8. At the last faint gash he makes, his knife-his faithful knife-falls from his little nerveless hand, and, ringing along the precipice, falls at his mother's feet. An involuntary groan of despair runs like a death-knell through the channel below, and all is still as the grave. At a height of nearly three hundred feet the devoted boy lifts his hopeless heart and closing eyes to commend his soul to God. 'Tis but a moment-there!--one foot swings off!-he is reeling, trembling, toppling over into eternity! Hark! a

shout falls on his ears from above! The man who is lying with half his length over the bridge has caught a glimpse of the boy's head and shoulders. Quick as thought the noosed rope is within reach of the sinking youth. No one breathes. With a faint, convulsive effort, the swooning boy drops his arms into the noose. Darkness comes over him, and with the words 'God!' and 'mother!' whispered on his lips, the tightening rope lifts him out of his last shallow niche. Not a lip moves while he is dangling over that fearful abyss; but when a sturdy Virginian reaches down and draws up the lad, and holds him in his arms before the tearful, breathless multitude, such shouting, such leaping, and weeping for joy, never greeted the ear of a human being so recovered from the yawning gulf of eternity.

1. JOAN OF ARC was born at Domrémy in Lorraine, in the year 1402, and of such poor parents that she was obliged to earn her living sometimes by minding sheep, sometimes by attending to the horses at the village inn. In 1429 France, her native country, was in a deplorable condition, overrun by the English, and the city of Orleans was closely besieged by them. At this juncture Joan, believing that she had received a call from heaven to deliver her country, joined the army of Charles VII., and, having given what were supposed to be miraculous evidences of her inspiration, was allowed to lead the royal forces to raise the siege. This she accomplished, and, having witnessed the coronation of King Charles at Rheims, declared her mission accomplished. She was, however, persuaded to undertake the defence of Compiégne, then besieged by the English; and, having been taken prisoner by them while leading a sally,' was condemned to be burned alive as a witch (1431).

2. What is to be thought of her? What is to be thought of the poor shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, who-like the shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judæa-rose suddenly out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew boy 2 inaugurated his patriotic mission by an act, by a victorious act, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, if we read her story as it was

1 A sally, a sudden rushing out of the troops in a besieged place in an attempt to drive off the besiegers.

2 The Hebrew boy, David.

read by those who saw her nearest. Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so they did to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them from a station of goodwill, both were found true and loyal to any promises involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the records of his people, and became a by-word amongst his posterity for a thousand years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah.

3. The poor forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest which she had secured for France. She never sang together with her friends the songs that rose in her native Domrémy as echoes to the departing steps of invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances which celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then silent; no! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted girl! whom from earliest youth ever I believed in as full of truth and self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for thy truth, that never once-no, not for a moment of weakness-didst thou revel in the vision of coronets1 and honour from man. Coronets for thee! O no! Honours, if they come when all is over, are for those that share thy blood. Daughter of Domrémy, when the gratitude of thy king shall awaken, thou wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. Call her, King of France, but she will not hear thee! Summon her to come and receive

'Coronets, crowns worn by princes and nobles.

a robe of honour, but she will be found 'contumacious." When the thunders of universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of the poor shepherd girl that gave up all for her country, thy ear, young shepherd girl, will have been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to do, that was thy portion in this life; that was thy destiny; and not for a moment was it hidden from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is short; and the sleep which is in the grave is so long! Let me use that life, so transitory,2 for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort the sleep which is so long.

4. This pure creature-pure from every suspicion of even a visionary self-interest, even as she was pure in senses more obvious-never once did this holy child, as regarded herself, relax from her belief in the darkness that was travelling to meet her. She might not prefigure the very manner of her death; she saw not in vision, perhaps, the fiery scaffold, the spectators without end on every road pouring into Rouen as to a coronation, the surging smoke, the volleying flames, the hostile faces all around, the pitying eye that lurked but here and there, until nature and imperishable truth broke loose from artificial restraints; these might not be apparent through the mists of the hurrying future. But the voice that called her to death, that she heard for ever.

DE QUINCEY.

By permission of Messrs. HOGG and SON.

' Contumacious, disobedient to lawful authority.

2 Transitory, passing away.