The village priest, her young companions, even the governor of the town, all tried to stop her, but it was in vain.
To the governor she said, "I must do the work my Lord has laid out for me."
Little by little people began to believe in her mission. At last all stopped trying to discourage her and some who were wealthy helped her to make the journey to the town of Chinon (she-non'), where the French king, Charles the Seventh, was living.
II
When Joan arrived at Chinon, a force of French soldiers was preparing to go to the south of France to relieve the city of Orleans which the English were besieging.
King Charles received Joan kindly and listened to what she had to say with deep attention. The girl spoke modestly, but with a calm belief that she was right.
"Gracious King, " she said, "my name is Joan. God has sent me to deliver France from her enemies. You shall shortly be crowned in the cathedral of Rheims (remz). I am to lead the soldiers you are about to send for the relief of Orleans . So God has directed and under my guidance victory will be theirs."
The king and his nobles talked the matter over and finally it was decided to allow Joan to lead an army of about five thousand men against the English at Orleans .
When she left Chinon at the head of her soldiers, in April, 1429, she was in her eighteenth year. Mounted on a fine war-horse and clad in white armor from head to foot, she rode along past the cheering multitude, "seeming rather, " it has been said, "of heaven than earth." In one hand she carried an ancient sword that she had found near the tomb of a saint, and in the other a white banner embroidered with lilies.
The rough soldiers who were near her left off their oaths and coarse manners, and carefully guarded her. She inspired the whole army with courage and faith as she talked about her visions.
When she arrived at the besieged city of Orleans she fearlessly rode round its walls, while the English soldiers looked on in astonishment. She was able to enter Orleans , despite the efforts of the besiegers to prevent her.
She aroused the city by her cheerful, confident words and then led her soldiers forth to give battle to the English. Their success was amazing. One after another the English forts were taken.
When only the strongest remained and Joan was leading the attacking force, she received a slight wound and was carried out of the battle to be attended by a surgeon. Her soldiers began to retreat. "Wait, " she commanded, "eat and drink and rest; for as soon as I recover I will touch the walls with my banner and you shall enter the fort." In a few minutes she mounted her horse again and riding rapidly up to the fort, touched it with her banner. Her soldier almost instantly carried it. The very next day the enemy's troops were forced to withdraw from before the city and the siege was at end.
The French soldiers were jubilant at the victory and called Joan the "Maid of Orleans." By this name she is known in history. Her fame spread everywhere, and the English as well as the French thought she had more than human power.
She led the French in several other battles, and again and again her troops were victorious.
At last the English were driven far to the north of France . Then Charles, urged by Joan, went to Rheims with twelve thousand soldiers, and there, with splendid ceremonies, was crowned king. Joan holding her white banner, stood near Charles during the coronation.
When the ceremony was finished, she knelt at his feet and said, "O King, the will of God is done and my mission is over! Let me now go home to my parents."
But the king urged her to stay a while longer, as France was not entirely freed from the English. Joan consented, but she said, "I hear the heavenly voices no more and I am afraid."
However she took part in an attack upon the army of the Duke of Burgundy, but was taken prisoner by him. For a large sum of money the duke delivered her into the hands of the English, who put her in prison in Rouen . She lay in prison for a year, and finally was charged with sorcery and brought to trial. It was said that she was under the influence of the Evil One. She declared to her judges her innocence of the charge and said, "God has always been my guide in all that I have done. The devil has never had power over me."
Her trial was long and tiresome. At its close she was doomed to be burned at the stake.
So in the market-place at Rouen the English soldiers fastened her to a stake surrounded by a great pile of fagots.
A soldier put into her hands a rough cross, which he had made from a stick that he held. She thanked him and pressed it to her bosom. Then a good priest, standing near the stake, read to her the prayers for the dying, and another mounted the fagots and held towards her a crucifix, which she clasped with both hands and kissed. When the cruel flames burst out around her, the noble girl uttered the word "Jesus, " and expired.
A statue of her now stands on the spot where she suffered.
Among all the men of her time none did nobler work than Joan. And hence it is that we put the story of her life among the stories of the lives of the great MEN of the Middle Ages, although she was only a simple peasant girl.
Gutenberg Lived from 1400-1468
I
While Joan of Arc was busy rescuing France from the English, another wonderful worker was busy in Germany . This was John Gutenberg, who was born in Mainz .
The Germans — and most other people — think that he was the inventor of the art of printing with movable types. And so in the cities of Dresden and Mainz his countrymen have put up statues in his memory.
