WARS and BATTLES
From Ancient Greece - to modern day.

The distress of that city had now become urgent. But the communication with the open country was not entirely cut off: the Orleannais had heard of the Holy Maid whom Providence had raised up for their deliverance, and their messengers earnestly implored the dauphin to send her to them without delay.

Joan appeared at the camp at Blois, clad in a new suit of brilliant white armor, mounted on a stately black war-horse, and with a lance in her right hand, which she had learned to wield with skill and grace.

Her head was unhelmeted; so that all could behold her fair and expressive features, her deep-set and earnest eyes, and her long black hair, which was parted across her forehead, and bound by a ribbon behind her back.

She wore at her side a small battle-axe, and the consecrated sword marked on the blade with five crosses, which had at her bidding been taken for her from the shrine of St. Catharine at Fierbois.

A page carried her banner, which she had caused to be made and embroidered as her Voices enjoined. It was white satin, strewn with fleurs-de-lis and on it were the words, "JHESUS MARIA," and the representation of the Savior in his glory.

 Joan afterward generally bore her banner herself in battle; she said that though she loved her word much, she loved her banner forty times as much; and she loved to carry it, because it could not kill any one.

Thus accoutered, she came to lead the troops of France, who looked with soldierly admiration on her well-proportioned and upright figure, the skill with which she managed her war-horse, and the easy grace with which she handled her weapons. Her military education had been short, but she had availed herself of it well.

She had also the good sense to interfere little with the maneuvers of the troops, leaving these things to Dunois, and others whom she had the discernment to recognize as the best officers in the camp. Her tactics in action were simple enough. As she herself described it, "I used to say to them, 'Go boldly in among the English,' and then I used to go boldly in myself."

Such, as she told her inquisitors, was the only spell she used, and it was one of power. But while interfering little with the military discipline of the troops, in all matters of moral discipline she was inflexibly strict. All the abandoned followers of the camp were driven away. She compelled both generals and soldiers to attend regularly at confessional. Her chaplain and other priests marched with the army under her orders; and at every halt, an altar was set up and the sacrament administered. Ho oath or foul language passed without punishment or censure. Even the roughest and most hardened veterans obeyed her. They put off for a time the bestial coarseness which had grown on them during a life of bloodshed and rapine; they felt that they must go forth in a new spirit to a new career, and acknowledged the beauty of the holiness in which the heaven-sent Maid was leading them to certain victory.

Joan marched from Blois on the 25th of April with a convoy of provisions for Orleans, accompanied by Dunois, La Hire, and the other chief captains of the French, and on the evening of the 28th they approached the town.

In the words of the old chronicler Hall:

"The Englishmen, perceiving that they within could not long continue for faute of vitaile and ponder, kepte not their watche so diligently as thei were accustomed, nor scoured now the countrey environed as thei before had ordained. Whiche negligence the citizens shut in perceiving, sent worde thereof to the French captaines, which, with Pucelle, in the dedde tyme of the nighte, and in a greate rayne and thundere, with all tneir vitaile and artillery, entered into the citie."

"When it was day, the Maid rode in solemn procession through the city, clad in complete armor, and mounted on a white horse. Dunois was by her side, and all the bravest knights of her army and of the garrison followed in her train. The whole population thronged around her; and men, women, and children strove to touch her garments, or her banner, or her charger.

They poured forth blessings on her, whom they already considered their deliverer. In the words used by two of them afterward before the tribunal, which reversed the sentence, but could not restore the life of the Virgin-martyr of France, "the people of Orleans, when they first saw her in their city, thought that it was an angel from heaven that had come down to save them."