_, vol. iii, p. 101.]

In this town, in the sanctuary of Anis, was preserved an image of the
Mother of God, brought from Egypt by Saint Louis. It was of great
antiquity and highly venerated, for the prophet Jeremiah had with his
own hands carved it out of sycamore wood in the semblance of the
virgin yet to be born, whom he had seen in a vision.[806] In holy week,
pilgrims flocked from all parts of France and of Europe,--nobles,
clerks, men-at-arms, citizens and peasants; and many, for penance or
through poverty, came on foot, staff in hand, begging their bread from
door to door. Merchants of all kinds betook themselves thither; and it
was at once the most popular of pilgrimages and one of the richest
fairs in the world. All round the town the stream of travellers
overflowed from the road on to vineyards, meadows, and gardens. On the
day of the Festival, in the year 1407, two hundred persons perished,
crushed to death in the throng.[807]

[Footnote 806: Francisque Mandet, _Histoire du Velay_, Le Puy,
1860-1862 (7 vols. in 12mo), vol. i, pp. 590 _et seq._ S. Luce,
_Jeanne d'Arc a Domremy_, ch. xii.]

[Footnote 807: Jean Juvenal des Ursins, 1407.]

In certain years the feast of the conception of Our Lord fell on the
same day as that of his death; and thus there coincided the promise
and the fulfilment of the promise of the greatest of mysteries. Then
Holy Friday became still holier. It was called Great Friday, and on
that day such as entered the sanctuary of Anis received plenary
indulgence. On that day the crowd of pilgrims was greater than usual.
Now, in the year 1429, Good Friday fell on the 25th of March, the day
of the Annunciation.[808]

[Footnote 808: Nicole de Savigni, _Notes sur les exploits de Jeanne
d'Arc et sur divers evenements de son temps_, in the _Bulletin de la
Societe de l'Histoire de Paris_, 1, 1874, p. 43. Chanoine Lucot,
_Jeanne d'Arc en Champagne_, Chalons, 1880, pp. 12, 13.]

There is, therefore, nothing extraordinary in Brother Pasquerel's
meeting Jeanne's relatives at Puy during Holy Week. That a peasant
woman should travel two hundred and fifty miles on foot, through a
country infested with soldiers and other robbers, in a season of snows
and mist, to obtain an indulgence, was an every-day matter if we
remember the surname which had for long been hers.[809] This was not
La Romee's first pilgrimage. As we do not know which members of the
Maid's escort the good Brother met, we are at liberty