itted, that after the Lord Chancellor, La Tremouille was the
boldest in employing the Maid, and if later she did thwart his plans
there is nothing to prove that it was his intention to have her
destroyed by the English. She destroyed herself and was consumed by
her own zeal.

[Footnote 2604: Perceval de Cagny, pp. 170, 173, _passim_.]

Rightly or wrongly, the Lord Chamberlain was held to be a bad man;
and, although his successor in the King's favour, the Duc de
Richemont, was avaricious, hard, violent, incredibly stupid, surly,
malicious, always beaten and always discontented, the exchange
appeared to be no loss. The Constable came in a fortunate hour, when
the Duke of Burgundy was making peace with the King of France.

In the words of a Carthusian friar, the English who had entered the
kingdom by the hole made in Duke John's head on the Bridge of
Montereau, only retained their hold on the kingdom by the hand of Duke
Philip. They were but few in number, and if the giant were to withdraw
his hand a breath of wind would suffice to blow them away. The Regent
died of sorrow and wrath, beholding the fulfilment of the horoscope of
King Henry VI: "Exeter shall lose what Monmouth hath won."[2605]

[Footnote 2605: Carlier, _Histoire des Valois_, 1764, in 4to, vol. ii,
p. 442. Vallet de Viriville, _Histoire de Charles VII_, vol. i, p.
307. The Regent also believed in astrology (B.N. MS. 1352).]

On the 13th of April, 1436, the Count of Richemont entered Paris. The
nursing mother of Burgundian clerks and _Cabochien_ doctors, the
University herself, had helped to mediate peace.[2606]

[Footnote 2606: Gruel, _Chronique d'Arthur de Richemont_, pp. 120,
121. Dom Felibien, _Histoire de Paris_, vol. iv, p. 597.]

Now, one month after Paris had returned to her allegiance to King
Charles, there appeared in Lorraine a certain damsel. She was about
twenty-five years old. Hitherto she had been called Claude; but she
now made herself known to divers lords of the town of Metz as being
Jeanne the Maid.[2607]

[Footnote 2607: _Chronique du doyen de Saint-Thibaud de Metz_, in
_Trial_, vol. v, pp. 321, 324. Jacomin Husson, _Chronique de Metz_,
ed. Michelant, Metz, 1870, pp. 64, 65. Cf. Lecoy de la Marche, _Une
fausse Jeanne d'Arc_, in _Revue des questions historiques_, October,
1871, pp. 562 _et seq._ Vergniaud-Romagnesi, _Des portraits de Jeanne
d'Arc et de la fausse Jeanne d'Arc_, in _Memoires de la Societe
d'Agriculture d'Orleans_, vol