ter excusing himself, said that it meant this: that if
she opposed the said articles she would be burnt; but he advised her to
refer it to the Church universal whether she should abjure or not. Which
thing she did, saying to Erard, 'I refer to the Church universal whether
I should abjure or not.' To which Erard answered, 'You shall abjure at
once or you will be burnt.' Massieu gives further particulars in another
part of the Rehabilitation process. Erard, he says, asked what he was
saying to the prisoner, and he answered that she would sign if the
schedule was read to her; but Jeanne said that she could not write, and
then added that she wished it to be decided by the Church, and ought
not to sign unless that was done: and also required that she should be
placed in the custody of the Church, and freed from the hands of the
English. The same Erard answered that there had been ample delay, and
that if she did not sign at once she should be burned, and forbade
Massieu to say any more."

Meanwhile many cries and entreaties came, as far as they dared, from
the crowd. Some one, in the excitement of the moment, would seem to have
promised that she should be transferred to the custody of the Church.
"Jeanne, why will you die? Jeanne, will you not save yourself?" was
called to her by many a bystander. The girl stood fast, but her heart
failed her in this terrible climax of her suffering. Once she called out
over their heads, "All that I did was done for good, and it was well
to do it:"--her last cry. Then she would seem to have recovered in
some measure her composure. Probably her agitated brain was unable to
understand the formula of recantation which was read to her amid all
the increasing noises of the crowd, but she had a vague faith in the
condition she had herself stated, that the paper should be submitted
to the Church, and that she should at once be transferred to an
ecclesiastical prison. Other suggestions are made, namely, that it was a
very short document upon which she hastily in her despair made a cross,
and that it was a long one, consisting of several pages, which was shown
afterwards with _Jehanne_ scribbled underneath. "In fact," says Massieu,
"she abjured and made a cross with the pen which the witness handed to
her:" he, if any one must have known exactly what happened.

No doubt all this would be imperfectly heard on the other platform.
But the agitation must have been visible enough, the spectators closing