y men?"

"Sire, I know not that such would be the case," spoke the Maid
gravely. "You stand amongst them now as their crowned and anointed
King. What need have they of other leader? They have followed me
heretofore, waiting for you; but now--"

"Now they will want you more than ever, since you have ever led
them to victory!" cried the King; and raising his voice and looking
about him, especially to those generals and officers of his staff
who had seen so much of the recent events of the campaign, he cried
out:

"What say you, gentlemen? What is our chance to drive away the
English and become masters of this realm if the MAID OF ORLEANS
take herself away from us, and the soldiers no longer see her
standard floating before them, or hear her voice cheering them to
the battle?"

Some of those present looked sullenly on the ground, unwilling to
own that the Maid was a power greater than any other which could be
brought into the field; but there were numbers of other and greater
men, who had never denied her her meed of praise, though they had
thwarted her at times in the council room; and these with one
accord declared that should the Maid betake herself back to
Domremy, leaving the army to its fate, they would not answer for
the effect which this desertion would have, but would, in fact,
almost expect the melting away of the great body of the trained
soldiers and recruits who had fought with her, and had come to
regard her presence with them as the essential to a perfect
victory.

But we were destined to have a greater testimony than this, for a
whisper of what was passing within the great hall had now filtered
forth into the streets, and all in a moment we were aware of a
mighty tumult and hubbub without, a clamour of voices louder and
more insistent than those which had hailed the King a short time
before, and the words which seemed to form themselves out of the
clamour and gradually grow into the burden of the people's cry was
the repeated and vehement shout, "THE MAID OF ORLEANS! THE MAID OF
ORLEANS! We will fight if the Maid goes with us--without her we be
all dead men!"

They came and told us what the crowd of soldiers in the street was
shouting; they begged that the Maid would show herself at some
window, and promise that she would remain with the army. Indeed,
there was almost a danger of riot and disaster if something were
not done to quell the excitement of the soldiery and the populace;
and at this new