The  last-named  oath  has  been  looked  upon  as  the  shibboleth  of  the  Enelish
for  nearly  five  centuries.  At  the  trial  of  loan  of  Arc  (anno  1429)  one  of  the
witnesses,  Colette,  being  asked  who  "Gocfon"  was,  replied  that  it  was  a  nick-
name given  to  the  English  from  their  favorite  exclamation  (Sharon  Turner  :
History  of  tJu  Middle  Ages^  8vo  ed.,  vol.  ii.  p.  555).  And  the  maid  herself,
while  chained  in  her  prison-cell,  proudly  said  to  the  Earls  of  Warwick  and
Stafford,  "You  think  when  you  have  slain  me  you  will  conquer  France,
but  that  you  will  never  do.  Though  there  were  a  hundred  thousand  God-
dammees  more  in  France  than  there  are,  they  will  never  conquer  that  kingdom."
The  name  by  which  the  English  were  known  to  Joan  01  Arc  has  followed
their  morning  drum- beat  around  the  world,  so  that  in  every  savage  and
cec  70»


834  HANDY-BOOK  OF

civiliied  ctime  their  ferarite  imprecation  has  become  the  national  snbriqutL
In  1770  Lord  Hales  tetis  us  that  in  Holland  little  childcen  saluted  the  English
with  Ihe  words  "There  come  the  Goddams."  Captain  Hall  more  recently
informed  us  that  when  a  Sandwich-Islander  wished  to  propitiate  a  British
crew  he  wooed  them  with  congratulatory  phrases  from  their  own  tongue:
"Very  glad  see  you  !  Dash  your  eyes!  Me  like  English  very  much.  l>»il-
ish  hot,  sir  I  Goddam."  Nor  must  we  forget  the  disastrous  attempt  of  Ihe
British  to  colonize  the  Isthmus  of  Daiien.  The  expedition  carried  a  goodly
company  of  clergymen  to  convert  the  heathen  natives,  for  it  was  intended
that  Christianity  should  consecrate  commerce.  But  the  colony  proved  a
commercial  and  theological  failure,  and  the  colonists  left  behind  them  no
mark  that  baptized  and  godly  men  had  set  foot  on  Darien  save  the  great
national  oath,  which  from  its  frequent  reiteration  had  caught  the  car  and  been
retained  in  the  memory  of  the  native  population.
