from her
horse to sooth the wounds of a suffering English soldier, and it is
recorded of her that she carried a dying enemy in her arms to a
confessor, and remained with him till his soul took flight. The people
adored her, the soldiers of her army idolized her, and the king realized
that she was of too great value to him to permit her to go in peace to
her old humble home. So Joan remained, asking that the king would
remove all impost from the village of Domremy, in place of bestowing a
title upon her family as he offered to do. For three hundred years her
request was obeyed. From this time to the tragic end, the story of
Joan's life is a hard one to relate. Although we are nearing the fifth
centennial of her birth, the recital of her sufferings and death must
still wring tears from every heart which is not made of stone. The
feeling of jealousy which great success, of even the most worthy and
noble souls, arouses in meaner natures, had already sprung up against
Joan. This feeling increased as the days passed by and she added more
and more to her glory by the conquest of Laon, Soissons, Compiegne, and
Beauvais. Paris was next besieged, and here Joan was seriously wounded,
an event which depressed the king and the army.

Her wound disabled her from action, and she was left lying on the field
until evening, neglected, and seemingly forgotten. Already conscious of
the growing sentiment of jealousy among her officers, this final proof
of their indifference to her fate must have been more painful to her
pure and lofty mind than the physical agony she was enduring. But even
lying there, wounded, she cheered on the men as they passed her in the
combat, and revived their failing courage.

She was enabled to resume action the next day; her plans were all
perfected, and judging from her past triumphs we can but suppose victory
would have attended her, had not that most remarkable mandate arrived
from the king, commanding the French army to retreat to Saint-Denis.

To the undying shame of his memory be it said that Charles VII. entered
into a plot, with jealous enemies of Joan, to force failure upon her.
The people and the soldiers had grown to believe her infallible; the
king and his favorites determined that she should be proven fallible.
They deemed the country sufficiently safe, the army sufficiently strong,
to enable them to go on now and claim victories of their own, without
having their divine deliverer share the glory.