Between the frontiers of Austria and the seat of the Byzantine monarchy

the crusaders were compelled to traverse an interval of six hundred

miles--the wild and desolate countries of Hungary and Bulgaria. Both

nations had imbibed the rudiments of Christianity: the Hungarians were

ruled by their native princes, the Bulgarians by a lieutenant of the

Greek emperor; but on the slightest provocation their ferocious nature

was rekindled, and ample provocation was afforded by the disorders of

the first pilgrims. Agriculture must have been unskilful and languid

among a people whose cities were built of reeds and timber, which were

deserted in the summer season for the tents of hunters and shepherds. A

scanty supply of provisions was rudely demanded, forcibly seized, and

greedily consumed; and on the first quarrel, the crusaders gave a loose

rein to indignation and revenge. But their ignorance of the country, of

war, and of discipline exposed them to every snare. The Greek prefect

of Bulgaria commanded a regular force; at the trumpet of the Hungarian

king, the eighth or the tenth of his martial subjects bent their bows and

mounted on horseback; their policy was insidious, and their retaliation

on these pious robbers was unrelenting and bloody. About a third of the

naked fugitives, and the hermit Peter was of the number, escaped to the

Thracian Mountains; and the emperor, who respected the pilgrimage and

succour of the Latins, conducted them by secure and easy journeys to

Constantinople, and advised them to await the arrival of their brethren.

For awhile they remembered their faults and losses; but no sooner were

they revived by the hospitable entertainment than their venom was again

inflamed; they stung their benefactor, and neither gardens, nor palaces,

nor churches were safe from their depredations. For his own safety,

Alexius allured them to pass over to the Asiatic side of the Bosporus;

but their blind impetuosity soon urged them to desert the station which

he had assigned, and to rush headlong against the Turks who occupied the

road of Jerusalem. The hermit, conscious of his shame, had withdrawn from

the camp to Constantinople; and his lieutenant, Walter the Penniless, who

was worthy of a better command, attempted without success to introduce

some order and prudence among the herd of savages. They separated in

quest of prey, and themselves fell an easy prey to the arts of the

sultan. By a rumour that their foremost companions were rioting in

the spoils of his capital, Suleiman tempted the main body to descend

into the plain of Nicæa; they were overwhelmed by the Turkish arrows;

and a pyramid of bones informed their companions of the place of their

defeat. Of the first crusaders, three hundred thousand[48] had already

perished before a single city was rescued from the infidels, before their

graver and more noble brethren had completed the preparations of their

enterprise.

THE LEADERS OF THE FIRST CRUSADE

[Sidenote: [1096-1097 A.D.]]

None of the great sovereigns of Europe embarked their persons in the

First Crusade. The religious ardour was more strongly felt by the

princes of the second order, who held an important place in the feudal

system. The first rank both in war and council is justly due to Godfrey

de Bouillon; and happy would it have been for the crusaders, if they

had trusted themselves to the sole conduct of that accomplished hero, a

worthy representative of Charlemagne, from whom he was descended in the

female line.

In the service of Henry IV, he bore the great standard of the empire,

and pierced with his lance the breast of Rudolf the rebel king; Godfrey

was the first who ascended the walls of Rome; and his sickness, his vow,

perhaps his remorse for bearing arms against the pope, confirmed an

early resolution of visiting the Holy Sepulchre, not as a pilgrim but a

deliverer. His valour was matured by prudence and moderation; his piety,

though blind, was sincere; and in the tumult of a camp he practised

the real and fictitious virtues of a convent. Superior to the private

factions of the chiefs, he reserved his enmity for the enemies of Christ;

and though he gained a kingdom by the attempt, his pure and disinterested

zeal was acknowledged by his rivals. Godfrey de Bouillon was accompanied

by his two brothers--by Eustace the elder, who had succeeded to the

county of Boulogne, and by the younger, Baldwin, a character of more

ambiguous virtue.

