Thus began that great movement from Europe towards Asia, which was to continue for several centuries, and end at length in disaster and defeat. But we are concerned here only with Peter the Hermit, and the conclusion of his career. He had set the flood in motion; how far was he to be borne on its waves?

The chiefs of the army welcomed him with respect and consideration, and heard with interest and feeling his account of the misfortunes of those under his leadership, and how they were due to their own ignorance, violence, and insubordination. With the few who survived from the multitude he joined the crusading army, and regained the ardent hopes which had almost vanished from his heart.

The army that reached Nicaea is said to have been six hundred thousand strong, though they were probably not nearly so many. On they went with many adventures, meeting the Turks in battle, suffering from hunger and thirst, enduring calamities, losing many by death, until at length the great city of Antioch was reached and besieged.

Here at first food was plenty and life easy. But the Turks held out, winter came, provisions grew scarce, life ceased to be agreeable. Such was the discouragement that succeeded that several men of note deserted the army of the cross, among them Robert, duke of Normandy, William, viscount of Melun, called the Carpenter, from his mighty battle-axe, and Peter the Hermit himself. Their flight caused the greatest indignation. Tancred, one of the leaders, hurried after and overtook them, and brought them back to the camp, where they, overcome by shame, swore on the Gospel never again to abandon the cause of the cross.

In time Antioch was taken, and the Turks therein massacred. But, unknown to the Crusaders, an immense army of Turks was being organized in Syria for its relief; and four days after its capture the Crusaders found themselves in their turn besieged, the place being completely enclosed.

Day by day the blockade became more strict. Suffering from want of food began. Starvation threatened the citizens and the army alike. It seemed as if the crusade might end there and then, in the death or captivity of all concerned in it; when an incident, esteemed miraculous, roused the spirits of the soldiers and achieved their deliverance.

A priest of Marseilles, Peter Bartholomew by name, presented himself before the chief and said that he had had a marvellous dream. St. Andrew had thrice appeared to him, saying, "Go into the church of my brother Peter at Antioch, and hard by the high altar thou wilt find, on digging up the ground, the head of the spear which pierced our Redeemer's side. That, carried in front of the army, will bring about the deliverance of the Christians."

The search was made, a spear-head was found, hope, confidence, enthusiasm were restored, and with loud shouts the half-starved multitude demanded that they should be led against the enemy. But before doing so, the chiefs decided to apprise the leader of the Turks of their intention, and for this purpose chose Peter the Hermit as their boldest and ablest speaker.

Peter, therefore, under a flag of truce, sought the Turkish camp, presented himself without any mark of respect before Corbogha, the leader of the Turks, and his captains, and boldly told them the decision of the crusading chiefs.

"They offer thee," he said, "the choice between divers determinations: either that thou appear alone in person to fight with one of our princes, in order that, if victorious, thou mayst obtain all thou canst demand, or, if vanquished, thou mayst remain quiet; or again, pick out divers of thine who shall fight, on the same terms, with the same number of ours; or, lastly, agree that the two armies shall prove, one against the other, the fortune of battle."

Corbogha received this challenge as an amusing jest, saying that the chiefs must be in a desperate state to send him such a proposition. "Go, and tell these fools," he said, "that all whom I shall find in full possession of all the powers of the manly age shall have their lives, and shall be reserved by me for my master's service, and that all others shall fall beneath my sword, as useless trees, so that there shall remain of them not even a faint remembrance. Had I not deemed it more convenient to destroy them by famine than to smite them with the sword, I should already have gotten forcible mastery of the city, and they would have reaped the fruits of their voyage hither by undergoing the law of vengeance."

Corbogha spoke much too hastily. Before night of the next day he was a helpless fugitive, his army destroyed or dispersed. Peter the Hermit returned with his message, but, by the advice of Godfrey de Bouillon, he simply announced that the Turks desired battle, and that instant preparation for it must be made. On the next day the whole Christian army, armed and enthusiastic, issued from the city, a part of the clergy marching at their head, the miraculous spear-head borne before them, and attacked the Turks in their camp. The battle was long, fierce, and stubborn, but in the end the Turks gave way before the fury of Christian enthusiasm, and fled for their lives, vast multitudes of them being slain on the field, while the vain-glorious Corbogha rode in all haste, with a weak escort, towards far-off Bagdad.

The camp of the Turks was taken and pillaged. It yielded fifteen thousand camels and an unnamed multitude of horses. The tent of Corbogha proved a rich prize. It was laid out in streets, flanked by towers, in imitation of a fortified town, was everywhere enriched with gold and precious stones, and was so spacious that it would have contained more than two thousand persons. It was sent to Italy, where it was long preserved. So great was the spoil that, says Albert of Aix, "every Crusader found himself richer than he had been at starting from Europe."

In June, 1099, the Crusaders arrived before Jerusalem, and saw with eyes of wonder and delight the vision of the Holy City which they had come so far to gaze upon. After a month of siege the chiefs fixed a day for the grand assault, and on the day preceding that chosen the whole army marched, fasting, and preceded by their priests, in slow procession round the walls, halting at every hallowed spot, listening to the hymns and exhortations of their priests, and looking upward with wrathful eyes at the insults heaped by the Islamites upon the cross and other symbols of the Christian faith.

"Ye see," cried Peter the Hermit, "the blasphemies of God's enemies. Now, this I swear to you by your faith; this I swear to you by the arms you carry; to-day these infidels are still full of pride and insolence, but to-morrow they shall be frozen with fear; those mosques, which tower over Christian ruins, shall serve for temples to the true God, and Jerusalem shall hear no longer aught but the praises of the Lord."

His words were received with shouts of applause by the whole army. His had been the first voice to call Europe to the deliverance of the Holy City; now, with a strong army to back him, he gazed on the walls of Jerusalem, still in the hands of the infidels, likely soon to be in the hands of the Christians. Well might he feel joy and self-gratification, in thinking that all this was his work, and that he had been the apostle of the greatest event in modern history.

On the next day, July 14, 1099, the assault began at daybreak. On Friday, the 15th, Jerusalem fell into the hands of the Crusaders, and the mission of Peter the Hermit was accomplished, the Holy City was won.

With that great day ended the active part played by Peter the Hermit in history. He was received with the greatest respect by the Christian dwellers in Jerusalem, who exerted themselves to render him the highest honors, and attributed to him alone, after God, their deliverance from the sufferings which they had so long endured. On his return to Europe he founded a monastery near Hue, in the diocese of Liege, where he spent the remainder of his life in retirement, respected and honored by all, and died there on the 11th of July, 1115.



THE COMMUNE OF LAON.

The history of the kingdoms of Europe has a double aspect, that of the arrogant rule of kings and nobles, and that of the enforced submission and occasional insurrection of the common people, whom the governing class despised while subsisting on the products of their labor, as a tree draws its nutriment from the base soil above which it proudly rises. Insurrections of the peasantry took place at times, we have said, though, as a rule, nothing was gained by them but blows and bloodshed. We have described such outbreaks in England. France had its share of them, all of which were speedily and cruelly suppressed. It was not by armed insurrection that the peasantry gained the measure of liberty they now possess. Their gradual emancipation was gained through unceasing protest and steady pressure, and in no sense by revolt and bloodshed.

A different story must be told of the towns. In these the common people were concentrated and well organized, and possessed skilled leaders and strong walls. They understood the political situation, struck for a definite purpose, and usually gained it. The history of nearly every town in France tells of some such demand for chartered privileges, ordinarily ending in the freeing of the town from the tyranny of the nobles. Each town had its municipal government, the Commune. It was this body which spoke for the burghers, which led in the struggle for liberty, and which succeeded in gaining for most of the towns a charter of rights and privileges. Many stirring incidents might be told of this fight for freedom. We shall confine ourselves to the story of the revolt of the Commune of Laon, of which a sprightly contemporary description exists.

At the end of the eleventh century Laon was a bustling and important city. It was the seat of a cathedral and under the government of a bishop; was wealthy and prosperous, stirring and turbulent; was the gathering-place of the surrounding people, the centre of frequent disturbances. Thierry draws a vivid picture of the state of affairs existing within its walls. "The nobles and their servitors," he says, "sword in hand, committed robbery upon the burghers; the streets of the town were not safe by night nor even by day, and none could go out without running a risk of being stopped and robbed or killed. The burghers in their turn committed violence upon the peasants, who came to buy or sell at the market of the town."

Truly, town life and country life alike were neither safe nor agreeable in those charming mediaeval days when chivalry was the profession of all and the possession of none, when the nobility were courteous in word and violent in deed, and when might everywhere lorded it over right, and conscience was but another word for desire. As for the treatment of the peasantry by the townsmen, we may quote from Guibert, an abbot of Nogent-sous-Coucy, to whose lively pen we owe all we have to tell about Laon.

"Let me give as example," he says, "a single fact, which had it taken place among the Barbarians or the Scythians would assuredly have been considered the height of wickedness, in the judgment even of those who know no law. On Saturday the inhabitants of the country places used to leave their fields and come from all sides to Laon to get provisions at the market. The townsfolk used then to go round the place carrying in baskets or bowls or otherwise samples of vegetables or grain or any other article, as if they wished to sell. They would offer them to the first peasant who was in search of such things to buy; he would promise to pay the price agreed upon; and then the seller would say to the buyer, 'Come with me to my house to see and examine the whole of the articles I am selling you.' The other would go; and then, when they came to the bin containing the goods, the honest seller would take off and hold up the lid, saying to the buyer, 'Step hither and put your head or arms into the bin to make quite sure that it is all exactly the same goods as I showed you outside.' And then when the other, jumping on to the edge of the bin, remained leaning on his belly, with his head and shoulders hanging down, the worthy seller, who kept in the rear, would hoist up the thoughtless rustic by the feet, push him suddenly into the bin, and, clapping on the lid as he fell, keep him shut up in this safe prison until he had bought himself out."

