One day meeting Gérardin d’Epinal, the only man at Domremy not of the Dauphin’s party, whose head according to her own confession she would willingly have cut off, although she was godmother to his son, she could not refrain from announcing even to him in veiled words her mystic dealing with God: “Gossip, if you were not a Burgundian there is something I would tell you.”
The good man thought it must be a question of an approaching betrothal and that Jacques d’Arc’s daughter was about to marry one of the lads with whom she had broken bread under l’Arbre des Fées and drunk water from the Gooseberry Spring.
Alas! how greatly would Jacques d’Arc have desired the secret to be of that nature. This upright man was very strict; he was careful concerning his children’s conduct; and Jeanne’s behaviour caused him anxiety. He knew not that she heard Voices. He had no idea that all day Paradise came down into his garden, that from Heaven to his house a ladder was let down, on which there came and went without ceasing more angels than had ever trodden the ladder of the Patriarch Jacob; neither did he imagine that for Jeannette alone, without any one else perceiving it, a mystery was being played, a thousand times richer and finer than those which on feast days were acted on platforms, in towns like Toul and Nancy. He was miles away from suspecting such incredible marvels. But what he did see was that his daughter was losing her senses, that her mind was wandering, and that she was giving utterance to wild words. He perceived that she could think of nothing but cavalcades and battles. He must have known something of the escapade at Vaucouleurs. He was terribly afraid that one day the unhappy child would go off for good on her wanderings. This agonising anxiety haunted him even in his sleep. One night he dreamed that he saw her fleeing with men-at-arms; and this dream was so vivid that he remembered it when he awoke. For several days he said over and over again to his sons, Jean and Pierre: “If I really believed that what I dreamed of my daughter would ever come true, I would rather see her drowned by you; and if you would not do it I would drown her myself.”
Isabelle repeated these words to her daughter hoping that they might alarm her and cause her to correct her ways. Devout as she was, Jeanne’s mother shared her father’s fears. The idea that their daughter was in danger of becoming a worthless creature was a cruel thought to these good people. In those troubled times there was a whole multitude of these wild women whom the men-at-arms carried with them on horseback. Each soldier had his own.
It is not uncommon for saints in their youth by the strangeness of their behaviour to give rise to such suspicions. And Jeanne displayed those signs of sainthood. She was the talk of the village. Folk pointed at her mockingly, saying: “There goes she who is to restore France and the royal house.”
The neighbours had no difficulty in finding a cause for the strangeness which possessed the damsel. They attributed it to some magic spell. She had been seen beneath the Beau Mai bewreathing it with garlands. The old beech was known to be haunted as well as the spring near by. It was well known, too, that the fairies cast spells. There were those who discovered that Jeanne had met a wicked fairy there. “Jeannette has met her fate beneath l’Arbre des Fées,” they said. Would that none but peasants had believed that story!
On the 22nd of June, from the Duke of Bedford, Regent of France for Henry VI, Antoine de Vergy, Governor of Champagne, received a commission to furnish forth a thousand men-at-arms for the purpose of bringing the castellany of Vaucouleurs into subjection to the English. Three weeks later, commanded by the two Vergy, Antoine and Jean, the little company set forth. It consisted of four knights-banneret, fourteen knights-bachelor, and three hundred and sixty-three men-at-arms. Pierre de Trie, commander of Beauvais, Jean, Count of Neufchâtel and Fribourg, were ordered to join the main body.
On the march, as was his custom, Antoine de Vergy laid waste all the villages of the castellany with fire and sword. Threatened once again with a disaster with which they were only too well acquainted, the folk of Domremy and Greux already beheld their cattle captured, their barns set on fire, their wives and daughters ravished. Having experienced before that the Castle on the Island was not secure enough, they determined to flee and seek refuge in their market town of Neufchâteau, only five miles away from Domremy. Thus they set out towards the middle of July. Abandoning their houses and fields and driving their cattle before them, they followed the road, through the fields of wheat and rye and up the vine-clad hills to the town, wherein they lodged as best they could.