In the parliament that was held at Paris, in the king’s presence, about

two months after the Council of Clermont, Hugh, count of Vermandois

was the most conspicuous of the princes who assumed the cross. But the

appellation of “the great” was applied, not so much to his merit or

possessions (though neither were contemptible) as to the royal birth

of the brother of the king of France. Robert, duke of Normandy, was

the eldest son of William the Conqueror; but on his father’s death he

was deprived of the kingdom of England by his own indolence and the

activity of his brother Rufus. For the trifling sum of ten thousand

marks he mortgaged Normandy, during his absence, to the English usurper;

but his engagement and behaviour in the holy war announced in Robert a

reformation of manners, and restored him in some degree to the public

esteem. Another Robert was count of Flanders; he was surnamed the

Sword and Lance of the Christians; but in the exploits of a soldier he

sometimes forgot the duties of a general. Stephen, count of Chartres, of

Blois, and of Troyes, was one of the richest princes of the age; and the

number of his castles has been compared to the 365 days of the year. His

mind was improved by literature; and in the council of the chiefs, the

eloquent Stephen was chosen to discharge the office of their president.

These four were the principal leaders of the French, the Normans, and

the pilgrims of the British Isles; but the list of the barons who were

possessed of three or four towns would exceed, says a contemporary, the

catalogue of the Trojan War.

[Illustration: THE FOUR LEADERS OF THE FIRST CRUSADE]

In the south of France, the command was assumed by Adhemar, bishop

of Puy, the pope’s legate; and by Raymond, count of St. Giles and

Toulouse, who added the prouder titles of duke of Narbonne and marquis

of Provence. The former was a respectable prelate, alike qualified for

this world and the next. The latter was a veteran warrior, who had fought

against the Saracens of Spain, and who consecrated his declining age

not only to the deliverance but to the perpetual service of the Holy

Sepulchre. A mercantile, rather than a martial spirit prevailed among

his provincials--a common name which included the natives of Auvergne

and Languedoc--the vassals of the kingdom of Burgundy or Arles. From the

adjacent frontier of Spain, he drew a band of hardy adventurers; as he

marched through Lombardy, a crowd of Italians flocked to his standard,

and his united force consisted of one hundred thousand horse and foot.

If Raymond was the first to enlist and the last to depart, the delay may

be excused by the greatness of his preparation and the promise of an

everlasting farewell.

[Illustration: A CRUSADER]

The name of Bohemond, the son of Robert Guiscard, was already famous

by his double victory over the Greek emperor; but his father’s will

had reduced him to the principality of Taranto and the remembrance of

his eastern trophies, till he was awakened by the rumour and passage

of the French pilgrims. It is in the person of this Norman chief that

we may seek for the coolest policy and ambition with a small alloy of

religious fanaticism. His conduct may justify a belief that he had

secretly directed the design of the pope, which he affected to second

with astonishment and zeal. At the siege of Amalfi, his example and

discourse inflamed the passions of a confederate army; he instantly tore

his garment to supply crosses for the numerous candidates and prepared

to visit Constantinople and Asia at the head of ten thousand horse and

twenty thousand foot. Several princes of the Norman race accompanied this

veteran general; and his cousin Tancred was the partner, rather than the

servant, of the war. In the accomplished character of Tancred we discover

all the virtues of a perfect knight--the true spirit of chivalry, which

inspired the generous sentiments and social offices of man, far better

than the base philosophy, or the baser religion, of the times.

Between the age of Charlemagne and that of the Crusades, a revolution had

taken place among the Spaniards, the Normans, and the French, which was

gradually extended to the rest of Europe. The service of the infantry

was degraded to the plebeians; the cavalry formed the strength of the

armies, and the honourable name _miles_, or soldier, was confined to the

gentlemen who served on horseback and were invested with the character

of knighthood. The dukes and counts, who had usurped the rights of

sovereignty, divided the provinces among their faithful barons; the

barons distributed among their vassals the fiefs or benefices of their

jurisdiction; and these military tenants, the peers of each other and of

their lord, composed the noble or equestrian order, which disdained to

conceive the peasant or burgher as of the same species with themselves.

The dignity of their birth was preserved by pure and equal alliances;

their sons alone who could produce four quarters or lines of ancestry

without spot or reproach, might legally pretend to the honour of

knighthood: but a valiant plebeian was sometimes enriched and ennobled

by the sword and became the father of a new race. A single knight could

impart, according to his judgment, the character which he received; and

the warlike sovereigns of Europe derived more glory from this personal

distinction than from the lustre of their diadem.