This has more the aspect of a practical joke than an act of barbarism. But withal, between the cheating of the peasantry by the burghers, the robbery of the burghers by the nobles, and the general turmoil and terror, there might have been found more delightful places of residence than the good city of Laon in the eleventh century. The story of this city is a long one. We are here concerned with but one episode in the tale.

In the year 1106 the bishopric of Laon, which had been for two years vacant, was bought by Gaudri, a Norman by birth, and a man of no very savory reputation. He was a clergyman with the habits of a soldier, hasty and arrogant in disposition, hurrying through the service of the mass, and dallying with delight over narratives of fighting and hunting, one of the churchmen of wickedly worldly tastes of which those days presented so many examples.

Laon soon learned something of the character of its new bishop. Not long was he in office before outrages began. He seized one man whom he suspected of aiding his enemies, and put out his eyes. Another was murdered in the church itself, with his connivance. In his deeds of violence or vengeance he employed a black slave, imitating in this some of the Crusaders, who brought with them such servants from the east. No lawless noble could have shown more disregard of law or justice than this dignitary of the church, and the burghers of Laon viewed with growing indignation his lawless and merciless course.

Taking advantage of the absence of Bishop Gaudri in England, the burghers bribed the clergy and knights who governed in his stead, and obtained from them the privilege of choosing their own rulers. "The clergy and knights," we are told, "came to an agreement with the common folk in hopes of enriching themselves in a speedy and easy fashion." A commune was set up, and given the necessary powers and immunities.

Gaudri returned, and heard with fierce wrath of what had been done in his absence. For several days he stayed outside the walls, clouding and thundering. Then the burghers applied the same plaster to his wrath as they had done to the virtue of his representatives. They offered him money, "enough to appease the tempest of his words." He accepted the bribe and swore to respect the commune. This done, he entered the city in state.

The burghers knew him somewhat too well to trust him. There were higher powers in France than Bishop Gaudri, which were known to be susceptible to the same mercenary argument. A deputation was therefore sent to King Louis the Fat at Paris, laden with rich presents, and praying for a royal confirmation of the commune. The king loved the glitter of cash; he accepted the presents, swore that the commune should be respected, and gave Laon a charter sealed with the great seal of the crown. All that the citizens were to do in return, beyond meeting the customary crown claims, was to give the king three lodgings a year, if he came to the town, or in lieu thereof, if he failed to come, twenty livres for each lodging.

For three years all went well in Laon. The burghers were happy in their security and proud of their liberty, while clergy and knights were occupied in spending the money they had received. The year 1112 came. The bishop and his subordinates had got rid of their money, and craved again the power they had sold. They began to consider how the citizens might once more be made serfs. They would not have hesitated long but for that inconvenient grant of Louis the Fat. But King Louis might be managed. He was normally avaricious. The bishop invited him to Laon to take part in the keeping of Holy Week, trusting to get his aid to overthrow the commune.

The king came. The burghers were not long in suspecting the cause of his coming. They offered him some four hundred livres to confirm them in their liberties. The bishop and his party offered him seven hundred livres to restore their power. The higher offer prevailed. The charter was annulled, and the magistrates of the commune were ordered to cease from their functions, to give up the seal and the banner of the town, and no more to ring the belfry-chimes which indicated the beginning and the ending of their sessions.

Wrath and uproar succeeded this decree. The burghers had tasted the sweets of liberty, and were not ready to lose their dearly-bought independence. So violent were they that the king himself was frightened, and hastily left his hotel for the stronger walls of the episcopal palace. At dawn of the next day, partly in fear and perhaps partly in shame, he departed from Laon with all his train, leaving the Easter festival to take place without him.

It was destined to be a serious festival for Bishop Gaudri and his crew of base-souled followers. The king had left a harvest of indignation behind him. On the day after his going all shops and taverns were kept closed and nothing was sold; every one remained at home, nursing his wrath. The next day the anger of the citizens grew more demonstrative. A rumor spread that the bishop and grandees were busy calculating the fortunes of the citizens, that they might force from them the sum promised the king. The burghers assembled in burning indignation, and forty of them bound themselves by oath to kill the bishop and all those who had aided him to destroy the commune.

Some rumor of this got afloat. Anselm, the arch-deacon, warned the bishop that his life was in danger, and urged him not to leave his house, and, in particular, not to accompany the procession on Easter-day. Thus Caesar had been warned, and had contemned the warning. Gaudri emulated him, and answered, with a sneer of contempt,—

"Pooh! I die by the hands of such fellows!"

Easter-day came. The bishop did not appear at matins, or at the later church service. But, lest he should be called coward, he joined the procession, followed by his clergy and domestics, and by a number of knights with arms and armor concealed under their clothes. Slowly through the streets moved the procession, the people looking on in lowering silence. As it passed a dark arch one of the forty rushed suddenly out, crying, "Commune! commune!" No one joined him; the crowd seemed intimidated; their feelings subsided in a murmur; the procession continued on its way undisturbed.

The next day another procession took place. This day the bishop had filled the town with peasants, who were charged to protect his church, his palace, and himself. The people kept quiet. All went well. Bishop Gaudri, satisfied that the talk of danger was all a myth, now dismissed the peasants, feeling quite secure.

"On the fourth day after Easter," says Guibert of Nogent, "my corn having been pillaged in consequence of the disorder that reigned in the town, I repaired to the bishop, and prayed him to put a stop to this state of violence.

"'What do you suppose,' said he to me, 'these fellows can do with all their outbreaks? Why, if my blackamoor, John, were to pull the nose of the most formidable amongst them, the poor devil durst not even grumble. Have I not forced them to give up what they called their commune, for the whole duration of my life?'

"I held my tongue," adds Guibert; "many folks besides me warned him of his danger, but he would not deign to believe anybody."

For three days all kept quiet. The bishop and his myrmidons busied themselves in calculating how much cash they could squeeze from the people. The people lowered like a gathering storm. All at once the storm broke. A sudden tumult arose; crowds filled the streets. "Commune! commune!" was the general cry; as if by magic, swords, lances, axes, bows, and clubs appeared in the hands of the people; with wild shouts of vengeance they rushed through the streets and burst into the bishop's palace. The knights who had promised to protect him hastened thither and faced the infuriated populace. The first three who appeared were hotly attacked and fell before the axes of the burghers. The others held back. In a few minutes more flames appeared in the palace, and in no long time it was a mass of seething fire. The day of vengeance had come.

The bishop had fled to the church. Here, having no means of defence, he hastily put on the dress of one of his servants and repaired to the church cellar, where were a number of empty casks. One of these he got into, a faithful follower then heading him in, and even stopping up the bung-hole. Meanwhile, the crowd were in eager quest for the object of their wrath. The palace had been searched before being set on fire; the church and all accompanying buildings now swarmed with revengeful burghers. Among these was a bandit named Teutgaud, a fellow notorious for his robberies and murders of travellers, but now hand and glove with the commune. The bishop had named him Isengrin, the by-word then for wolf.

This worthy made his way into the cellar, followed by an armed crowd. Through this they went, tapping the casks as they proceeded. Teutgaud halted in front of that in which the bishop was concealed—on what suspicion does not appear.

"Knock in the head of this," he ordered.

He was quickly obeyed.

"Is there any one here?" he asked.

"Only a poor prisoner," came a quavering voice from the depths of the cask.

"Ha! ha!" laughed Teutgaud; "so it is you, Master Isengrin, who are hiding here!"

Seizing the trembling bishop by the hair, he dragged him without ceremony from the cask. The frightened culprit fell on his knees and begged piteously for his life. He would do anything; he would give up the bishopric, yield them all the money he had, and leave the country.

Insults and blows were the only replies. In a minute more the unfortunate man was dead. Teutgaud, true to his profession, cut off his finger to obtain the episcopal ring that glittered on it. Stripped of its clothing, the body was hurled into a corner, and the furious throng flung stones and mud at it, as the only vent remaining to their revengeful passions.

All that day and the night that followed the armed and maddened townsmen searched the streets and houses of Laon for the supporters of the murdered bishop, and numbers of them shared his fate. Not the guilty alone, but many of the innocent, perished before the blind wrath of the multitude. "The progress of the fire," says Guibert, "kindled on two sides at once, was so rapid, and the winds drove the flames so furiously in the direction of the convent of St. Vincent, that the monks were afraid of seeing all they possessed become the fire's prey, and all the persons who had taken refuge in this monastery trembled as if they had seen swords hanging over their heads."

It was a day and night of frightful excess, one of those dread occasions which arise when men are roused to violence by injustice, and for the time break all the bonds of mercy and moderation which ordinarily control them. Regret at their insensate rage is sure to succeed all such outbreaks. Retribution is likely to follow. Consternation came to the burghers of Laon when calm thought returned to them. They had defied the king. What would he do? To protect themselves they added to the burden of their offences, summoning to their aid Thomas de Marle, the son of Lord Enguerraud de Coucy, a man who was little better than a brigand, and with a detestable reputation for cruelty and ferocity.

