enly voice spoke, no miracle intervened
as her young limbs were tied to the stake and the fagots and straw
piled up about her. The torch was applied, and her pure soul mounted
heavenward in a column of flames.

Rugged men wept. A Burgundian general said, as he turned gloomily
away, "We have murdered a saint."

[Illustration: Burning of Joan of Arc at Rouen, May 30, 1431. From the
painting by Lenepveu.]

And Charles, sitting upon the throne she had rescued for him, what was
he doing to save her? Nothing--to his everlasting shame be it said,
nothing. He might not have succeeded; the effort at rescue, or to stay
the event, might have been unavailing. But where was his knighthood,
where his manhood, that he did not try, or utter passionate protest
against her fate?

Twenty-five years later we see him erecting statues to her memory, and
"rehabilitating" her desecrated name. And to-day, the Church which
condemned her for blasphemy is placing her upon the calendar of saints.

CHAPTER X.

CHARLES VII. in creating a standing army struck feudalism a deadly
blow. His son, Louis XI., with cold-blooded brutality finished the
work. This man's powerful and crafty intelligence saw in an alliance
with the common people a means of absorbing to himself supreme power.
Not since Tiberius had there been a more blood-thirsty monster on a
throne. But he demolished the political structure of mediaevalism in
his kingdom; and when his cruel reign was ended the Middle Ages had
passed away, and modern life had begun in France.

There was no longer even the pretence of knightly virtues in France.
It was time for the high-born robbers and ruffians in steel helmets to
give place to men with hearts and brains. It is said that of those
thousands, that chivalric host, which was slaughtered at Agincourt, not
one in twenty could write his name. All alike were cruel and had the
instincts of barbarians. While the Duke of Burgundy, the richest
prince in Europe, was starving his enemies in secret dungeons in the
Bastille, his Orleans rival, Count of Armagnac, not having access to
the Bastille, was decapitating Burgundians till his executioners
fainted from fatigue.

It is almost with relief that we read of the slaughter of these
knightly savages at Agincourt. If the shipwreck of a mighty kingdom
was to be averted, two things must be done. The decaying corpse of
feudalism must be thrown overboard, and the Church must be purified.