this father, who shortly before had said that he would throw
his daughter into the Meuse rather than that she should go off with
men-at-arms, should have allowed her to go to the gates of the town,
protected by a kinsman of whose weakness he was well aware, is hard to
understand. However so he did.[381]

[Footnote 378: _Trial_, vol. ii, pp. 428, 434. S. Luce, _Jeanne d'Arc
a Domremy_, p. clxxx. E. de Bouteiller and G. de Braux, _Nouvelles
recherches_, p. xxiii.]

[Footnote 379: _Les caquets de l'accouchee_, new edition by E.
Fournier and Le Roux de Lincy, Paris, 1855, in 16mo, introduction.]

[Footnote 380: _Trial_, vol. i, p. 53; vol. ii, p. 443.]

[Footnote 381: _Ibid._, vol. ii, pp. 428, 430, 434.]

Leaving the home of her childhood, which she was never to see again,
Jeanne, in company with Durand Lassois, passed down her native valley
in its winter bareness. As she went by the house of the husbandman
Gerard Guillemette of Greux, whose children and Jacques d'Arc's were
great friends, she cried: "Good-bye! I am going to Vaucouleurs."[382]

[Footnote 382: _Ibid._, p. 416.]

A few paces further she saw her friend Mengette: "Good-bye, Mengette,"
she said. "God bless thee."[383]

[Footnote 383: _Ibid._, p. 431.]

And by the way, on the doorsteps of the houses, whenever she saw faces
she knew, she bade them farewell.[384] But she avoided Hauviette with
whom she had played and slept in childhood and whom she dearly loved.
If she were to bid her good-bye she feared that her heart would fail
her. It was not till later that Hauviette heard of her friend's
departure and then she wept bitterly.[385]

[Footnote 384: _Trial_, vol. ii, p. 418.]

[Footnote 385: _Ibid._, p. 419: _dixit quod nescivit recessum dictae
Johannae; quae testis propter hoc multum flebat, quia eam multum propter
suam bonitatem diligebat et quod sua socia erat_.]

On her second arrival at Vaucouleurs, Jeanne imagined that she was
setting foot in a town belonging to the Dauphin, and, in the language
of the day, entering the royal antechamber.[386] She was mistaken.
Since the beginning of August, 1428, the Commander of Vaucouleurs had
yielded the fortress to Antoine de Vergy, but had not yet surrendered
it to him.

[Footnote 386: _Ibid._, vol. ii, p. 436.]

It was one of those promises to capitulate at the end of a given time.
They were not uncommon in those days, and they ceased to be valid if
the fortress were relieved before the day fixed fo