een dead six
centuries, had been a veritable mine of knowledge in his lifetime. He
had written on theology and chronology; he had discoursed of night and
day, of weeks and months, of the signs of the zodiac, of epacts, of
the lunar cycle, and of the movable feasts of the Church. In his book
_De temporum ratione_ he had treated of the seventh and eighth ages of
the world, which were to follow the age in which he lived. He had
prophesied. During the siege of Orleans, churchmen were circulating
these obscure lines attributed to him, and foretelling the coming of
the Maid:

_Bis sex cuculli, bis septem se sociabunt,[696]
Gallorum pulli Tauro nova bella parabunt
Ecce beant bella, tunc fert vexilla Puella._

[Footnote 696: Adopting the emendation made by M. Germain
Lefevre-Pontalis in his _Chronique d'Antonio Morosini_, vol. iii, pp.
126, 127; vol. iv, pp. 316 _et seq._]

The first of these lines is a chronogram, that is, it contains a date.
To decipher it you take the numeral letters of the line and add them
together; the total gives the date.

bIs seX CVCVLLI, bIs septeM se soCIabVnt.

1 + 10 + 100 + 5 + 100 + 5 + 50 + 50 + 1 + 1 + 1000 + 100 +
1 + 5 = 1429.

Had any one sought these lines in the works of the Venerable Bede they
would not have found them, because they are not there; but no one
thought of looking for them any more than they thought of looking for
the Foret Chenue in Merlin.[697] And it was understood that both Bede
and Merlin had foretold the coming of the Maid. In those days
prophecies, chronograms, and charms flew like pigeons from the banks
of the Loire and spread abroad throughout the realm. Not later than
the May or June of this year the pseudo Bede will reach Burgundy.
Earlier still he will be heard of in Paris. The aged Christine de
Pisan, living in retirement in a French abbey, before the last day of
July, 1429, will write that Bede and Merlin had beheld the Maid in a
vision.[698]

[Footnote 697: _The Complete Works of the Venerable Bede_, ed. Giles,
London, 1843-1844, 12 vols., in 8vo, in _Patres Ecclesiae Anglicanae_.]

[Footnote 698: Christine de Pisan, in _Trial_, vol. v, p. 12.
Morosini, vol. iii, p. 126. The Dean of Saint Thibaud, in _Trial_,
vol. iv, p. 423. Herman Korner, in Le P. Ayroles, _La vraie Jeanne
d'Arc_, pp. 279 _et seq._ Walter Bower, in _Trial_, vol. iv, p. 481.]

The clerks, who were busy forging prophecies for the Maid's benefit,
did not s