The d’Arc family was taken in by the wife of Jean Waldaires, who was called La Rousse. She kept an inn, where lodged soldiers, monks, merchants, and pilgrims. There were some who suspected her of harbouring bad women. And there is reason to believe that certain of her women customers were of doubtful reputation. Albeit she herself was of good standing, that is to say, she was rich. She had money enough to lend sometimes to her fellow-citizens. Although Neufchâteau belonged to the Duke of Lorraine, who was of the Burgundian party, it has been thought that the hostess of this inn inclined towards the Armagnacs; but it is vain to attempt to discover the sentiments of La Rousse concerning the troubles of the kingdom of France.
At Neufchâteau as at Domremy Jeanne drove her father’s beasts to the field and kept his flocks. Handy and robust she used also to help La Rousse in her household duties. This circumstance gave rise to the malicious report set on foot by the Burgundians that she had been serving maid in an inn frequented by drunkards and bad women. The truth is that Jeanne, when she was not tending the cattle, and helping her hostess, passed all her time in church.
There were two fine religious houses in the town, one belonging to the Grey Friars, the other to the Sisters of St. Claire, the sons and daughters of good St. Francis. The monastery of the Grey Friars had been built two hundred years earlier by Mathieu II of Lorraine. The reigning duke had recently added richly to its endowments. Noble ladies, great lords, and among others a Bourlémont lord of Domremy and Greux lay there beneath brasses.
In the flower of their history these mendicant monks of old had welcomed to their third order crowds of citizens and peasants as well as multitudes of princes and kings. Now they languished corrupt and decadent among the French friars. Quarrels and schisms were frequent. Notwithstanding Colette of Corbie’s attempted restoration of the rule, the old discipline was nowhere observed. These mendicants distributed leaden medals, taught short prayers to serve as charms, and vowed special devotion to the holy name of Jesus.
During the fortnight Jeanne spent in the town of Neufchâteau, she frequented the church of the Grey Friars monastery, and two or three times confessed to brethren of the order. It has been stated that she belonged to the third order of St. Francis, and the inference has been drawn that her affiliation dated from her stay at Neufchâteau.
Such an inference is very doubtful; and in any case the affiliation cannot have been very ceremonious. It is difficult to see how in so short a time the friars could have instructed her in the practices of Franciscan piety. She was far too imbued with ecclesiastical notions concerning the spiritual and the temporal power, she was too full of mysteries and revelations to imbibe their spirit. Besides, her sojourn at Neufchâteau was troubled by anxiety and broken by absences.
In this town she received a summons to appear before the official of Toul, in whose jurisdiction she was, as a native of Domremy-de-Greux. A young bachelor of Domremy alleged that a promise of marriage had been given him by Jacques d’Arc’s daughter. Jeanne denied it. He persisted in his statement, and summoned her to appear before the official. To this ecclesiastical tribunal such cases belonged; it pronounced judgment on questions of nullity of marriage or validity of betrothal.
The curious part of Jeanne’s case is that her parents were against her, and on the side of the young man. It was in defiance of their wishes that she defended the suit and appeared before the official. Later she declared that in this matter she had disobeyed them, and that it was the only time she had failed in the submission she owed her parents.
<
br /> The journey from Neufchâteau to Toul and back involved travelling more than twenty leagues on foot, over roads infested with bands of armed men, through a country desolated by fire and sword, from which the peasants of Domremy had recently fled in a panic. To such a journey, however, she made up her mind against the will of her parents.
Possibly she may have appeared before the judge at Toul, not once but two or three times. And there was a great chance of her having to journey day and night with her so-called betrothed, for he was passing over the same road at the same time. Her Voices bade her fear nothing. Before the judge she swore to speak the truth, and denied having made any promise of marriage.
