Seven years have sped by, and the scene shifts to the ancient cathedral of Rheims. A great concourse of nobles in glittering armour with pennons and banners fills the nave. Trumpets are sounding, and outside the crowd raises cheer upon cheer. The sun streams in through the painted windows, casting rainbow hues on the exultant throng. Ten thousand candles are burning, and the smoke of incense is ascending. At the high altar, clad in the ermine robe of state, kneels the Dauphin of France. An archbishop, wearing his mitre and the splendid robes of his high office, places the crown upon the prince’s head, and anoints him with the sacred oil out of the ancient flask which the priests say came straight from heaven. The Dauphin is king in very deed, and a great shout of joy echoes and re-echoes from the vaulted roof. And now all eyes turn to the striking figure by the side of the newly-made king. You see a noble maiden, clad in knightly armour, and holding a drawn sword in one hand and a white banner in the other. She kneels at her prince’s feet, and tears of joy fall from her eyes as she greets him “King” for the first time. “Now,” she says, “is the will of God fulfilled.”

Who is this maiden, and why holds she such an honoured place amidst this noble throng? Let the old chroniclers relate her story. It is one of the most wondrous ever told. What Wallace did for Scotland this maid has done for France.

In the year 1429 there was a young girl living in Domremy, a village in the east of France. She was named Joan, and was the daughter of James Darc and Isobel, his wife. Joan was but a country maid that was wont to herd the cattle by day and sew and spin in the evening. She was a strong, handsome girl, nobly formed, with dark hair and lustrous eyes. About her thirteenth year she grew silent and dreamy, and loved to steal away from her companions to the village church, where she knelt for hours together in silent prayer. One day she was standing in her father’s garden when she heard a Voice, and saw a great light. The Voice bade her be diligent in work and prayer, for God had chosen her to save France. She replied that she was but a poor girl who could not ride, or lead soldiers in the wars; but the Voice spoke to her again and again, telling her that she must go. The saints appeared to her, too, and they gave her the same message, and added words of counsel and warning. The Visions and the Voices were with her night and day, and at length she felt that she must do their bidding.

Truly her land was in a piteous condition at the time. King Harry of England was dead, and so was the old French king, his father-in-law, and the English baby born at Windsor had been crowned King of France. His uncle, the Duke of Bedford, the famous Talbot, and many another knight of renown, were leading English armies to and fro, besieging towns, burning villages, and filling the land with slaughter. Woeful tales of death, plunder, and famine found their way to the quiet little village of Domremy, and Joan’s heart was filled with grief at the miseries of her beloved France. The Scots had come to the help of their old friends, the French, and though they managed to win a great victory, they were badly beaten at Verneuil, where the field was dyed with Scottish blood.

As for the Dauphin, the rightful King of France, he only held the country south of the Loire, and did not hold even that securely. His strongest fortress was the city of Orleans, which was even now closely besieged by the English. To make matters worse, the Dauphin was a man of no spirit and enterprise. He was half-hearted in his own cause, and, indeed, was not fully assured that he was the son of the late king, and therefore lawfully entitled to the crown. It is said that he had prayed secretly that a sign might be given to him to prove that he was the rightful heir, and that hitherto no sign had been vouchsafed. He had very little hope of beating the English, for, like the rest of his countrymen, he had lost heart and deemed his foes unconquerable. A handful of English archers by their very presence could send five hundred Frenchmen flying in terror to the woods.

By this time the Voices and the Visions had so wrought upon the Maid that she left home without taking leave of her father and mother (not that she did not hold them in honour and respect, but lest they should hinder her intent), and went to Vaucouleurs hoping for an audience with Robert de Baudricourt, the commander of the town. Now, her uncle lived in the town, and to him she betook herself, and told him how the saints and angels had urged her on her mission, and how the Voices had said, “Daughter of God, go on! We will be with you.” The uncle listened and believed, and led her to the captain, who laughed at her, and bade her uncle chastise her for a foolish maiden.

But again she came to him and told him how a terrible misfortune had happened that very day to the Dauphin’s army near Orleans. As Vaucouleurs was many leagues from Orleans, and even the swiftest runner could not have brought the news so quickly, the captain gave ear to her; and when he knew that she had spoken the truth, he saw that she was no mere hysterical country girl, but one endowed with supernatural gifts. “My lord captain,” she said, “know that for some years back, at divers times, God hath made known to me and commanded me to go to the gentle Dauphin, who should be and is the true King of France, that he may give me men-at-arms, whereby I may raise the siege of Orleans, take him to be anointed at Rheims, win back Paris, and drive the English from the realm.” Robert hearkened to her words, and furnished her with man’s attire. A young knight gave her a horse, which to the surprise of all she rode well; and, dressed in a gray doublet and black hose, she rode away to seek the Dauphin, who was then at Chinon. To test her, the Dauphin dressed one of his knights in his princely attire, and himself, in a plain and sober dress, mingled with his courtiers. But Joan went straight to him, and kneeling on one knee, cried, “Fair sir, you are the Dauphin, to whom I am come.”

