Jeanne knew nothing about it; she was no connoisseur in tapestry and in paintings, like the Duke of Bar and the Duke of Orléans; neither were her judges, not on this occasion at any rate. And if they were concerned about a picture in the house of Maître Boucher, it was not so much on account of the painting as of the doctrine. These three women that the wealthy Maître Boucher kept in his house were doubtless nude. The painters of those days depicted on small panels allegories and bathing scenes, and they painted nude women. Full foreheads, round heads, golden hair, short figures of small build but with embonpoint, their nudity minutely represented and but thinly veiled; many such were produced in Flanders and in Italy. The illustrious masters, to whom those pictures appeared corrupt and indecent, doubtless wished to reproach Jeanne with having looked at them in the house of the treasurer of the Duke of Orléans. It is not difficult to divine what were the doctors’ suspicions when they are found asking Jeanne whether Saint Michael wore clothes, in what manner she greeted her saints, and how she gave them her rings to touch.
They also wanted to make her admit that she had caused herself to be honoured as a saint. She disconcerted them by the following reply: “The poor folk came to me readily, because I did them no hurt, but aided them to the best of my power.”
Then the examination ranged over many and various subjects: Friar Richard; the children Jeanne had held over the baptismal fonts; the good wives of the town of Reims who touched rings with her; the butterflies caught in a standard at Château Thierry.
In this town, certain of the Maid’s followers were said to have caught butterflies in her standard. Now doctors in theology knew for a certainty that necromancers sacrificed butterflies to the devil. A century before, at Pamiers, the tribunal of the Holy Inquisition had condemned the Carmelite Pierre Recordi, who was accused of having celebrated such a sacrifice. He had killed a butterfly and the devil had revealed his presence by a breath of wind. Jeanne’s judges may have wished to involve her in similar fashion, or their design may have been quite different. In war a butterfly in the cap was a sign either of unconditional surrender or of the possession of a safe conduct. Were the judges accusing her or her followers of having feigned to surrender in order treacherously to attack the enemy? They were quite capable of making such a charge. However that may be, the examiner passed on to inquire concerning a lost glove found by Jeanne in the town of Reims. It was important to know whether it had been discovered by magic art. Then the magistrate returned to several of the capital charges of the trial: communion received in man’s dress; the hackney of the Bishop of Senlis, which Jeanne had taken, thus committing a kind of sacrilege; the discoloured child she had brought back to life at Lagny; Catherine de La Rochelle, who had recently borne witness against her before the Official at Paris; the siege of La Charité which she had been obliged to raise; the leap which she had made in her despair from the keep of Beaurevoir, and, finally, certain blasphemy she was falsely accused of having uttered at Soissons concerning Captain Bournel.
Then the Lord Bishop declared the examination concluded. He added, however, that should it appear expedient to interrogate Jeanne more fully, certain doctors and masters would be appointed for that purpose.
Accordingly, on Saturday, March the 10th, Maître Jean de la Fontaine, the Bishop’s commissioner, went to the prison. He was accompanied by Nicolas Midi, Gérard Feuillet, Jean Fécard, and Jean Massieu. The first point touched upon at this inquiry was the sortie from Compiègne. The priests took great pains to prove to Jeanne that her Voices must be bad or that she must have failed to understand them since her obedience to them had brought about her destruction. Jacques Gélu and Jean Gerson had foreseen this dilemma and had met it in anticipation with elaborate theological arguments. She was examined concerning the paintings on her standard, and she replied:
“Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret bade me take the standard and bear it boldly, and have painted upon it the King of Heaven. And this, much against my will, I told to my King. Touching its meaning I know nought else.”
They tried to make her out avaricious, proud, and ostentatious because she possessed a shield and arms, a stable, chargers, demi-chargers, and hackneys, and because she had money with which to pay her household, some ten to twelve thousand livres. But the point on which they questioned her most closely was the sign which had already been twice discussed in the public examinations. On this subject the doctors displayed an insatiable curiosity. For the sign was the exact reverse of the coronation at Reims; it was an anointing, not with divine unction but with magic charm, the crowning of the King of France by a witch. Maître Jean de la Fontaine had this advantage over Jeanne, he knew what she was going to say and what she wished to conceal. “What is the sign that was given to your King?”
“It is beautiful and honourable and very credible; it is the best and the richest in the world....”
“Does it still last?”
“It is well to know that it lasts and will last for a thousand years. My sign is in the King’s treasury.”
“Is it of gold or silver, or of precious stones, or is it a crown?”
“Nothing more will I tell unto you and no man can devise anything so rich as is this sign. Nevertheless, the sign that you need is that God should deliver me out of your hands and no surer sign can he send you....”
“When the sign came to your King what reverence did you make to it?”
“I thanked Our Lord for having delivered me from the troubles caused me by the clerks of our party, who were arguing against me. And I knelt down several times. An angel from God and from none other gave the sign to my King. And many times did I give thanks to Our Lord. The clerks ceased to attack me when they had seen the said sign.”
“Did the churchmen of your party behold the sign?”
