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After the above priests, on whom rests the infamy of having taken part in the death of the heroine, it is a relief to find the next witness, although a Churchman, a man of sufficient honesty and courage to have been one of those few who refused to take any part in the iniquitous proceedings connected with Joan of Arc's trial, and who suffered imprisonment owing to his unwillingness to carry out Cauchon's wishes.
John d'Estivet, surnamed 'Bénédicité, canon of Beauvais and Bayeux, was another of Cauchon's creatures. He acted the part of Procureur-Général during the trial. D'Estivet was a gross and cruel ecclesiastic, and it is somewhat satisfactory to know his end. He was found dead in a muddy ditch soon after Joan of Arc's death. As M. Fabre justly says, 'He perished in his native element.
They wept hot tears as in the keen personal pang of sorrow and fellow-feeling and impotence to help. Winchester withdrawn high on his platform, ostentatiously separated from any share in it, a spectator merely wept; and the judges wept. The Bishop of Boulogne was overwhelmed with emotion, iron tears flowed down the accursed Cauchon's cheeks.
Cauchon and the others having left her alone with Martin Ladvenu, she made her confession to him, and when that was finished she begged that the Sacrament might be administered to her. Without Cauchon's leave Ladvenu did not dare to obtain this supreme consolation for the martyr. He despatched a messenger to the Bishop, who, after consulting with some of the clergy, gave his permission.
He also had been one of Cauchon's crawling creatures. There is little of interest in his evidence, except the passage where he says that an English knight had told him that the English feared Joan of Arc more than a hundred soldiers, and that her very name was a source of terror to the foe.
Cauchon's evil eye, however, at length detected Isambard's conduct, and he informed Warwick of it. Soon after, Isambard was confronted by Warwick, and the latter, with many abusive words, threatened to have him drowned in the Seine if he dared assist Joan of Arc.
One might almost name the day that the betrayed girl, the most innocent creature in France and the noblest, would go to her pitiful death. The world knows now that Cauchon's plan was as I have sketched it to you, but the world did not know it at that time.
It was not too soon for Cauchon's object that the trial was now conducted with closed doors. Joan of Arc's courage, firmness, and simplicity, accompanied by her transparent truth and pure fervent belief in her mission, impressed even her judges and much more so those who had attended the public days of her trial as spectators.
And now there was another voice it was from the other platform pealing solemnly above the din: Cauchon's reading the sentence of death! Joan's strength was all spent. She stood looking about her in a bewildered way a moment, then slowly she sank to her knees, and bowed her head and said: "I submit." They gave her no time to reconsider they knew the peril of that.
Ah, we had two or three honorable brave men in that pack of judges; and Jean Lefevre was one of them. He sprang to his feet and cried out: "It is a terrible question! The accused is not obliged to answer it!" Cauchon's face flushed black with anger to see this plank flung to the perishing child, and he shouted: "Silence! and take your seat. The accused will answer the question!"
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