Battles of Destiny

by Isabel Shepperson

Of the Burgundians, at this spectacle

Evinced some token of indignant shame.

The queen perceived it and addressed the crowds,

Exclaiming with loud voice, ‘Be grateful, Frenchmen,

That I engraft upon a sickly stock

A healthy scion, and redeem you from

The misbegotten son of a mad sire.’”

Surely the first part of Merlin’s prophecy had been ominously fulfilled: France was lost by a woman. Would a woman save France? And far away—among the wooded hills of Domremy wandered the splendid Dreamer who should, in three bright, bitter years—flame-cut into fame forever—undo what Isabeau had done, throw off the incubus of alien authority, negative the Treaty of Troyes, and save France.

Thank God for the enthusiasts, for those who follow their Voices! Tho’ their way lies thro’ adamantine opposition, they know it not, their eyes are fixed on the goal; and even as one in hypnotic somnambulism leaps on from toppling crag to crag unawed by the sheer depths of yawning destiny o’er which he strides, so do these enthusiasts press on to the goal: and they reach it.