De Marle was not quite ready to undertake this task. He consulted his people, who declared that it would be folly for their small force to seek to defend such a city against the king. He thereupon induced the burghers to meet him in a field, about a mile from the city, where he would make answer to their request. When they had come, he said,—

"Laon is the head of the kingdom; it is impossible for me to keep the king from making himself master of it. If you fear his arms, follow me to my own land, and you will find in me a protector and a friend."

Their consternation was extreme at this advice. For the time being they were in a panic, through fear of the king's vengeance, and the conference ended in many of them taking the advice of the Lord of Marle, and flying with him to his stronghold. Teutgaud was among the number that accepted his protection.

The news of their flight quickly spread to the country places around Laon. The story went that the town was quite deserted. The peasants, filled with hopes of plunder, hastened to the town, took possession of what empty houses they found, and carried off what money and other valuables they could discover. "Before long," says Guibert, "there arose between the first and last comers disputes about the partition of their plunder; all that the small folks had taken soon passed into the hands of the powerful; if two men met a third quite alone they stripped him; the state of the town was truly pitiable. The burghers who had quitted it with Thomas de Marle had beforehand destroyed and burnt the houses of the clergy and grandees whom they hated; and now the grandees, escaped from the massacre, carried off in their turn from the houses of the fugitives all means of subsistence and all movables to the very hinges and bolts."

What succeeded must be briefly told. The story of the events here described spread through the kingdom. Thomas de Marle was put under ban by the king and excommunicated by the church. Louis raised an army and marched against him. De Marle was helpless with illness, but truculent in temper. He defied the king, and would not listen to his summons. Louis attacked his castles, took two of them, Crecy and Nogent, and in the end forced him to buy pardon by a heavy ransom and an indemnity to the church. As for the burghers who had taken refuge with him, the king showed them no mercy. They had had a hand in the murder of Bishop Gaudri, and all of them were hung.

The remaining story of Laon is too long for our space. The burghers continued to demand their liberties, and in 1128 a new charter was granted them. This they retained, except during some intervals, until that later period when the mediaeval system of municipal government came to an end, and all the cities and towns fell under the direct control of the deputies of the king.



HOW BIG FERRE FOUGHT FOR FRANCE.

It was in the heart of the Hundred Years' War. Everywhere France lay desolate under the feet of the English invaders. Never had land been more torn and rent, and never with less right and justice. Like a flock of vultures the English descended upon the fair realm of France, ravaging as they went, leaving ruin behind their footsteps, marching hither and thither at will, now victorious, now beaten, yet ever plundering, ever desolating. Wherever they came the rich were ruined, the poor were starved, want and misery stared each other in the face, happy homes became gaping ruins, fertile fields became sterile wastes. It was a pandemonium of war, a frightful orgy of military license, a scene to make the angels weep and demons rejoice over the cruelty of man.

In the history of this dreadful business we find little to show what part the peasantry took in the affair, beyond that of mere suffering. The man-at-arms lorded it in France; the peasant endured.

Yet occasionally this down-trodden sufferer took arms against his oppressors, and contemporary chronicles give us some interesting insight into brave deeds done by the tiller of the soil. One of these we propose to tell,—a stirring and romantic one. It is half legendary, perhaps, yet there is reason to believe that it is in the main true, and it paints a vivid picture of those days of blood and violence which is well worthy of reproduction.

In 1358 the king of Navarre, who had aided the English in their raids, suddenly made peace with France. This displeased his English allies, who none the less, however, continued their destructive raids, small parties marching hither and thither, now victorious, now vanquished, an interminable series of minor encounters taking the place of large operations. Both armies were reduced to guerilla bands, who fought as they met, and lived meanwhile on the land and its inhabitants. The battle of Poitiers had been recently fought, the king of France was a prisoner, there was no organization, no central power, in the realm, and wherever possible the population took arms and fought in their own defence, seeking some little relief from the evils of anarchy.

The scene of the story we propose to tell is a small stronghold called Longueil, not far from Compiegne and near the banks of the Oise. It was pretty well fortified, and likely to prove a point of danger to the district if the enemy should seize it and make it a centre of their plundering raids. There were no soldiers to guard it, and the peasants of the vicinity, Jacques Bonhomme (Jack Goodfellow) as they were called, undertook its defence. This was no unauthorized action. The lord-regent of France and the abbot of the monastery of St. Corneille-de-Compiegne, near by, gave them permission, glad, doubtless, to have even their poor aid, in the absence of trained soldiery.

In consequence, a number of the neighboring tillers of the soil garrisoned the place, providing themselves with arms and provisions, and promising the regent to defend the town until death. Hither came many of the villagers for security, continuing the labors which yielded them a poor livelihood, but making Longueil their stronghold of defence. In all there were some two hundred of them, their chosen captain being a tall, finely-formed man, named William a-Larks (aux Alouettes). For servant, this captain had a gigantic peasant, a fellow of great stature, marvellous strength, and undaunted boldness, and withal of extreme modesty. He bore the name of Big Ferre.

This action of the peasants called the attention of the English to the place, and roused in them a desire to possess it. Jacques Bonhomme was held by them in utter contempt, and the peasant garrison simply brought to their notice the advantage of the place as a well-fortified centre of operations. That these poor dirt delvers could hold their own against trained warriors seemed a matter not worth a second thought.

"Let us drive the base-born rogues from the town and take possession of it," said they. "It will be a trifle to do it, and the place will serve us well."

Such seemed the case. The peasants, unused to war and lacking all military training, streamed in and out at pleasure, leaving the gates wide open, and taking no precautions against the enemy. Suddenly, to their surprise and alarm, they saw a strong body of armed men entering the open gates and marching boldly into the court-yard of the stronghold, the heedless garrison gazing with gaping eyes at them from the windows and the inner courts. It was a body of English men-at-arms, two hundred strong, who had taken the unguarded fortress by surprise.

Down came the captain, William a-Larks, to whose negligence this surprise was due, and made a bold and fierce assault on the invaders, supported by a body of his men. But the English forced their way inward, pushed back the defenders, surrounded the captain, and quickly struck him to the earth with a mortal wound. Defence seemed hopeless. The assailants had gained the gates and the outer court, dispersed the first party of defenders, killed their captain, and were pushing their way with shouts of triumph into the stronghold within. The main body of the peasants were in the inner court, Big Ferre at their head, but it was beyond reason to suppose that they could stand against this compact and well-armed body of invaders.

Yet they had promised the regent to hold the place until death, and they meant it.

"It is death fighting or death yielding," they said. "These men will slay us without mercy; let us sell them our lives at a dear price."

"Gathering themselves discreetly together," says the chronicler, "they went down by different gates, and struck out with mighty blows at the English, as if they had been beating out their corn on the threshing-floor; their arms went up and down again, and every blow dealt out a mighty wound."

Big Ferre led a party of the defenders against the main body of the English, pushing his way into the outer court where the captain had fallen. When he saw his master stretched bleeding and dying on the ground, the faithful fellow gave vent to a bitter cry, and rushed with the rage of a lion upon the foe, wielding a great axe like a feather in his hands.

The English looked with surprise and alarm on this huge fellow, who topped them all in height by a head and shoulders, and who came forward like a maddened bull, uttering short, hoarse cries of rage, while the heavy axe quivered in his vigorous grasp. In a moment he was upon them, striking such quick and deadly blows that the place before him was soon void of living men. Of one man the head was crushed; of another the arm was lopped off; a third was hurled back with a gaping wound. His comrades, seeing the havoc he was making, were filled with ardor, and seconded him well, pressing on the dismayed English and forcing them bodily back. In an hour, says the chronicler, the vigorous fellow had slain with his own hand eighteen of the foe, without counting the wounded.

This was more than flesh and blood could bear. The English turned to fly; some leaped in terror into the ditches, others sought to regain the gates; after them rushed Big Ferre, still full of the rage of battle. Reaching the point where the English had planted their flag, he killed the bearer, seized the standard, and bade one of his followers to go and fling it into the ditch, at a point where the wall was not yet finished.

"I cannot," said the man; "there are still too many English there."

"Follow me with the flag," said Big Ferre.

Like a woodman making a lane through a thicket, the burly champion cleared an avenue through the ranks of the foe, and enabled his follower to hurl the flag into the ditch. Then, turning back, he made such havoc among the English who still remained within the wall, that all who were able fled in terror from his deadly axe. In a short time the place was cleared and the gates closed, the English—such of them as were left—making their way with all haste from that fatal place. Of those who had come, the greater part never went back. It is said that the axe of Big Ferre alone laid more than forty of them low in death. In this number the chronicler may have exaggerated, but the story as a whole is probably true.

The sequel to this exploit of the giant champion is no less interesting. The huge fellow whom steel could not kill was slain by water,—not by drowning, however, but by drinking. And this is how it came to pass.

The story of the doings at Longueil filled the English with shame and anger. When the bleeding and exhausted fugitives came back and reported the fate of their fellows, indignation and desire for revenge animated all the English in the vicinity. On the following day they gathered from all the camps in the neighborhood and marched in force on Longueil, bent on making the peasants pay dearly for the slaughter of their comrades.

