f I wouldn't make him climb this
tree quicker than--well, you'd see what I would do! Taking a person by
surprise, that way--why, I never meant to run; not in earnest, I mean. I
never thought of running in earnest; I only wanted to have some fun, and
when I saw Joan standing there, and him threatening her, it was all I
could do to restrain myself from going there and just tearing the livers
and lights out of him. I wanted to do it bad enough, and if it was to do
over again, I would! If ever he comes fooling around me again, I'll--"

"Oh, hush!" said the Paladin, breaking in with an air of disdain; "the
way you people talk, a person would think there's something heroic
about standing up and facing down that poor remnant of a man. Why, it's
nothing! There's small glory to be got in facing him down, I should say.
Why, I wouldn't want any better fun than to face down a hundred like
him. If he was to come along here now, I would walk up to him just as I
am now--I wouldn't care if he had a thousand axes--and say--"

And so he went on and on, telling the brave things he would say and the
wonders he would do; and the others put in a word from time to time,
describing over again the gory marvels they would do if ever that madman
ventured to cross their path again, for next time they would be ready
for him, and would soon teach him that if he thought he could surprise
them twice because he had surprised them once, he would find himself
very seriously mistaken, that's all.

And so, in the end, they all got back their self-respect; yes, and even
added somewhat to it; indeed when the sitting broke up they had a finer
opinion of themselves than they had ever had before.

Chapter 5 Domremy Pillaged and Burned

THEY WERE peaceful and pleasant, those young and smoothly flowing days
of ours; that is, that was the case as a rule, we being remote from the
seat of war; but at intervals roving bands approached near enough for
us to see the flush in the sky at night which marked where they were
burning some farmstead or village, and we all knew, or at least felt,
that some day they would come yet nearer, and we should have our turn.
This dull dread lay upon our spirits like a physical weight. It was
greatly augmented a couple of years after the Treaty of Troyes.

It was truly a dismal year for France. One day we had been over to have
one of our occasional pitched battles with those hated Burgundian boys
of the village of Maxey, an