Then for the first time her wonderful eyes fastened themselves on my face, and I felt as though my very soul were being read.

“Nay, sire,” she answered, and there was something so flute-like and penetrating in her tones that they seemed to sink into my very soul, “but the Lord of Heaven Himself is about to fight for France, and He has sent me to the Governor here, who will direct me to the Dauphin, who knows nothing of me as yet.  But I am to bring him help, and that by Mid-Lent.  So I pray you, gentle knight, go tell Robert de Baudricourt that he must needs bestir himself in this business, for my voices tell me that the hour is at hand when, come what may, I must to Chinon, even though I wear my legs to the knees in going thither.”

“Why should I tell this to the Seigneur de Baudricourt?” I asked, marvelling at her words and the fashion of her speech.

“Because he has sent you to me,” she answered, her eyes still on my face, “and I thank him for having chosen so gracious a messenger; for you have a good heart, and you are no mocker of the things my Lord has revealed to me; and you will be one of those to do His will, and to bring me safely to the Dauphin.”

Half confounded by her words I asked: 

“Who is your Lord?”

“It is God,” she answered, and bent her head in lowly reverence.

And then I did a strange thing; but it seemed to be forced upon me from above by a power which I could not withstand.  I fell suddenly to my knees before her, and put up my clasped hands, as we do when we pay homage for our lands and honours to our liege lord.  And, I speak truth, and nought else, the Maid put her hands over mine just as our lord or sovereign should do, and though I dare swear she had never heard my name before, she said: 

“Jean de Novelpont de Metz, my Lord receives you as His faithful knight and servant.  He will be with us now and to the end.”

And the people all uncovered and stood bareheaded round us, whilst I felt as though I had received a mandate from Heaven.

Then I went into the house with Jeanne, and asked her of herself, and of her visions and voices.  She told me of them with the gentle frankness of a child, but with a reverence and humility that was beautiful to see, and which was in strange contrast to some of the things she spoke, wherein she told how that she herself was to be used of Heaven for the salvation of France.

I cannot give her words as she spoke them, sitting there in the window, the light upon her face, her eyes fixed more often upon the sunny sky than upon her interlocutor, though now and again she swept me with one of her wonderful glances.  She told me how from a child she had heard voices, which she knew to be from above, speaking to her, bidding her to be good, to go to the church, to attend to her simple duties at home.  But as she grew older there came a change.  She remembered the day when first she saw a wonderful white light hovering above her; and this light came again, and yet again; and the third time she saw in it the figure of an angel—­more than that—­of the Archangel Michael himself—­the warrior of Heaven; and from him she first received the message that she was to be used for the deliverance of her people.