This time they found entrance not so easy. The gates were closed, the walls well manned. Big Ferre was now the captain of Longueil, and so little did he or his followers fear the assaults of their foes, that they sallied out boldly upon them, their captain in the lead with his mighty axe.

Fierce was the fray that followed. The peasants fought like tigers, their leader like a lion. The English were broken, slaughtered, driven like sheep before the burly champion and his bold followers. Many were slain or sorely wounded. Numbers were taken, among them some of the English nobles. The remainder fled in a panic, not able to stand against that vigorous arm and deadly axe, and the fierce courage which the exploits of their leader gave to the peasants. The field was cleared and Longueil again saved.

Big Ferre, overcome with heat and fatigue, sought his home at the end of the fight, and there drank such immoderate draughts of cold water that he was seized with a fever. He was put to bed, but would not part with his axe, "which was so heavy that a man of the usual strength could scarcely lift it from the ground with both hands." In this statement one would say that the worthy chronicler must have romanced a little.

The news that their gigantic enemy was sick came to the ears of the English, and filled them with joy and hope. He was outside the walls of Longueil, and might be assailed in his bed. Twelve men-at-arms were chosen, their purpose being to creep up secretly upon the place, surround it, and kill the burly champion before aid could come to him.

The plan was well laid, but it failed through the watchfulness of the sick man's wife. She saw the group of armed men before they could complete their dispositions, and hurried with the alarming news to the bedside of her husband.

"The English are coming!" she cried. "I fear it is for you they are looking. What will you do?"

Big Ferre answered by springing from bed, arming himself in all haste despite his sickness, seizing his axe, and leaving the house. Entering his little yard, he saw the foe closing covertly in on his small mansion, and shouted, angrily,—

"Ah, you scoundrels! you are coming to take me in my bed. You shall not get me there; come, take me here if you will."

Setting his back against a wall, he defended himself with his usual strength and courage. The English attacked him in a body, but found it impossible to get inside the swing of that deadly axe. In a little while five of them lay wounded upon the ground, and the other seven had taken to flight.

Big Ferre returned triumphantly to his bed; but, heated by his exertions, he drank again too freely of cold water. In consequence his fever returned, more violently than before. A few days afterwards the brave fellow, sinking under his sickness, went out of the world, conquered by water where steel had been of no avail. "All his comrades and his country wept for him bitterly, for, so long as he lived, the English would not have come nigh this place."

And so ended the short but brilliant career of the notable Big Ferre, one of those peasant heroes who have risen from time to time in all countries, yet rarely have lived long enough to make their fame enduring. His fate teaches one useful warning, that imprudence is often more dangerous than armed men.

We are told nothing concerning the fate of Longueil after his death. Probably the English found it an easy prey when deprived of the peasant champion, who had held it so bravely and well; though it may be that the wraith of the burly hero hung about the place and still inspired his late companions to successful resistance to their foes. Its fate is one of those many half-told tales on which history shuts its door, after revealing all that it holds to be of interest to mankind.



BERTRAND DU GUESCLIN.

In the castle of Motte-Broon, near Rennes, France, there was born about the year 1314 "the ugliest child from Rennes to Dinan," as an uncomplimentary chronicle says. He was a flat-nosed, swarthy, big-headed, broad-shouldered fellow, a regular wretch, in his own mother's words, violent in temper, using his fist as freely as his tongue, driving his tutor away before he could teach him to read, but having no need to be taught to fight, since this art came to him by nature. At sixteen he fled from home to Rennes, where he entered into adventures, quarrels, and challenges, and distinguished himself by strength, courage, and a strong sense of honor.

He quickly took part in the wars of the time, showed his prowess in every encounter, and in the war against Navarre, won the highest honors. At a later date he engaged in the civil wars of Spain, where he headed an army of thirty thousand men. In the end the adventurers who followed him, Burgundian, Picard, Champagnese, Norman, and others, satisfied with their spoils, left him and returned to France. Bertrand had but some fifteen hundred men-at-arms remaining under his command when a great peril confronted him. He was a supporter of Henry of Transtamare, who was favorable to France, and who had made him Constable of Castile. This was not pleasing to Edward III. of England. Don Pedro the Cruel, a king equally despised and detested, had been driven from Castile by the French allies of his brother Henry. Edward III. determined to replace him on the throne, and with this intent sent his son, the Black Prince, with John Chandos, the ablest of the English leaders, and an army of twenty-seven thousand men, into the distracted kingdom.

A fierce battle followed on April 3, 1367. The ill-disciplined soldiers of Henry were beaten and put to rout. Du Guesclin and his men-at-arms alone maintained the fight, with a courage that knew no yielding. In the end they were partly driven back, partly slain. Du Guesclin set his back against a wall, and fought with heroic courage. There were few with him. Up came the Prince of Wales, saw what was doing, and cried,—

"Gentle marshals of France, and you too, Bertrand, yield yourselves to me."

"Yonder men are my foes," exclaimed Don Pedro, who accompanied the prince; "it is they who took from me my kingdom, and on them I mean to take vengeance."

He came near to have ended his career of vengeance then and there. Du Guesclin, incensed at his words, sprang forward and dealt him so furious a blow with his sword as to hurl him fainting to the ground. Then, turning to the prince, the valiant warrior said, "Nathless, I give up my sword to the most valiant prince on earth."

The prince took the sword, and turning to the Captal of Buch, the Navarrese commander, whom Bertrand had years before defeated and captured, bade him keep the prisoner.

"Aha, Sir Bertrand," said the Captal, "you took me at the battle of Cocherel, and to-day I've got you."

"Yes," retorted Bertrand; "but at Cocherel I took you myself, and here you are only my keeper."

Pedro was restored to the throne of Castile,—which he was not long to hold,—and the Prince of Wales returned to Bordeaux, bringing him his prisoner. He treated him courteously enough, but held him in strict captivity, and to Sir Hugh Calverley, who begged that he would release him at a ransom suited to his small estate, he answered,—

"I have no wish for ransom from him. I will have his life prolonged in spite of himself. If he were released he would be in battle again, and always making war."

And so Bertrand remained in captivity, until an event occurred of which the chroniclers give us an entertaining story. It is this event which it is our purpose to relate.

A day came in which the Prince of Wales and his noble companions, having risen from dinner, were amusing themselves with narratives of daring deeds of arms, striking love-passages, and others of the tales with which the barons of that day were wont to solace their leisure. The talk came round to the story of how St. Louis, when captive in Tunis, had been ransomed with fine gold, paid down by weight. At this point the prince spoke, somewhat unthinkingly.

"When a good knight is made prisoner in fair feat of arms," he said, "and sworn to abide prisoner, he should on no account depart without his master's leave. But one should not demand such portion of his substance in ransom as to leave him unable to equip himself again."

The Sire de Lebret, who was friendly to Du Guesclin, answered,—

"Noble sire, be not angry if I relate what I have heard said of you in your absence."

"By my faith," said the prince, "right little should I love follower of mine, sitting at my table, if he heard a word said against my honor and apprised me not of it."

"Sire," answered he of Lebret, "men say that you hold in prison a knight whose name I well know, whom you dare not deliver."

"That is true," broke in Oliver de Clisson; "I have heard the same said."

The prince heard them with a countenance that reddened with anger.

"I know no knight in the world," he declared, "who, if he were my prisoner, I would not put to a fair ransom, according to his ability."

"How, then, do you forget Bertrand du Guesclin?" said Lebret.

The prince doubly changed color on hearing this. He felt himself fairly caught, and, after a minute's indecision, he gave orders that Bertrand should be brought before him.

The knights who went in search found Bertrand talking with his chamberlain, as a relief to his weariness.

"You are come in good time," he said to his visitors, and bade the chamberlain bring wine.

"It is fitting that we should have good and strong wine," said one of the knights, "for we bring you good and pleasant tidings, with the best of good-will."

"The prince has sent us for you," said another. "We think you will be ransomed by the help of the many friends you have in court."

"What say you?" answered Bertrand. "I have not a half-penny to my purse, and owe more than ten thousand livres in this city, which have been lent me since I have been held prisoner here. I cannot well ask more from my friends."

"How have you got rid of so much?" asked one of his visitors.

"I can easily answer for that," said Bertrand, with a laugh. "I have eaten, drunk, given, and played at dice. A little money is soon spent. But that matters not; if once free I shall soon pay it. He who, for my help, lends me the keys of his money, has it in the best of keeping."

"Sir, you are stout-hearted," answered an officer. "It seems to you that everything which you would have must happen."

"By my faith, you are right," said Bertrand, heartily. "In my view a dispirited man is a beaten and discomfited one."

"Surely there is enchantment in your blood," rejoined the officer, "for you seem proof against every shock."

Leaving Bertrand's chamber, they sought that in which was the prince and his companions. The prisoner was dressed in a rough gray coat, and bore himself with manly ease and assurance. The prince laughed pleasantly on seeing him.

"Well, Bertrand, how are you?" he asked.

"Sir, when it shall please you, I may fare better," answered Bertrand, bowing slightly. "Many a day have I heard the rats and mice, but it is long since I have heard the song of birds. I shall hear them when it is your pleasure."

"That shall be when you will, Bertrand," said the prince. "I require you only to swear never to bear arms against me nor these with me, nor to assist Henry of Spain. If you consent to this, we shall set you free, pay your debts, and give ten thousand florins to equip you anew. If you refuse, you shall not go."

