Transcriber‘s Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

JEANNE D’ARC

Reputed Portrait of
Jeanne d’Arc,
From the original, formerly in the Church of S^t. Maurice, Orleans.
(MUSÉE DU TROCADÉRO, PARIS.)

JEANNE D’ARC
MAID OF ORLEANS
DELIVERER OF FRANCE
Being the Story of her Life, her Achievements, and her Death, as attested on Oath and Set forth in the Original Documents

EDITED BY

T. DOUGLAS MURRAY

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND A MAP

LONDON

WILLIAM HEINEMANN

1902

This Edition enjoys Copyright in all Countries signatory to the Berne Treaty, and is not to be imported into the United States of America.

PREFACE

The following Document concerning the story of the life and death of Jeanne d’Arc, Maid of Orleans, is probably the only known instance in which a complete biographical record, of historical importance, has been elicited by evidence taken on oath. These depositions cover the childhood of the Maid; the series of her military exploits as Commander-in-Chief of the armies of France; her capture, imprisonment, and death at the stake in the market-place of Rouen.

The official Latin text of the Trial and Rehabilitation of Jeanne d’Arc, rescued from oblivion among the archives of France, and published in the forties by Quicherat, has been faithfully, and now for the first time, rendered into English. This account, given by numerous contemporary witnesses, of an episode which profoundly affected the history of Europe and determined the destinies of England and France must appeal to the general reader no less than to the student.

INTRODUCTION

By the order of Pope Calixtus in 1455, the Trial of Jeanne d’Arc at Rouen, which had taken place twenty-four years before, was reconsidered by a great court of lawyers and churchmen, and the condemnation of Jeanne was solemnly annulled and declared wicked and unjust. By this re-trial posterity has been allowed to see the whole life of the village maiden of Domremy, as she was known first to her kinsfolk and her neighbours, and afterwards to warriors, nobles and churchmen who followed her extraordinary career. The evidence so given is unique in its minute and faith-worthy narration of a great and noble life; as indeed that life is itself unique in all human history. After all that can be done by the rationalising process, the mystery remains of an untutored and unlettered girl of eighteen years old, not only imposing her will upon captains and courtiers, but showing a skill and judgment worthy, as General Dragomiroff says, of the greatest commanders, indeed of Napoleon himself. While we must give due weight and consideration to the age in which this marvel showed itself on the stage of history, an age of portents and prophecies, of thaumaturgists and saints, yet when all allowance is made there remains this sane, strong, solid girl leaving her humble home, and in two short months accomplishing more than Cæsar or Alexander accomplished in so much time, and at an age when even Alexander had as yet achieved nothing.

The story is best given by the witnesses, and only indications or, so to speak, sign-posts are needed to point out the way. Before the work of Jeanne can be even vaguely apprehended something must be known of how France stood at her coming. A century of misfortune and sorrow, broken only by a parenthesis of comparative prosperity from 1380 to 1407, had left her an easy prey to the hereditary enemy. Torn asunder by factions which distracted Church and State alike, she was in no condition of health and courage to recover from the shock of the crushing disaster of Agincourt. For although the English were unable at the moment to follow up the victory they had gained, and Henry V. returned to England the bearer of barren glory, still the breathing time was not put to good account by the French, whose domestic jars made combined national action impossible. At Henry’s second coming, regular resistance was hardly offered. His fleets and armies held the Channel and the ports and fortresses on both sides. The King of France was insane. His wife, Isabel of Bavaria, came to terms with the English King, and by the treaty of Troyes (1420) the Crown of France was to pass away from the Dauphin, whom his wretched mother would fain bastardise, to the issue of Henry and the Princess Catherine, the ready instrument of her mother’s purpose. When Henry V. died the son born of this unhallowed marriage was declared King of France and England under the title of Henry VI. The poor child was less than a year old. His able and resolute uncle John, Duke of Bedford, ruled France as Regent, and carried the arms of England in triumph against all who dared to dispute his nephew’s title. The Dauphin fled to the south, and abandoned to Bedford all territory north of the Loire. Paris was occupied and held by the English. The braver members of the Parliament and the University joined the Dauphin at Poitiers, but the accommodating and timid members did homage to Bedford and duly attorned to Henry VI. as to their lawful King. Orleans alone remained, of the strong places of France, in the hands of the patriot party. If Orleans fell, all organised opposition to Bedford would melt away.

As Orleans was the key of the military, so was Rheims the key of the political, situation. Rheims was the old city where for many centuries the Kings of France had been crowned and consecrated. Such a ceremony brought with it in an especial manner the sacrosanct divinity which in the middle ages hedged a King.

It is noteworthy that Jeanne’s mission, as now defined and traced by French scholars, was the double one of rescuing beleaguered Orleans and crowning the Dauphin at Rheims.

Orleans had withstood a stubborn siege of many months, but its fate seemed sealed. The Dauphin had almost given up the struggle. He had made futile appeals for help to the King of Scotland, whose infant daughter was betrothed to young Louis, afterwards the terrible Louis XI. To Naples also he made appeals, but no succour or hope came, and in despair he shut himself up at Chinon, giving up the cause of France as lost unless aid came from on high. Jeanne came as the messenger of glad tidings, and announced herself as one sent by God to aid France in her extreme need.

She came from Lorraine, out of which no good thing could come, as proverbs taught; for Lorraine had ever been branded as false to God and false to man. Ambiguous in its relations to France and to the Empire, it had, like most borderlands, the unstableness of character which comes of social and political insecurity. Jeanne’s native town of Domremy was one of a cluster of hamlets on the verge of France, in the smiling valley through which a winding river made its way. Her father and mother were in a very humble station, having a little patch of land with rights of commonage on the village pastures, and were, from the evidence of their neighbours, frugal, hard-working, and “well thought of.”

Jeanne herself was in no way marked out from her girl friends by any special accomplishments or ambition. She prided herself solely on her domestic usefulness and her skill in household work. She was intensely pious, but in no way introspective or morbid. God and His angels and saints were as real to her, more real indeed, than the men and women of her native village. The thoughts of sacred things subdued her soul to an unconsciousness of self, which marks her off even from such beautiful spiritual natures as Teresa and Bridget of Sweden and Catherine of Sienna, whose habit of mind was less simple and less humble than hers. She seems to have grieved long and deeply on the misfortunes of France, which was to her the only country claiming her allegiance. For, although geographically in Lorraine, Domremy was part of the French Kingdom, and its people were devotedly on the side of the Dauphin and the national party. The Duke of Burgundy, who had sided with the English, had only one adherent in Domremy, and he was treated, after the manner of good-natured peasants, with a certain humorous toleration by the patriots of the village.

Growing up in this atmosphere, Jeanne, who was born on the feast of the Epiphany 1412, heard in her earlier girlhood of the sad state of her country torn asunder by faction and treason, and presenting a very broken front to the redoubtable armies of England, which had in the course of a century carried the banner of St. George over all the lands from Calais to Cadiz without once meeting an enemy strong enough to look them in the face on a pitched field of battle.

