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I am an atypical Cardinals fan in that the 2007 season for me represents an improvement over last year, at least in one respect. During the off-season we relocated our season tickets to the Casino Queen Party Porch, the only place in Busch Stadium where Schlafly is available on tap. The Party Porch (which is located on the mezzanine level near the foul pole in left field) offers the additional advantage of serving beer until one hour after the end of the game, unlike most concession stands, which discontinue beer sales in the eighth inning.
It's a wonderful convenience to be able to buy a cup of Schlafly Pale Ale and, in less than a minute, be in my seats in time to hear the immortal music of John Stafford Smith. On the off chance that an erudite reader (ER) of The Growler doesn't already know who John Stafford Smith was, I remind you that he was the English composer who in the 1760s wrote the music for To Anacreon in Heaven. This became the official song of the Anacreonic Society, a musicians' club in London that got its name from the Greek poet Anacreon, whose lyrics celebrated wine, women and song.
 The tune is familiar to baseball fans who aren't ERs because it is also that of The Star Spangled Banner, which was written by Francis Scott Key in 1814 and officially became the national anthem of the United States in 1931. At one point the tune also served as the national anthem of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg.
That two countries as disparate in size as the United States and Luxembourg once shared a common national anthem strikes me as a little incongruous. For that matter, Luxembourg's official name and the fact that it even has a national anthem also seem a bit incongruous. Notwithstanding its many charms, the Grand Duchy really isn't all that grand. Two of Missouri's 114 counties have bigger populations than Luxembourg and two are larger geographically.
There was a time, however, when the grandeur of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg was very real. Seven centuries ago, on June 29, 1312, Henry VII from the House of Luxembourg was crowned as Holy Roman Emperor. Slightly more than a century later, on May 23, 1430, John II of Luxembourg, Count of Ligny, commanded the forces that captured Joan of Arc during the 100 Years War. Later that year John sold the captive Joan to the English for 10,000 livres, which in today's money would buy a whole lot of beer, even at stadium prices, but probably wouldn't be enough to pay Albert Pujols's salary under a long term contract.
The English, who were understandably miffed at Joan for contesting their right to rule France, wanted a reason to put her to death. She couldn't be charged with witchcraft because it was believed that virgins could not be witches and her virginity had been conclusively established. Instead she was charged with and convicted of wearing men's clothing in violation of the Biblical proscription found in Deuteronomy 22: "Women are not to wear men's clothing, and men are not to wear women's clothing; the Lord your God hates people who do such things."
On May 30, 1431, Joan of Arc was burned at the stake for the heresy of cross-dressing. Her charred body was repeatedly raked and burned to insure that no possible relics remained. Her ashes were then thrown into the Seine.
Despite the thoroughness of Joan's English executioners, purported relics surfaced four centuries later and were recognized as authentic. They were said to include a charred human rib, pieces of carbonized wood and the femur of a cat, the latter because black cats were supposedly thrown onto the pyre when women were burned as witches. Unfortunately for the museum in Chinon that proudly displayed them, these relics were recently proved to be fakes. The bones were in fact those of an Egyptian mummy that was as much as two millennia older than Joan of Arc.
Although the Catholic Church didn't get around to making Joan a saint until May 16, 1920, her canonization was predicted as early as the 16th century by William Shakespeare in Part I of Henry VI, in which the Bastard of Orleans says, "But Joan la Pucelle shall be France's saint." (Joan was commonly known as la pucelle d'Orleans, or the maid of Orleans.)
More than 300 years later another English playwright, George Bernard Shaw, addressed her sainthood again in Saint Joan, which was set in the 15th century. At the end of the play, a visitor from the 20th century appears to announce that Joan would be canonized in the distant future. When the 15th century chaplain of Winchester Cathedral asks whether there will be a statue of La Pucelle in his cathedral, the visitor responds that he cannot speak to that eventuality, "As the building is temporarily in the hands of the Anglican heresy." Presumably King George V was not amused by this Shavian characterization of the Church of England, of which he was the titular head at the time.
Whatever the English might think of Joan of Arc, she is still highly revered in France, where the second Sunday in May is celebrated as a national holiday in her honor. What is particularly remarkable is that she was only 19 when she was executed. In spite of her demonstrated military leadership and her unassailable virtue, Joan of Arc was never sufficiently mature to drink a beer legally at the Casino Queen Party Porch.
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