“Nay,” said he, “yonder is the Dauphin,” pointing to a richly-dressed knight in the company.

“No, fair sir,” repeated the maid, “it is to you that I am sent.”

The Dauphin was surprised, but he did not yet believe in her. One day she took him aside where nobody could hear and whispered to him the purport of his secret prayer, and assured him that he was the rightful king. Then the Dauphin had faith in her, and when his council and the clergy had examined her straitly, and at last had reported that “to doubt the maid would be to resist the Holy Spirit,” he agreed to send her with a train of provisions which he hoped to be able to get secretly into Orleans. While armour was being made for her, she bade the Dauphin’s servants dig behind the altar of the Chapel of St. Catherine at Fierbois, and there they would find a sword with five crosses on the blade. The sword was found, and she girt herself with it, and taking her banner of white with the image of the Lord and two angels on it, thus she led her small company towards Orleans.

As she lay at Blois she sent a letter to the English captain who was besieging Orleans, bidding him depart in peace, or else she would fall upon him with blows, and “we shall see who hath the better right, God or you.” The English laughed at her words, and threatened to burn her as a witch if they caught her. Nevertheless she advanced, and entered the town, whereat the spirits of the citizens rose and their confidence returned. And now, being strengthened by fresh troops and fresh stores, they no longer acted merely on the defensive, but began to assault the English forts, and with Joan as leader captured two of them. Then Joan led them against the Bulwark and the Round Towers. All morning they fought without success, and at one o’clock in the afternoon a bolt from an English cross-bow wounded her in the shoulder. The arrow was extracted, and still the fight went on.

After sunset the captain wished to withdraw for the night, but Joan begged him to fall to again. She mounted her horse and rode to a quiet place and prayed, and then returned to the fight. She alighted from her horse, and taking her standard in her hand, waved it to and fro so that all men saw it. “Take heed,” she said, “when the float of my banner shall touch the Bulwark.” “It touches! it touches!” they cried. Then said she to her men, “All is yours; enter in.”

With a great rush the French climbed the scaling-ladders, captured the Round Towers, stormed the Bulwark, and put to the sword most of the defenders. That night the English, terrified by the reappearance of the Maid, raised the siege and departed, leaving their big guns and much victual behind them. So the town of Orleans was delivered, and Frenchmen everywhere began to believe that the Maid was really an angel of God sent to deliver France.

Without delay Joan rode to the Dauphin and besought him to make ready to be crowned at Rheims, the old coronation place of the French kings. But he would not set forth until the way was cleared of English. So with six hundred lances and some infantry Joan led an attack on them, and drove them before her. And now in June the Dauphin at her entreaty gat him on the road for Rheims, Joan warning him that “she would only last for a year, or not much longer, and that he must make haste.” At Troyes the garrison yielded, and ere long the Dauphin was in Rheims, and the scene in which you saw the Maid for the first time took place.

Hardly was the coronation over ere Joan urged the king to march on Paris. As he advanced, town after town opened its gates to him, and Bedford dared not give him battle. But when the first attack on Paris failed, he withdrew, like the coward that he was, and would not persevere, in spite of all Joan’s prayers and tears. Almost broken-hearted, she hung up her arms in the church of St. Denis, and begged leave to go home to her father and mother and herd the cattle as of yore. The king, however, would not let her go, but gave her a pension and a title of nobility.

Now in Easter week of this fateful year the Voices spoke again to her and said that she should be taken prisoner before Midsummer Day. They encouraged her to be resigned to her fate, for God would help her. The Maid knew full well that to be captured meant being burned as a witch; nevertheless she halted not in her purpose, deeming her end glorious if only she could give her body to be burned for her country.

The town of CompiÈgne was closely besieged by the English and the Burgundians, and was likely to yield. So the Maid rode thither with her brothers and two or three hundred men to raise the siege. She charged the Burgundians, but was surrounded and taken prisoner and held to ransom. The French would not pay a franc for her, and so her captors sold her to the English, who “feared not any captain, not any chief in war, as they had feared the Maid.” She was brought before the Bishop of Beauvais and tried for witchcraft. After a long and tedious trial, and after suffering every kind of insult and hardship, she was found guilty, and was tricked into signing a paper confessing her guilt. And all the time the miserable French king made no sign, and lifted not his little finger to save her.

On May 30, 1431, they led her into the market-place of Rouen and burnt her alive. With her dying words she testified to the truth of her Visions, and underwent her awful doom with the courage of a martyr. So she died, pressing to her lips a rude cross which a pitiful soldier held out to her. The old legends tell that as the flames leaped round her, and her spirit departed, a pure white dove, the harbinger of peace, rose from out the smouldering pile and winged its way towards heaven. In very truth peace did spring from her ashes. Her heroic example gave new life to the crushed spirit of her countrymen, who rose and drove the invader from their shores. Four years later, nothing was left of all the English conquests in France but the town of Calais.