Agincourt, and the carnage after Agincourt, revived in French minds the humiliation of Poitiers and the horrors of Limoges, so that dread and hatred of the English were the burden of every household story. Nor must we forget that in Europe then, as in Asia and Africa now, news spread apace, and unlettered folk got to know in some strange way the doings of camps and courts.

Old prophecies too were on every lip. That weird unrest which Shakespeare shadows forth in Peter of Pomfret and his sayings, shaking the throne of Richard II. by their very vagueness, was nowhere felt more intensely than in Lorraine, with its blending of old Celtic myths, German romances, and tales of Provençal minstrelsy in all hearts and memories.

Sublime above all these loomed the Church and its tremendous message. And so, from current history and fable and folk-lore, Jeanne’s imagination was fed, while her soul was ready to receive any mandate which the Lord of all things might deign to signify. She was thirteen years old when the first message came to her. The Archangel Michael, as she states, appeared, and she was struck with great fear; but afterwards she longed for his coming and his words. He admonished her to be pure and holy and religious, and she determined to be so. Later on St. Catherine (the Virgin) and St. Margaret appeared to her, and told her that the Lord ordered her to go into France and relieve Orleans. In her examination she tells these things with great particularity, meeting all questions as to age, size, voice, dress, language, and surroundings of the angels, with a simple directness which carries conviction of her absolute truthfulness.

Her doubts and misgivings as to her own unfitness she put aside as impertinences, when assured of her divine mission. No shadow of spiritual inflation or egotism is to be seen in all these things. Rather she held by the belief that her very unworthiness in the world’s eye was the cause of her being chosen as a simple instrument in the hands of the Lord.

Her uncle led her to Vaucouleurs in 1428; Robert de Baudricourt, whom she believed she was told to see, declined to give ear to her stories; but Jean de Metz, whose evidence is of absorbing interest, tells us how he was overcome and won over to her by her compelling earnestness and faith. She came to Chinon with a small escort, and she and her guard had to travel mostly by night to avoid the Burgundians. “At Chinon,” says Jean de Metz, “she had to submit to long inquiries.”

The Dauphin was naturally loath to take a step so full of peril, and indeed so fraught with the danger of ridiculous failure, without grave, anxious, and searching investigation. He wished Jeanne to appear at Poitiers before the prelates and lawyers of Parliament. At Poitiers she was subjected to the closest examination, and in the end convinced the lawyers and churchmen of her good faith and the reality of her visions and voices. The Archbishop of Rheims, following “Gamaliel in the Council of the Jews,” advised the Dauphin not to spurn the proffered help; and Charles, who had been already impressed by the “revelations,” took the Archbishop’s advice, and placed his forces and his fortune in her hands, trusting to divine help and succour. The armies of France were in marked contrast to those of England. French nobles had quasi-regal power in their dominions, and only fitfully followed the royal arms. In England, from the Conquest, the King was supreme lord of all, and every one owed direct and immediate allegiance to him. The English armies, unlike the French feudal array, were made up of peasants and artisans and adventurous young men seeking a career, and, in the last resort, as we know from Falstaff, of losels and waifs and ne’er-do-wells. Whether Lord Melville’s famous saying that “the worst men make the best soldiers” be or be not accepted, it seems true enough that for aggressive wars at any rate the reckless bravery of adventurers goes very far. And Henry’s army, composed as it was of English, Welsh, and Irish, was in truth an army of intrepid condottieri, intrepid to a fault, but lacking the chivalrous feelings which with all their drawbacks the feudal system and the knightly organisations tended to evolve.

Hardened and seasoned by years of warfare, the English in 1429 were without serious opposition or check in their movements and attacks. No French army kept the field. The King’s authority was flouted. The Duke of Burgundy was openly for the English cause. The Duke of Brittany and Lorraine wavered from side to side. Money had run out, and the last chance of success was staked in a bold throw on the strange promises of the young country girl.

The evidence given by competent witnesses shows us clearly the magnitude of her achievements during the months of May, June, and July, 1429: the relief of Orleans; the victory of Patay; the capture of Troyes; and the triumphal march to Rheims, completing her work by the consecration of Charles in the old Cathedral, which had seen so many of his predecessors anointed and crowned within its walls.

But the marvel is that these stupendous achievements were not the results of mere enthusiasm, great and potent though that was, but of settled, farseeing skill and prudence on the part of Jeanne, joined to a strength of soul and purpose which multiplied the strength of the army tenfold.

Like Cromwell she “new-modelled” the army. The licentious gaiety of the feudal warrior had to give way to the sobriety and seemliness which became a Christian camp. The voluptuary and the blasphemer had to amend their lives. To revels succeeded prayers and fasts and vigils. Yet never for a moment did this great amendment degenerate into formalism or hypocrisy. Like all great souls she awakened latent good and drove vice abashed from her presence without any conscious spiritual superiority in herself. Men were ashamed to be base in such a presence. Nor did she ever become a law unto herself, as the “illuminated” are so apt to be; rather she was more than ever observant of all the duties and claims and observances of ordinary religious obligation, being ever in heart the simple maid whom the Lord for His own mysterious purpose, and without any merit of hers, had chosen for a mighty task.

These great qualities won for her the ready submission of the soldiers, while her name and fame brought levies of ardent volunteers, from all sides, eagerly contending for the glory of serving under such a leader. Her frame was hardy and enduring. She wore armour night and day for a week at a time. She ate sparingly and drank hardly at all, moistening a crust in wine, or, greatly fatigued, tasting a little as a restorative. While her woman’s nature showed itself in her burst of tears when dishonouring names were flung at her by some brutal English soldiers, or when she screamed at the sharp and sudden pain of the wound she received, still there always came a quick moral reinforcement which restored her serene fortitude in the midst of indignities and perils.

Writers have differed and must go on differing with regard to the scope of her mission and the waning of her powers after the coronation of Rheims. If she dictated the letter to Henry VI. in which the words occur, “body for body you will be driven out of France,” we may, by connecting this saying with her famous letter to the Hussites—in which she threatened to chastise them, “Saracens” that they were, when her work was done and France cleared of her enemies—and from other scattered phrases as well, come to the conclusion that in her belief France was to be wholly freed, and freed by her as agent of the Lord. But the letter to Henry VI. is of doubtful authority, and her appeal to Charles after the coronation to be allowed to return to her father and mother, supported by contemporary authority, seems to show that she looked upon her work as done, and the great outburst of weeping in the Cathedral was in all likelihood the sob of satisfied piety and patriotism, whose cares were at an end and whose task was fulfilled even to fruition.

This seems the true view, with which also the latest French students agree. Yielding to entreaty she threw herself further into the national struggle. She was still brave, still magnetic and inspiring, but no longer to herself or to others the sword in the hand of God.

