hold Paris. It was thirty leagues to the north and west of the capital, lying on the River Oise. It will be recalled that Charles had offered the city as a bribe to Burgundy to woo him from the English allegiance, but the city had refused to be lent. It had submitted to the King and the Maid the August before, and its people remained loyal, declaring that they would die and see their wives and children dead before they would yield to England or Burgundy; saying that they preferred death to dishonour. They had imbibed Jeanne’s spirit, and the Maid loved them.
It was further planned by the Regent to clear the road to Reims so that young Henry of England might be crowned there. Bedford was bringing him over from
England for that purpose, believing that the French would be more inclined to
support him if he were crowned at Reims. This plan was given up, however, for Burgundy warned Bedford against attempting to imitate the feat of the Maid, saying that it was too difficult. So the real objective of the spring campaign became Compiègne, other movements being to relieve Paris, and to distract the
French on their rear. For the French were rising; rising without their King. All over northern France there were stir and activity as troops began to gather to go against the enemy.
From Melun Jeanne journeyed to Lagny, which was but a short distance away, but the road was through a country full of enemies, in which she was subject to attack from every direction. It was one of the towns recovered for France the August before, and was now held for Ambrose de Loré by Foucault with a garrison of Scots under Kennedy, and a Lombard soldier of fortune, Baretta, with his company of men-at-arms, cross-bowmen and archers. It was making “good war on the English in Paris,” and “choking the heart of the kingdom.”
Paris itself became greatly excited when it heard of the arrival of the Maid at Lagny, its ill-neighbor, and feared that she was coming to renew her attack on the city. Among the English also there was consternation when the tidings spread that again Jeanne had taken to the field. “The witch is out again,” they declared to their captains when the officers sought to embark troops for France, and many refused to go. They deserted in crowds. Beating and imprisonment had no effect
upon them, and only those who could not escape were forced on board.
Jeanne had scarcely reached Lagny when news came that a band of Anglo-Burgundians was traversing the Isle of France, under one Franquet d’Arras, burning and pillaging the country, damaging it as much as they could. The Maid, with Foucault, Kennedy and Baretta, determined to go against the freebooters.
They came up with the raiders when they were laying siege to a castle, and were laden with the spoils of a recently sacked village. The assault was made, and
“hard work the French had of it,” for the enemy was superior in numbers. But after a “bloody fight” they were all taken or slain, with losses also to the French in killed and wounded.
For some reason the leader, Franquet d’Arras, was given to Jeanne. There had been an Armagnac plot in Paris in March to deliver the city to the loyalists, but it had failed. The Maid hoped to exchange the leader of the freebooters for one of the chief conspirators who had been imprisoned, but it was found that the man
had died in prison, so the burghers demanded Franquet of Jeanne, claiming that
he should be tried as a murderer and thief by the civil law. Jeanne did as
requested, saying as she released him to the Bailly of Senlis:
“As my man is dead, do with the other what you should do for justice.”
Franquet’s trial lasted two weeks; he confessed to the charges against him, and was executed. The Burgundians although accustomed to robbery, murder and treachery, charged Jeanne with being guilty of his death, and later this was made a great point against her.
There was another happening at Lagny that was later made the basis of a charge
against the Maid. A babe about three days old died, and so short a time had it lived that it had not received the rites of baptism, and must needs therefore be buried in unconsecrated ground. In accordance with the custom in such cases the child was placed upon the altar in the hope of a miracle, and the parents came to Jeanne requesting her to join with the maidens of the town who were assembled
in the church praying God to restore life that the little one might be baptized.
Jeanne neither worked, nor professed to work miracles. She did not pretend to heal people by touching them with her ring, nor did the people attribute miracles to her. But she joined the praying girls in the church, and entreated Heaven to restore the infant to life, if only for so brief a space of time as might allow it to be received into the Church. Now as they knelt and prayed the little one seemed suddenly to move. It gasped three times and its color began to come back.
Crying, “A miracle! A miracle!” the maidens ran for the priest, and brought him.
When he came to the side of the child he saw that it was indeed alive, and straightway baptized it and received it into the Church. And as soon as this had been done the little life that had flared up so suddenly went out, and the infant was buried in holy ground. If receiving an answer to earnest prayer be witchcraft were not the maidens of Lagny equally guilty with Jeanne? But this act was later included in the list of charges brought against her.
From Lagny Jeanne went to various other places in danger, or that needed encouragement or help. She made two hurried visits to Compiègne which was being menaced in more than one direction by both parties of the enemy, and was
now at Soissons, now at Senlis, and presently in the latter part of May came to Crépy-en-Valois.
And here came the news that Compiègne was being invested on all sides, and that preparations to press the siege were being actively made. Eager to go at once to the aid of the place Jeanne ordered her men to get ready for the march.
She had but few in her company, not more than two or three hundred, and some
of them told her that they were too few to pass through the hosts of the enemy. A
warning of this sort never had any effect upon Jeanne.
“By my staff, we are enough,” she cried. “I will go to see my good friends at Compiègne.” [25]
At midnight of the twenty-second, therefore, she set forth from Crépy, and by hard riding arrived at Compiègne in the early dawn, to the great joy and surprise of the Governor, Guillaume de Flavy, and the people who set the bells to ringing and the trumpets to sounding a glad welcome.
The men-at-arms were weary with the night’s ride, but Jeanne, after going to mass, met with the Governor to arrange a plan of action.
Now Compiègne in situation was very like to Orléans, in that it lay on a river, but it was on the south instead of the north bank. Behind the city to the southward stretched the great forest of Pierrefonds, and at its feet was the River Oise. In front of the city across the river a broad meadow extended to the low hills of Picardy. It was low land, subject to floods, so that there was a raised road or causeway from the bridge of Compiègne to the foot of the hills, a mile distant.
Three villages lay on this bank: at the end of the causeway was the tower and village of Margny, where was a camp of Burgundians; on the left, a mile and a
half below the causeway, was Venette, where the English lay encamped; and to
the right, a league distant above the causeway, stood Clairoix, where the Burgundians had another camp. The first defence of the city, facing the enemy,
was a bridge fortified with a tower and boulevard, which were in turn guarded by a deep fosse.
It was Jeanne’s plan to make a sally in the late afternoon when an attack would not be expected, against Margny, which lay at the other end of the raised road.
Margny taken, she would turn to the right and strike at Clairoix, the second Burgundian camp, and so cut off the Burgundians from their English allies at Venette. De Flavy agreed to the sortie, and proposed to line the ramparts of the boulevard with culverins, men, archers, and cross-bowmen to keep the English troops from coming up from below and seizing the causeway and cutting off retreat should Jeanne have to make one; and to station a number of small boats
filled with archers along the further bank of the river to shoot at the enemy if the troops should be driven back, and for the rescue of such as could not win back to the boulevard.
