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he provinces south of the Loire. This was the result of opposition to his claim on the part of his mother, Isabeau, who had always hated the Dauphin, and who, in her Treaty of Troyes, set aside her son's rights to the throne, and married his sister Catherine to the King of England, thus securing to their children that succession to the throne which was the lawful right of the Dauphin. France was indeed in the throes of a great crisis, and every remote duchy or tiny village heard rumours of the vast struggle going on in their well loved land, but still the party who were loyal to the Dauphin looked confidently for the day when he should be crowned at Rheims, where French kings for a thousand years had taken oath, although still the opposing party was growing in power and possessions. Quiet little Domremy lying folded in the embrace of its peaceful valley was thrilled by the tales of chance pilgrims passing through the village, who, stopping for a drink of water or a bite of food, would recount to eager listeners the current saying that, "France, lost by a woman,--and that woman, Isabeau, mother of the Dauphin,--should be saved by a maid who would come with arms and armour from an ancient wood." Now, towering high above little Domremy stretches a great forest called the Ancient Wood, and to the village folk there was in all France no other Ancient Wood than this, and so when they heard the travellers' tales they whispered to one another in hushed voices and with awe-stricken faces that the Wonderful Maid of Prophecy was to come from their own midst, but who was she, where was she, and to whom would she reveal herself? Many of these queries came to the ears of children busy near their elders, while they spun and talked, and as Jeanne d'Arc, now grown into a bright intelligent young girl, listened to the prophecy and the questions, all else became of no importance except the plight of France and the restoring of the Dauphin to his rightful inheritance. But to her elders or companions she gave no evidence of this absorption, seeming entirely occupied with her out of door tasks such as tending her father's sheep, helping to harvest grain, or to plough the fields, or at other times with her mother indoors, weaving and spinning,--for there was plenty of work in both house and field to keep all the children busy. In leisure hours Jeanne played and danced and sang as merrily as the other children, who gathered often ar
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