But if in the campaign of May and June she showed the wonderful military genius to which so many competent witnesses bear testimony, in the weary winter of the same year she shows a clearness and depth of statesmanship scarcely less astonishing. In moments of national peril there are always “wise” men who think that further resistance is foolish and even criminal. Alfred had to deal with such time-servers. So had Bruce, and so later on had Washington. Jeanne with a sore heart found herself clogged and impeded by these prudent men. Foremost amongst them was the Archbishop of Rheims, Regnault de Chartres. His programme was one of reconciliation. The Duke of Burgundy was to become the ally of France, and as such was to act as negotiator and intermediary for a lasting peace between Henry VI. and Charles VII. Poor Charles was weary of the war, and lent a ready ear to the accommodator. In vain Jeanne warned him of the folly of these plans. To strike, and strike quickly, at Paris was her advice. Halting and hesitating, Charles consented. An army was placed at her disposal, but, just as victory seemed sure, she was ordered to desist, and Burgundy so duped the French King that he was allowed to go through the French lines into Paris, ostensibly to treat for peace, but in reality, as the event proved, to put himself under Bedford’s orders, and to hold Paris as lieutenant for the Regent and ally of the King of England. Had Jeanne’s advice been followed this shameful treason could never have come about. She had known and felt that the hatred of the Duke of Burgundy and his house against Charles VII. was too deep and too rooted to be pulled up in a moment. For twenty years France had been distracted by the factions of Burgundy and Orleans struggling for control. Fire and water were not more opposed. Burgundy looked to England, and Orleans to France. We must not too hastily condemn these factions. Nations in the modern sense had not fully arisen. The State was everything. Whether a great Anglo-French monarchy sitting in Paris ruled over France, England, Ireland, and Wales, or a more domestic French line only ruled over France itself, was a question on which upright men might well take opposite sides. Jeanne’s special merit was that she saw the possibility of a great French nation, self-centred, self-sufficient, and she so stamped this message on the French heart that its characters have never faded. Ecclesiastics, on the other hand, with their conception of a Universal Empire and a Universal Church, thought little of National aspirations or claims. To them, anything which would allay the bitter rivalries of France and England naturally appealed, seeing, as they did, in such a change the promise of a return to the days before the Babylonian captivity at Avignon, and the bringing of all peoples into ready submission to Peter’s chair. Jeanne’s greatness is nowhere more manifest than in her willing loyalty to the Church and “our lord the Pope,” while claiming for France absolute national independence. Herein she stands alone. Dante’s two swords (wielded by Pope and Emperor) were lethal to national life. To the spiritual sword Jeanne bowed, but to no Emperor or King other than the anointed King of France could the loyalty of a French heart be due.

The winter of 1429 was spent in controversies of which the opposing principles of imperialism and nationality are the true keys. In the early spring, Jeanne, who had bravely stood by the national cause, and heartened all who withstood the party of compromise and surrender, saw only too clearly that for the time the French hopes of success had given way. That brave night ride to relieve Compiègne was in many respects a meeting of fate half way. No doubt, she defied augury, but signs of impending disaster multiplied; and when she fell into the hands of the Burgundians, she must have felt that while her own agony began, the cause of France might well gather more strength from her example as a sufferer, than from her futile struggle against cowardice and treason. Into one short year her whole astounding public career is crowded; Orleans, Patay, Troyes, Rheims, Paris, Compiègne; glory, exaltation, wreckage, and captivity. But France was at the end of it a conscious nation with an anointed King, and the work of deliverance was assured.

The Trial and Rehabilitation.

The English had felt sorely the humiliations of the year 1429. In Bedford’s report to the King’s Council in London he told of those who were struck with fear by the incantations of this “limb of the fiend” who had startled them from their security; and proclamations were issued against those who in terror of the Maid deserted the army. Now that she, who had worked such mischief to them, was in their hands, betrayed by her own countrymen,[^[1]] they wreaked vengeance upon her without stint.

The story of her prison life is a record of shame to her gaolers. Chained, mocked at, threatened, and insulted, her serenity never failed. She was in God’s hand, and she bowed to His will.

Months of suffering and anxiety passed over her before her captors made up their minds as to the course they would take to bring about her death under the semblance of legal execution. If she could be convicted by an ecclesiastical court of crimes against the faith, her condemnation would redound to the fair fame of England and the pious[^[2]] House of Lancaster, while covering the French and their sovereign with confusion as the allies and associates of a minister of hell.

Pliant churchmen were at hand to give countenance and help in this undertaking—bishops full of zeal and loyalty for our sovereign lord Henry VI., by the grace of God King of France and England.

The worst of these servile churchmen was the wretched Bishop of Beauvais, Pierre Cauchon. Many other prelates were Cæsar’s friends, but he sits exalted in solitary infamy. He came to the Burgundian camp and claimed his victim in the name of Bedford, Regent of France for the English King. Had Jeanne been detained by the Burgundians, it is impossible to believe that Charles VII. would not have procured her release. Had she been held as a prisoner of war by the English, it is very likely that the shame of holding a woman captive in their hands would have made it possible to arrange for her ransom. But once charged with heresy and taken out of the hands of the Burgundians such hopes and chances were closed. Still, as an ecclesiastical prisoner she would have been entitled to counsel and guidance by religious persons, the Church offering admonition before preferring grave charges of rebellion against any of her children. But this would render her punishment uncertain. Grave doctors of the law and eminent churchmen had at Poitiers, after long inquiry, declared her worthy of trust and they might do so again.

Therefore it was determined that she should be held in a lay prison though charged with an ecclesiastical offence. Cut off in this way from all spiritual help and instruction, she was to be brought, when the process was ripe, before a well-chosen court bent on her destruction, and ready to entangle her in questions which might entrap her into erroneous or heretical statements.

And once more we are confronted, if we try to rationalise her life and put away all belief in inspiration, with the amazing problem as to where and how this untutored girl drew her stores of logic, law, and theology.

The trial took place in Rouen Castle,[^[3]] the seat of Bedford’s government in France. The choosing of her judges was committed to Cauchon, who selected the most sturdy adherents of the English. No formal charge was preferred, but Jeanne was interrogated. This course was severely condemned by a distinguished lawyer named Lohier, who puts clearly before us the procedure and principles that should govern such a hearing.

There should be in the first place in all such trials a definite indictment of the charges advanced against the accused, who in turn ought to have due time to answer all the allegations with the assistance of counsel.

In Jeanne’s particular case, seeing that she had been already practically tried and acquitted at Poitiers at a trial presided over by the Archbishop of Rheims, the metropolitan of the Bishop of Beauvais, it was putting her twice in peril for the same offence, and on the second occasion before an inferior court, a thing contrary to law and reason. Moreover the venue was wrong. She had been captured in one diocese as an ecclesiastical prisoner, and she was to be tried in another, and no assent of the chapter of Rouen could give jurisdiction in such a case.

Finally she was in a lay prison, held there by her political enemies, which made it impossible for her to have the liberty and spiritual assistance necessary to meet ecclesiastical charges. The trial ought to have been held in an ordinary court and not in the Castle.

