ill man,” for he acknowledged that he spoke the patois of his district, and therefore that the blow was fair.  But perhaps for the moment he was irritated too.  He asked her, a question equally unnecessary, “do you believe in God?” to which with more and more impatience she made a similar answer:  “Better than you do.”  There was nothing to be made of one so well able to defend herself.  “Words are all very well,” said the monk, “but God would not have us believe you, unless you show us some sign.”  To this Jeanne made an answer more dignified, though still showing signs of exasperation, “I have not come to Poitiers to give signs,” she said; “but take me to Orleans—­I will then show the signs I am sent to show.  Give me as small a band as you please, but let me go.”

The situation of Orleans was at the time a desperate one.  It was besieged by a strong army of English, who had built a succession of towers round the city, from which to assail it, after the manner of the times.  The town lies in the midst of the plain of the Loire, with not so much as a hillock to offer any advantage to the besiegers.  Therefore these great works were necessary in face of a very strenuous resistance, and the possibility of provisioning the besieged, which their river secured.  The English from their high towers kept up a disastrous fire, which, though their artillery was of the rudest kind, did great execution.  The siege was conducted by eminent generals.  The works were of themselves great fortifications, the assailants numerous, and strengthened by the prestige of almost unbroken success; there seemed no human hope of the deliverance of the town unless by an overwhelming army, which the King’s party did not possess, or by some wonderful and utterly unexpected event.  Jeanne had always declared the destruction of the English and the relief of Orleans to be the first step in her mission.

Besides the formal and official examination of her faith and character, held at Poitiers, private inquests of all kinds were made concerning of the claims of the miraculous maid.  She was visited by every curious person, man or woman, in the neighbourhood, and plied with endless questions, so that her simple personal story, and that of her revelations—­mes voix, as she called them—­became familiarly known from her own report, to the whole country round about.  The women pressed a question specially interesting—­for no doubt, many a good mother half convinced otherwise, shook her head at Jeanne’s costume—­Why she wore the dress of a man? for which the Maid gave very good reasons:  in the first place because it was the only dress for fighting, which, though so far from her desires or from the habits of her life, was henceforward to be her work; and also because in her strange circumstances, constrained as she was to live among men, she considered it safest for herself—­statements which evidently convinced the minds of the questioners.  It was, no doubt, good policy to make her thus widely and generally known, and the result was a daily growing enthusiasm for her and belief in her, in all classes.  The result of the formal process was that the doctors could find nothing against her, and they reluctantly allowed that the King might lawfully take what advantage he could of her offered services.