Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/78

4664 [sic] Her dexterity in managing her steed, though acquired in her former station, was regarded as a fresh proof of her mission; her former occupation was even denied; she was converted into a shepherdess, an employment more agreeable to the fancy. Some years were substracted from her age, in order to excite still more admiration; and she was received with the loudest acclamations, by persons of all ranks.

The English at first affected to speak with derision of the maid and her heavenly mission; but were secretly struck with the strong persuasion which prevailed in all around them. They found their courage daunted, by degrees, and thence began to infer a divine vengeance hanging over them. A silent astonishment reigned among those troops, formerly so elated with victory, and so fierce for the combat. The maid entered the city of Orleans, at the head of a convoy, arrayed in her military garb, and displaying her consecrated standard. She was received as a celestial deliverer by the garrison and its inhabitants; and with the instructions of count Dunois, commonly called the Bastard of Orleans, who commanded in that place, she actually obliged the English to raise the siege of that city, after driving them from their entrenchments, and defeating them in several desperate attacks.

Raising the siege of Orleans was one part of the maid's promise to Charles: crowning him at Rheims was the other; and she now vehemently insisted, that he should set out immediately on that journey. A few weeks before, such a proposal would have appeared altogether extravagant. Rheims lay in a distant quarter of the kingdom; was then in the hands of a victorious enemy; the whole road that led to it was occupied by their garrisons; and no imagination could have been so sanguine as to hope, that such an attempt could possibly be