All these objections are of great substance and go to the very root of the inquiry. But more vital than all was Jeanne’s own expostulation against trial before Cauchon, who was her declared and bitter enemy, and the mere instrument of her foes and gaolers.

Gross however as the injustice was, there were certain barriers within which even Cauchon and his accomplices had to work their wicked wills. As there were fearless canonists like Lohier, who, as members of a great international Bar, were independent of any King or bishop, so the notaries, being apostolic and imperial officers, were in no way amenable to Cauchon or his crew. Every word spoken in court is duly and faithfully recorded, and this record formed the basis for the petition subsequently presented to the Pope by Jeanne’s mother and brother when seeking amendment of Cauchon’s judgment.

The trial is one of the most enthralling dramas in all history. The caution, the skill, the simplicity withal, shown by Jeanne in her answers to bewildering and entrapping questions, well earned the praise bestowed twenty years later by the accomplished lawyers who wrote on the case, sustaining the appeal for a new hearing.

The report gives all the details of the inquiry with fulness and accuracy, and when we carefully examine its course, we must agree with the canonists who said that the forms of law were indeed adhered to, but its spirit was grossly violated. The judges in Jeanne’s case fortified themselves with the decision of the University of Paris, but that decision was procured by laying before the University what purported to be the statements of Jeanne, but what were in truth selected passages from her statements torn from qualifying contexts and often with the suppression of governing words.

Still this précis was also part of the record of the Court, although attempts were made to suppress it, and at the re-hearing Cauchon and his fellow hirelings were vehemently condemned for this nefarious proceeding.

By a sentence, so obtained and so buttressed, Jeanne d’Arc was done to death. The story of the execution is one of the most heart-rending incidents in history. No comment can deepen or add to the pathos of the narrative given by the bystanders.

In 1450 King Charles VII. empowered Guillaume Bouillé, Rector of the University of Paris, to inquire into the circumstances of Jeanne’s trial, condemnation, and death, and to report the result of his investigation.

Great lawyers gave their opinions, and declared the trial void, as having been bad in substance as well as in form. But no regular judgment was pronounced.

Again in 1452 Pope Nicholas V., on appeal by Jeanne’s mother, Isabel d’Arc, ordered inquiry, which duly took place, but without formal issue.

It is fortunate for truth and human interest that these inquiries were abortive. Had they on general grounds annulled the proceedings under Cauchon, how much would have been lost to us!

We should never have had that delightful picture of Domremy given by the simple people of the place. Nor should we have, as we have now, a sworn narrative of Jeanne’s private and public life laying bare her very soul.

When Pope Calixtus ordered a full inquiry, he seemed to think, as Newman thought when writing the “Apologia,” that the less argument and the more narrative and evidence that could be given the better; and so, instead of discussing the nature of angels, the limits of Catholic obedience, the Great Schism,[^[4]] and the assurances of salvation of the just, he and his deputies put aside such questions with patient contempt until they first made sure of the human side of the story. How Jeanne impressed her neighbours, her priest, and her kin; what kind of girl she was; what were her employments; was she restive and ambitious or quiet and satisfied; was her life pure; was she given to foolish imaginings, or was she a sane, modest, unpretending country maiden? Into all these things Cauchon had made inquiries, but as the answers were all favourable to the accused he suppressed the evidence.

The decree of Pope Calixtus has added a true romance to human story. In all that we know of the world’s great ones we can find no parallel for the Maid of Domremy. Perhaps only in Catholic France was such a heroine possible. Certainly Teutonic Protestantism has as yet given to the world none of the exalted types of radiant and holy women such as those that illuminate Latin Christianity. Whether as a saint or a nation-maker, Jeanne’s place in world-history is assured.

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Part I
THE TRIAL

Information as to the Original Documents of the Trial will be found in the Appendix, p. [331].

An Introductory Note on the Maid’s Capture at Compiègne and on the Procedure of her Trial is given in the Appendix on p. [332].

THE OLD CASTLE OF ROUEN.

I
FIRST PROCESS: THE LAPSE

TRIAL EX OFFICIO

Six Public Examinations

On Wednesday, February 21st, at 8 o’clock in the morning, in the Chapel Royal of the Castle of Rouen. The Bishop and 42 Assessors present.

We did first of all command to be read the Royal letters conveying surrender and deliverance of the said woman into Our hands; afterwards the letters of the Chapter of Rouen, making concession of territory for Our benefit. This reading ended, M^tre. Jean d’Estivet, nominated by Us as Promoter of the Case, did, in Our presence, shew that the aforesaid woman of the name of Jeanne hath been, by the Executor of Our Mandate, cited to appear in this place at this hour and day, here to answer, according to law, to the questions to be put to her.

The said Promoter did then produce Our Mandate, to which is attached the document confirming its execution, and did read them all. Our said Promoter did then require that the said woman should be placed before us, and, in terms of the citation, questioned by Us on divers Articles concerning the Faith, to the which We did agree. But as a preliminary, because the said woman had asked to hear Mass beforehand, We did shew to the Assessors that, by the advice of well-known Doctors and Masters consulted by Us, it hath been decided, considering the crimes of which she is accused, and the impropriety of the dress which she is wearing, that it is right to postpone permission to hear Mass and to assist in Divine Service.

In the meantime, the said woman was brought by the Executor of Our Mandate, and set before Us.

We did then shew that the said Jeanne hath been lately taken[^[5]] in the territory of Beauvais; that many acts contrary to the Orthodox Faith have been committed by her, not only in Our Diocese, but in many others; that the public report, which imputes these misdeeds to her, hath spread in all estates of Christendom; that, in the last place, the most Serene and most Christian our lord the King hath sent and given her up to Us in order that, according to law and right, an action may be brought against her in the matter of the Faith; that, acting upon this common report, upon public rumour, and also on certain information obtained by Us, of which mention hath already been often enough made, by the advice of men versed in sacred and secular Law, We have officially given commandment to cite the said Jeanne to appear before Us, in order through her to obtain truthful answers to the questions to be put to her in matters of the Faith, and in order to act towards her according to law and right; which doth so appear in the letters that the Promoter hath shewn.

Then, desiring in this particular the blessed succour of Jesus Christ, Who is concerned in this, and wishing only to fulfil the duties of Our office for the exaltation and preservation of the Catholic Faith, We did first charitably warn and require the said Jeanne, seated in Our presence, for the more prompt resolution of the Action and the relief of her own conscience, to speak the whole truth upon all questions which should be addressed to her touching the Faith; and We did exhort her to avoid all subterfuges and shufflings of such a nature as should turn her aside from a sincere and true avowal.

And in the first instance we did require her, in the appointed form, her hand on the Holy Gospels, to swear to speak truth on the questions to be addressed to her.

To which she did reply:

“I know not upon what you wish to question me: perhaps you may ask me of things which I ought not to tell you.”

“Swear,” We did then say to her, “to speak truth on the things which shall be asked you concerning the Faith, and of which you know.”

