of oaths that
she suffered him still to swear by his baton. For in the midst of her
enthusiasm her good sense never left her. The people crowded round her as
she rode along, praying her to work miracles, and bringing crosses and
chaplets to be blest by her touch. "Touch them yourself," she said to an
old Dame Margaret; "your touch will be just as good as mine." But her
faith in her mission remained as firm as ever. "The Maid prays and
requires you," she wrote to Bedford, "to work no more distraction in
France but to come in her company to rescue the Holy Sepulchre from the
Turk." "I bring you," she told Dunois when he sallied out of Orleans to
meet her after her two days' march from Blois, "I bring you the best aid
ever sent to any one, the aid of the King of Heaven." The besiegers looked
on overawed as she entered Orleans and, riding round the walls, bade the
people shake off their fear of the forts which surrounded them. Her
enthusiasm drove the hesitating generals to engage the handful of
besiegers, and the enormous disproportion of forces at once made itself
felt. Fort after fort was taken till only the strongest remained, and then
the council of war resolved to adjourn the attack. "You have taken your
counsel," replied Jeanne, "and I take mine." Placing herself at the head
of the men-at-arms, she ordered the gates to be thrown open, and led them
against the fort. Few as they were, the English fought desperately, and
the Maid, who had fallen wounded while endeavouring to scale its walls,
was borne into a vineyard, while Dunois sounded the retreat. "Wait a
while!" the girl imperiously pleaded, "eat and drink! so soon as my
standard touches the wall you shall enter the fort." It touched, and the
assailants burst in. On the next day the siege was abandoned, and on the
eighth of May the force which had conducted it withdrew in good order to
the north.

[Sidenote: Coronation of Charles]

In the midst of her triumph Jeanne still remained the pure, tender-hearted
peasant girl of the Vosges. Her first visit as she entered Orleans was to
the great church, and there, as she knelt at mass, she wept in such a
passion of devotion that "all the people wept with her." Her tears burst
forth afresh at her first sight of bloodshed and of the corpses strewn
over the battle-field. She grew frightened at her first wound, and only
threw off the touch of womanly fear when she heard the signal for retreat.
Yet more womanly was the puri