"Then, sir," answered Bertrand, proudly, "my deliverance will not come to pass, for before I do this, may I lie chained by the leg in prison while I live. With God's will, I shall never be a reproach to my friends, but shall serve with my whole heart the good king of France, and the noble dukes of Anjou, Berry, Burgundy, and Bourbon, whose subject I have been. But, so please you, worthy prince, suffer me to go. You have held me too long in prison, wrongfully and without cause. Had I been free I had intended to go from France, to work out my salvation by fighting the Saracens."

"Why, then, went you not straight, without stopping?" asked the prince.

"I will tell you," exclaimed Bertrand, in a loud and fierce tone. "We found Peter,—the curse of God confound him!—who had long since thrice falsely murdered his noble queen, who was of the royal blood of France and your own cousin. I stopped to take revenge for her, and to help Henry, whom I believe to be the rightful king of Spain. But you, through pride and covetousness of gold and silver, came to Spain, thinking to have the throne after the death of Peter. In this you injured your own blood and troubled me and my people, ruined your friends and famished your army, and for what? After all this, Peter has deceived you by cheating and trickery, for he has not kept faith nor covenant with you. But for this, by my soul and faith, I thank him heartily."

These bold words were listened to by the prince with a changeful face. Seldom had he heard the truth spoken so bluntly, or with such firm composure in the speaker. When he had ceased, the prince rose, and with a somewhat bitter laugh declared that, on his soul, Bertrand had spoken but the truth. The barons around repeated the same among themselves, and, fixing their eyes on Bertrand, said,—"A brave fellow, the Breton."

"Whether this be truth or no, Bertrand," continued the prince, "you have rejected my offer, and shall not escape without a good ransom. It vexes me to let you go at all, for your king has none like you; but as men say that I keep you prisoner because I fear you, you shall go free on payment of sufficient ransom. Men shall learn that I neither fear nor care for you."

"Sir, I thank you," said Bertrand. "But I am a poor knight of little name and small means. What estate I have is deeply mortgaged for the purchase of war-horses, and I owe besides in this town full ten thousand florins. I pray you, therefore, to be moderate, and deliver me."

"Where will you go, fair sir?" asked the prince.

"Where I may regain my loss," answered Bertrand. "More than that, I say not."

"Consider, then," said the prince, "what ransom you will give me. What sum you name shall be enough for me."

"I trust you will not stoop to retract your meaning," rejoined Bertrand. "And since you are content to refer it to my pleasure, I ought not to value myself too low. So I will give and engage for my freedom one hundred thousand double golden florins."

These words roused the greatest surprise and excitement in the room. Many of those present started, and the prince changed color, as he looked around at his knights.

"Does he mean to make game of me, that he offers such a sum?" asked the prince. "I would gladly free him for the quarter."

Then, turning again to Bertrand, who stood with impassive countenance, he said,—

"Bertrand, neither can you pay, nor do I wish such a sum. So consider again."

"Sir," answered Bertrand, with grave composure, "since you wish not so much, I place myself at sixty thousand double florins; you shall not have less, if you but discharge me."

"Be it so," said the prince. "I agree to it."

Then Bertrand looked round him with glad eyes, and drew up his form with proud assurance.

"Sir," he said, "Prince Henry may truly vaunt that he will die king of Spain, cost him what it may, if he but lend me half my ransom, and the king of France the other. If I can neither go nor send to these two, I will get all the spinstresses in France to spin it, rather than that I should remain longer in your hands."

"What sort of man is this?" said the prince, aside to his lords. "He is startled by nothing, either in act or thought; no more than if he had all the gold in the world. He has set himself at sixty thousand double florins, when I would have willingly accepted ten thousand."

The barons talked among one another, lost in astonishment. Bertrand stood aside, his eyes fixed quietly upon the prince.

"Am I then at liberty?" he asked.

"Whence shall the money come?" queried Chandos.

"Trust me to find it," said Bertrand. "I have good friends."

"By my faith," answered Chandos, heartily, "you have one of them here. If you need my help, thus much I say: I will lend you ten thousand."

"You have my thanks," answered Bertrand. "But before accepting your offer, I will try the people of my own country."

The confidence of the gallant soldier was not misplaced. Part of the sum was raised among his Breton friends, and King Charles V. of France lent him thirty thousand Spanish doubloons. In the beginning of 1368 the Prince of Wales set him at liberty.

The remaining story of the life of Du Guesclin is a stirring and interesting one. War was the only trade he knew, and he plunged boldly into it. First he joined the Duke of Anjou, who was warring in Provence against Queen Joan of Naples. Then he put his sword again at the service of Henry of Transtamare, who was at war once more with Pedro the Cruel, and whom he was soon to dethrone and slay with his own hand. But shortly afterwards war broke out again between France and England, and Charles V. summoned Du Guesclin to Paris.

The king's purpose was to do the greatest honor to the poor but proud soldier. He offered him the high office of Constable of France,—commander-in-chief of the army and the first dignitary under the crown. Du Guesclin prayed earnestly to be excused, but the king insisted, and he in the end felt obliged to yield. The poor Breton had now indeed risen to high estate. The king set him beside himself at table, showed him the deepest affection, and showered on him gifts and estates. His new wealth the free-handed soldier dispensed lavishly, giving numerous and sumptuous dinners, where, says his poet chronicler,—

"At Bertrand's plate gazed every eye, So massive, chased so gloriously."

This plate proved a slippery possession. More than once he pledged it, and in the end sold great part of it, to pay "without fail the knights and honorable fighting-men of whom he was the leader."

The war roused a strong spirit of nationality through France. Towns, strongholds, and castles were everywhere occupied and fortified. The English marched through the country, but found no army in the field, no stronghold that was to be had without a hard siege. Du Guesclin adopted the waiting policy, and kept to it firmly against all opposition of lord or prince. It was his purpose to let the English scatter and waste themselves in a host of small operations and petty skirmishes. For eight years the war continued, with much suffering to France, with no gain to England. In 1373 an English army landed at Calais, which overran nearly the whole of France without meeting a French army or mastering a French fortress, while incessantly harassed by detached parties of soldiers. On returning, of the thirty thousand horses with which they had landed, "they could not muster more than six thousand at Bordeaux, and had lost full a third of their men and more. There were seen noble knights who had great possessions in their own country, toiling along afoot, without armor, and begging their bread from door to door without getting any." Such were the happy results for France of the Fabian policy of the Constable Du Guesclin.

A truce was at length signed, that both parties might have time to breathe. Soon afterwards, on June 8, 1376, the Black Prince died, and in June of the following year his father, Edward III., followed him to the tomb, and France was freed from its greatest foes. During his service as constable, Bertrand had recovered from English hands the provinces of Poitou, Guienne, and Auvergne, and thus done much towards the establishment of a united France.

Du Guesclin was not long to survive his great English enemies. The king treated him unjustly, and he threw up his office of constable, declaring that he would seek Spain and enter the service of Henry of Castile. This threat brought the king to his senses. He sent the Dukes of Anjou and Bourbon to beg Du Guesclin to retain his office. The indignant soldier yielded to their persuasions, accepted again the title of Constable of France, and died four days afterwards, on July 13, 1380. He had been sent into Languedoc to suppress disturbances and brigandage, provoked by the harsh government of the Duke of Anjou, and in this service fell sick while besieging Chateauneuf-Randon, in the Gevandan, a fortress then held by the English. He died at sixty-six years of age, with his last words exhorting the captains around him "never to forget that, in whatsoever country they might be making war, churchmen, women, children, and the poor people were not their enemies."

He won victory even after his death, so say the chronicles of that day. It is related that an agreement had been made for the surrender of the besieged fortress, and that the date fixed was July 14, the day after Du Guesclin died. The new commander of the army summoned the governor to surrender, but he declared that he had given his word to Du Guesclin, and would yield the place to no other. He was told that the constable was dead.

"Very well;" he replied, "I will carry the keys of the town to his tomb."

And so he did. He marched out of the place at the head of his garrison, passed through the lines of the besieging army, knelt before Du Guesclin's corpse, and laid the keys of Chateauneuf-Randon on his bier.

And thus passed away one of the greatest and noblest warriors France had ever known, honored in life and triumphant in death.



JOAN OF ARC, THE MAID OF ORLEANS.

At the hour of noon, on a sunny summer's day in the year of our Lord 1425, a young girl of the little village of Domremy, France, stood with bent head and thoughtful eyes in the small garden attached to her father's humble home. There was nothing in her appearance to attract a second glance. Her parents were peasants, her occupation was one of constant toil, her attire was of the humblest, her life had been hitherto spent in aiding her mother at home or in driving her father's few sheep afield. None who saw her on that day could have dreamed that this simple peasant maiden was destined to become one of the most famous women whose name history records, and that this day, was that of the beginning of her career.

She had been born at a critical period in history. Her country was in extremity. For the greater part of a century the dreadful "Hundred Years' War" had been waged, desolating France, destroying its people by the thousands, bringing it more and more under the dominion of a foreign foe. The realm of France had now reached its lowest depth of disaster, its king uncrowned, its fairest regions overrun,—here by the English, there by the Burgundians,—the whole kingdom in peril of being taken and reduced to vassalage. Never before nor since had the need of a deliverer been so vitally felt. The deliverer chosen of heaven was the young peasant girl who walked that summer noon in her father's humble garden at Domremy.

