them. They then ordered her
"to abjure" publicly the various things of which she was accused. She
did not understand what was required of her. Erard exclaimed that she
must "abjure" or be burnt at once. At last he began to read her
sentence of condemnation. Then, though she was conscious of no evil,
she at last said, "I submit myself to the Church." They hastened to
read over the twelve articles of accusation already given, and the
poor girl agreed to them, promising never to sin again and to submit
herself to the justice of the Church. Massieu read to her a formula
"of some eight lines," according to his testimony afterwards.

There was some murmuring among the crowd during this long ceremony;
for while Jeanne was alive the English soldiery dared attempt nothing
fresh; and they only saw in her refusals to "abjure" an immediate
reason for handing her over from the ecclesiastical justice to the
secular, whose ways were swifter. But merely burning Jeanne would not
have been enough. She had to confess her sins, to disavow her mission,
to be received into the bosom of the Church and pardoned, and
then--_to be discovered in fresh crime_. One of the consequences of
her "abjuration" was that she was wearing woman's dress that very
afternoon. Two days afterwards (on Sunday) the ecclesiastics heard
that she had changed to masculine attire again. They rushed to the
castle to verify the "relapse" they were so ardently expecting, but
the English soldiers drove them out again, being very tired by this
time of their unintelligible delays. On May 28th Pierre Cauchon
questioned her, and she said that if they kept their word, to free her
and let her hear mass, she would keep hers and change her dress, but
that among men a man's dress suited her best.[55] Asked if she had
heard her "voices" again--a deliberate trap to secure the certainty of
proved "relapse"--she replied, "God has told me by Saint Catherine and
Saint Margaret of the pity and the betrayal that I have wrought in
making abjuration to save my life, and that I lost my soul to save my
life." To this the clerk added the fatal comment, "RESPONSIO
MORTIFERA." Jeanne realised now what her "abjuration" had really
meant. The fear that had inspired it had passed, and she boldly
reaffirmed her mission and her faith. It was all her judges needed.
"Farewell," cried Pierre Cauchon to Warwick and his English who waited
in the castle-yard, "be of good cheer, for it is done."

[Footnote