--Donne en la
Chapelle du Manoir archiepiscopal de Rouen, le mardi 29 mai, l'an du
Seigneur 1431, apres la fete de la Trinite de notre Seigneur."

Yet there is not a single mark or inscription to record the fact of
which this lonely and neglected chapel was the scene.]

In the midst of all these machinations the prisoner herself fell ill.
Doctors were hurried to her cell to save her for the vengeance of her
judges, and the "processes of law" were pushed forward more hastily
than ever. On the 2nd of May she was once more confronted with the
accusations made against her, in a long speech by the Archdeacon. She
would add nothing to what had been already said. "Even if I saw the
flames before me I should say what I have already told you, and do
what I have done;" and the clerk writes "Superba Responsio" opposite
the entry.

Determined to leave no means untried to overcome this resistance, her
judges summoned her on Wednesday the 9th of May into the "Grosse Tour
du chateau de Rouen," the donjon which you can visit in the Rouen of
to-day, by turning to the left as you go northward up the Rue
Bouvreuil (see Map D). The room in which Jeanne stood to answer her
accusers has been carefully restored, but it is obscured by the huge
plaster cast of a statue by Mercie. The vaulting is the original work
intact, and on the keystone is carved the oldest existing shield of
the arms of France, the six truncated Fleurs de Lys of Philip
Augustus, which are reproduced more clearly on the huge and lofty cowl
above the chimney. Beneath the floor there is still the old well that
supplied the garrison, a little to the left of the entrance, and
rather further round is the small spiral staircase leading to the
upper rooms, which are not so large.

She was brought here because there was no room in her former prison
for the instruments of torture, and the executioners' gear with which
her courage was finally to be tested. Pierre Cauchon directed the
proceedings, with Lemaitre and nine others, of whom three were members
of the Chapterhouse of Rouen, and one was Massieu the clerk. Besides
these, the ushers and the guard of English soldiers lined the walls.
Here it is recorded how she was threatened with torture "if she did
not avow the truth," and shown the instruments and the officials who
were ready to administer it. I will not attempt to translate the few
words Jeanne d'Arc ever uttered whose echoes we may still imagine
beneath the very roof t