Part 75 (1/2)

i, ch. xxii. D. Michel Felibien, _Histoire de l'abbaye royale de Saint-Denys en France_, Paris, in folio, 1706, pp. 229, 320. Vallet de Viriville, _Notice du ma.n.u.scrit de P. Cochon_, at the end of _La chronique de la Pucelle_, p. 360. _Chronique de Du Guesclin_, ed.

Francisque-Michel, pp. 452 _et seq._]

[Footnote 1713: _Trial_, vol. v, pp. 107, 109.]

The monks of Saint-Denys preserved precious relics, notably a piece of the wood of the true cross, the linen in which the Child Jesus had been wrapped, a fragment of the pitcher wherein the water had been changed to wine at the Cana marriage feast, a bar of Saint Lawrence's gridiron, the chin of Saint Mary Magdalen, a cup of tamarisk wood used by Saint Louis as a charm against the spleen. There likewise was to be seen the head of Saint Denys. True, at the same time one was being shown in the Cathedral church of Paris. The Chancellor, Jean Gerson, treating of Jeanne the Maid, a few days before his death, wrote that of her it might be said as of the head of Saint Denys, that belief in her was a matter of edification and not of faith, albeit in both places alike the head ought to be wors.h.i.+pped in order that edification should not be turned into scandal.[1714]

[Footnote 1714: D. M. Felibien, _op. cit._, ch. ii, pp. 528 _et seq._ Ill.u.s.trations. J. Doublet, _op. cit._, vol. i, ch. xliii, xlvi.

_Trial_, vol. iii, p. 301. _Gallia Christiana_, vol. vii, col. 142.]

In this abbey everything proclaimed the dignity, the prerogatives and the high wors.h.i.+p of the house of France. Jeanne must joyously have wondered at the insignia, the symbols and signs of the royalty of the Lilies gathered together in this spot,[1715] if indeed those eyes, occupied with celestial visions, had leisure to perceive the things of earth, and if her Voices, endlessly whispering in her ear, left her one moment's respite.

[Footnote 1715: _Religieux de Saint-Denis_, pp. 154, 156, 226.]

Saint Denys was a great saint, since there was no doubt of his being in very deed the Areopagite himself.[1716] But since he had permitted his abbey to be taken he was no longer invoked as the patron saint of the Kings of France. The Dauphin's followers had replaced him by the Blessed Archangel Michael, whose abbey, near the city of Avranches, had victoriously held out against the English. It was Saint Michael not Saint Denys who had appeared to Jeanne in the garden at Domremy; but she knew that Saint Denys was the war cry of France.[1717]

[Footnote 1716: Estienne Binet, _La vie apostolique de saint Denys l'Areopagite, patron et apostre de la France_, Paris, 1624, in 12mo.

J. Doublet, _Histoire chronologique pour la verite de Saint Denys l'Areopagite, apotre de France et premier eveque de Paris_, Paris, 1646, in 4to, and _Histoire de l'abbaye de Saint-Denys en France_, p.

95. J. Havet, _Les origines de Saint-Denis_, in _Les Questions merovingiennes_.]

[Footnote 1717: _Trial_, vol. i, p. 179.]

The monks of that rich abbey wasted by war lived there in poverty and in disorder.[1718] Armagnacs and Burgundians in turn descended upon the neighbouring fields and villages, plundering and ravaging, leaving nought that it was possible to carry off. At Saint-Denys was held the Fair of Le Lendit, one of the greatest in Christendom. But now Merchants had ceased to attend it. At the Lendit of 1418, there were but three booths, and those for the selling of shoes from Brabant, in the high street of Saint-Denys, near the Convent of Les Filles-Dieu.

Since 1426, there had been no fair at all.[1719]

[Footnote 1718: _Journal d'un bourgeois de Paris_, p. 179, note 5.]

[Footnote 1719: _Ibid._, pp. 101, 209, note 1.]

At the tidings that the Armagnacs were approaching Troyes, the peasants had cut their corn before it was ripe and brought it into Paris. On entering Saint-Denys, the Duke of Alencon's men-at-arms found the town deserted. The chief burgesses had taken refuge in Paris.[1720] Only a few of the poorer families were left. The Maid held two newly born infants over the baptismal font.[1721]

[Footnote 1720: _Ibid._, pp. 241, 242. Monstrelet, vol. iv, p. 354.]

[Footnote 1721: _Trial_, vol. i, p. 103.]

Hearing of these Saint-Denys baptisms, her enemies accused her of having lit candles and held them inclined over the infant's heads, in order that she might read their destinies in the melted wax. It was not the first time, it appeared, that she indulged in such practices.

When she entered a town, little children were said to offer her candles kneeling, and she received them as an agreeable sacrifice.

Then upon the heads of these innocents she would let fall three drops of burning wax, proclaiming that by virtue of this ceremony they could not fail to be good. In such acts Burgundian ecclesiastics discerned idolatry and witchcraft, in which was likewise involved heresy.[1722]

[Footnote 1722: _Ibid._, p. 304. Noel Valois, _Un nouveau temoignage sur Jeanne d'Arc_, in _Annuaire-bulletin de la Societe de l'Histoire de France_, Paris, 1907, in 8vo, separate issue, pp. 17, 18.]

Here again, at Saint-Denys, she distributed banners to the men-at-arms. Churchmen on the English side strongly suspected her of charming those banners. And as everyone in those days believed in magic, such a suspicion was not without its danger.[1723]

[Footnote 1723: _Trial_, vol. i, p. 236.]

The Maid and the Duke of Alencon lost no time. Immediately after their arrival at Saint-Denys they went forth to skirmish before the gates of Paris. Two or three times a day they engaged in this desultory warfare, notably by the wind-mill at the Saint-Denys Gate and in the village of La Chapelle. ”Every day there was booty taken,” says Messire Jean de Bueil.[1724] It seems hardly credible that in a country which had been plundered and ravaged over and over again, there should have been anything left to be taken; and yet the statement is made and attested by one of the n.o.bles in the army.

[Footnote 1724: _Le Jouvencel_, vol. ii, p. 281.]

Out of respect for the seventh commandment, the Maid forbade the men of her company to commit any theft whatsoever. And she always refused victuals offered her when she knew they had been stolen. In reality she, like the others, lived on pillage, but she did not know it. One day when a Scotsman gave her to wit that she had just partaken of some stolen veal, she flew into a fury and would have beaten him: saintly women are subject to such fits of pa.s.sion.[1725]