Such were the troops, and such the leaders, who assumed the cross for

the deliverance of the Holy Sepulchre. As soon as they were relieved

by the absence of the plebeian multitude, they encouraged each other,

by interviews and messages, to accomplish their vow and hasten their

departure. Their wives and sisters were desirous of partaking the danger

and merit of the pilgrimage; their portable treasures were conveyed

in bars of silver and gold; and the princes and barons were attended

by their equipage of hounds and hawks to amuse their leisure and to

supply their table. The difficulty of procuring subsistence for so many

myriads of men and horses engaged them to separate their forces; their

choice or situation determined the road; and it was agreed to meet in

the neighbourhood of Constantinople, and from thence to begin their

operations against the Turks.

ALEXIUS COMPELS HOMAGE

[Sidenote: [1097 A.D.]]

In some oriental tale there is the fable of a shepherd, who was ruined by

the accomplishment of his own wishes: he had prayed for water; the Ganges

was turned into his grounds, and his flock and cottage were swept away

by the inundation. Such was the fortune, or at least the apprehension,

of the Greek emperor Alexius Comnenus. In the Council of Placentia, his

ambassadors had solicited a moderate succour, perhaps of ten thousand

soldiers; but he was astonished by the approach of so many potent chiefs

and fanatic nations. The promiscuous multitudes of Peter the Hermit

were savage beasts, alike destitute of humanity and reason; nor was it

possible for Alexius to prevent or deplore their destruction. The troops

of Godfrey and his peers were less contemptible, but not less suspicious,

to the Greek emperor. Their motives might be pure and pious; but he was

equally alarmed by his knowledge of the ambitious Bohemond, and his

ignorance of the Transalpine chiefs; the courage of the French was blind

and headstrong; they might be tempted by the luxury and wealth of Greece,

and elated by the view and opinion of their invincible strength; and

Jerusalem might be forgotten in the prospect of Constantinople.

After a long march and painful abstinence, the troops of Godfrey

encamped in the plains of Thrace; they heard with indignation that their

brother, the count of Vermandois, was imprisoned by the Greeks; and

their reluctant duke was compelled to indulge them in some freedom of

retaliation and rapine. They were appeased by the submission of Alexius;

he promised to supply their camp; and as they refused, in the midst of

winter, to pass the Bosporus, their quarters were assigned among the

gardens and palaces on the shores of that narrow sea. But an incurable

jealousy still rankled in the minds of the two nations, who despised each

other as slaves and barbarians. Ignorance is the ground of suspicion,

and suspicion was inflamed into daily provocations; prejudice is blind,

hunger is deaf; and Alexius is accused of a design to starve or assault

the Latins in a dangerous post, on all sides encompassed with the waters.

Godfrey sounded his trumpets, burst the net, overspread the plain, and

insulted the suburbs; but the gates of Constantinople were strongly

fortified; the ramparts were lined with archers; and after a doubtful

conflict, both parties listened to the voice of peace and religion. The

gifts and promises of the emperor insensibly soothed the fierce spirit of

the western strangers; as a Christian warrior, he rekindled their zeal

for the prosecution of their holy enterprise, which he engaged to second

with his troops and treasures. On the return of spring, Godfrey was

persuaded to occupy a pleasant and plentiful camp in Asia; and no sooner

had he passed the Bosporus than the Greek vessels were suddenly recalled

to the opposite shore. The same policy was repeated with the succeeding

chiefs, who were swayed by the example and weakened by the departure of

their foremost companions. By his skill and diligence Alexius prevented

the union of any two of the confederate armies at the same moment under

the walls of Constantinople; and before the feast of the Pentecost not a

Latin pilgrim was left on the coast of Europe.

The same arms which threatened Europe might deliver Asia, and repel the

Turks from the neighbouring shores of the Bosporus and the Hellespont.

