JEANNE D'ARC _Frontispiece_

COFACHIQUI 90

LADY JANE GREY 148

MADELEINE DE VERCHERES 194

PREFACE

As in the Ten Boys from History, so in this companion volume, the plan
has been to call attention to the lives of girls who achieved some
noteworthy success during youth, and in whose character courage was the
dominant trait.

Many authorities have been consulted in the re-telling of these stories,
and in their presentation more attention has been paid to accuracy of
historic fact than to the weaving of interesting romances, in the hope
that this volume may be used as an introduction to the more detailed
historical documents from which its sketches are taken.

K. D. S.

TEN GIRLS FROM HISTORY

JEANNE D'ARC:

The Maid of France

THE peaceful little French village of Domremy lies in the valley of the
river Meuse, at the south of the duchy of Bar, and there five hundred
years ago was born the wonderful "Maid of France," as she was called;
she who at an age when other girls were entirely occupied with simple
diversions or matters of household importance was dreaming great dreams,
planning that vast military campaign which was to enroll her among the
idols of the French nation as well as among heroes of history.

On the parish register of an old chapel in the village of her birth can
still be seen the record of the baptism of Jeanette or Jeanne d'Arc, on
the sixth of January, 1412, and although her father, Jacques d'Arc, was
a man of considerable wealth and importance in the small community of
Domremy, yet even so neither he nor any of the nine god-parents of the
child--a number befitting her father's social position--could forecast
that the child, then being christened, was so to serve her country, her
king, and her God, that through her heroic deeds alone the name of
Jacques d'Arc and of little Domremy were to attain a world-wide fame.

At the time of Jeanne's birth the Hundred Years' War between England and
France was nearing its end. Victorious England was in possession of
practically all of France north of the river Loire, while France,
defeated and broken in spirit, had completely lost confidence in her own
power of conquest and Charles, the Dauphin, rightful heir to the throne
of France, had been obliged to flee for his life to t