ly more exciting than
any play, and going on endlessly, the excitement always getting stronger
till it became the chief stimulus and occupation of life.

CHAPTER XIII -- THE PUBLIC EXAMINATION. FEBRUARY, 1431.

It was in the chapel of the Castle of Rouen, on the 21st of February,
that the trial of Jeanne was begun. The judges present numbered about
forty, and are carefully classed as doctors in theology, abbots, canons,
doctors in canonical and civil law, with the Bishop of Beauvais at their
head (the archepiscopal see of Rouen being vacant, as is added: but not
that my lord of Beauvais hoped for that promotion). They were assembled
there in all the solemnity of their priestly and professional robes,
the reporters ready with their pens, the range of dark figures forming a
semicircle round the presiding Bishop, when the officer of the court led
in the prisoner, clothed in her worn and war-stained tunic, like a boy,
with her hair cut close as for the helmet, and her slim figure, no doubt
more slim than ever, after her long imprisonment. She had asked to be
allowed to hear mass before coming to the bar, but this was refused. It
was a privilege which she had never failed to avail herself of in her
most triumphant days. Now the chapel--the sanctuary of God contained
for her no sacred sacrifice, but only those dark benches of priests amid
whom she found no responsive countenance, no look of kindness.

Jeanne was addressed sternly by Cauchon, in an exhortation which it is
sad to think was not in Latin, as it appears in the _Proces_. She was
then required to take the oath on the Scriptures to speak the truth, and
to answer all questions addressed to her. Jeanne had already held that
conversation with L'Oyseleur in the prison which Cauchon and Warwick had
listened to in secret with greedy ears, but which Manchon, the honest
reporter, had refused to take down. Perhaps, therefore, the Bishop knew
that the slim creature before him, half boy half girl, was not likely to
be overawed by his presence or questions; but it cannot have been but a
wonder to the others, all gazing at her, the first men in Normandy,
the most learned in Paris, to hear her voice, _assez femme_, young and
clear, arising in the midst of them, "I know not what things I may be
asked," said Jeanne. "Perhaps you may ask me questions which I cannot
answer." The assembly was startled by this beginning.

"Will you swear to answer truly all that concerns the faith