Young as she was, she had seen the horrors of war. Four years before the village had been plundered and burnt, its defenders slain or wounded, the surrounding country devastated. The story of the suffering and peril of France was in all French ears. Doubtless little Joan's soul burned with sympathy for her beloved land as she moved thoughtfully up and down the garden paths, asking herself if God could longer permit such wrongs and disasters to continue.

Suddenly, to her right, in the direction of the small village church, Joan heard a voice calling her, and, looking thither, she was surprised and frightened at seeing a great light. The voice, continued; her courage returned; "it was a worthy voice," she tells us, one that could come only from angels. "I saw them with my bodily eyes," she afterwards said. "When they departed from me I wept and would fain have had them take me with them." Again and again came to her the voices and the forms; they haunted her; and still the burden of their exhortation was the same, that she should "go to France to deliver the kingdom." The girl grew dreamy. She became lost in meditation, full of deep thoughts and budding purposes, wrought by the celestial voices into high hopes and noble aspirations, possessed with the belief that she had been chosen by heaven to deliver France from its woes and to disconcert its enemies.

The times were fitting for such a conception. Two forces ruled mens' minds,—ambition and trust in the supernatural. The powerful depended upon their own arms for aid; the weak and miserable turned to Christ and the Virgin for support; there were those who looked to see God in bodily person; His angels and ministers were thought to deal directly with man; it was an age in which force and fraud alike were dominant, in which men were governed in their bodies by the sword, in their souls by their belief in and dread of the supernatural, and in which enthusiasm had higher sway than thought. It was enthusiastic belief in her divine mission that moved Joan of Arc. It was trust in her as God's agent of deliverance that filled the soul of France with new spirit, and unnerved her foes with enfeebling fears. Joan's mission and her age were well associated. In the nineteenth century she would have been covered with ridicule; in the fifteenth she led France to victory.

Three years passed away. Joan's faith in her mission had grown with the years. Some ridiculed, many believed her. The story of her angelic voices was spreading. At length came the event that moved her to action. The English laid siege to Orleans, the most important city in the kingdom after Paris and Rouen. If this were lost, all might be lost. Some of the bravest warriors of France fought in its defence; but the garrison was weak, the English were strong, their works surrounded the walls; daily the city was more closely pressed; unless relieved it must fall.

"I must go to raise the siege of Orleans," said Joan to Robert de Baudricourt, commander of Vaucouleurs, with whom she had gained speech. "I will go, should I have to wear off my legs to the knee."

"I must be with the king before the middle of Lent," she said later to John of Metz, a knight serving with Baudricourt; "for none in the world, nor kings, nor dukes, nor daughter of the Scottish king can recover the kingdom of France; there is no help but in me. Assuredly I would far rather be spinning beside my poor mother, for this other is not my condition; but I must go and do my work because my Lord wills that I should do it."

"Who is your Lord?" asked John of Metz.

"The Lord God."

"By my faith," cried the knight, as he seized her hands. "I will take you to the king, God helping. When will you set out?"

"Rather now than to-morrow; rather to-morrow than later," said Joan.

On the 6th of March, 1429, the devoted girl arrived at Chinon, in Touraine, where the king then was. She had journeyed nearly a hundred and fifty leagues, through a country that was everywhere a theatre of war, without harm or insult. She was dressed in a coat of mail, bore lance and sword, and had a king's messenger and an archer as her train. This had been deemed necessary to her safety in those distracted times.

Interest and curiosity went before her. Baudricourt's letters to the king had prepared him for something remarkable. Certain incidents which happened during Joan's journey, and which were magnified by report into miracles, added to the feeling in her favor. The king and his council doubted if it were wise to give her an audience. That a peasant girl could succor a kingdom in extremity seemed the height of absurdity. But something must be done. Orleans was in imminent danger. If it were taken, the king might have to fly to Spain or Scotland. He had no money. His treasury, it is said, held only four crowns. He had no troops to send to the besieged city. Drowning men catch at straws. The people of Orleans had heard of Joan and clamored for her; with her, they felt sure, would come superhuman aid. The king consented to receive her.

It was the 9th of March, 1429. The hour was evening. Candles dimly lighted the great hall of the king's palace at Chinon, in which nearly three hundred knights were gathered. Charles VII., the king, was among them, distinguished by no mark or sign, more plainly dressed than most of those around him, standing retired in the throng.

Joan was introduced. The story—in which we cannot put too much faith—says that she walked straight to the king through the crowd of showily-dressed lords and knights, though she had never seen him before, and said, in quiet and humble tones,—

"Gentle dauphin" (she did not think it right to call him king until he had been crowned), "my name is Joan the maid; the King of Heaven sendeth you word by me that you shall be anointed and crowned in the city of Rheims, and shall be lieutenant of the King of Heaven, who is king of France. It is God's pleasure that our enemies, the English, should depart to their own country; if they depart not, evil will come to them, and the kingdom is sure to continue yours."

What followed is shrouded in doubt. Some say that Joan told Charles things that none but himself had known. However this be, the king determined to go to Poitiers and have this seeming messenger from Heaven questioned strictly as to her mission, by learned theologians of the University of Paris there present.

"In the name of God," said Joan, "I know that I shall have rough work there, but my Lord will help me. Let us go, then, for God's sake."

They went. It was an august and learned assembly into which the unlettered girl was introduced, yet for two hours she answered all their questions with simple earnestness and shrewd wit.

"In what language do the voices speak to you?" asked Father Seguin, the Dominican, "a very sour man," says the chronicle.

"Better than yours," answered Joan. The doctor spoke a provincial dialect.

"Do you believe in God?" he asked, sharply.

"More than you do," answered Joan, with equal sharpness.

"Well," he answered, "God forbids belief in you without some sign tending thereto; I shall not give the king advice to trust men-at-arms to you and put them in peril on your simple word."

"In the name of God," replied Joan, "I am not come to Poitiers to show signs. Take me to Orleans and I will give you signs of what I am sent for. Let me have ever so few men-at-arms given me and I will go to Orleans."

For a fortnight the questioning was continued. In the end the doctors pronounced in Joan's favor. Two of them were convinced of her divine mission. They declared that she was the virgin foretold in ancient prophecies, notably in those of Merlin. All united in saying that "there had been discovered in her naught but goodness, humility, devotion, honesty, and simplicity."

Charles decided. The Maid should go to Orleans. A suit of armor was made to fit her. She was given the following of a war-chief. She had a white banner made, which was studded with lilies, and bore on it a figure of God seated on clouds and bearing a globe, while below were two kneeling angels, above were the words "Jesu Maria." Her sword she required the king to provide. One would be found, she said, marked with five crosses, behind the altar in the chapel of St. Catharine de Fierbois, where she had stopped on her arrival in Chinon. Search was made, and the sword was found.

And now five weeks were passed in weary preliminaries, despite the fact that Orleans pleaded earnestly for succor. Joan had friends at court, but she had powerful enemies, whose designs her coming had thwarted, and it was they who secretly opposed her plans. At length, on the 27th of April, the march to Orleans began.

On the 29th the army of relief arrived before the city. There were ten or twelve thousand men in the train, guarding a heavy convoy of food. The English covered the approach to the walls, the only unguarded passage being beyond the Loire, which ran by the town. To the surprise and vexation of Joan her escort determined to cross the stream.

"Was it you," she asked Dunois, who had left the town to meet her, "who gave counsel for making me come hither by this side of the river, and not the direct way, over there where Talbot and the English are?"

"Yes; such was the opinion of the wisest captains," he replied.

"In the name of God, the counsel of my Lord is wiser than yours. You thought to deceive me, and you have deceived yourselves, for I am bringing you the best succor that ever had knight, or town, or city, and that is, the good-will of God and succor from the King of Heaven; not, assuredly, for love of me; it is from God only that it proceeds."

She wished to remain with the troops until they could enter the city, but Dunois urged her to cross the stream at once, with such portion of the convoy as the boats might convey immediately.

"Orleans would count it for naught," he said, "if they received the victuals without the Maid."

She decided to go, and crossed the stream with two hundred men-at-arms and part of the supplies. At eight o'clock that evening she entered the city, on horseback, in full armor, her banner preceding her, beside her Dunois, behind her the captains of the garrison and several of the most distinguished citizens. The population hailed her coming with shouts of joy, crowding on the procession, torch in hand, so closely that her banner was set on fire. Joan made her horse leap forward with the skill of a practised horseman, and herself extinguished the flame.

It was a remarkable change in her life. Three years before, a simple peasant child, she had been listening to the "voices" in her father's garden at Domremy. Now, the associate of princes and nobles, and the last hope of the kingdom, she was entering a beleaguered city at the head of an army, amid the plaudits of the population, and followed by the prayers of France. She was but seventeen years old, still a mere girl, yet her coming had filled her countrymen with hope and depressed their foes with dread. Such was the power of religious belief in that good mediaeval age.

The arrival of the Maid was announced to the besiegers by a herald, who bore a summons from her to the English, bidding them to leave the land and give up the keys of the cities which they had wrongfully taken, under peril of being visited by God's judgment. They detained and threatened to burn the herald, as a warning to Joan, the sorceress, as they deemed her. Yet such was their terror that they allowed the armed force still outside the city to enter unmolested, through their intrenchments.

