ed him by
assuring him that Joan should not be allowed to escape her fate: 'Do
not fear, my lord,' he said; 'you will catch her yet.'

That evening the Vice-Inquisitor, accompanied by Loiseleur, Thomas de
Courcelles, Isambard de la Pierre, and a few other of the judges who
had taken part in the proceedings that day at Saint Ouen, visited the
prisoner. Their object in going to her was to insist upon her changing
her man's dress, with which demand she now had to comply. That
occurred on Thursday night, and on the Sunday following a rumour was
spread abroad that Joan of Arc had discarded the woman's dress, and
had again put on male dress.

Although, during the last days of the heroine's life, it is most
difficult to gather anything authentic as to her treatment in the
prison, we are led to understand, by the least untrustworthy
testimony, that what happened in the interval between Thursday night
and the following Sunday was as follows.

The soldiers placed in charge of Joan after her recantation and her
return to the prison had rendered her existence a long martyrdom; and
there is reason to believe that on her discarding her man's dress
these ruffians attempted to violate the prisoner: so, sooner than
suffer this, although she knew that to return to her former dress
would be equivalent to meeting certain death, she did not hesitate to
save her maidenhood at the exposure of her life.

Michelet, in his history of the Maid, quotes from the deposition of
one of the officials--Massieu, who saw much of Joan of Arc in those
last days--the statement that on the morning of Trinity Sunday, on
waking, she asked the soldiers to leave her alone for a few moments
while she dressed; that one of the men removed her woman's clothes,
and in place substituted the dress of a man; and that, in order not
to be naked, she was obliged to put on the latter.

Be this as it may, on the following morning, Cauchon, followed by
several of his creatures, returned to the prison, in order that he
might see and show to others that his victim had been entrapped at
last. 'We have come,' he said to the prisoner, 'to find out the state
of your soul, and we find you, in despite of our command, and despite
of your promise to renounce this man's dress, again thus attired. Tell
us the reason why you have dared again to wear these clothes.'

Joan's answer was that she preferred that dress to the other, and
that, being placed among men, it was better that she