“Of my father and my mother and of what I did after taking the road to France, willingly will I swear; but of the revelations which have come to me from God, to no one will I speak or reveal them, save only to Charles my King; and to you I will not reveal them, even if it cost me my head; because I have received them in visions and by secret counsel, and am forbidden to reveal them. Before eight days are gone, I shall know if I may reveal them to you.”

Again did We several times warn and require her to be willing, on whatsoever should touch on the Faith, to swear to speak truly. And the said Jeanne, on her knees, her two hands resting on the Missal, did swear to speak truth on that which should be asked her and which she knew in the matter of the Faith, keeping silence under the condition above stated, that is to say, neither to tell nor to reveal to any one the revelations made to her.

After this oath, Jeanne was interrogated by Us as to her name, and surname, her place of birth, the names of her father and mother, the place of her baptism, her godfathers and godmothers, the Priest who baptized her, etc., etc.

“In my own country they call me Jeannette; since I came into France I have been called Jeanne. Of my surname I know nothing. I was born[^[6]] in the village of Domremy, which is really one with the village of Greux. The principal Church is at Greux. My father is called Jacques d’Arc; my mother, Ysabelle. I was baptized in the village of Domremy.[^[7]] One of my godmothers[^[8]] is called Agnes, another Jeanne, a third Sibylle. One of my godfathers is called Jean Lingué, another Jean Barrey. I had many other godmothers, or so I have heard from my mother. I was, I believe, baptized by Messire Jean Minet; he still lives, so far as I know. I am, I should say, about nineteen years of age. From my mother I learned my Pater, my Ave Maria, and my Credo. I believe I learned all this from my mother.”

JEANNE D’ARC’S HOUSE AT DOMREMY.

“Say your Pater.”

“Hear me in confession, and I will say it willingly.”

To this same question, which was many times put to her, she always answered: “No, I will not say my Pater to you, unless you will hear me in confession.”

“Willingly,” We said to her, “We will give you two well-known men, of the French language, and before them you shall say your Pater.”

“I will not say it to them, unless it be in confession.”

And then did We forbid Jeanne to go out of the prison which hath been assigned to her in the Castle without Our permission, under pain of the crime of heresy.

“I do not accept such a prohibition,” she answered; “if ever I do escape, no one shall reproach me with having broken or violated my faith, not having given my word to any one, whosoever it may be.”

And as she complained that she had been fastened with chains and fetters of iron, We said to her:

“You have before, and many times, sought, We are told, to get out of the prison, where you are detained; and it is to keep you more surely that it has been ordered to put you in irons.”

“It is true I wished to escape; and so I wish still: is not this lawful for all prisoners?”

We then commissioned as her guard the noble man John Gris,[^[9]] Squire, one of the Body Guard of our Lord the King, and, with him, John Berwoist and William Talbot, whom We enjoined well and faithfully to guard the said Jeanne, and to permit no person to have dealings with her without Our order. Which the aforenamed, with their hands on the Gospels, did solemnly swear.

Finally, having accomplished all the preceding, We appointed the said Jeanne to appear the next day, at 8 o’clock in the morning, before Us in the Ornament Room, at the end of the Great Hall of the Castle of Rouen.

Thursday, February 22nd, in the Ornament Room at the end of the Great Hall of the Castle of Rouen. The Bishop and 48 Assessors present.

In their presence, We shewed that Jean Lemaître, Deputy of the Chief Inquisitor, had been summoned and required by Us to join himself to the present Action, with Our offer of communicating to him all that hath been done hitherto or shall be done in the future; but that the said Deputy had replied, that, having been commissioned by the Chief Inquisitor for the City and Diocese of Rouen only, and the actual Process being deduced by Us in a territory which hath been ceded to Us by the Metropolitan Chapter, by reason of Our Ordinary Jurisdiction, as Bishop of Beauvais, he had thought it right to avoid all nullity and also for the peace of his own conscience, to refuse to join himself with Us, in the quality of Judge, until he should receive from the Chief Inquisitor a Commission and more extended powers: that, nevertheless, he would have no objection to see the trial continue without interruption.

After having heard Us make this narration, the said Deputy, being present, declared, addressing himself to Us, “That which you have just said is true. It has been, as much as in me lies, and still is, agreeable to me that you should continue the Trial.”

Then the said Jeanne was brought before Us.

We warned and required her, on pain of law, to make oath as she had done the day before and to swear simply and absolutely to speak truth on all things in respect of which she should be asked; to which she answered:

“I swore yesterday: that should be enough.”

Again We required her to swear: we said to her, not even a prince, required to swear in a matter of faith, can refuse.

“I made oath to you yesterday,” she answered, “that should be quite enough for you: you burden me over-much!”

Finally she made oath to speak truth on that which touches the Faith.

Then Maître Jean Beaupère, a well-known Professor of Theology, did, by Our order, question the said Jeanne. This he did as follows:

“First of all, I exhort you, as you have so sworn, to tell the truth on that which I am about to ask you.”

“You may well ask me some things on which I shall tell you the truth and some on which I shall not tell it you. If you were well informed about me, you would wish to have me out of your hands. I have done nothing except by revelation.”

“How old were you when you left your father’s house?”

“On the subject of my age I cannot vouch.”

“In your youth, did you learn any trade?”

“Yes, I learnt to spin and to sew; in sewing and spinning I fear no woman in Rouen. For dread of the Burgundians, I left my father’s house and went to the town of Neufchâteau,[^[10]] in Lorraine, to the house of a woman named La Rousse, where I sojourned about fifteen days. When I was at home with my father, I employed myself with the ordinary cares of the house. I did not go to the fields with the sheep and the other animals. Every year I confessed myself to my own Curé, and, when he was prevented, to another Priest with his permission. Sometimes, also, two or three times, I confessed to the Mendicant Friars; this was at Neufchâteau. At Easter I received the Sacrament of the Eucharist.”

“Have you received the Sacrament of the Eucharist at any other Feast but Easter?”

“Pass that by [Passez outre]. I was thirteen when I had a Voice from God for my help and guidance. The first time that I heard this Voice, I was very much frightened; it was mid-day, in the summer, in my father’s garden. I had not fasted the day before. I heard this Voice to my right, towards the Church; rarely do I hear it without its being accompanied also by a light. This light comes from the same side as the Voice. Generally it is a great light. Since I came into France I have often heard this Voice.”

“But how could you see this light that you speak of, when the light was at the side?”

