xt to actual beholding of that
glorious rite, the best thing was to hear my master tell of it, taking
out his books, wherein he had drawn the King, and the Maid in her
harness, and many of the great lords. From these pictures a tapestry was
afterwards wrought, and hung in Reims Cathedral, where it is to this day:
the Maid on horseback beckoning the King onward, the Scots archers beside
him in the most honourable place, as was their lawful due, and, behind
all, the father of the Maid entering Reims by another road. By great
good fortune, and by virtue of being a fellow-traveller with Thomas
Scott, the rider of the King's stable, my master found lodgings easily
enough. So crowded was the town that, the weather being warm, in mid
July, many lay in tabernacles of boughs, in the great place of Reims, and
there was more singing that night than sleeping. But my master had lain
at the hostelry called L'Asne Roye, in the parvise, opposite to the
cathedral, where also lay Jean d'Arc, the father of the Maid. Thither
she herself came to visit him, and she gave gifts to such of the people
of her own countryside as were gathered at Reims.

"And, Jeannot, do you fear nothing?" one of them asked her, who had known
her from a child.

"I fear nothing but treason," my master heard her reply, a word that we
had afterwards too good cause to remember.

"And is she proud now that she is so great?" asked Elliot.

"She proud! No pride has she, but sat at meat, and spoke friendly with
all these manants, and it was 'tu' and 'toy,' and 'How is this one? and
that one?' till verily, I think, she had asked for every man, woman,
child, and dog in Domremy. And that puts me in mind--"

"In mind of what?"

"Of nought. Faith, I remember not what I was going to say, for I am well
weary."

"But Paris?" I asked. "When march we on Paris?" My master's face
clouded. "They should have set forth for Paris the very day after the
sacring, which was the seventeenth of July. But envoys had come in from
the Duke of Burgundy, and there were parleys with them as touching peace.
Now, peace will never be won save at the point of the lance. But a truce
of a fortnight has been made with Burgundy, and then he is to give up
Paris to the King. Yet, ere a fortnight has passed, the new troops from
England will have come over to fight us, and not against the heretics of
Bohemia, though they have taken the cross and the vow. And the King has
gone to Saint Ma