The fair provinces from Nicæa to Antioch were the recent patrimony of

the Roman emperor; and his ancient and perpetual claim still embraced

the kingdoms of Syria and Egypt. In his enthusiasm, Alexius indulged,

or affected, the ambitious hope of leading his new allies to subvert

the thrones of the East; but the calmer dictates of reason and temper

dissuaded him from exposing his royal person to the faith of unknown

and lawless barbarians. His prudence, or his pride, was content with

extorting from the French princes an oath of homage and fidelity, and a

solemn promise that they would either restore, or hold, their Asiatic

conquests, as the humble and loyal vassals of the Roman Empire. Their

independent spirit was fired at the mention of this foreign and voluntary

servitude; they successively yielded to the dexterous application of

gifts and flattery; and the first proselytes became the most eloquent and

effectual missionaries to multiply the companions of their shame.

The ceremony of their homage was grateful to a people who had long since

considered pride as the substitute of power. High on his throne, the

emperor sat mute and immovable; his majesty was adored by the Latin

princes; and they submitted to kiss either his feet or his knees, an

indignity which their own writers are ashamed to confess, and unable to

deny.

NUMBERS OF THE CRUSADERS

The conquest of Asia was undertaken and achieved by Alexander, with

thirty-five thousand Macedonians and Greeks; and his best hope was in

the strength and discipline of his phalanx of infantry. The principal

force of the crusaders consisted in their cavalry; and when that force

was mustered in the plains of Bithynia, the knights and their martial

attendants on horseback amounted to one hundred thousand fighting men,

completely armed with the helmet and coat of mail. The value of these

soldiers deserved a strict and authentic account; and the flower of

European chivalry might furnish, in a first effort, this formidable

body of heavy horse. A part of the infantry might be enrolled for the

service of scouts, pioneers, and archers; but the promiscuous crowd were

lost in their own disorder; and we depend not on the eyes or knowledge,

but on the belief and fancy of a chaplain of Count Baldwin, in the

estimate of six hundred thousand pilgrims able to bear arms, besides the

priests and monks, the women and children, of the Latin camp. The reader

starts; and before he recovers from his surprise, we shall add, on the

same testimony, that if all who took the cross had accomplished their

vow, above six millions would have migrated from Europe to Asia. Under

this oppression of faith we derive some relief from a more sagacious

and thinking writer, who, after the same review of the cavalry, accuses

the credulity of the priest of Chartres, and even doubts whether the

Cisalpine regions (in the geography of a Frenchman) were sufficient to

produce and pour forth such incredible multitudes. The coolest scepticism

will remember, that of these religious volunteers great numbers never

beheld Constantinople and Nicæa. Of enthusiasm the influence is irregular

and transient; many were detained at home by reason or cowardice, by

poverty or weakness; and many were repulsed by the obstacles of the way,

the more insuperable as they were unforeseen to these ignorant fanatics.

The savage countries of Hungary and Bulgaria were whitened with their

bones; their vanguard was cut in pieces by the Turkish sultan; and the

loss of the first adventure, by the sword, or climate, or fatigue, has

already been stated at three hundred thousand men. Yet the myriads that

survived, that marched, that pressed forwards on the holy pilgrimage,

were a subject of astonishment to themselves and to the Greeks. The

copious energy of her language sinks under the efforts of the princess

Anna Comnena; the images of locusts, of leaves and flowers, of the sands

of the sea, or the stars of heaven, imperfectly represent what she had

seen and heard; and the daughter of Alexius exclaims, that Europe was

loosened from its foundations and hurled against Asia. The ancient

hosts of Darius and Xerxes labour under the same doubt of a vague and

indefinite magnitude; but we are inclined to believe that a larger

number has never been contained within the lines of a single camp than

at the siege of Nicæa, the first operation of the Latin princes. Their

motives, their characters, and their arms, have been already displayed.

Of their troops the most numerous portion were natives of France; the

Low Countries, the banks of the Rhine, and Apulia sent a powerful

reinforcement; some bands of adventurers were drawn from Spain, Lombardy,

and England, and from the distant bogs and mountains of Ireland or

Scotland issued some naked and savage fanatics, ferocious at home, but

unwarlike abroad.

