: Lucy Foster Madison
: Joan of Arc The Warrior Maid
: OTB eBook publishing
: 9783962726522
: 1
: CHF 1.80
:
: Altertum
: English
: 259
: kein Kopierschutz
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
Excerpt: In presenting this story for the young the writer has endeavored to give a vivid and accurate life of Jeanne D’Arc (Joan of Arc) as simply told as possible. There has been no pretence toward keeping to the speech of the Fifteenth Century, which is too archaic to be rendered literally for young readers, although for the most part the words of the Maid have been given verbatim. The name of this wonderful girl has been variously written. In the Fifteenth Century the name of the beloved disciple was preferred for children above all others; so we find numerous Jeans and Jeannes. To render these holy names more in keeping with the helplessness of little ones the diminutive forms of Jeannot and Jeannette were given them. So this girl was named Jeannette, or Jehannette in the old spelling, and so she was called in her native village. By her own account this was changed to Jeanne when she came into France. The English translation of Jeanne D’Arc is Joan of Arc; more properly it should be Joanna. Because it seems more beautiful to her than the others the writer has retained the name of Jeanne in her narrative.

CHAPTER II


The Knight’s Story


“By a Woman Shall France Be Lost; By a Maid Shall
It Be Redeemed.”

Old Prophecy.Merlin, The Magician.

The house where Jeanne D’Arc lived was a stone cottage with the roof sloping from a height on one side half way to the ground on the other. In front there were but two windows, admitting but a scanty light. Close by the door, as was usual in that country, were piles of faggots and farm tools covered with mud and rust. The enclosure served also as kitchen garden and orchard.

Beyond the cottage, scarce a stone’s throw distant, only separated from it by a small graveyard, stood the village church, and north of both buildings there was a square towered monastery.

A streamlet that flowed down into the Meuse trickled noisily by the cottage and church, dividing them from the other houses of the village. Perhaps it was because of this fact that the24 church seemed to Jeanne to belong more to her and to her family than it did to the other inhabitants of Domremy. Born under its very walls, she was lulled in her cradle by the chime of its bells, and cherished a passionate love for them in her heart. Involuntarily the little girl paused with her hand on the latch to cast a lingering, tender glance at the church before opening the door of the cottage. Before she had crossed the threshold a tall woman, who was stirring the contents of a large iron pot which hung on a tripod before the fire, turned quickly at the sound of her sabots, and seeing that it was Jeanne hastily left her task and drew the maid once more without the door. It was Isabeau Romée,[2] the wife of Jacques D’Arc. In marriage the wife always retained her maiden name, so Jeanne’s mother was always spoken of as Isabeau Romée of Vauthon, her native village. She was mild in manner, but her usual serenity was at this moment disturbed by anxiety.

“Right glad am I that you have come, Jeanne,” she remarked. “Your Gossip Beatrix has been asking for you. She came this afternoon. And but a short time since two men-at-arms came, asking for supper and bed. Gentles they are, who have but escaped from the hands of the Burgundians, having been prisoners for many months. Sup them I will right gladly, but bed them I can not. The house is full. It galls your father that we must refuse them.”

“And why not bed them, mother? Let little Catherine sleep with you, and I can lie upon the floor before the hearth. Then the g