Failing in this _coup d'essai_, she would not simply disappoint
many a beating heart in the glittering crowd that on different motives
yearned for her success, but she would ruin herself, and, as the oracle
within had told her, would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our own
Sovereign Lady Victoria rehearses annually a trial not so severe in
degree, but the same in kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked
for a king. But observe the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men
out of three; Joanna for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of
the Islands and the Orient!--she _can_ go astray in her choice only
by one-half: to the extent of one-half she _must_ have the
satisfaction of being right. And yet, even with these tight limits to
the misery of a boundless discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all
loyalty, to submit that now and then you prick with your pin the wrong
man. But the poor child from Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a
dazzling court--not _because_ dazzling (for in visions she had seen
those that were more so), but because some of them wore a scoffing
smile on their features--how should _she_ throw her line into so
deep a river to angle for a king, where many a gay creature was
sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! Nay, even more than any
true king would have done: for, in Southey's version of the story, the
dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's magnetic sympathy with
royalty,
"On the throne,
I the while mingling with the menial throng,
Some courtier shall be seated.
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