Yes, well we know that.

On the 13th of September the army, sad and spiritless, turned its face
toward the Loire, and marched--without music! Yes, one noted that detail.
It was a funeral march; that is what it was. A long, dreary funeral
march, with never a shout or a cheer; friends looking on in tears, all
the way, enemies laughing. We reached Gien at last--that place whence we
had set out on our splendid march toward Rheims less than three months
before, with flags flying, bands playing, the victory-flush of Patay
glowing in our faces, and the massed multitudes shouting and praising and
giving us godspeed. There was a dull rain falling now, the day was dark,
the heavens mourned, the spectators were few, we had no welcome but the
welcome of silence, and pity, and tears.

Then the King disbanded that noble army of heroes; it furled its flags,
it stored its arms: the disgrace of France was complete. La Tremouille
wore the victor's crown; Joan of Arc, the unconquerable, was conquered.



41 The Maid Will March No More

YES, IT was as I have said: Joan had Paris and France in her grip, and
the Hundred Years' War under her heel, and the King made her open her
fist and take away her foot.

Now followed about eight months of drifting about with the King and his
council, and his gay and showy and dancing and flirting and hawking and
frolicking and serenading and dissipating court--drifting from town to
town and from castle to castle--a life which was pleasant to us of the