Part 8 (2/2)
And there all the poor, the widowed and orphans lamented ”their foster-mother,” ”their mother,” and showed the gifts she had given them and the garments she had made for them. Eustochium could with difficulty be prevailed to leave her. She stayed kissing the cold lips, and at last, her grief breaking through the usual calm of her life, throwing her arms about the unconscious form and praying to be buried beside her.
Paula died at fifty-six. She had spent the last eighteen years of her life in Palestine.
Jerome, for the first time in his laborious life, lost his appet.i.te for work. He could do no more. ”I have been able to do nothing, not even from the Scriptures, since the death of the holy and gracious Paula,” he wrote. ”Grief overwhelms me.”
Eustochium, with the instinct of true affection, drew him out of this stupor by inducing him to write a memoir of her mother for her. In two sleepless nights he dictated it. ”He could not write himself. Each time that he took up the tablets his fingers stiffened and the stylus fell from his hand. He could not dwell,” he said, ”on her great pedigree from the Scipios, the Gracchi, from Agamemnon, nor on her splendid opulence and her palace at Rome. She had preferred Bethlehem to Rome. Her praise was that she died poorer than the poorest she had succoured. At Rome she had not been known beyond Rome. At Bethlehem all Christendom, Roman and barbarian, revered her.”
”We weep not her loss; we thank G.o.d to have had her. Nay! we have her always, for all live by the spirit of G.o.d; and the elect who ascend to Him remain still always in the family of those He loves.”
Eustochium quietly took up the guidance of her mother's convents and hospice and gently urged Jerome to resume his work. Writing almost countless letters, translating and commenting on the Scriptures he pa.s.sed still many years, and at last, dying, at his own wish his body was buried in a hollow of the rocks at Bethlehem. To this day, it is said, his name can still be traced graven in the rock.
In the fifteen hundred years that have pa.s.sed since the death of Paula, the homes of piety and charity established by her strength and love have been swept away. No tradition even of their site is left.
But with one storied chamber is connected a warm interest. It is the rocky room, in one of the half caves, half excavations, close to that of the Nativity, and communicating with it by rudely hewn stairs and pa.s.sages. In this, the legend runs, Jerome established himself while his convent was building. He called it his paradise. Sunlit from above, with prayer and the music of alleluias sounding there night and day, brightened by the glow of the pure affections of Paula and Eustochium and sanctified by their great work, from it flowed rivers of water to refresh the earth.
V
JOAN OF ARC
On the 6th of January, 1412, Jeanne d'Arc, or, as we call her, Joan of Arc, was born at Domremy, a little village on the left bank of the Meuse, on land belonging to the French crown. Her parents, Jacques d'Arc and Isabelle Romee, were simple peasants, ”of good life and reputation,” who brought up their children to work hard, fear G.o.d and honour the saints. Besides Joan, they had four children--three sons, Jacques, Jean and Pierre, and a daughter, Catherine.
Joan's native valley was fair and fertile. The low hills that bounded it were covered with thick forests, and the rich meadows along the Meuse were gay with flowers, which gave to the chief town in the district its name of Vaucouleurs, _Vallis colorum_. Domremy, built on a slope, touched upon those flowery meadows, but over the hill behind it spread an ancient oakwood, the _Bois Chesnu_ of legend and prophecy. Between the forest and the village rose solitary a great beech, ”beautiful as a lily,” about which the country people told a thousand tales. They called it the ”Fairies' Tree,” the ”Tree of the Ladies,” the ”Beautiful May.” In old times the fairies had danced round it, and under its shadow a n.o.ble knight had formerly dared to meet and talk with an elfin lady.
But now, in Joan's time, the presence of the fairies was less certain, for the priest of Domremy came once a year to say ma.s.s under the tree, and exorcise it and a spring that bubbled up close by. On festival days the young villagers hung it with garlands, danced and played round it, and rested under its boughs to eat certain cakes which their mothers had made for them. During her childhood, Joan brought her cakes and garlands like the rest, danced with them, and sang more than she danced; but as she grew older, she would steal away and carry her flowers to the neighbouring chapel of Our Lady of Domremy.
Her early years were, considering the times, quiet and peaceful. With the war raging between English and French and their allies, to its west and north, Domremy had comparatively little to do. News of English successes, of French defeats, and the sorrows of the French King, were brought by fugitives from the war, by travelling monks, and other wanderers. Joan helped to receive those wayfarers, waited on them, gave up her own bed to them sometimes; and what they told of the woes of France she heard with intense sympathy, and pondered in her heart.
