. They carried
one of the gates; Jeanne and her fellow townsmen fired it, and the fire
burned so fiercely that for a week approach on that side was cut off.

On the 9th of July, says the Canon of Beauvais, Jean de Bonneuil, "the
Burgundians began the assault upon the gates of the Hotel-Dieu and of
Bresle, in which assault the women bore (around the walls) the body of
Saint Agadresme, patron saint of Beauvais." But the repulse of this
assault was not to be due to the miraculous intervention of Saint
Agadresme; it was again Jeanne Laisne, now surnamed Hachette, from the
ax she wielded, who saved the city. "It is not to be forgotten,"
continues the chronicler, "that in the said assault, while the
Burgundians were setting up their ladders and mounting upon the walls,
one of the said women of Beauvais, called Jeanne Laisne, did, without
other aid or arm, seize and snatch away from one of the said Burgundians
the standard which he bore and carry it to the church of the Jacobins,
where was the shrine of Saint Agadresme." Jeanne had remained on the
ramparts while the enemy came on to the assault; and as the standard
bearer planted the Burgundian flag in a breach, she smote him with her
ax, so that he fell back into the fosse. Others hurried to her aid, and
repelled once more the disheartened assailants.

Meanwhile, succor had come for Beauvais; at first only a handful of
men-at-arms from Noyon, then at last a large body of troops under the
best leaders in France effected an entrance into the town, and enabled
it to withstand an assault lasting from dawn until noon, in which the
duke sacrificed scores of his men to no purpose. Not till he found his
army too much depleted and discouraged for further offensive operations,
however, did Charles retire from before Beauvais, burning and pillaging
as he marched toward Normandy. On July 22nd the besiegers were gone.

The heroism of Jeanne Hachette, as everyone now called her, had proved
contagious: "All the women of the town, high and low, showed themselves
to be so valiant during this siege that they surpassed in boldness the
men of other towns." It was to the women, so all were willing to admit,
that the preservation of Beauvais had been due; and now it was for
Louis, as well as for the citizens, to make some visible and worthy
acknowledgment of the debt. Louis, who, says Michelet, "in his devout
speculations... often took the saints and Our Lady for partners, keeping
an open accoun