Part 45 (2/2)

And the Maid would not let it go. The n.o.bles and captains saw the standard shake, took it for a sign and rallied. Meanwhile Sire d'Aulon had reached the rampart. He imagined that the Basque was following close behind. But, when he turned round he perceived that he had stopped on the other side of the ditch, and he cried out to him: ”Eh!

Basque, what did you promise me?”

At this cry the Basque pulled so hard that the Maid let go, and he bore the standard to the rampart.[1087]

[Footnote 1087: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 216, 217.]

Jeanne understood and was satisfied. To those near her she said: ”Look and see when the flag of my standard touches the bulwark.”

A knight replied: ”Jeanne, the flag touches.”

Then she cried: ”All is yours. Enter.”[1088]

[Footnote 1088: _Journal du siege_, p. 86. _Chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 293.]

Straightway n.o.bles and citizens, men-at-arms, archers, townsfolk threw themselves wildly into the ditch and climbed up the palisades so quickly and in such numbers that they looked like a flock of birds descending on a hedge.[1089] And the French, who had now entered within the fortifications, saw retreating before them, but with their faces turned proudly towards the enemy, the Lords Moleyns and Poynings, Sir Thomas Giffart, Baillie of Mantes, and Captain Glasdale, who were covering the flight of their men to Les Tourelles.[1090] In his hand Glasdale was holding the standard of Chandos, which, after having waved over eighty years of victories, was now retreating before the standard of a child.[1091] For the Maid was there, standing upon the rampart. And the English, panic-stricken, wondered what kind of a witch this could be whose powers did not depart with the flowing of her blood, and who with charms healed her deep wounds. Meanwhile she was looking at them kindly and sadly and crying out, her voice broken with sobs:

”Gla.s.sidas! Gla.s.sidas! surrender, surrender to the King of Heaven.

Thou hast called me strumpet; but I have great pity on thy soul and on the souls of thy men.”[1092]

[Footnote 1089: _Chronique de la fete_, in the _Trial_, vol. v, p.

294.]

[Footnote 1090: _Journal du siege_, p. 87.]

[Footnote 1091: Letter from Charles VII to the inhabitants of Narbonne, 10 May, 1429, in _Trial_, vol. v, p. 103. Monstrelet, in _Trial_, vol. iv, p. 365.]

[Footnote 1092: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 110 (Pasquerel's evidence).]

At the same time, from the walls of the town and the bulwark of La Belle Croix cannon b.a.l.l.s rained down upon Les Tourelles.[1093]

Montargis and Rifflart cast forth stones. Maitre Guillaume Duisy's new cannon, from the Chesneau postern, hurled forth b.a.l.l.s weighing one hundred and twenty pounds.[1094] Les Tourelles were attacked from the bridge side. Across the arch broken by the English a narrow footway was thrown, and Messire Nicole de Giresme, a knight in holy orders, was the first to pa.s.s over.[1095] Those who followed him set fire to the palisade which blocked the approach to the fort on that side. Thus the six hundred English, their strength and their weapons alike exhausted, found themselves a.s.sailed both in front and in the rear. In a crafty and terrible manner they were also attacked from beneath. The people of Orleans had loaded a great barge with pitch, tow, f.a.ggots, horse-bones, old shoes, resin, sulphur, ninety-eight pounds of olive oil and such other materials as might easily take fire and smoke. They had steered it under the wooden bridge, thrown by the enemy from Les Tourelles to the bulwark: they had anch.o.r.ed the barge there and set fire to its cargo. The fire from the barge had caught the bridge just when the English were retreating. Through smoke and flames the six hundred pa.s.sed over the burning platform. At length it came to the turn of William Glasdale, Lord Poynings and Lord Moleyns, who with thirty or forty captains, were the last to leave the lost bulwark; but when they set foot on the bridge, its beams, reduced to charcoal, crumbled beneath them, and they all with the Chandos standard were engulfed in the Loire.[1096]

[Footnote 1093: _Chronique de la Pucelle_, pp. 293, 294. Morosini, vol. iii, p. 31.]

[Footnote 1094: _Journal du siege_, p. 17. Jollois, _Histoire du siege_, p. 12.]

[Footnote 1095: _Journal du siege_, p. 87. _Chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 294. _Chronique de la fete_, in _Trial_, vol. v, p. 294.]

[Footnote 1096: _Trial_, vol. iii, pp. 9, 25, 80. _Chronique de l'etabliss.e.m.e.nt de la fete_, in _Trial_, vol. v, p. 294. _Chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 294. _Journal du siege_, pp. 87, 88. Jean Chartier, _Chronique_, vol. i, p. 78. Perceval de Cagny, p. 145. Eberhard Windecke, p. 173. Monstrelet, vol. iv, p. 321. Morosini, vol. iii, pp.

31 _et seq._]

Jeanne moved to pity wept over the soul of Gla.s.sidas and over the souls of those drowned with him.[1097] The captains, who were with her, likewise grieved over the death of these valiant men, reflecting that they had done the French a great wrong by being drowned, for their ransom would have brought great riches.[1098]

[Footnote 1097: _Trial_, vol. iii, p. 110 (Pasquerel's evidence).]

[Footnote 1098: _Journal du siege_, p. 87.]

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