeased to see certain old wives coming to salute her; that was a kind of adoration which alarmed her. But poor folk who came to her she never repulsed. She would not hurt them, but aided them as far as she could.[1150]
With marvellous rapidity the fame of her holiness had been spread abroad throughout the whole of France. Many pious persons were wearing medals of lead or some other metal, stamped with her portrait, according to the customary mode of honouring the memory of saints.[1151] Paintings or sculptured figures of her were placed in chapels. At mass the priest recited as a collect "the Maid's prayer for the realm of France:"
"O God, author of peace, who without bow or arrow dost destroy those enemies who hope in themselves,[1152] we beseech thee O Lord, to protect us in our adversity; and, as Thou hast delivered Thy people by the hand of a woman, to stretch out to Charles our King, Thy conquering arm, that our enemies, who make their boast in multitudes and glory in bows and arrows, may be overcome by him at this present, and vouchsafe that at the end of his days he with his people may appear gloriously before Thee who art the way, the truth and the life. Through Our Lord Jesus Christ, etc."[1153]
In those days the saintly, both men and women, were consulted in all the difficulties of life. The more they were deemed simple and innocent the more counsel was asked of them. For if of themselves they knew nothing then all the surer was it that the voice of God was to be heard in their words. The Maid was believed to have no intelligence of her own, wherefore she was held capable of solving the most difficult questions with infallible wisdom. It was observed that knowing nought of the arts of war, she waged war better than captains, whence it was concluded that everything, which in her holy ignorance she undertook, she would worthily accomplish. Thus at Toulouse it occurred to a capitoul to consult her on a financial question. In that city the indignation of the townsfolk had been aroused because the guardians of the mint had been ordered to issue coins greatly inferior to those which had been previously in circulation. From April till June the capitouls had been endeavouring to get this order revoked. On the 2nd of June, the capitoul, Pierre Flamenc, proposed that the Maid should be written to concerning the evils resulting from the corruption of the coinage and that she should be asked to suggest a remedy. Pierre Flamenc made this proposal at the Capitole because he thought that a saint was a good counsellor in all matters, especially in anything which concerned the coinage, particularly when, like the Maid, she was the friend of the King.[1154]
From Loches Jeanne sent a little gold ring to the Dame de Laval, who had doubtless asked for some object she had touched.[1155] Fifty-four years previously Jeanne Dame de Laval had married Sire Bertrand Du Guesclin whose memory the French venerated and who in the House of Orléans was known as the tenth of Les Preux. Dame Jeanne's renown, however, fell short of that of Tiphaine Raguenel, astrologer and fairy,[1156] who had been Sire Bertrand's first wife. Jeanne was a choleric person and a miser. Driven out of her domain of Laval by the English, she lived in retirement at Vitré with her daughter Anne. Thirteen years before, the latter had incurred her mother's displeasure by secretly marrying a landless younger son of a noble house. When Dame Jeanne discovered it she imprisoned her daughter in a dungeon and welcomed the younger son by shooting at him with a cross-bow. After which the two ladies dwelt together in peace.[1157]
From Loches the Maid went to Selles-en-Berry, a considerable town on the Cher. Here, shortly before had met the three estates of the kingdom; and here the troops were now gathering.[1158]
On Saturday, the 4th of June, she received a herald sent by the people of Orléans to bring her tidings of the English.[1159] As commander in war they recognised none but her.
Meanwhile, surrounded by monks, and side by side with men-at-arms, like a nun she lived apart, a saintly life. She ate and drank little.[1160] She communicated once a week and confessed frequently.[1161] During mass at the moment of elevation, at confession and when she received the body of Our Lord she used to weep many tears. Every evening, at the hour of vespers, she would retire into a church and have the bells rung for about half an hour to summon the mendicant friars who followed the army. Then she would begin to pray while the brethren sang an anthem in honour of the Virgin Mary.[1162]
While practising as far as she was able the austerities required by extreme piety, she appeared magnificently attired, like a lord, for indeed she held her lordship from God. She wore the dress of a knight, a small hat, doublet and hose to match, a fine cloak of silk and cloth of gold well lined and shoes laced on the outer side of the foot.[1163] Such attire in no wise scandalised even the most austere members of the Dauphin's party. They read in holy Scripture that Esther and Judith, inspired by the Lord, loaded themselves with ornaments; true it was for sexual reasons and in order for the salvation of Israel to attract Ahasuerus and Holophernes. Wherefore they held that when Jeanne decked herself with masculine adornments, in order to appear before the men-at-arms as an angel giving victory to the Christian King, far from yielding to the vanities of the world, she, like Esther and Judith, had nothing in her heart but the interest of the holy nation and the glory of God. The English and Burgundian clerks on the other hand converted into scandal what was a subject of edification, and maintained that she was a woman dissolute in dress and in manners.