To this question she answered nothing, but went on to something else. “If I were in a wood, I could easily hear the Voice which came to me. It seemed to me to come from lips I should reverence. I believe it was sent me from God. When I heard it for the third time, I recognized that it was the Voice of an Angel. This Voice has always guarded me well, and I have always understood it; it instructed me to be good and to go often to Church; it told me it was necessary for me to come into France. You ask me under what form this Voice appeared to me? You will hear no more of it from me this time. It said to me two or three times a week: ‘You must go into France.’ My father knew nothing of my going. The Voice said to me: ‘Go into France!’ I could stay no longer. It said to me: ‘Go, raise the siege which is being made before the City of Orleans. ‘Go!’ it added, ‘to Robert de Baudricourt,[^[11]] Captain of Vaucouleurs: he will furnish you with an escort to accompany you.’ And I replied that I was but a poor girl, who knew nothing of riding or fighting. I went to my uncle and said that I wished to stay near him for a time. I remained there eight days. I said to him, ‘I must go to Vaucouleurs.’[^[12]] He took me there. When I arrived, I recognized Robert de Baudricourt, although I had never seen him. I knew him, thanks to my Voice, which made me recognize him. I said to Robert, ‘I must go into France!’ Twice Robert refused to hear me, and repulsed me. The third time, he received me, and furnished me with men;[^[13]] the Voice had told me it would be thus. The Duke of Lorraine[^[14]] gave orders that I should be taken to him. I went there. I told him that I wished to go into France. The Duke asked me questions about his health; but I said of that I knew nothing. I spoke to him little of my journey. I told him he was to send his son with me, together with some people to conduct me to France, and that I would pray to God for his health. I had gone to him with a safe-conduct: from thence I returned to Vaucouleurs. From Vaucouleurs I departed, dressed as a man, armed with a sword given me by Robert de Baudricourt, but without other arms. I had with me a Knight,[^[15]] a Squire, and four servants, with whom I reached the town of Saint Urbain, where I slept in an Abbey. On the way, I passed through Auxerre, where I heard Mass in the principal Church. Thenceforward I often heard my Voices.”

“Who counselled you to take a man’s dress?”

To this question she several times refused to answer. In the end, she said: “With that I charge no one.” Many times she varied in her answers to this question. Then she said:

“Robert de Baudricourt made those who went with me swear to conduct me well and safely. ‘Go,’ said Robert de Baudricourt to me, ‘Go! and let come what may!’ I know well that God loves the Duke of Orleans; I have had more revelations about the Duke of Orleans than about any man alive, except my King. It was necessary for me to change my woman’s garments for a man’s dress. My counsel thereon said well. I sent a letter to the English before Orleans,[^[16]] to make them leave, as may be seen in a copy of my letter which has been read to me in this City of Rouen; there are, nevertheless, two or three words in this copy which were not in my letter. Thus, ‘Surrender to the Maid,’ should be replaced by ‘Surrender to the King.’ The words, ‘body for body’ and ‘chieftain in war’ were not in my letter at all.[^[17]]

“I went without hindrance to the King. Having arrived at the village of Saint Catherine de Fierbois, I sent for the first time to the Castle of Chinon,[^[18]] where the King was. I got there towards mid-day, and lodged first at an inn. After dinner, I went to the King, who was at the Castle. When I entered the room where he was I recognized him among many others by the counsel of my Voice, which revealed him to me. I told him that I wished to go and make war on the English.”

“When the Voice shewed you the King, was there any light?”

“Pass on.”

“Did you see an Angel over the King?”

“Spare me. Pass on. Before the King set me to work, he had many apparitions and beautiful revelations.”

“What revelations and apparitions had the King?”

“I will not tell you; it is not yet time to answer you about them; but send to the King, and he will tell you. The Voice had promised me that, as soon I came to the King, he would receive me. Those of my party knew well that the Voice had been sent me from God; they have seen and known this Voice, I am sure of it. My King and many others have also heard and seen the Voices which came to me: there were there Charles de Bourbon[^[19]] and two or three others. There is not a day when I do not hear this Voice; and I have much need of it. But never have I asked of it any recompense but the salvation of my soul. The Voice told me to remain at Saint-Denis, in France; I wished to do so, but, against my will, the Lords made me leave. If I had not been wounded, I should never have left. After having quitted Saint-Denis, I was wounded in the trenches before Paris;[^[20]] but I was cured in five days. It is true that I caused an assault to be made before Paris.”

“Was it a Festival that day?”

“I think it was certainly a Festival.”

“Is it a good thing to make an assault on a Festival?”

“Pass on.”

And as it appeared that enough had been done for to-day, We have postponed the affair to Saturday next, at 8 o’clock in the morning.

Saturday, 24th February, in the same place. The Bishop and 62 Assessors present.

In their presence We did require the aforenamed Jeanne to swear to speak the truth simply and absolutely on the questions to be addressed to her, without adding any restriction to her oath. We did three times thus admonish her. She answered:

“Give me leave to speak. By my faith! you may well ask me such things as I will not tell you. Perhaps on many of the things you may ask me I shall not tell you truly, especially on those that touch on my revelations; for you may constrain me to say things that I have sworn not to say; then I should be perjured, which you ought not to wish.” [Addressing the Bishop:] “I tell you, take good heed of what you say, you, who are my Judge;[^[21]] you take a great responsibility in thus charging me. I should say that it is enough to have sworn twice.”

“Will you swear, simply and absolutely?”

“You may surely do without this. I have sworn enough already twice. All the clergy of Rouen and Paris cannot condemn me if it be not law. Of my coming into France I will speak the truth willingly; but I will not say all: the space of eight days would not suffice.”

“Take the advice of the Assessors, whether you should swear or not.”

“Of my coming I will willingly speak truth, but not of the rest; speak no more of it to me.”

“You render yourself liable to suspicion in not being willing to swear to speak the truth absolutely.”

“Speak to me no more of it. Pass on.”

“We again require you to swear, precisely and absolutely.”

“I will say willingly what I know, and yet not all. I am come in God’s name; I have nothing to do here; let me be sent back to God, whence I came.”

“Again we summon and require you to swear, under pain of going forth charged with that which is imputed to you.”

“Pass on.”

“A last time we require you to swear, and urgently admonish you to speak the truth on all that concerns your trial; you expose yourself to a great peril by such a refusal.”

“I am ready to speak truth on what I know touching the trial.”

And in this manner was she sworn.

Then, by Our order, she was questioned by Maître Jean Beaupère, a well-known Doctor, as follows:

“How long is it since you have had food and drink?”[^[22]]

“Since yesterday afternoon.”

“How long is it since you heard your Voices?”

“I heard them yesterday and to-day.”

“At what hour yesterday did you hear them?”

“Yesterday I heard them three times,—once in the morning, once at Vespers, and again when the Ave Maria rang in the evening. I have even heard them oftener than that.”

“What were you doing yesterday morning when the Voice came to you?”

“I was asleep: the Voice awoke me.”

“Was it by touching you on the arm?”

“It awoke me without touching me.”

“Was it in your room?”

“Not so far as I know, but in the Castle.”

“Did you thank it? and did you go on your knees?”

“I did thank it. I was sitting on the bed; I joined my hands; I implored its help. The Voice said to me: ‘Answer boldly.’ I asked advice as to how I should answer, begging it to entreat for this the counsel of the Lord. The Voice said to me: ‘Answer boldly; God will help thee.’ Before I had prayed it to give me counsel, it said to me several words I could not readily understand. After I was awake, it said to me: ‘Answer boldly.’” [Addressing herself to Us, the said Bishop:] “You say you are my judge. Take care what you are doing; for in truth I am sent by God, and you place yourself in great danger.”

