ause for the
strangeness which possessed the damsel. They attributed it to some
magic spell. She had been seen beneath the _Beau Mai_ bewreathing it
with garlands. The old beech was known to be haunted as well as the
spring near by. It was well known, too, that the fairies cast spells.
There were those who discovered that Jeanne had met a wicked fairy
there. "Jeannette has met her fate beneath _l'Arbre des Fees_,"[351]
they said. Would that none but peasants had believed that story!

[Footnote 351: _Ibid._, vol. i, p. 68.]

On the 22nd of June, from the Duke of Bedford, Regent of France for
Henry VI, Antoine de Vergy, Governor of Champagne, received a
commission to furnish forth a thousand men-at-arms for the purpose of
bringing the castellany of Vaucouleurs into subjection to the English.
Three weeks later, commanded by the two Vergy, Antoine and Jean, the
little company set forth. It consisted of four knights-banneret,
fourteen knights-bachelor, and three hundred and sixty-three
men-at-arms. Pierre de Trie, commander of Beauvais, Jean, Count of
Neufchatel and Fribourg, were ordered to join the main body.[352]

[Footnote 352: Report of Andre d'Epernon in S. Luce, _Jeanne d'Arc a
Domremy_, p. clxvii and proofs and illustrations, pp. 217, 218, 220.]

On the march, as was his custom, Antoine de Vergy laid waste all the
villages of the castellany with fire and sword. Threatened once again
with a disaster with which they were only too well acquainted, the
folk of Domremy and Greux already beheld their cattle captured, their
barns set on fire, their wives and daughters ravished. Having
experienced before that the Castle on the Island was not secure
enough, they determined to flee and seek refuge in their market town
of Neufchateau, only five miles away from Domremy. Thus they set out
towards the middle of July. Abandoning their houses and fields and
driving their cattle before them, they followed the road, through the
fields of wheat and rye and up the vine-clad hills to the town,
wherein they lodged as best they could.[353]

[Footnote 353: _Trial_, vol. i, pp. 51, 214; vol. ii, pp. 391-454. S.
Luce, _Jeanne d'Arc a Domremy_, p. clxxvi.]

The d'Arc family was taken in by the wife of Jean Waldaires, who was
called La Rousse. She kept an inn, where lodged soldiers, monks,
merchants, and pilgrims. There were some who suspected her of
harbouring bad women.[354] And there is reason to believe that certain
of her women cust