is made of a small sum paid for refreshments furnished
to a messenger who had brought letters from the Maid of Orleans, and of
twelve livres given to Jean du Lis, brother of Jeanne d'Arc, to help
him pay the expenses of his journey back to his sister. Then come two
charges which we shall translate literally. "To the sieur de Lis, 18th
October, 1436, for a journey which he made through the said city while
on his way to the Maid, who was then at Erlon in Luxembourg, and for
carrying letters from Jeanne the Maid to the King at Loicher, where he
was then staying, six livres." And again: "To Renard Brune, 25th July,
1435, at evening, for paying the hire of a messenger who was carrying
letters from Jeanne the Maid, and was on his way to William Beliers,
bailiff of Troyes, two livres."

As no doubt has been thrown upon the genuineness of these documents, it
must be considered established that in 1436, five years after the public
execution at Rouen, a young woman, believed to be the real Jeanne d'Arc,
was alive in Lorraine and was married to a M. Hermoises or Armoises. She
may, of course, have been an impostor; but in this case it is difficult
to believe that her brothers, Jean and Pierre, and the people of
Lorraine, where she was well known, would not have detected the
imposture at once. And that Jean du Lis, during a familiar intercourse
of at least several months, as indicated in the above extracts, should
have continued to mistake a stranger for his own sister, with whom he
had lived from childhood, seems a very absurd supposition. Nor is it
likely that an impostor would have exposed herself to such a formidable
test. If it had been a bold charlatan who, taking advantage of the
quite general belief, to which we have ample testimony, that there was
something more in the execution at Rouen than was allowed to come to the
surface, had resolved to usurp for herself the honours due to the woman
who had saved France, she would hardly have gone at the outset to a part
of the country where the real Maid had spent nearly all her life. Her
instant detection and exposure, perhaps a disgraceful punishment, would
have been inevitable. But if this person were the real Jeanne, escaped
from prison or returning from an exile dictated by prudence, what should
she have done but go straightway to the haunts of her childhood, where
she might meet once more her own friends and family?

But the account does not end here. M. Wallon, in his elabora