the English King, Nicolas Loyseleur, a canon of Rouen,
and others. One alone of those invited, Nicolas de Houppeville,
objected to serving, because his direct superior, the Archbishop of
Reims, had already disapproved. He was only just saved from being
murdered. No one else dared to differ with Pierre Cauchon, and several
affirmed later on that they had voted in fear of their lives. Both the
clerk of the court, Manchon, and Massieu, the doorkeeper, found their
sympathies too perilous to express. This was because, though scarcely
an Englishman was actually a member of the Court, the English kept the
whole proceeding directly under their thumb, and to every appeal the
same answer was returned--"The King (of England) has ordered it." The
King's two uncles, of Bedford and of Winchester, watched that the
orders were carried out; and the price of every one is still recorded
in the exact account-books of the time. The English never let her
leave their castle till the end, so that any slight "judicial error"
might always be corrected if need were.

They kept her first in an iron cage, then in one of the castle towers,
with irons upon her feet, chained to a log of wood, and guarded night
and day by four common soldiers. On the 9th of January 1431 the Bishop
of Beauvais summoned in Rouen the council chosen for the trial, and
appointed its officials. On the 20th, Jeanne, being summoned to make
her appearance before the court at eight next morning, begged that her
judges might be more fairly chosen, and that she might hear Mass. She
was refused both, and appeared on the 21st, in the chapel of the
castle. Asked to answer truly upon oath all the questions put to her,
Jeanne replied--"I do not know on what points you wish to question
me. You might perhaps ask me things which I will not tell you." After
this she told how she was called "Jeannette" at home, and Jeanne "in
France," and knew no surname; how she was baptised and born at
Domremy, of Jacques d'Arc and his wife Isabel about nineteen years
ago; she refused to promise not to escape if she could; and would only
recite the Lord's Prayer in confession to a priest. After Cauchon had
begun, the next day's questioning was more gently taken by Jean
Beaupere, to whom she told of her care of the house at home, and of
her skill in needlework, "as good as any in Rouen." The inquirers then
went on to reveal the story of her "voices," and she firmly repeated
her refusal to bind herself by