She had done nothing wrong. But an evil interpretation was set upon conduct which proceeded alone from an innocence both singular and heroic. At Neufchâteau it was said that on those journeys she had consumed all her substance. But what was her substance? Alas! she had set out with nothing. She may have been driven to beg her bread from door to door. Saints receive alms as they give them: for the love of God. There was a story that her betrothed seeing her living during the trial in company with bad women, had abandoned his demand for justice, renouncing a bride of such bad repute. Such calumnies were only too readily believed.
After a fortnight’s sojourn at Neufchâteau, Jacques d’Arc and his family returned to Domremy. The orchard, the house, the monastery, the village, the fields, — in what a state of desolation did they behold them! The soldiers had plundered, ravaged, burnt everything. Unable to exact ransom from the villeins who had taken flight, the men-at-arms had destroyed all their goods. The monastery once as proud as a fortress, with its watchman’s tower, was now nothing but a heap of blackened ruins. And now on holy days the folk of Domremy must needs go to hear mass in the church of Greux.
So full of danger were the times that the villagers were ordered to keep in fortified houses and castles.
Meanwhile the English were laying siege to the town of Orléans, which belonged to their prisoner Duke Charles. By so doing they acted badly, for, having possession of his body, they ought to have respected his property. They built fortified towers round the city of Orléans, the very heart of France; and it was said that they had entrenched themselves there in great strength. Now Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret loved the Land of the Lilies; they were the sworn friends and gentle cousins of the Dauphin Charles. They talked to the shepherd maid of the misfortunes of the kingdom and continued to say: “Leave thy village and go into France.”
Jeanne was all the more impatient to set forth because she had herself announced the time of her arrival in France, and that time was drawing near. She had told the Commander of Vaucouleurs that succour should come to the Dauphin before mid Lent. She did not want to make her Voices lie.
Towards the middle of January occurred the opportunity she was looking for of returning to Burey. At this time Durand Lassois’ wife, Jeanne le Vauseul, was brought to bed. It was the custom in the country for the young kinswomen and friends of the mother to attend and wait upon her and her babe. A good and kindly custom, followed all the more readily because of the opportunity it gave of pleasant meetings and cheerful gossip. Jeanne urged her uncle to ask her father that she might be sent to tend the sick woman, and Lassois consented: he was always ready to do what his niece asked him, and perhaps his complaisance was encouraged by pious persons of some importance. But how this father, who shortly before had said that he would throw his daughter into the Meuse rather than that she should go off with men-at-arms, should have allowed her to go to the gates of the town, protected by a kinsman of whose weakness he was well aware, is hard to understand. However so he did.
Leaving the home of her childhood, which she was never to see again, Jeanne, in company with Durand Lassois, passed down her native valley in its winter bareness. As she went by the house of the husbandman Gérard Guillemette of Greux, whose children and Jacques d’Arc’s were great friends, she cried: “Good-bye! I am going to Vaucouleurs.”
A few paces further she saw her friend Mengette: “Good-bye, Mengette,” she said. “God bless thee.”
And by the way, on the doorsteps of the houses, whenever she saw faces she knew, she bade them farewell. But she avoided Hauviette with whom she had played and slept in childhood and whom she dearly loved. If she were to bid her good-bye she feared that her heart would fail her. It was not till later that Hauviette heard of her friend’s departure and then she wept bitterly.
On her second arrival at Vaucouleurs, Jeanne imagined that she was setting foot in a town belonging to the Dauphin, and, in the language of the day, entering the royal antechamber. She was mistaken. Since the beginning of August, 1428, the Commander of Vaucouleurs had yielded the fortress to Antoine de Vergy, but had not yet surrendered it to him.
It was one of those promises to capitulate at the end of a given time. They were not uncommon in those days, and they ceased to be valid if the fortress were relieved before the day fixed for its surrender.
Jeanne went to Sire Robert in his castle just as she had done nine months before; and this was the revelation she made to him: “My Lord Captain,” she said, “know that God has again given me to wit, and commanded me many times to go to the gentle Dauphin, who must be and who is the true King of France, and that he shall grant me men-at-arms with whom I shall raise the siege of Orléans and take him to his anointing at Reims.”
