In some sort it was the last of her acts performed whilst she was yet the deliverer of her people.
When I looked upon those words, long after they had been penned, I felt the tears rising in mine eyes.

I could have wept tears of blood to think of the fate which had befallen one whose thoughts were ever of peace and mercy, even in the hour of her supremest triumph.
How can my poor pen describe the wonders of the great scene, of which I was a spectator upon that day?
Nay, rather will I only seek to speak of the Maid, and how she bore herself upon that great occasion.

She would have been content with a very humble place in the vast Cathedral today; she had no desire to bear a part in the pageant which had filled the city and packed the great edifice from end to end.
But the King and the people willed it otherwise.

The thing which was about to be done was the work of the Maid, and she must be there to see all, and the people should see her, too--see her close to the King himself, who owed to her dauntless courage and devotion the crown he was about to assume, the realm he had begun to conquer.
So she stood near at hand to him all through that long, impressive ceremony--a still, almost solemn figure in her silver armour, a long white velvet mantle, embroidered in silver, flowing from her shoulders, her hand grasping the staff of her great white banner, which had been borne into the Cathedral by D'Aulon, and beside which she stood, her hand upon the staff.
She was bareheaded, and the many-coloured lights streamed in upon her slim, motionless figure, and the face which she lifted in adoration and thanksgiving.

I trow that none in that vast assembly, who could see her as she thus stood, doubted but that she stood there the accredited messenger of the Most High.