Maître Beaupère, continuing, said:

“Has this Voice sometimes varied in its counsel?”

“I have never found it give two contrary opinions.... This night again I heard it say: ‘Answer boldly.’”

“Has your Voice forbidden you to say everything on what you are asked?”

“I will not answer you about that. I have revelations touching the King that I will not tell you.”

“Has it forbidden you to tell those revelations?”

“I have not been advised about these things. Give me a delay of fifteen days,[^[23]] and I will answer you. If my Voice has forbidden me, what would you say about it? Believe me, it is not men who have forbidden me. To-day I will not answer: I do not know if I ought, or not; it has not been revealed to me. But as firmly as I believe in the Christian Faith and that God hath redeemed us from the pains of Hell, that Voice hath come to me from God and by His Command.”

“The Voice that you say appears to you, does it come directly from an Angel, or directly from God; or does it come from one of the Saints?”

“The Voice comes to me from God; and I do not tell you all I know about it: I have far greater fear of doing wrong in saying to you things that would displease it, than I have of answering you. As to this question, I beg you to grant me delay.”

“Is it displeasing to God to speak the truth?”

“My Voices have entrusted to me certain things to tell to the King, not to you. This very night they told me many things for the welfare of my King, which I would he might know at once, even if I should drink no wine until Easter, ... the King would be the more joyful at his dinner!”

“Can you not so deal with your Voices that they will convey this news to your King?”

“I know not if the Voice would obey, and if it be God’s Will. If it please God, He will know how to reveal it to the King, and I shall be well content.”

“Why does not this Voice speak any more to your King, as it did when you were in his presence?”

“I do not know if it be the Will of God. Without the grace of God I should not know how to do anything.”

“Has your counsel revealed to you that you will escape from prison?”

“I have nothing to tell you about that.”

“This night, did your Voice give you counsel and advice as to what you should answer?”

“If it did give me advice and counsel thereon, I did not understand.”

“The last two occasions on which you have heard this Voice, did a brightness come?”

“The brightness comes at the same time as the Voice.”

“Besides the Voice, do you see anything?”

“I will not tell you all; I have not leave; my oath does not touch on that. My Voice is good and to be honoured. I am not bound to answer you about it. I request that the points on which I do not now answer may be given me in writing.”

“The Voice from whom you ask counsel, has it a face and eyes?”

“You shall not know yet. There is a saying among children, that ‘Sometimes one is hanged for speaking the truth.’”

“Do you know if you are in the grace of God?”

“If I am not, may God place me there; if I am, may God so keep me. I should be the saddest in all the world if I knew that I were not in the grace of God. But if I were in a state of sin, do you think the Voice would come to me? I would that every one could hear the Voice as I hear it. I think I was about thirteen when it came to me for the first time.”

“In your youth, did you play in the fields with the other children?”

“I certainly went sometimes, I do not know at what age.”

“Do the Domremy people side with the Burgundians or with the opposite party?”

“I knew only one Burgundian[^[24]] at Domremy: I should have been quite willing for them to cut off his head—always had it pleased God.”

“The Maxey people, were they Burgundians, or opposed to the Burgundians?”

“They were Burgundians. As soon as I knew that my Voices were for the King of France, I loved the Burgundians no more. The Burgundians will have war unless they do what they ought; I know it by my Voice. The English were already in France when my Voices began to come to me. I do not remember being with the children of Domremy when they went to fight against those of Maxey for the French side: but I certainly saw the Domremy children who had fought with those of Maxey coming back many times, wounded and bleeding.”

“Had you in your youth any intention of fighting the Burgundians?”

“I had a great will and desire that my King should have his own Kingdom.”

“When you had to come into France, did you wish to be a man?”

“I have answered this elsewhere.”

“Did you not take the animals to the fields?”

“I have already answered this also. When I was bigger and had come to years of discretion, I did not look after them generally; but I helped to take them to the meadows and to a Castle called the Island,[^[25]] for fear of the soldiers. I do not remember if I led them in my childhood or no.”

“What have you to say about a certain tree which is near to your village?”

“Not far from Domremy there is a tree[^[26]] that they call ‘The Ladies’ Tree’—others call it ‘The Fairies’ Tree’; near by, there is a spring where people sick of the fever come to drink, as I have heard, and to seek water to restore their health. I have seen them myself come thus; but I do not know if they were healed. I have heard that the sick, once cured, come to this tree[^[27]] to walk about. It is a beautiful tree, a beech, from which comes the ‘beau may’—it belongs to the Seigneur Pierre de Bourlement,[^[28]] Knight. I have sometimes been to play with the young girls, to make garlands for Our Lady of Domremy. Often I have heard the old folk—they are not of my lineage—say that the fairies haunt this tree. I have also heard one of my Godmothers, named Jeanne, wife of the Maire Aubery of Domremy, say that she has seen fairies there; whether it be true, I do not know. As for me, I never saw them that I know of. If I saw them anywhere else, I do not know. I have seen the young girls putting garlands on the branches of this tree, and I myself have sometimes put them there with my companions; sometimes we took these garlands away, sometimes we left them. Ever since I knew that it was necessary for me to come into France, I have given myself up as little as possible to these games and distractions. Since I was grown up, I do not remember to have danced there. I may have danced there formerly, with the other children. I have sung there more than danced. There is also a wood called the Oak-wood, which can be seen from my father’s door; it is not more than half-a-league away. I do not know, and have never heard if the fairies appear there; but my brother told me that it is said in the neighbourhood: ‘Jeannette received her mission at the Fairies’ Tree.’ It is not the case; and I told him the contrary. When I came before the King, several people asked me if there were not in my country a wood, called the Oak-wood, because there were prophecies[^[29]] which said that from the neighbourhood of this wood would come a maid who should do marvellous things. I put no faith in that.”

“Would you like to have a woman’s dress?”

“Give me one, and I will take it and begone; otherwise, no. I am content with what I have, since it pleases God that I wear it.”

This done, We stayed the interrogation, and put off the remainder to Tuesday next, on which day We have convoked all the Assessors, at the same place and hour.

Tuesday, February 27th, in the same place. The Bishop and 54 Assessors present.

In their presence, We required the said Jeanne to swear to tell the truth on everything touching her Trial.

“Willingly will I swear,” she answered, “to tell the truth on everything touching the trial, but not upon all that I know.”

We required her again to speak the truth on all which should be asked of her.

“You ought to be satisfied,” she answered. “I have sworn enough.”

Then, by Our order, Maître Beaupère began to question her. And first he inquired of her, how she had been since the Saturday before?

“You can see for yourself how I am. I am as well as can be.”

“Do you fast every day this Lent?”

“Is that in the Case? Well, yes! I have fasted every day during this Lent.”

“Have you heard your Voices since Saturday?”

“Yes, truly, many times.”

“Did you hear them on Saturday in this hall, where you were being examined?”

