tion of the precepts of Deuteronomy:

"When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim
peace unto it.

"And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee,
then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be
tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.

"And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against
thee, then thou shalt besiege it:

"And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou
shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:

"But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is
in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto
thyself." (Deuteronomy xx, 10-14.)

But at least it is certain that on this occasion the Maid is
expressing her own sentiments. Afterwards we shall find her saying: "I
asked for peace, and when I was refused I was ready to fight."[889]
But, as she dictated the letter and was unable to read it, we may ask
whether the clerks who held the pen did not add to it.

[Footnote 889: _Trial_, vol. i, pp. 55, 84, 240.]

Two or three passages suggest the ecclesiastical touch. Afterwards the
Maid did not remember having dictated "body for body," which is quite
unimportant. But she declared that she had not said: "I am chief in
war" and that she had dictated: "Surrender to the King" and not
"Surrender to the Maid."[890] Possibly her memory failed her; it was
not always faithful. Nevertheless she appeared very certain of what
she said, and twice she repeated that "chief in war" and "surrender to
the Maid" were not in the letter. It may have been that the monks who
were with her used these expressions. To these wandering priests a
dispute over fiefs mattered little, and it was not their first concern
to bring King Charles into the possession of his inheritance.
Doubtless they desired the good of the kingdom of France; but
certainly they desired much more the good of Christendom; and we shall
see that, if those mendicant monks, Brother Pasquerel and later Friar
Richard, follow the Maid, it will be in the hope of employing her to
the Church's advantage. Thus it would be but natural that they should
declare her at the outset commander in war, and even invest her with a
spiritual power superior to the temporal power of the King, and
implied in the phrase: "Surrender to the Maid ... the keys of the good
towns."

[Footnote 890: _Ibid._, pp. 55, 56, 84.]

This very l