did not come down from their hill. The two heralds sent by two
English knights to offer single combat received the answer: "For
to-day you may go to bed, because it grows late. But to-morrow, if it
be God's will, we will come to closer quarters."[1273]

[Footnote 1273: Those who would attribute this saying to the Maid have
misunderstood Wavrin. _Anciennes chroniques_, vol. i, p. 287.]

The English, assured that they would not be attacked, marched off to
pass the night at Meung.[1274]

[Footnote 1274: Wavrin du Forestel, _Anciennes chroniques_, vol. i, p.
287. Monstrelet, vol. iv, pp. 326 _et seq._]

On the morrow, Saturday, the 18th, Saint Hubert's day, the French went
forth against them. They were not there. The _Godons_ had decamped
early in the morning and gone off, with cannon, ammunition, and
victuals, towards Janville,[1275] where they intended to entrench
themselves.

[Footnote 1275: _Chronique de la Pucelle_, _Journal du siege_, Gruel,
J. Chartier, Berry, _loc. cit._]

Straightway King Charles's army of twelve thousand men[1276] set out
in pursuit of them. Along the Paris road they went, over the plain of
Beauce, wooded, full of game, covered with thickets and brushwood,
wild, but finely to the taste of English and French riders, who
praised it highly.[1277]

[Footnote 1276: Wavrin du Forestel, _Anciennes chroniques_, vol. i, p.
289. Fauche-Prunelle, _Lettres tirees des archives de l'eveche de
Grenoble_, in _Bull. acad. Delph._, vol. ii, 1847, pp. 458 _et seq._
Letter from Charles VII to the town of Tours, in _Trial_, vol. v, pp.
262, 263.]

[Footnote 1277: Wavrin du Forestel, _Anciennes chroniques_, vol. i, p.
289. The herald Berry, _Le livre de la description des pays_, ed.
Hamy.]

Gazing over the infinite plain, where the earth seems to recede
before one's glance, the Maid beheld the sky in front of her, that
cloudy sky of plains, suggesting marvellous adventures on the
mountains of the air, and she cried: "In God's name, if they were
hanging from the clouds we should have them."[1278]

[Footnote 1278: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 98, 99. _Chronique de la
Pucelle_, p. 306. _Chronique normande_, ch. xlviii, ed. Vallet de
Viriville. Monstrelet, vol. iii, pp. 325 _et seq._ Morosini, vol. iii,
pp. 72-73. Wavrin du Forestel, _Anciennes chroniques_, vol. i, pp.
289-290. These words are said to have been uttered when the English
had been discovered, but then they would have been meaningless.]

Now, as on t