“When my King and such as were with him had seen the sign and also the angel who gave it, I asked my King whether he were pleased, and he replied that he was. Then I departed and went into a little chapel near by. I have since heard that after my departure more than three hundred persons saw the sign. For love of me and in order that I should be questioned no further, God was pleased to permit this sign to be seen by all those of my party who did see it.”
“Did your King and you make any reverence to the angel when he brought the sign?”
“Yes, for my part, I did. I knelt and took off my hood.”
CHAPTER XII
THE TRIAL FOR LAPSE (continued)
ON Monday, the 12th of March, Brother Jean Lemaistre received from Brother Jean Graverent, Inquisitor of France, an order to proceed against and to pronounce the final sentence on a certain woman, named Jeanne, commonly called the Maid. On that same day, in the morning, Maître Jean de la Fontaine, in presence of the Bishop, for the second time examined Jeanne in her prison.
He first returned to the sign. “Did not the angel who brought the sign speak?”
“Yes, he told my King that he must set me to work in order that the country might soon be relieved.”
“Was the angel, who brought the sign, the angel who first appeared unto you or another?”
“It was always the same and never did he fail me.”
“But inasmuch as you have been taken hath not the angel failed you with regard to the good things of this life?”
“Since it is Our Lord’s good pleasure, I believe it was best for me to be taken.”
“In the good things of grace hath not your angel failed you?”
“How can he have failed me when he comforteth me every day?”
Maître Jean de la Fontaine then put her a subtle question and one as nearly approaching humour as was permissible in an ecclesiastical trial.
“Did Saint Denys ever appear to you?”
Saint Denys, patron of the most Christian kings, Saint Denys, the war cry of France, had allowed the English to take his abbey, that rich church, to which queens came to receive their crowns, and wherein kings had their burying. He had turned English and Burgundian, and
it was not likely he would come to hold converse with the Maid of the Armagnacs.
To the question: “Were you addressing God himself when you promised to remain a virgin?” she replied:
“It sufficed to give the promise to the messengers of God, to wit, Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret.”
They had sought to entrap her, for a vow must be made directly to God. However, it might be argued, that it is lawful to promise a good thing to an angel or to a man; and that this good thing, thus promised, may form the substance of a vow. One vows to God what one has promised to the saints. Pierre of Tarentaise (iv, dist: xxviii, a. 1) teaches that all vows should be made to God: either to himself directly or through the mediation of his saints.
According to a statement made during the inquiry, Jeanne had given a promise of marriage to a young peasant. Now the examiner endeavoured to prove that she had been at liberty to break her vow of virginity made in an irregular form; but Jeanne maintained that she had not promised marriage, and she added:
“The first time I heard my Voices, I vowed to remain a virgin as long as it should please God.”
But this time it was Saint Michael and not the saints who had appeared to her. She herself found it difficult to unravel the tangled web of her dreams and her ecstasies. And from these vague visions of a child the doctors were laboriously essaying to elaborate a capital charge.
Then a very grave and serious question was asked her by the examiner: “Did you speak to your priest or to any other churchman of those visions which you say were vouchsafed to you?”
“No, I spoke of them only to Robert de Baudricourt and to my King.”
The vavasour of Champagne, a man of mature years and sound sense, when in the days of King John, he, like the Maid, had heard a Voice in the fields bidding him go to his King, went straightway and told his priest. The latter commanded him to fast for three days, to do penance, and then to return to the field where the Voice had spoken to him.
The vavasour obeyed. Again the Voice was heard repeating the command it had previously given. The peasant again told his priest, who said to him: “My brother, thou and I will abstain and fast for three days, and I will pray for thee to Our Lord Jesus Christ.” This they did, and on the fourth day the good man returned to the field. After the Voice had spoken for the third time, the priest enjoined his parishioner to go forthwith and fulfil his mission, since such was the will of God.
There is no doubt that, according to all appearances, this vavasour had acted with greater wisdom than La Romée’s daughter. By concealing her visions from the priest the latter had slighted the authority of the Church Militant. Still there might be urged in her defence the words of the Apostle Paul, that where the spirit of God is there is liberty. If ye be led of the Spirit ye are not under the law. Was she a heretic or was she a saint? Therein lay the whole trial.
Then came this remarkable question: “Have you received letters from Saint Michael or from your Voices?”
She replied: “I have not permission to tell you; but in a week I will willingly say all I know.”
Such was her manner of speaking when there was something she wanted to conceal but not to deny. The question must have been embarrassing therefore. Moreover, these interrogatories were based on a good store of facts either true or false; and in the questions addressed to the Maid we may generally discern a certain anticipation of her replies. What were those letters from Saint Michael and her other saints, the existence of which she did not deny, but which were never produced by her judges? Did certain of her party send them in the hope that she would carry out their intentions, while under the impression that she was obeying divine commands?
Without insisting further for the present, the examiner passed on to another grievance:
“Have not your Voices called you daughter of God, daughter of the Church, great-hearted damsel?”
“Before the siege of Orléans and since, every day when they speak to me, many times have they called me Jeanne the Maid, daughter of God.”
