The Irish standard., 1905-01-07

it was fulfilled before night. At Tours
she foretold the limit of her military
career-saying it would end in one year
from the time of it's utterance-and
she was right. She foretold her mar
tyrdom--using that word, and naming
Il time three months away-and again
she was right. At Il time when France
seemed hopelessly and permanently in
the hands of the English she twice as
serted i'll her prison before her judges
that within seven years the English
would meet with mightier disaster
| than had been the fall of Orleans; it
! happened within tive-the fall of Paris
Other prophecies Of hers came true,
both as to the event named and the
time limit prescribed.
She was deeply religious and be-
lieved that she had daily speech with
angels; that she saw them face to face,
and that they counseled her, comforted
and heartened her, and brought COM
mands to her direct from God She
had Il childlike faith in the heavenly
origin Of her apparitions and her
/ Voices, and not any threat of any form
Of death was able to brighten it out Of
her loyal heart. She was beautiful
and simple and lovable character. In
the records Of the Trials this comes
out in clear and shining detail. She
was gentle and winning and affection
ate; she loved her home and friends
and her village life; she was miserable
in the presence of pain and suffering;
she was full Of compassion; on the
field of her most splendid victory she
forgot her triumph to hold in her lap
the head Of dying enemy and COM
| fort his passing spirit with plying
words; in an age when it was common
to slaughter prisoners she stood daunt-
less between hers and harm, and saved
them alive; she was forgiving and gen.
erous, unselfish, magnanimous; she
was pure from all spot or stain of
baseness. And always she was girl;
and dear and worshipful as is meet for
that estate; when she fell wounded, the
first time, she was frightened, and
cried when she saw her blood gushing
from her breast; but she was Joan Of
Arc! and when presently she found
that her generals were sounding the re-
treat, she staggered to her feet and led
the assault again and took that place
by storm.
There is no blemish in that rounded
and beautiful character.
How strange it is!-that almost in
variably the artist remembers only one
detail-one minor and meaningless de-
tail Of the personality of Joan of Arc
to-wit, that she was a peasant girl
and forgets all the rest; and so he
paints her as a strapping, middle-aged
fsherwoman, with costume to match,
and in her face the spirituality of a
ham. He is slave to his one idea, and
forgets to observe that the supremacy
great souls are never lodged in gross
bodies. No Drawn, no muscle, could
endure the work that their bodies must
do; they do their miracles by the spirit,
which has fifty times the strength and
staying power of Drawn and muscle.
The Napoleons are little, not big; and
they work twenty hours in the twenty
four, and come up fresh, while the big
soldiers with the little hearts faint
around them with fatigue. We know
what Joan of Arc was like, without
asking-merely what she did. The
artist should paint her spirit-then he
could not fail to paint her body right.
Taking into account, as have sug-
gested before, all the circumstances
her origin, youth, sex, illiteracy, early
environment, and the obsructing con-
ditions under which she exploited her
high gifts and made her conquests in
the field and before the courts that
tried her for her life-she is easily and
by far the most extraordinary person
the human race has ever produced.