Gutenberg's father was a man of good family. Very likely the boy was taught to read. But the books from which he learned were not like ours; they were written by hand. A better name for them than books is "manuscripts, " which means "hand-writings."
While Gutenberg was growing up a new way of making books came into use, which was a great deal better than copying by hand. It was what is called block-printing. The printer first cut a block of hard wood the size of the page that he was going to print. Then he cut out every word of the written page upon the smooth face of his block. This had to be very carefully done. When it was finished the printer had to cut away the wood from the sides of every letter. This left the letters raised, as the letters are in books now printed for the blind.
The block was now ready to be used. The letters were inked, paper was laid upon them and pressed down.
With blocks the printer could make copies of a book a great deal faster than a man could write them by hand. But the making of the blocks took a long time, and each block would print only one page.
Gutenberg enjoyed reading the manuscripts and block books that his parents and their wealthy friends had; and he often said it was a pity that only rich people could own books. Finally he determined to contrive some easy and quick way of printing.
He did a great deal of his work in secret, for he thought it was much better that his neighbors should know nothing of what he was doing.
So he looked for a workshop where no one would be likely to find him. He was now living in Strasburg, and there was in that city a ruined old building where, long before his time, a number of monks had lived. There was one room of the building which needed only a little repairing to make it fit to be used. So Gutenberg got the right to repair that room and use it as his workshop.
All his neighbors wondered what became of him when he left home in the early morning, and where he had been when they saw him coming back late in the twilight. Some felt sure that he must be a wizard, and that he had meetings somewhere with the devil, and that the devil was helping him to do some strange business.
Gutenberg did not care much what people had to say, and in his quiet room he patiently tried one experiment after another, often feeling very sad and discouraged day after day because his experiments did not succeed.
At last the time came when he had no money left. He went back to his old home, Mainz , and there met a rich goldsmith named Fust (or Faust).
Gutenberg told him how hard he had tried in Strasburg to find some way of making books cheaply,
and how he had now no more money to carry on his experiments. Fust became greatly interested and gave Gutenberg what money he needed. But as the experiments did not at first succeed Fust lost patience. He quarreled with Gutenberg and said that he was doing nothing but spending money. At last he brought suit against him in the court, and the judge decided in favor of Fust. So everything in the world that Gutenberg had, even the tools with which he worked, came into Fust's possession.
II
But though he had lost his tools, Gutenberg had not lost his courage. And he had not lost all his friends. One of them had money, and he bought Gutenberg a new set of tools and hired a workshop for him. And now at last Gutenberg's hopes were fulfilled. First of all it is thought that he made types of hard wood. Each type was a little block with a single letter at one end. Such types were a great deal better than block letters. The block letters were fixed. They could not be taken out of the words of which they were parts. The new types were movable so they could be set up to print one page, then taken apart and set up again and again to print any number of pages.
But type made of wood did not always print the letters clearly and distinctly, so Gutenberg gave up wood types and tried metal types. Soon a Latin Bible was printed. It was in two volumes, each of which had three hundred pages, while each of the pages had forty-two lines. The letters were sharp and clear. They had been printed from movable types of metal.
III
The Dutch claim that Lorenz Coster, a native of Harlem , in the Netherlands , was the first person who printed with movable type. They say that Coster was one day taking a walk in a beech forest not far from Harlem , and that he cut bark from one of the trees and shaped it with his knife into letters.
Not long after this the Dutch say Coster had made movable types and was printing and selling books in Harlem .
The news that books were being printed in Mainz by Gutenberg went all over Europe , and before he died printing-presses like his were at work making books in all the great cities of the continent.
About twenty years after his death, when Venice was the richest of European cities, a man named Aldus (Al'-dus) Manutius (Ma-nu'-tius) established there the most famous printing house of that time. He was at work printing books two years before Columbus sailed on his first voyage. The descendents of Aldus continued the business after his death for about one hundred years. The books published by them were called "Aldine, " from Aldus. They were the most beautiful that had ever come from the press. They are admired and valued to this day.
Warwick the Kingmaker Lived from 1428-1471
I
The earl of Warwick , known as the "kingmaker, " was the most famous man in England for many years after the death of Henry V. He lived in a great castle with two towers higher than most church spires. It is one of the handsomest dwellings in the world and is visited every year by thousands of people. The kingmaker had a guard of six hundred men. At his house in London meals were served to so many people that six fat oxen were eaten at breakfast alone. He had a hundred and ten estates in different parts of England and no less than 30, 000 persons were fed daily at his board. He owned the whole city of Worcester , and besides this and three islands, Jersey , Guernsey and Alderney , so famed in our time for their cattle, belonged to him.
