They were directed by the cleverest man in the King's Council, the Duke Archbishop of Reims, the Chancellor of the kingdom.

By the ceremoniousness and the deliberation of their inquiries, they drew upon Jeanne the curiosity, the interest, and the hopes of minds lost in amazement.[88] [Footnote 88: O.Raguenet, _Les juges de Jeanne d'Arc a Poitiers, membres du Parlement ou gens d'Eglise ?_ in _Lettres et memoires de l'Academie de Sainte-Croix d'Orleans VII_, 1894, pp.

339-442; D.
Lacombe, _L'hote de Jeanne d'Arc a Poitiers, maitre Jean Rabateau, President au Parlement de Poitiers in Revue du Bas-Poitou_, 1891, pp.
46-66.] The defences of the city of Orleans consisted in its walls, its trenches, its cannon, its men-at-arms, and its money.

The English had failed both to surround it and to take it by assault.

Convoys and companies passed between their bastions.