The warning Joan had sent them by herald she now repeated in person, mounting a bastion and bidding the English, in a loud voice, to begone, else woe and shame would come upon them.

The commandant of the bastille opposite, Sir William Gladesdale, answered with insults, bidding her to go back and mind her cows, and saying that the French were miscreants.

"You speak falsely!" cried Joan; "and in spite of yourselves shall soon depart hence; many of your people shall be slain; but as for you, you shall not see it."

Nor did he; he was drowned a few days afterwards, a shot from Orleans destroying a drawbridge on which he stood, with many companions.

What succeeded we may tell briefly. Inspired by the intrepid Maid, the besieged boldly attacked the British forts, and took them one after another. The first captured was that of St. Loup, which was carried by Joan and her troops, despite the brave defence of the English. The next day, the 6th of May, other forts were assailed and taken, the men of Orleans, led by Joan, proving irresistible. The English would not face her in the open field, and under her leadership the French intrepidly stormed their ramparts.

A memorable incident occurred during the assault on the works south of the city. Here Joan seized a scaling ladder, and was mounting it herself when an arrow struck and wounded her. She was taken aside, her armor removed, and she herself pulled out the arrow, though with some tears and signs of faintness. Her wound being dressed, she retired into a vineyard to rest and pray. Discouraged by her absence, the French began to give way. The captains ordered the retreat to be sounded.

"My God, we shall soon be inside," cried Joan to Dunois. "Give your people a little rest; eat and drink."

In a short time she resumed her arms, mounted her horse, ordered her banner to be displayed, and put herself at the head of the storming party. New courage inspired the French; the English, who had seen her fall, and were much encouraged thereby, beheld her again in arms with superstitious dread. Joan pressed on; the English retreated; the fort was taken without another blow. Back to Orleans marched the triumphant Maid, the people wild with joy. All through the night the bells rang out glad peals, and the Te Deum was chanted. Much reason had they for joy: Orleans was saved.

It was on a Saturday that these events had taken place. At daybreak of the next day, Sunday, May 8, the English advanced to the moats of the city as if to offer battle. Some of the French leaders wished to accept their challenge, but Joan ran to the city gates, and bade them desist "for the love and honor of holy Sunday."

"It is God's good-will and pleasure," she said, "that they be allowed to get them gone if they be minded to go away; if they attack you, defend yourselves boldly; you will be the masters."

An altar was raised at her suggestion; mass was celebrated, and hymns of thanksgiving chanted. While this was being done, the English turned and marched away, with banners flying. Their advance had been an act of bravado.

"See," cried Joan, "are the English turning to you their faces, or verily their backs? Let them go; my Lord willeth not that there be any fighting this day; you shall have them another time."

Her words were true; the English were in full retreat; the siege of Orleans was raised. So hastily had they gone that they had left their sick and many of their prisoners behind, while the abandoned works were found to be filled with provisions and military supplies. The Maid had fulfilled her mission. France was saved.

History contains no instance to match this. A year before, Joan of Arc, a low-born peasant girl, had occupied herself in tending sheep and spinning flax; her hours of leisure being given to dreams and visions. Now, clad in armor and at the head of an army, she was gazing in triumph on the flight of a hostile army, driven from its seemingly assured prey by her courage, intrepidity, and enthusiasm, while veteran soldiers obeyed her commands, experienced leaders yielded to her judgment. Never had the world seen its like. The Maid of Orleans had made her name immortal.

Three days afterward Joan was with the king, at Tours. She advanced to meet him with her banner in her hand, her head uncovered, and making a deep obeisance over her horse's head. Charles met her with the deepest joy, taking off his cap and extending his hand, while his face beamed with warm gratitude.

She urged him to march at once against his flying enemies, and to start without delay for Rheims, there to be crowned, that her mission might be fulfilled.

"I shall hardly last more than a year," she said, with prophetic insight; "we must think of working right well this year, for there is much to do."

Charles hesitated; hesitation was natural to him. He had many advisers who opposed Joan's counsel. There were no men, no money, for so great a journey, they said. Councils were held, but nothing was decided on. Joan grew impatient and impetuous. Many supported her. Great lords from all parts of France promised their aid. One of these, Guy de Laval, thus pictures the Maid:

"It seems a thing divine to look on her and listen to her. I saw her mount on horseback, armed all in white armor, save her head, and with a little axe in her hand, on a great black charger, which, at the door of her quarters, was very restive and would not let out her mount. Then said she, 'Lead him to the cross,' which was in front of the neighboring church, on the road. There she mounted him without his moving, and as if he were tied up; and turning towards the door of the church, which was very nigh at hand, she said, in quite a womanly voice, 'You priests and churchmen, make procession and prayers to God!' Then she resumed her road, saying, 'Push forward, push forward!'"

Push forward it was. The army was infected with her enthusiasm, irresistible with belief in her. On the 10th of June she led them to the siege of the fortified places which lay around Orleans. One by one they fell. On Sunday, June 12, Jargeau was taken. Beaugency next fell. Nothing could withstand the impetuosity of the Maid and her followers, Patay was assailed.

"Have you good spurs?" she asked her captains.

"Ha! must we fly, then!" they demanded.

"No, surely; but there will be need to ride boldly; we shall give a good account of the English, and our spurs will serve us famously in pursuing them."

The French attacked, by order of Joan.

"In the name of God, we must fight," she said. "Though the English were suspended from the clouds, we should have them, for God has sent us to punish them. The gentle king shall have to-day the greatest victory he has ever had; my counsel has told me that they are ours."

Her voices counselled well. The battle was short, the victory decisive. The English were put to flight; Lord Talbot, their leader, was taken.

"Lord Talbot, this is not what you expected this morning," said the Duke d'Alencon.

"It is the fortune of war," answered Talbot, coolly.

Joan returned to the king and demanded that they should march instantly for Rheims. He hesitated still. His counsellors advised delay. The impatient Maid left the court and sought the army. She was mistress of the situation. The king and his court were obliged to follow her. On June 29 the army, about twelve thousand strong, began the march to Rheims.

There were obstacles on the road, but all gave way before her. The strong town of Troyes, garrisoned by English and Burgundians, made a show of resistance; but when her banner was displayed, and the assault began, she being at the head of the troops, the garrison lost heart and surrendered. On went the army, all opposition vanishing. On the 16th of July, King Charles entered Rheims. The coronation was fixed for the following day. "Make good use of my time," Joan repeated to the king, "for I shall hardly last longer than a year."

In less than three months she had driven the English from before Orleans, captured from them city after city, raised the sinking cause of France into a hopeful state, and now had brought the prince to be crowned in that august cathedral which had witnessed the coronation of so many kings. On the 17th the ceremony took place with much grandeur and solemnity. Joan rode between Dunois and the Archbishop of Rheims, while the air rang with the acclamations of the immense throng.

"I have accomplished that which my Lord commanded me to do," said Joan, "to raise the siege of Orleans and have the gentle king crowned. I should like it well if it should please Him to send me back to my father and mother, to keep their sheep and their cattle and do that which was my wont."

It would have been well for her if she had done so, for her future career was one of failure and misfortune. She kept in arms at the king's desire. In September she attacked Paris, and was defeated, she herself being pierced through the thigh with an arrow. It was her first repulse. During the winter we hear little of her. Her family was ennobled by royal decree, and the district of Domremy made free from all tax or tribute. In the spring the enemy attacked Compiegne. Joan threw herself into the town to save it. She had not been there many hours when, in a sortie, the French were repulsed. Joan and some of her followers remained outside fighting, while the drawbridge was raised and the portcullis dropped by the frightened commandant. The Burgundians crowded around her. Twenty of them surrounded her horse. One, a Picard archer, "a tough fellow and mighty sour," seized her and flung her to the ground. She was a prisoner in their hands.

The remaining history of Joan of Arc presents a striking picture of the character of the age. It is beyond our purpose to give it. It will suffice to say that she was tried by the English as a sorceress, dealt with unfairly in every particular, and in the end, on May 30, 1431, was burned at the stake. Even as the flames rose she affirmed that the voices which she had obeyed came from God. Her voice was raised in prayer as death approached, the last word heard from her lips being "Jesus!"

"Would that my soul were where I believe the soul of that woman is!" cried two of her judges, on seeing her die.

And Tressart, secretary to Henry VI. of England, said, on his return from the place of execution, "We are all lost; we have burned a saint!"

A saint she was, an inspired one. She died, but France was saved.



THE CAREER OF A KNIGHT-ERRANT.

Mediaeval history would be of greatly reduced interest but for its sprightly stories of knights and their doings. In those days when men, "clad in complete steel," did their fighting with spear, sword, and battle-axe, and were so enamoured of hard blows and blood-letting that in the intervals of war they spent their time seeking combat and adventure, much more of the startling and romantic naturally came to pass than can be looked for in these days of the tyranny of commerce and the dominion of "villanous saltpetre." This was the more so from the fact that enchanters, magicians, demons, dragons, and all that uncanny brood, the creation of ignorance and fancy, made knighthood often no sinecure, and men's haunting belief in the supernatural were frequently more troublesome to them than their armed enemies. But with this misbegotten crew we have nothing to do. They belong to legend and fiction, not to history, and it is with the latter alone that we are here concerned. But as more than one example has been given of how knights bore themselves in battle, it behooves us to tell something of the doings of a knight-errant, one of those worthy fellows who went abroad to prove their prowess in single combat, and win glory in the tournament at spear's point.