Her bringing up fitted her for the tender fulfilling of all womanly duties. Unlike most girls of her cla.s.s, she had few outdoor tasks, but spent most of her time at her mother's side, doing the work of the house, learning to sew and spin, to repeat the Belief, and the legends of the saints. Her work done, her dearest pleasure was to go to the village church, which was close to her father's cottage, and there kneel in prayer, gaze on the pictured angels, or listen to the bells calling the faithful to wors.h.i.+p: she had always a peculiar delight in the sound of church bells. She fasted regularly, and went often to confession; so often, that her young companions were inclined to jest at her devotion, and even her chosen friends, Haumette and Mengette, half-scolded her for being over-religious. But her faith bore sound fruit. The little money she got she gave in alms. She nursed the sick, she was gentle to the young and weak, obedient to her parents, kind to all. ”There was no one like her in the village,” said her priest. ”She was a good girl,” testified an old peasant, ”such a daughter as I would gladly have had.” A good girl, indeed: they were pure and helpful hands that for a while held the fate of France.
There was a prophecy current during that unhappy time--an old prophecy of Merlin--which the suffering people had taken and applied to their own day and their own need. ”The kingdom, lost by a woman, was to be saved by a woman.” The woman who had lost it was Isabeau, of Bavaria, the wicked queen, the false wife of Charles VI, the unnatural mother.
Who was she that should save it? In the east of France it was said that the deliverer would be a maid from the marshes of Lorraine.
Joan knew the ancient prophecy, and in her young mind it became blended with legends of the saints, with stories of Bible heroines, with her own ardent faith and high aspirations. She loved more and more to be alone. Night and day the wonderful child brooded on the sorrows of France. She sent out her vague hopes and yearnings in tears and prayers, and pa.s.sionate thoughts that were prayers, and they all came back to her with form and sound, in the visions and voices that were henceforth to be the rulers of her life.
They came first when she was thirteen years old. On a summer's day, at noon, she was in her father's garden, when suddenly by the church there appeared a great light, and out of the light a voice spoke to her, ”Joan, be a good child; go often to church.” She was frightened then, but both voice and brightness came again and again, and grew dear and familiar. n.o.ble shapes appeared in the glory. St. Michael showed himself to her; St. Catherine and St. Margaret bent over her their radiant heads, bidding her ”be good; trust in G.o.d.” They told her of ”the sorrow there was in the kingdom of France,” and warned her that one day it would be her mission to go and carry help to the King.
While to outward eyes she lived as usual, she had a life apart, given to G.o.d and her saints. She vowed her virginity to Heaven, but of her vow and the visions that had led her to it she told no one, not even the priest. Her meditations, her prayers and unearthly friends.h.i.+ps, made of her no sickly dreamer nor hot brained fanatic. She grew up strong, tall and handsome, with a healthy mind in her healthy body.
Meanwhile the dangers of France darkened and thickened. The war was pus.h.i.+ng southward; the English leader, Salisbury, was on his way to Orleans; the French King, Charles, poor, indolent, ill-advised, was deliberating whether he should retreat into Dauphine, or Spain, or Scotland.
Joan's voices grew more frequent and more urgent. Their word now was always, ”Go--go into France!” At last they had told her the way: ”Go to Vaucouleurs, to Robert de Baudricourt, the governor; he will give you men-at-arms, and send you to the King.”
It was now that Joan's trial began. While her beautiful visitors had spoken vaguely of some ”deliverance” she was to bring about in the future, she had listened with trembling joy. But now they had plainly shown her the distasteful first step, and for a moment she shrank from taking it. How could a peasant brave the governor of Vaucouleurs? How was a modest girl to venture among rude men-at-arms? How could a dutiful child leave her parents and her home?
”Alas!” she pleaded, ”I am a poor girl; I know neither how to ride nor how to fight.” She had a short, hard struggle with her own weakness, but the voices did not alter, and she set herself to do their bidding.
Her uncle, Durant Laxart, with whom she evidently was a favourite, lived at a village near Vaucouleurs, and in May, 1428, she went to his house for a visit. After a few days she confided to him something of her plans, reminding him of the old prophecy of Merlin, but never speaking of her visions. With much difficulty she prevailed on him to help her. He went with her to Vaucouleurs, and before the governor, to whom she made known her errand.
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