He had a cousin of whom he was as fond as if he were a brother. This was Richard, duke of York , who was also own cousin to King Henry VI, the son of Henry V.
One evening as the sun was setting, and the warders were going to close the gates of the city of York for the night, a loud blast of a horn was heard. It was made by the sentry on the wall near the southern gate. An armed troop was approaching. When they drew near the gate their scarlet coats embroidered with the figure of a boar proved them to be the men of the earl of Warwick . The earl himself was behind them. The gate was opened.
Passing through it and on to the castle, the earl and his company were soon within its strong stone walls.
"Cousin, " said the earl of Warwick to the duke of York as they sat talking before a huge log fire in the great room of the castle, " England will not long endure the misrule of a king who is half the time out of his mind."
The earl spoke the truth. Every now and then Henry VI lost his reason, and the duke of York , or some other nobleman, had to govern the kingdom for him.
The earl of Warwick added: "You are the rightful heir to the throne. The claim of Henry VI comes through Lancaster, the fourth son of Edward III — yours through Lionel, the second. His claim comes through his father only — yours through both your father and mother. It is a better claim and it is a double claim."
"That is true, my cousin of Warwick , " replied the duke of York , "but we must not plunge England into war."
"Surely not if we can help it, " replied the earl. "Let us first ask for reform. If the king heeds our petition, well and good. If not I am determined, cousin of York , that you shall sit on the throne of England instead of our insane sovereign."
A petition was soon drawn up and signed and presented to Henry. It asked that Henry would do something which would make the people contented.
The king paid no attention to it. Then a war began. It was the longest and most terrible that ever took place in England . It lasted for thirty years.
Those who fought on the king's side were called Lancastrians, because Henry's ancestor, John of Gaunt, was the duke of Lancaster . The friends of Richard were called Yorkists, because he was duke of York . The Lancastrians took a red rose for their badge; the Yorkists a white one. For this reason the long struggle has always been called the "War of the Roses."
In the first great battle the Red Rose party was defeated and the king himself was taken prisoner.
The victors now thought that the duke of York ought to be made king at once. However, a parliament was called to decide the question, and it was agreed that Henry should be king as long as he lived, but that at his death the crown should pass to the duke of York .
II
Most people though this was a wise arrangement; but Queen Margaret, Henry's wife, did not like it at all, because it took from her son the right to reign after his father's death. So she went to Scotland and the North of England, where she had many friends, and raised an army.
She was a brave woman and led her men in a battle in which she gained the victory. The duke of York was killed, and the queen ordered some of her men to cut off his head, put upon it a paper crown in mockery, and fix it over one of the gates of the city of York .
Warwick attacked the queen again as soon as he could; but again she was victorious and captured from Warwick her husband, the king, whom the earl had held prisoner for some time past.
This was a great triumph for Margaret, for Henry became king once more.
But the people were still discontented. The York party was determined that Edward, the son of the old duke of York , should be made king. So thousands flocked to the White Rose standard and Warwick marched to London at their head.
The queen saw that her only safety was in flight. She left London and the kingmaker entered the city in triumph.
The citizens had been very fond of the old duke of York , and when his party proclaimed his handsome young son King Edward IV, the city resounded with the cry "God save King Edward."
Brave Queen Margaret was completey defeated in another battle. The story is told that after this she fled into a forest with her young son. A robber met them, but Margaret, with wonderful courage, said to him, "I am your queen and this is your prince. I entrust him to your care."
The man was pleased with the confidence that she showed. He took her and the young prince to a safe hiding place, and helped them to escape from England in a sailing vessel.
III
Edward IV now seemed to be seated securely upon the throne. But trouble was near. Warwick wished him to follow his advice. Edward thought he could manage without any advice. Then the king and the kingmaker quarreled, and at last became open enemies and fought one another on the fie
ld of battle. The end of it was that Warwick was defeated, and driven out of the country. He sailed across the channel and sought refuge in France .
There whom should he meet but his old enemy, Queen Margaret. She had beaten him in battle, and had beheaded his cousin Richard, duke of York ; he had beaten her and driven her from her kingdom; and twice he had made her husband prisoner and taken from him his crown. In spite of all this the two now became fast friends, and the kingmaker agreed to make war upon Edward and restore Henry to the throne.
He asked assistance from Louis XI, king of France , who supplied him with men and money. So with an army of Frenchmen the kingmaker landed on the shores of England . Thousands of Englishmen who were tired of Edward flocked to Warwick 's standard, and when he reached London he had an army of sixty thousand men.
Famous Men of The Middle Ages Page 13
