life was confused by expectations and recollections of the celestial
visitant, who might arrive upon her at any moment, in the midst perhaps
of some innocent play, or when she sat sewing in the garden before her
father's humble door.

After a while the _vrai prud' homme_ came seldom; other figures more
like herself, soft forms of women, white and shining, with golden
circlets and ornaments, appeared to her in the great halo of the light;
they bowed their heads, naming themselves, as to a sister spirit,
Catherine, and the other Margaret. Their voices were sweet and soft
with a sound that made you weep. They were both martyrs, encouraging and
strengthening the little martyr that was to be. "A lady is there in the
heavens who loves thee": Virgil could not say more to rouse the flagging
strength of Dante. When these gentle figures disappeared, the little
maid wept in an anguish of tenderness, longing if only they would take
her with them. It is curious that though she describes in this vague
rapture the appearance of her visitors, it is always as "_mes voix_"
that she names them--the sight must always have been more imperfect than
the message. Their outlines and their lovely faces might shine uncertain
in the excess of light; but the words were always plain. The pity for
France that was in their hearts spread itself into the silent rural
atmosphere, touching every sensitive chord in the nature of little
Jeanne. It was as if her mother lay dying there before her eyes.

Curious to think how little anyone could have suspected such meetings as
these, in the cottage hard by, where the weary ploughmen from the fields
would come clamping in for their meal, and Dame Isabeau would call
to the child, even sharply perhaps now and then, to leave that
all-absorbing needlework and come in and help, as Martha called Mary
fourteen hundred years before; and where the priest, mumbling his mass