Such a knight was Jacques de Lelaing, "the good knight without fear and without doubt," as his chroniclers entitle him, a Burgundian by birth, born in the chateau of Lelaing early in the fifteenth century. Jacques was well brought up for a knight. Literature was cultivated in Burgundy in those days, and the boy was taught the arts of reading and writing, the accomplishments of French and Latin, and in his later life he employed the pen as well as the sword, and did literary work of which specimens still survive.

In warlike sports he excelled. He was still but a youth when the nephew of Philip the Good of Burgundy (Philip the Bad would have hit the mark more nearly) carried him off to his uncle's court to graduate in knighthood. The young adventurer sought the court of Philip well equipped for his new duties, his father, William de Lelaing, having furnished him with four fine horses, a skilful groom, and a no less skilful valet; and also with some good advice, to the effect that, "Inasmuch as you are more noble than others by birth, so should you be more noble than they by virtues," adding that, "few great men have gained renown for prowess and virtue who did not entertain love for some dame or damoiselle."

The latter part of the advice the youthful squire seemed well inclined to accept. He was handsome, gallant, bold, and eloquent, and quickly became a favorite with the fair sex. Nor was he long in gaining an opportunity to try his hand in battle, a squabble having arisen between Philip and a neighboring prince. This at an end, our hero, stirred by his "errant disposition," left Philip's court, eager, doubtless, to win his spurs by dint of battle-axe and blows of blade.

In 1445 he appeared at Nancy, then occupied by the French court, which had escorted thither Margaret of Anjou, who was to be taken to England as bride to Henry VI. The occasion was celebrated by festivals, of which a tournament was the principal feature, and here the Burgundian squire, piqued at some disparaging remarks of the French knights, rode into the lists and declared his purpose to hold them against all comers, challenging the best knight there to unhorse him if he could.

The boastful squire was richly adorned for the occasion, having already made friends among the ladies of the court, and wearing favors and jewels received at the hands of some of the fairest there. Nor was his boast an empty one. Not a man who faced him was able to hurl him from the saddle, while many of them left the lists with bruised bodies or broken bones.

"What manner of man will this be," said the onlookers, "who as a boy is so firm of seat and strong of hand?"

At the banquet which followed Jacques was as fresh and gay as if newly risen from sleep, and his conquests among the ladies were as many as he had won among the knights. That night he went to his couch the owner of a valuable diamond given him by the Duchess of Orleans, and of a ring set with a precious ruby, the gift of the Duchess of Calabria. Verily, the squire of Burgundy had made his mark.

The end of the year found our bold squire in Antwerp. Here, in the cathedral of Notre Dame, he met an arrogant Sicilian knight named Bonifazio, whose insolent bearing annoyed him. The Sicilian wore on his left leg a golden fetter-ring fastened by a chain of gold to a circlet above his knee, while his shield bore the defiant motto, "Who has fair lady, let him look to her well."

Jacques looked at the swaggering fellow, liked his bearing but little, and touched his shield by way of challenge, saying, "Thine is an impertinent device."

"And thou art but a sorry squire, though with assurance enough for a tried knight," answered the Sicilian.

"That is to prove," said Jacques, defiantly. "If my master, Duke Philip, will give me leave to fight, thou durst not deny me, being, as we are, on his Grace's territory."

Bonifazio accepted the challenge, and as the duke gave consent, a battle between squire and knight was arranged, Ghent being the chosen place of combat.

Two days it lasted, the first day's fight being a sort of horseback prelude to the main combat. In this the squire bore himself so well against his experienced antagonist, that Duke Philip judged he had fairly won his spurs, and on the next day he was formally made a knight, with the accolade and its attendant ceremonies.

This day the work displayed worthily followed the promising preface. After a preliminary bout with spears, the combatants seized their battle-axes, and hewed at each other with the vigor of two woodmen felling a mighty oak. The edges of the axes being spoiled, the knights drew their well-tempered swords and renewed the combat with the lustihood of the heroes of the Round Table, fighting so fiercely that it was not easy to follow the gleam of the swift-flashing blades. In the end the Burgundian proved himself more than a match for the Sicilian, driving him back, hewing rents in his armor, and threatening him with speedy death. At this stage of the affray Duke Philip, at the request of the Duke of Orleans, flung his truncheon into the lists and ended the fight, in time to save the Sicilian knight.

His signal victory won Sir Jacques much fame. His antagonist was a man of mark, and the Burgundian knight gained from his prowess the appellation of "The Good Knight," which he maintained throughout his career. He now determined to take up the profession of knight-errant, travelling from court to court, and winning smiles and fame wherever lists were set up or men of prowess could be found. But first he sought his home and the approval of his parents.

"Go on thy way, with God's blessing," said his stout sire, who had cracked skulls in his day and was proud of his doughty son.

"Yes, go on thy way, Jacques," said his mother in milder tone, and with moist eyes. "I have put a healing ointment in thy valise, that will cure bruises. If thou shouldst break a bone, Heaven send thee a skilful surgeon."

Into France rode Sir Jacques, well mounted, and with squire and page in his train, in search of adventures and opponents, eager for fame and profit. From his left arm, fastened by a chain of gold, hung a splendid helmet, which he offered as a prize to any knight who could overcome him in single combat. To this he added a diamond, which he agreed to present to any lady whom his victor should name. Whoever should first drop his axe in the combat was to bestow a bracelet on his opponent. To this Jacques added a singular stipulation, significant of queer doings in those days, that neither knight should be fastened to his saddle. For all else, he put his trust in God and his own right arm, and in the aid that came to him from the love of "the fair lady who had more power over him than aught besides throughout the entire world."

Thus prepared and thus defying, Sir Jacques rode through Paris and the other cities of France without meeting a knight ready to accept his challenge. This was due to the king, however, rather than to his knights; Charles VII. had forbidden any of his chevaliers to fight the bold Burgundian, the fame of whose strength and prowess was already wide-spread. Through southern France, then in the hands of the English, rode our hero, with the same fortune. Many were ready to meet him at the board, none in the field. Into Spain he passed on, still without an adversary, and sore in temper despite his pride in his reputation.

At last, in the realm of the Dons, he found a knight ready to break lances with him in the field, out of pure duty to his "much loved lady," as he affirmed. This was Don Diego de Guzman, grand master of Calatrava, whom he met on the borders of Castile, and who at once accepted his challenge. Yet single combat in those days was not quite the easy affair we might imagine it, if we judged from fiction and legend. Before a knight could indulge in mortal affray he was obliged to obtain the consent of his sovereign, provided that peace ruled between his country and that of his antagonist, as was the case between Spain and Burgundy. The king of Spain was absent. An answer could not be had immediately. While awaiting it, Sir Jacques rode into Portugal, followed by a splendid retinue, and offered an open challenge to the knights of that kingdom to take the field against him.

His ride was almost a royal procession. The story of his one combat seemed to have gained Jacques world-wide fame. From the frontier to Lisbon he was met with a continuous ovation, and in the capital, where a ball was given in his honor, he was invited to open the dance with the queen for partner. And so it went,—an abundance of merry-making, unlimited feasting and dancing, but no fighting. Sir Jacques grew melancholy. He pleaded with King Alphonso.

"I have had a turn in the dance with your queen," he said; "now let me have a tourney with your knights."

"Burgundy is my good friend," answered the king, "and Heaven forbid that a knight from that court should be roughly treated by any knights of mine."

"By all the saints, I defy the best of them!" cried the irate knight.

"And so let it rest," said Alphonso, placably. "Ride back to Castile, and do thy worst upon Guzman's hard head and strong ribs."

There being nothing better to do, Jacques complied, and made his way to Valladolid, having learned that the king of Spain had graciously consented to the combat. The 3d of February, 1447, was the day which had been fixed for the battle between the two knights, "for the grace of God and the love of their ladies," and on the advent of that day the city named was so crowded with sport-loving Spaniards that its streets were barely passable. A great day in the history of knight-errantry was promised, and gentles and simples, lords and ladies alike, were anxious to see the spectacle.

When the morning of the eventful day dawned all was bustle and excitement in Valladolid, and multitudes gathered at the lists. The Burgundian was on the ground and ready by ten o'clock, but it was three before Don Guzman appeared, and then he came armed with an axe so portentously long in the handle that the Spanish umpires themselves, anxious as they were for his success, forbade its use. Yet the truculent Don gave them no small trouble before he would consent to choose another. This done, the knights were conducted to their tents, which they were not to leave till the clarions had thrice sounded the signal of battle.

Don Guzman, however, proved inconveniently brave and eager. At the first trumpet blast out he sprang, and muttered fiercely when ordered back. The second blast brought him out again, and this time the king himself sent him back "with an ugly word." The third blast sounded. Out now flew both combatants. Battle-axe in hand, they made at each other, and soon the ring of axe on helmet delighted the ardent souls of the thousands of lookers-on. At length, Diego's axe was hurled from his hand. Jacques, with knightly courtesy, threw down his, and an interval of wrestling for the mastery followed. Then they drew their swords, and assailed each other with undiminished fierceness. What might have been the result it is not easy to say; Sir Jacques had no carpet knight to deal with in Don Diego; but the king ended the business by throwing his truncheon into the lists, and refusing permission to the combatants to finish their fight on horseback, as they wished. They thereupon shook hands, while the air rang with the shouts of the spectators.