ours which you claim you had from God,
was to make war and pour out human blood."

Joan replied quite simply, contenting herself with explaining that war
was not her first move, but her second:

"To begin with, I demanded that peace should be made. If it was refused,
then I would fight."

The judge mixed the Burgundians and English together in speaking of the
enemy which Joan had come to make war upon. But she showed that she
made a distinction between them by act and word, the Burgundians being
Frenchmen and therefore entitled to less brusque treatment than the
English. She said:

"As to the Duke of Burgundy, I required of him, both by letters and by
his ambassadors, that he make peace with the King. As to the English,
the only peace for them was that they leave the country and go home."

Then she said that even with the English she had shown a pacific
disposition, since she had warned them away by proclamation before
attacking them.

"If they had listened to me," said she, "they would have done wisely."
At this point she uttered her prophecy again, saying with emphasis,
"Before seven years they will see it themselves."

Then they presently began to pester her again about her male costume,
and tried to persuade her to voluntarily promise to discard it. I
was never deep, so I think it no wonder that I was puzzled by their
persistency in what seemed a thing of no consequence, and could not make
out what their reason could be. But we all know now. We all know now
that it was another of their treacherous projects. Yes, if they could
but succeed in getting her to formally discard it they could play a game
upon her which would quickly destroy her. So they kept at their evil
work until at last she broke out and said:

"Peace! Without the permission of God I will not lay it off though you
cut off my head!"

At one point she corrected the proces verbal, saying:

"It makes me say that everything which I have done was done by the
counsel of Our Lord. I did not say that, I said 'all which I have well
done.'"

Doubt was cast upon the authenticity of her mission because of the
ignorance and simplicity of the messenger chosen. Joan smiled at that.
She could have reminded these people that Our Lord, who is no respecter
of persons, had chosen the lowly for his high purposes even oftener
than he had chosen bishops and cardinals; but she phrased her rebuke in
simpler terms:

"It is the prerogative of Our Lord to choose Hi