ow the Fairy Tree of Domremy, before Joan the
Maiden.

III

THE CHILDHOOD OF JOAN THE MAIDEN

THE English were besieging Orleans; Joan the Maid drove them from its
walls. How did it happen that a girl of seventeen, who could neither
read nor write, became the greatest general on the side of France? How
did a woman defeat the hardy English soldiers who were used to chase the
French before them like sheep?

[Illustration: JOAN IN CHURCH]

We must say that France could only be saved by a miracle, and by a
miracle she was saved. This is a mystery; we cannot understand it. Joan
the Maiden was not as other men and women are. But, as a little girl,
she was a child among children, though better, kinder, stronger than the
rest, and, poor herself, she was always good and helpful to those who
were poorer still.

Joan's parents were not indigent; they had lands and cattle, and a
little money laid by in case of need. Her father was, at one time,
_doyen_, or head-man, of Domremy. Their house was hard by the church,
and was in the part of the hamlet where the people were better off, and
had more freedom and privileges than many of their neighbours. They were
devoted to the Royal House of France, which protected them from the
tyranny of lords and earls further east. As they lived in a village
under the patronage of St. Remigius, they were much interested in Reims,
his town, where the kings of France were crowned, and were anointed with
Holy Oil, which was believed to have been brought in a sacred bottle by
an angel.

In the Middle Ages, the king was not regarded as really king till this
holy oil had been poured on his head. Thus we shall see, later, how
anxious Joan was that Charles VII., then the Dauphin, should be crowned
and anointed in Reims, though it was still in the possession of the
English. It is also necessary to remember that Joan had once an elder
sister named Catherine, whom she loved dearly. Catherine died, and
perhaps affection for her made Joan more fond of bringing flowers to the
altar of her namesake, St. Catherine, and of praying often to that
saint.

Joan was brought up by her parents, as she told her judges, to be
industrious, to sew and spin. She did not fear to match herself at
spinning and sewing, she said, against any woman in Rouen. When very
young she sometimes went to the fields to watch the cattle, like the
goose-girl in the fairy tale. As she grew older, she worked in the
house, she did not a