The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-07-25
home OF JOAN or ARC.
A VISIT TO THE VILLAGE OF
DoMREMY.

whose story is at once so beautiful,
so heroic and so tragic as that of
the young Lorraine girl who sacrificed
her life for France-Jeanne dare.
II appeals alike to the young and to1
the old, to the learned and the UNI
learned, to the peasant in the cottage
and the prince in the palace, and few
there are who have not felt the tears
start as they read the life of the
young heroine. France sacrificed it's
saviour, but today no other of it's
1 heroes and heroines, save Napoleon, is
idolized and revered more than the
poor shepherd girl of Domremy. Her
name is household word and her
statues are found all over France. But
nowhere does the maid seem so real,
nowhere does she so appeal to you as
she does in the little village of her
birth.
Domremy lies in the northeastern
part of France, in the hilly department
of the Vosges. 1t is off from the
main routes of travel, but is visited
every year by thousands of tourists
who go to spend a day at the birth
place and girlhood of the heroine.
The hamlet looks very different from
what it may have looked when Jeanne
herself walked along it's narrow street
or tended her fathers sheep on the
| hillside. One marvels that from such
quiet, rural, retired spot one could
have gone forth to make so much his
tory.
A little gray hamlet, of perhaps
thirty or forty houses, on the side of
a low hill, that slopes down to the
meadow of the Meuse, with a church
tower rising in the midst, an old stone
bridge, and the ruins of an old castle,
which was perhaps dismantled before
Jeanne's time-this is Domremy of the
present day. The village is a farm
ing community and the ways of it's
people are primitive and simple. Every
one of the inhabitants, except the
priest and colony of nuns, works in
the fields. They wear wooden shoes
and know little more about the world
than did Jeanne's father and mother
To visit Domremy is like going back
| llLO Lu6 MluuI0 Ages.
In the middle of the village stands
the church, the same church that
Jeanne attended, large, barn-like
structure, with square stunted tower
Surmounted by a cross. The tower
has a clock in it, and to the left of
the entrance on a high pedestal is a
bronze statue of Jeanne. 1t represents
her in a half-kneeling posture, and is
not so striking as the statue of the
heroic maid at Rouen. Above the main
entrance is a great allegorical paint
ing on canvas, tackled against the wall
Among it's figures is that of Jeanne
in her white armor, with saints and
Warriors in various guises, which are
somewhat confusing in their signifi-
canoe and meaning.
Close to the church is Jeanne d'Arc's
cottage, which looks as much like
big shed as anything. 1t has a very
high front and the roof slopes back
all one way to the rear. The interior
is used as museum, and is cold and
cherries with no suggestion OF it's
once having been a home But there
is the big fireplace before which
Jeanne used to sit and knit in the
winter evenings, and overhead is the
timbered ceiling, wholly unchanged
from her day. Many and many a time
the maid must have passed in and out
Of this door and her childish feet have
battered upon the floor.
At the back of the house is the gar
den with it's narrow paths and little
plots Of flowers and vegetables, where
Jeanne used to wander in the tWi-
light hours and listen to the bells of
the nearby church and where the
voices first spoke to her. Dear little
shepherd maiden, it all comes back
the lowly life and the humble toll, her
innocent and dreamy childhood, her
heroism and her triumphs and the sad,
tragic end-as we wander over the
little yard and we can almost see
Jeanne sitting there and listening to
the voices that called her to her
splendor and her fate The house and
grounds are the property of the coun-
Gil general of the department, who pur-
chased it in order that so remarkable
q relic of the past might be saved to
future generations. An iron fence
shuts it in from the thoroughfare, and
every means is rsed to keep it in per-
feet repair. The house is painted a
dull gray and the reddish slate roof
has peculiar charm against the green
OF the surrounding trees.
On the hill slope overlooking the val
ley Of the Mouse, three-fourths of a
mile from the village, stands a basilica
!, with slender golden spire, marking
the spot where, according to tradition
! stood the Fairy Tree" beneath which
Jeanne and the maidens of the village
, used to dance and where the maid re-
ceived the command to go forth and
lead the armies of France 1t is a
: quiet, beautiful spot. Around are fields
; where Jeanne watched the sheep. and
/ below, by the grayish, red-roofed viii
, lage and following the winding river,
. are the roadways, one of which Jeanne
took that morning as she went to
| Vaucalers.
: Today tie fields are green with hay
and corn, and men and women are
| busy caring for the harvests. Two
wheeled carts, drawn by oxen, some
; times with a horse in front, come up
the hill and are loaded and driven