AMAZONS. 
152 
Instances of heroism in women have occasionally occurred in ir.adern 
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times, somewhat resembling that of the ancient Amazons. The times 
and the manners of chivalry in partjcular, by bringing great enter- 
j)rises, bold adventures, and extravagant heroism, into fashion, ins])ired 
the women with the same taste. The women, in consequence of the 
prevailing passion, were accordingly seen in the midst of camps and 
of armies. They quitted the soft and tender inclinations, and the 
delicate offices, of their own sex, for the toilsome occupations of 
ours. During the crusades, animated by the double enthusiasm of 
religion and of valour, they often performed the most manly exploits, 
obtained indulgences on the field of battle, and died with arms in their 
hands, by the side of their lovers or of their husbands. In Europe, 
the women defended and attacked fortifications, princesses commanded 
their armies, and obtained victories. Such was the celebrated Joan 
de Montfort disputing for her duchy of Bretagne, and fighting for it 
herself. Such was that still more celebrated Margaret of Anjou, an 
ingenious and intrepid general and soldier, whose genius and spirit 
supported for a long time a feeble husband, taught him to conquer, 
placed him upon the throne, twice relieved him from prison, and, 
oppressed by fortune and by rebels, did not bend till after she had 
decided in person twelve battles. 
The warlike spirit among the women, consistent with ages of bar- 
barism, when every thing is impetuous, because nothing is fixed, ami 
when all excess is the excess of force, continued in Europe upwards 
of 400 years, shewing itself from time to time, and always in the 
middle of convulsions, or on the eve of great revolutions. But there 
are aeras and countries in which that spirit appeared with particular 
lustre. Such were the displays it made in the 15th and IGth 
centuries in Hungary, and in the islands of the Archipelago and the 
Mediterranean, when they were invaded by the Turks. 
Among the striking instances of Amazonian conduct in modern 
ladies, may be mentioned that of Jane of Belleville, widow of Mons. 
de Ciisson, who was beheaded in the year 1353, on a suspicion of 
carrying on a correspondence with England and the Count de Mont- 
fort. This lady, filled with grief for the death of her husband, and 
exasperated at the ill treatment which she considered him as having 
received, sent off her son secretly to London, and, when her apprehen- 
sions were removed with respect to him, sold her jew'els, fitted out 
three ships, and put to sea, to revenge the death of her husband upon 
all the French with whom she should meet. This female corsair 
made several descents upon Normandy, where she stormed castles 
and the inhabitants of that province were spectators more than once,^ 
whilst their villages were all in a blazej of one of the finest women in. 
Europe, with a sw'ord in one hand and a torch in the other, urging 
the carnage, and eyeing with pleasure all the horrors of war.” Me- 
zeray says, that during the crusade, ia X147, “many w’^omen did not 
content themselves with taking the cross, but also took up arms to 
defend it, and composed squadrons of females, which rendered credi- 
ble all that has been said of the prowess of the Amazons.” 
In 1590, the League party obtained some troops from the king of 
Spain. Upon the new s of their being disembarked, Barri de St. Aunez, 
