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About Hesperian student / (Lincoln [Neb.]) 1872-1885 | View Entire Issue (June 2, 1884)
THE HESPERIAN STUDENT. ') cat deception and flattery, a villain who finds his proper antagonist and conqueror in the sausage-seller ! the figs ora. It In absurd to suppose (as Plutarch and other his torians have done) that sucli a man could havo been a suc cessful opponent of Periklesand Nikias. 84 JEANNE DARO. Tho darkest hour In French lus4ory is juBt before the dawn of the reformation, of the Jrevival of learning; Just before tho dawn of modem times. Warhnd boon carried on with England for a hundred years, and at no lime in that dreadful century of devastation did Franco seem so nearly lost as in the year 1428. Tho English Henry VI, had been proclaimed king of Franco, whilo the Dauphin, Charles VI, still uncrowned was making nofl offorf to regain his lost kingdom. Never has France been so near extirpation. "The people,' as the historian Martin expresses it, "were no longer bathed in th'eir sweat, but drowned in their blood, debased below tho beasts of the forest, among which they wander panic-stricken, muti lated, in quest of nn asylum in tho wilderness.1' JSiBut France was not to bo lost. If her king or her men at arms were not oble to save her, there was one who could. This one was a girl of scarcely eighteea years, a poor uneducated peasant's child. Jeanne Dure was the child of a laborer of Domrcmy, a villogo on the marches of Lorrain and Champagne; her home was close to tho fairy haunted forests of the Vosges, witli their sacred trees and founlains. Such surroundings would have an influence oven on jho rude peasantry, and how much more would they effect a mind, so imagina tive and delicato as Jeanne possessed ? A French writer says of her: "Born under Hie very walls of the church, lulled in her cradle by tho chimes of bells, And nourished by legends, she was herself a legend, a quickly passing and pure legend, from birth to death." But her quiet, dreamy life was soon broken by the storm of war which at last burst upon far off Domrcmy. Her hitherto aimless dreams were now centered upon the condition of France. She had pity, to use the phrase forever upon her lips, for tlu fair reulm of Franco. And so intense was her pity that al last her one absorbing thought returned to her, in what alio fancied to bo llie voices of the saints, assuring and commanding her to go forth, crown her kini? and save France. For five years she resisted tho voices, her delicate na ture shrank from so bold an undertaking. But when tho crisis came, w' in tho French were besieged in Orleans, tho key to tho .ole countiy, she could resist no longer, but left her homo forever to present herself at tho Dau phin's court. Tho story of her exploits is familiar to all. "What this untaught girl really did for her country wiu-Jof ilself simple, but great in its results; she brought to bear upon the armies of France the influence of a devout, patriotic, chri3tianjlife. From baudsjof recklcss.divsoluto plunderers, she made French soldiers Jorderly, decent, moral and devout. IJrpe revived, she made the Dauphin believe in himself, and the court believe in the cause. "Men of faitli saw in her the expected virgin savior; men ofmulor ptanding, perceived the ndvontage to their sido of hav ing her thus regarded. She inspired a superstitions con fidence in the French, and in tho English superstitious terror. This wus tho secret of h(-r success. It was no magic but tho irresistible enthusiasm of u restless spirit which calculated no chances, folt no .'oubts. Firmly believing in a divine mission, she moved serenely on towards its aim. Her career could bo but brief. She left her homo to relievo Orleans and crown tho king. She accomplished her mission and begged leave to return to her shepherd's work. But this could not bo. After a series of imporl-s ant victories accompanied by minor defeats, site wa taken prisoner under tho walls of Compiegno, which she was attempting to relievo. She hud saved others, herself she could not save. All were against her. Those whom she had saved de serted, betrayed, and condemned her. French troops fighting on tho English sido'capturcd and imprisoned her French priests sang a TeDcum in honor of her capture, and of tho judges who condemned iter fifty nine were French. But the English from whose grasp she had wrenched so great a province, were wild with hate and humiliation. They had been thwarted in their conquest by a child. There was but one hope left to them, to prove that Charles VII, had been crowned by a witch. If Jeanne were not tried, condemned and burned as a sorceress, if her victories were not set down ob due to the devil, they would remain in tho eyes of the people miracles, God's own work. Accordingly after twelve months imprisonment, sho was braught to trial on a charge of heresy, before an ecclesiastical court witli the Bishop of Bcauvais at its head. Never from tho foundation of the earth has there been another such a trial. It was a contest between one iguorant peasant girl and tho church of Rome, paid and backvd by the power that ruled England and a part of Franco. Nothing is so striking as the utter silence with which all men looked or at the long, dreary trial, at the shame ful imprisonment nud bitter death. From all tho sur rounding darkness the noble figure of tho heroine of Franco stands out in wonderful beauty against the back ground of treachery, meanness and cruelty of her perse cutors. Throughout tho long process every device was used to entangle Iter speech. Two-cdgcd,questinns which not one of the judges themselves could answer, were put loher.To tho unlawful question, "Do tou b.'licvo that you arc in u statu of grace?" yiio simply leplied, "If lam may God be pleased to keep me ill it, if I nm not may God he pleased to put me in it." For five months she kept her judges as it were al bay. Her condemnation was delayed by the hope that some sentence would be dropped which would prove her a witch. But her woman's subtlety thwarted nil their attempts. Not one word of repentaneo could they per suade her to utter. .The snaky kindness and the threats of the judges wore alike of no avail. The University of Paris was consulted: it could givo butoue judgment, either the evuuls related by the pris oner occurred, or they old not occur; if tlioy did not occur site is a contumacious liar: tftuey did occur sho is a sorceress, a servant of Hid devil. Shu must confess, recant, renounce, or suU'cr a penalty proportioned to her crimes. wmm