The examination was suspended and resumed in the afternoon.
Maître Jean de la Fontaine questioned Jeanne concerning a dream of her father, of which the judges had been informed in the preliminary inquiry.
Sad it is to reflect that when Jeanne was accused of the sin of having broken God’s commandment, “Thou shalt honour thy father and thy mother,” neither her mother nor any of her kin asked to be heard as witnesses. And yet there were churchmen in her family; but a trial on a question of faith struck terror into all hearts.
Again her man’s dress was reverted to, and not for the last time. We marvel at the profound meditations into which the Maid’s doublet and hose plunged these clerics. They contemplated them with gloomy terror and in the light of the precepts of Deuteronomy.
Thereafter they questioned her touching the Duke of Orléans. Their object was to show from her own replies that her Voices had deceived her when they promised the prisoner’s deliverance. Here they easily succeeded. Then she pleaded that she had not had sufficient time.
“Had I continued for three years without let or hindrance I should have delivered him.”
In her revelations there had been mentioned a term shorter than three years and longer than one.
Questioned again touching the sign vouchsafed to her King, she replied that she would take counsel with Saint Catherine.
On the morrow, Tuesday, the 13th of March, the Bishop and the Vice-Inquisitor went to her prison. For the first time the Vice-Inquisitor opened his mouth: “Have you promised and sworn to Saint Catherine that you will not tell this sign?”
He spoke of the sign given to the King. Jeanne replied:
“I have sworn and I have promised that I will not myself reveal this sign, because I was too urgently pressed to tell it. I vow that never again will I speak of it to living man.”
Then she continued forthwith: “The sign was that the Angel assured my King, when bringing him the crown, that he should have the whole realm of France, with God’s help and my labours, and that he should set me to work. That is to say, he should grant me men-at-arms. Otherwise he would not be so soon crowned and anointed.”
“In what manner did the Angel bring the crown? Did he place it on your King’s head?”
“It was given to an archbishop, to the Archbishop of Reims, meseemeth in the King’s presence. The said Archbishop received it and gave it to the King; and I myself was present; and it is put in the King’s treasury.”
“To what place was the crown brought?”
“To the King’s chamber in the castle of Chinon.”
“On what day and at what hour?”
“The day I know not, the hour was full day. No further recollection have I of the hour or of the month. But meseemeth it was the month of April or March; it will be two years this month or next April. It was after Easter.”
“On the first day that you saw the sign did your King see it?”
“Yes. He had it the same day.”
“Of what was the crown made?”
“It is well to know that it was of fine gold, and so rich that I cannot count its riches; and the crown meant that he would hold the realm of France.”
“Were there jewels in it?”
“I have told you that I do not know.”
“Did you touch it or kiss it?”
“No.”
“Did the Angel who bore it come from above, or did he come from the earth?”
“He came from above. I understand that he came by Our Lord’s command, and he came in by the door of the chamber.”
“Did the Angel come along the ground, walking from the door of the room?”
“When he was come before the King he did him reverence, bowing low before him and uttering the words concerning the sign which I have already repeated; and thereupon the Angel recalled to the King’s mind the great patience he had had in the midst of the long tribulation that had befallen him; and as he came towards the King the Angel walked and touched
the ground.”
“How far was it from the door to the King?”
“Methinketh it was a full lance’s length; and as he had come so he returned. When the Angel came, I accompanied him and went with him up the steps into the King’s chamber; and the Angel went in first. And I said to the King: ‘Sire, behold your sign; take it.’”
In a spiritual sense we may say that this fable is true. This crown, which “flowers sweetly and will flower sweetly if it be well guarded,” is the crown of victory. When the Maid beholds the Angel who brought it, it is her own image that appears before her. Had not a theologian of her own party said that she might be called an angel? Not that she had the nature of an angel, but she did the work of one.
She began to describe the angels who had come with her to the King:
“So far as I saw, certain among them were very like, the others different. Some had wings. Some wore crowns, others did not. And they were with Saint Catherine and Saint Margaret, and they accompanied the Angel of whom I have spoken and the other angels also into the chamber of the King.”
And thus for a long time, as she was pressed by her interrogator, she continued to tell these marvellous stories one after another.
When she was asked for the second time whether the Angel had written her letters, she denied it. But now it was the Angel who bore the crown and not Saint Michael who was in question. And despite her having said they were one and the same, she may have distinguished between them. Therefore we shall never know whether she did receive letters from Saint Michael the Archangel, or from Saint Catherine and from Saint Margaret.
Thereafter the examiner inquired touching a cup lost at Reims and found by Jeanne as well as the gloves. Saints sometimes condescended to find things that had been lost, as is proved by the example of Saint Antony of Padua. It was always with the help of God. Necromancers imitated their powers by invoking the aid of demons and by profaning sacred things.
She was also questioned concerning the priest who had a concubine. Here again she was reproached with being possessed of a magic gift of clairvoyance. It was by magic she had known that this priest had a concubine. Many other such things were reported of her. For example, it was said that at the sight of a certain loose woman she knew that this woman had killed her child.
Complete Works of Anatole France Page 465