Ban and Arriere Ban: A Rally of Fugitive Rhymes
p. 115Page 1.

p. 115

Jeanne d’Arc is said to have led a Scottish force at Lagny, when she defeated the Burgundian, Franquet d’Arras. A Scottish artist painted her banner; he was a James Polwarth, or a Hume of Polwarth, according to a conjecture of Mr. Hill Burton’s. A monk of Dunfermline, who continued Fordun’s Chronicle, avers that he was with the Maiden in her campaigns, and at her martyrdom. He calls her Puella a spiritu sancto excitata. Unluckily his manuscript breaks off in the middle of a sentence. At her trial, Jeanne said that she had only once seen her own portrait: it was in the hands of a Scottish archer. The story of the white dove which passed from her lips as they opened to her last cry of Jesus! was reported at the trial for her Rehabilitation (1450–56).

p. 116Page 2. One of that Name.

p. 116

Two archers of the name of Lang, Lain, or Laing were in the French service about 1507. See the book on the Scottish Guard, by Father Forbes Leith, S. J.

Thy Church unto the Maid Denies.

These verses were written, curiously enough, the day before the Maiden was raised to the rank of ‘Venerable,’ a step towards her canonisation, which, we trust, will not be long delayed. It is not easy for any one to understand the whole miracle of the life and death of Jeanne d’Arc, and the absolutely unparalleled grandeur and charm of her character, without studying the full records of both her trials, as collected and published by M. Quicherat, for the Société de l’Histoire de France.

Page 4. How they held the Bass.

This story is versified from the account in Memoirs of the Rev. John Blackader, by Andrew Crichton, p. 117Minister of the Gospel. Second Edition. Edinburgh, 1826. Dunbar was retained as a prisoner, when negotiations for surrender, in 1691, were broken off by Middleton’s return with supplies. Halyburton was, it seems, captured later, and only escaped hanging by virtue of the terms extorted by Middleton. Patrick Walker tells the tale of Peden and the girl. Wodrow, in his Analecta, has the story of the Angel, or other shining spiritual presence, which is removed from its context in the ballad. The sufferings from weak beer are quoted in Mr. Blackader’s Memoirs. Mitchell was the undeniably brave Covenanter who shot at Sharp, and hit the Bishop of the Orkneys. He was 
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