“You did desire a good thing, my Captain,” she said, “and had you told me of your brave wish, I would have put myself at your head and led you to victory forthwith.  Yet this victory has not been forfeited, only delayed by your eager rashness.  Say, if I lead you myself, this very hour, against yon frowning tower, will you follow me like brave soldiers of the Cross, and not turn back till my Lord has given us the victory?  For He will deliver yon place into our hands, albeit not without bloodshed, not without stress or strife.  Many must be slain ere we can call it ours, but will you follow and take it?”

The shout which arose from a thousand throats rang to the welkin, and methinks must have smote with dread import upon the English ears.  The Maid’s voice seemed to float through the air, and penetrate to the extreme limits of the crowd, or else her words were taken up and repeated by a score of eager tongues, and so ran through the mighty muster with thrilling import.  The eyes were dazzled by the flashing blades as men swung them above their heads.

“Lead us, O Maid, lead us!  We follow to death or victory!  We fear nothing so that you are our leader and our guide!”

There was no withstanding a spirit like that!  La Hire’s voice was one of the foremost in the cry; his great blade the first to leap from its scabbard.  Sage counsels of war, prompted by experience, had to give way before a power different from anything which the veterans had known before.  With a dash, the elan of which was a marvellous sight to see, the soldiers poured themselves like a living stream against the walls of St. Loup.  The English behind the fortifications rained upon them missiles of every description.  The air was darkened by a cloud of arrows.  The cannon from the walls belched forth smoke and flame, and great stone and iron balls came hurtling down into our midst, dealing death and destruction.  The English soldiers with their characteristic daring sallied forth sword in hand to beat us back and yet we pressed on and ever on; driven backwards here and there by stress of fighting; but never giving great way, and always rallied by the sight of that gleaming white armour, and by the clear, sweet voice ringing out through all the tumult of arms.

“Courage, my children, courage.  The fight is fierce; but my Lord gives you the victory.  A little more courage, a little more patience, and the day is ours!”

She stood unscathed amid the hail of stones and arrows.  Her clear glance never quailed; her sweet voice never faltered; she had thought for everyone but herself.  Again and again with her own hands she snatched some follower from a danger unseen by him, but which a moment later would have been his death.  She herself stood unmoved in the awful tumult.  She even smiled when Dunois and La Hire would have drawn her from the hottest of the fighting.

“No, no, my friends, my place is here.  Have no fear.  I shall not suffer.  I have guardians watching over me that you wot not of.”