thought they meant themselves by the Church of which they spoke to
her; but when she was told by him what the Church really signified she
always said she submitted herself to it and to the Pope. It was to
Isambard de la Pierre that Joan begged for a cross when on the pile
and about to die. 'As I was close by the poor child,' he says, 'she
begged me humbly to go to the church close at hand and bring her a
cross to hold up right before her eyes, till her death, so that the
cross on which God hung might as long as she lived appear before her.
She died a true and good Christian. In the midst of the flames she
never ceased calling on the sacred name of Jesus, and invoking the aid
of the saints in Paradise. When the fire was lit she begged me to get
down from off the stake with my cross, but to hold it still before
her, which I did. At last, bending down her head, with a strong voice
calling on the name of Jesus, she gave up the ghost.'
Yet another priest succeeds: this is 'venerable et religieux personne,
frere Jean Toutmouille,' of the order of the preaching friars of
Rouen. Toutmouille was quite a youth at the time of Joan of Arc's
death. Another priest follows, William Daval, also one of the order
of preaching friars, and belonging to the Church of Saint James at
Rouen. He, too, had been, with Isambard, one of the acolytes of the
Vice-Inquisitor. In his evidence, he tells of how, after Isambard had
been advising Joan in her prison, he was met by Warwick, who
threatened to have him thrown into the river if he continued seeing
the prisoner.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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