This time she announces that it is her mission to deliver Orléans. And the anointing is not to come to pass until this the first part of her task shall have been accomplished. We cannot fail to recognise the readiness and the tact with which the Voices altered their commands previously given, according to the necessities of the moment. Robert’s manner towards Jeanne had completely changed. He said nothing about boxing her ears and sending her back to her parents. He no longer treated her roughly; and if he did not believe her announcement at least he listened to it readily.
In one of her conversations with him she spoke of strange matters: “Once I have accomplished the behest Messire has given me, I shall marry and I shall bear three sons, the eldest of whom shall be pope, the second emperor, and the third king.”
Sire Robert answered gayly: “Since thy sons are to be such great personages, I should like to give thee one. Thereby should I myself have honour.”
Jeanne replied: “Nay, gentle Robert, nay. It is not yet time. The Holy Ghost shall appoint the time.”
To judge from the few of her words handed down to us, in the early days of her mission the young prophetess spoke alternately two different languages. Her speech seemed to flow from two distinct sources. The one ingenuous, candid, naïve, concise, rustically simple, unconsciously arch, sometimes rough, alike chivalrous and holy, generally bearing on the inheritance and the anointing of the Dauphin and the confounding of the English. This was the language of her Voices, her own, her soul’s language. The other, more subtle, flavoured with allegory and flowers of speech, critical with scholastic grace, bearing on the Church, suggesting the clerk and betraying some outside influence. The words she uttered to Sire Robert touching the children she should bear are of the second sort. They are an allegory. Her triple birth signifies that the peace of Christendom shall be born of her work, that after she shall have fulfilled her divine mission, the Pope, the Emperor, and the King — all three sons of God — shall cause concord and love to reign in the Church of Jesus Christ. The apologue is quite clear; and yet a certain amount of intelligence is necessary for its comprehension. The Captain failed to understand it; he interpreted it literally and answered accordingly, for he was a simple fellow and a merry.
Jeanne lodged in the town with humble folk, Henri Leroyer and his wife Catherine, friends of her cousin Lassois. She used to occupy her time in spinning, being a good spinster; and the little she had she gave to the poor. With Catherine she went to the parish church. In the morning, in her most devout moods, she would climb the hill, round the foot of which cluster the roofs of the town, and enter the cha
pel of Sainte Marie-de-Vaucouleurs. This collegiate church, built in the reign of Philippe VI, adjoined the château wherein dwelt the Commander of Vaucouleurs. The venerable stone nave rose up boldly towards the east, overlooking the vast extent of hills and meadows, and dominating the valley where Jeanne had been born and bred. She used to hear mass and remain long in prayer.
Under the chapel, in the crypt, there was an image of the Virgin, ancient and deeply venerated, called Notre-Dame-de-la-Voûte. It worked miracles, but especially on behalf of the poor and needy. Jeanne delighted to remain in this dark and lonely crypt, where the saints preferred to visit her.
One day a young clerk, barely more than a child, who waited in the chapel, saw the damsel motionless, with hands clasped, head thrown back, eyes full of tears raised to heaven; and as long as he lived the vision of that rapture remained imprinted on his mind.
She confessed often, usually to Jean Fournier, priest of Vaucouleurs.
Her hostess was touched by the goodness and gentleness of her manner of life; but she was profoundly agitated when one day the damsel said to her: “Dost thou not know it hath been prophesied that France ruined by a woman shall be saved by a maiden from the Lorraine Marches?”
Leroyer’s wife knew as well as Durand Lassois that Madame Ysabeau, as full of wickedness as Herodias, had delivered up Madame Catherine of France and the Kingdom of the Lilies to the King of England. And henceforth she was almost persuaded to believe that Jeanne was the maid announced by the prophecy.
This pious damsel held converse with devout persons and also with men of noble rank. To all alike she said: “I must to the gentle Dauphin. It is the will of Messire, the King of Heaven, that I wend to the gentle Dauphin. I am sent by the King of Heaven. I must go even if I go on my knees.”
Complete Works of Anatole France Page 418