We’ll give her wool to spin.”
This roused the rage of the French, and thereafter no quarter was asked or given in the skirmishes that ensued when parties of the English sallied out in answer to the jibes and taunts of the French. But with all their endeavors the English were not to be stung into leaving their strong position. Later Alençon and the Maid sent a message that they would retire and give the English a fair field to deploy in, but they did not accept the offer. Bedford was not anxious for a chivalrous engagement in a fair field.
In the afternoon the English captured a few field pieces which the French had brought up to enfilade the English line. So the long summer day passed, and when it grew dusk so that friend and foe could not be distinguished from each other the French retired to their quarters. The King left them, and retired to Crépy.
Early the next morning the French withdrew, hoping that the English would follow them. But the Regent would not. As soon as he was clear of the French he retreated to Senlis and from there went to Paris. Of course the royal army should have followed him, but the triumphant spirit that filled the troops at Patay had been dissipated. The captains feared to move without the King’s sanction, and, though Jeanne counselled the pursuit, they deemed it best to join the King at Crépy.
Compiègne, Senlis, and Beauvais now made their submission to the King and the Maid. Charles marched at once to Compiègne, fifty miles from Paris. At Beauvais those persons who refused to recognize Charles were driven out with
their possessions. Among these was Pierre Cauchon, its Bishop. This man never
forgave Jeanne for being the cause of his losing his diocese and his revenues, and later took a dire revenge upon her.
Charles dallied at Compiègne, greatly to the distress of Jeanne, who knew the value of rapid movements. She saw too that the troops were losing heart. The
King, however, was busy entangling himself with new truces with Burgundy, but of this the Maid at this time knew naught. She only knew that the fifteen days’
truce was ended, and Paris had not been delivered to her King; that August was
almost spent, and that nothing had been accomplished. She grieved at the monarch’s shilly-shallying, and suspected that he was content with the grace God had given him without undertaking any further enterprise.
As the time passed without bringing action of any sort, or any promise of it, the girl’s patience became thoroughly exhausted. She had only a year to work in, she had said, and France’s King was wasting the time that should have been used for France. So one day she said to Alençon:
“My fair duke, make ready the men, for by my staff, I wish to see Paris nearer
than I have seen it yet.”
The words struck a responsive chord in Alençon’s breast, and the captains gladly made ready for the march; for all were weary of inaction, and discouraged by the irresolution of the King.
On the twenty-third of August, therefore, the troops under Jeanne and Alençon
set forth, making a short pause at Senlis so that the forces under the Count de Vendôme might join them. It was hoped that, moved by their example, the King
would be impelled to follow them with the main body of the army; the hope proved a futile one. After three days’ march they rode into St. Denys, a town six miles from Paris, and the other sacred place of the realm.
It was the city of the Martyr Saint whose name was the war cry of France. It was also the city of the tomb; for, as Reims was the place where French kings were
crowned, so St. Denys was the town where French kings were buried. From antiquity they had lain here in the great Abbey, where too was the crown of Charlemagne. There were also many sacred relics of the saints here, among them
a head said to be that of Saint Denys. It was a sacred place to all French hearts.
At their approach those people who were of Anglo-Burgundian opinions retired
to Paris, terrified by the dark stories of vengeance with which the emissaries of Burgundy had beguiled them, so that those who remained in the place were royalists. As she had often done of late Jeanne became godmother for two little babies, holding them at the font. When the little ones were boys she gave them
the name of the King; if they were girls, and the parents had no name for them, she called them Jeanne.
There was further vexatious delay here in waiting for the coming of the King. It was a supreme moment in the affairs of the realm. All that had been gained in
the summer was now to be either entirely lost, or fully perfected by this attack on the capital. Charles’s presence was needed for the authority and approval that it gave, and, too, the main body of the army was necessary for the attack as the city was too strong to be assailed with what troops Alençon and Jeanne had with them. Courier after courier was sent to the King to urge his coming, and at length Alençon rode back to entreat his presence. Reluctantly the monarch advanced to
Senlis, and there stopped. “It seemed that he was advised against the Maid and
the Duc d’Alençon and their company.” [20]
Meantime Jeanne employed the time in skirmishing and reconnoissances,
studying the city to find the best point for the onslaught. Alençon also sent letters to the burghers, calling the dignitaries by name, and asking them to surrender to their true Lord.
The authorities in the city were not idle. They strengthened the fortifications, and frightened the people by spreading stories of the dire vengeance that Charles had sworn to wreak against them. He would deliver the city and its people of all ages and conditions to the pleasure of his soldiers, it was said; and he had also sworn to raze it to its foundations so that the plough should break the ground where Paris had stood. Terrified by these tales the citizens feared to leave the gates to gather the grapes which grew on the slopes beyond the walls, or to get the vegetables from the great gardens which lay to the north of the city.
Finally, after a fortnight, Charles arrived at Saint Denys, and his coming was hailed with delight. The army was wrought up to a high pitch of excitement, and was eager for assault. “There was no one of whatever condition who did not say,
‘The Maid will lead the King into Paris if he will let her.’”[21] Charles himself was not so eager. In truth, the last thing in the world that he desired was this attack.
In the afternoon of the day of his arrival Jeanne and the captains started toward the city walls to make the usual demonstration. The King rode with them.
Now at Blois, at Orléans, on the march to Reims the army of men was orderly,
clean confessed and of holy life; but it was no longer what it had been. It is idleness that demoralizes and disorganizes men on the march or in camp. Action
keeps them in trim, and in a righteous way of living. The personnel of the troops was no longer what it had been before Orléans. After the coronation men had flocked in from every quarter; soldiers of the robber companies, rude, foul, and disorderly. They revered the Maid for her saintly manner of life, but continued to practice their own vices, greatly to her distress.
So now as the King and the Maid rode from the town toward the walls of the city one of the vile women who followed the camp thrust herself forward boldly from the crowd of people who had gathered to watch the passing of the monarch
and the girl, and leered insolently at them. At this, all of Jeanne’s youthful purity was roused to a blaze of indignation, and she brought up her sword quickly, and smote the creature a smart blow with the flat side of the weapon.
“Get you gone,” she cried sharply.