“That is not in your Case. Very well, then—yes! I did hear them.”

“What did your Voice say to you last Saturday?”

“I did not quite understand it; and up to the moment when I returned to my room, I heard nothing that I may repeat to you.”

“What did it say to you in your room, on your return?”

“It said to me, ‘Answer them boldly.’ I take counsel with my Voice about what you ask me. I will tell willingly whatever I shall have permission from God to reveal; as to the revelations concerning the King of France, I will not tell them without the permission of my Voice.”

“Has your Voice forbidden you to tell everything?”

“I did not quite understand it.”

“What did your Voice last say to you?”

“I asked counsel about certain things that you had asked me.”

“Did it give you counsel?”

“On some points, yes; on others you may ask me for an answer that I shall not give, not having had leave. For, if I answered without leave, I should no longer have my Voices as warrant. When I have permission from Our Saviour, I shall not fear to speak, because I shall have warrant.”

“This Voice that speaks to you, is it that of an Angel, or of a Saint, or from God direct?”

“It is the Voice of Saint Catherine and of Saint Margaret.[^[30]] Their faces are adorned with beautiful crowns, very rich and precious. To tell you this I have leave from Our Lord. If you doubt this, send to Poitiers, where I was examined before.”

“How do you know if these were the two Saints? How do you distinguish one from the other?”

“I know quite well it is they; and I can easily distinguish one from the other.”

“How do you distinguish them?”

“By the greeting they give me. It is seven years now since they have undertaken to guide me. I know them well because they were named to me.”

“Are these two Saints dressed in the same stuff?”

“I will tell you no more just now; I have not permission to reveal it. If you do not believe me, go to Poitiers. There are some revelations which come to the King of France, and not to you, who are questioning me.”

“Are they of the same age?”

“I have not leave to say.”

“Do they speak at the same time, or one after the other?”

“I have not leave to say; nevertheless, I have always had counsel from them both.”

“Which of them appeared to you first?”

“I did not distinguish them at first. I knew well enough once, but I have forgotten. If I had leave, I would tell you willingly: it is written in the Register at Poitiers.[^[31]] I have also received comfort from Saint Michael.”

“Which of these two appearances came to you first?”

“Saint Michael.”

“Is it a long time since you first heard the voice of Saint Michael?”

“I did not say anything to you about the voice of Saint Michael; I say I have had great comfort from him.”

“What was the first Voice that came to you when you were about thirteen?”

“It was Saint Michael: I saw him before my eyes; he was not alone, but quite surrounded by the Angels of Heaven. I came into France only by the order of God.”

“Did you see Saint Michael and these Angels bodily and in reality?”

“I saw them with my bodily eyes as well as I see you; when they went from me, I wept. I should have liked to be taken away with them.”

“And what was Saint Michael like?”

“You will have no more answer from me; and I am not yet free to tell you.”

“What did Saint Michael say to you this first time?”

“You will have no more answer about it from me to-day. My Voices said to me, ‘Reply boldly.’ Once I told the King all that had been revealed to me, because it concerned him; but I am no longer free to reveal to you all that Saint Michael said to me.” [To Maître Beaupère:] “I wish you could get a copy of this book at Poitiers, if it please God.”

“Have your Voices forbidden you to make known your revelations without leave from them?”

“I will answer you no more about it. On all that I have leave, I will answer willingly. I have not quite understood if my Voices have forbidden me to answer.”

“What sign do you give that you have this revelation from God, and that it is Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret that talk with you?”

“I have told you that it is they; believe me if you will.”

“Are you forbidden to say?”

“I have not quite understood if this is forbidden or not.”

“How can you make sure of distinguishing such things as you are free to tell, from those which are forbidden?”

“On some points I have asked leave, and on others I have obtained it. I would rather have been torn asunder by four horses than have come into France without God’s leave.”

“Was it God who prescribed to you the dress of a man?”

“What concerns this dress is a small thing—less than nothing. I did not take it by the advice of any man in the world. I did not take this dress or do anything but by the command of Our Lord and of the Angels.”

“Did it appear to you that this command to take man’s dress was lawful?”

“All I have done is by Our Lord’s command. If I had been told to take some other, I should have done it; because it would have been His command.”

“Did you not take this garment by order of Robert de Baudricourt?”

“No.”

“Do you think it was well to take a man’s dress?”

“All that I have done by the order of Our Lord I think has been well done; I look for good surety and good help in it.”

“In this particular case, this taking of man’s dress, do you think you did well?”

“I have done nothing in the world but by the order of God.”

“When you saw this Voice coming to you, was there a light?”

“There was plenty of light everywhere, as was seemly.” [Addressing herself to Maître Beaupère:] “It does not all come to you!”

“Was there an angel over the head of your King when you saw him for the first time?”

“By Our Lady! if there were, I know nothing of it; I did not see it.”

“Was there a light?”

“There were more than three hundred Knights and more than fifty torches, without counting the spiritual light.”

“Why was your King able to put faith in your words?”

“He had good signs, and the clergy bore me witness.”

“What revelations has your King had?”

“You will not have them from me this year. During three weeks I was questioned by the clergy at Chinon and at Poitiers. Before he was willing to believe me, the King had a sign of my mission; and the clergy of my party were of opinion that there was nothing but good in my mission.”

“Have you been to Saint Catherine de Fierbois?”[^[32]]

“Yes, and I heard there three Masses in one day. Afterwards, I went to the Castle of Chinon, whence I sent letters to the King, to know if I should be allowed to see him; saying, that I had travelled a hundred and fifty leagues to come to his help, and that I knew many things good for him. I think I remember there was in my letter the remark that I should recognize him among all others. I had a sword I had taken at Vaucouleurs. Whilst I was at Tours, or at Chinon, I sent to seek for a sword which was in the Church of Saint Catherine de Fierbois, behind the altar; it was found there at once; the sword was in the ground, and rusty; upon it were five crosses; I knew by my Voice where it was. I had never seen the man who went to seek for it. I wrote to the Priests of the place, that it might please them to let me have this sword, and they sent it to me. It was under the earth, not very deeply buried, behind the altar, so it seemed to me: I do not know exactly if it were before or behind the altar, but I believe I wrote saying that it was at the back. As soon as it was found, the Priests of the Church rubbed it, and the rust fell off at once without effort. It was an armourer of Tours who went to look for it. The Priests of Fierbois made me a present of a scabbard; those of Tours, of another; one was of crimson velvet, the other of cloth-of-gold. I had a third made of leather, very strong. When I was taken prisoner I had not got this sword. I always bore the sword of Fierbois from the time I had it up to my departure from Saint-Denis,[^[33]] after the attack on Paris.”

“What blessing did you invoke, or have invoked, on this sword?”

“I neither blessed it, nor had it blessed: I should not have known how to set about it. I cared very much for this sword, because it had been found in the Church of Saint Catherine, whom I love so much.”

“Have you been at Coulange-les-Vineuses?”[^[34]]

“I do not know.”