THE SIEGE OF NICÆA

We have expatiated with pleasure on the first steps of the crusaders, as

they paint the manners and character of Europe; but we shall abridge the

tedious and uniform narrative of their blind achievements, which were

performed by strength, and are described by ignorance. From their first

station in the neighbourhood of Nicomedia, they advanced in successive

divisions; passed the contracted limit of the Greek Empire; opened a road

through the hills, and commenced, by the siege of his capital, their

pious warfare against the Turkish sultan. His kingdom of Roum extended

from the Hellespont to the confines of Syria, and barred the pilgrimage

of Jerusalem; his name was Kilij-Arslan, or Suleiman, of the race of

Seljuk, and son of the first conqueror; and in the defence of a land

which the Turks considered as their own, he deserved the praise of his

enemies, by whom alone he is known to posterity. Yielding to the first

impulse of the torrent, he deposited his family and treasure in Nicæa;

retired to the mountains with fifty thousand horse; and twice descended

to assault the camps or quarters of the Christian besiegers, which formed

an imperfect circle of above six miles.

The lofty and solid walls of Nicæa were covered by a deep ditch, and

flanked by 370 towers; and on the verge of Christendom, the Moslems were

trained in arms, and inflamed by religion. Before this city, the French

princes occupied their stations, and prosecuted their attacks without

correspondence or subordination; emulation prompted their valour; but

their valour was sullied by cruelty, and their emulation degenerated into

envy and civil discord. In the space of seven weeks, much labour and

blood were expended, and some progress, especially by Count Raymond, was

made on the side of the besiegers. But the Turks could protract their

resistance and secure their escape, as long as they were masters of the

lake Ascanius, which stretches several miles to the westward of the

city. The means of conquest were supplied by the prudence and industry

of Alexius; a great number of boats was transported on sledges from the

sea to the lake; they were filled with the most dexterous of his archers;

the flight of the sultana was intercepted; Nicæa was invested by land

and water; and a Greek emissary persuaded the inhabitants to accept his

master’s protection, and to save themselves, by a timely surrender, from

the rage of the savages of Europe. In the moment of victory, or at least

of hope, the crusaders, thirsting for blood and plunder, were awed by

the imperial banner that streamed from the citadel; and Alexius guarded

with jealous vigilance this important conquest. The murmurs of the chiefs

were stifled by honour or interest; and after a halt of nine days, they

directed their march towards Phrygia, under the guidance of a Greek

general, whom they suspected of a secret connivance with the sultan.

The consort and the principal servants of Suleiman had been honourably

restored without ransom; and the emperor’s generosity to the miscreants

was interpreted as treason to the Christian cause.

BATTLE OF DORYLÆUM

Suleiman was rather provoked than dismayed by the loss of his capital;

he admonished his subjects and allies of this strange invasion of the

western barbarians; the Turkish emirs obeyed the call of loyalty or

religion; the Turkoman hordes encamped round his standard; and his whole

force is loosely stated by the Christians at 200,000, or even 360,000

horse. Yet he patiently waited till they had left behind them the sea and

the Greek frontier; and hovering on the flanks, observed their careless

and confident progress in two columns beyond the view of each other. Some

miles before they could reach Dorylæum in Phrygia, the left, and least

numerous, division was surprised and attacked and almost oppressed, by

the Turkish cavalry. The heat of the weather, the clouds of arrows, and

the barbarous onset, overwhelmed the crusaders; they lost their order and

confidence; and the fainting fight was sustained by the personal valour,

rather than by the military conduct, of Bohemond, Tancred, and Robert of

Normandy. They were revived by the welcome banners of Duke Godfrey, who

flew to their succour with the count of Vermandois and sixty thousand

horse; and was followed by Raymond of Toulouse, the bishop of Puy, and

the remainder of the sacred army. Without a moment’s pause, they formed

in new order, and advanced to a second battle. They were received with

equal resolution; and, in their common disdain for the unwarlike people

of Greece and Asia, it was confessed on both sides, that the Turks and

the Franks were the only nations entitled to the appellation of soldiers.

[Illustration: HELMET OF A CRUSADER OF THE FIRST CRUSADE]

As long as the horses were fresh and the quivers full, Suleiman

maintained the advantage of the day; and four thousand Christians were

pierced by the Turkish arrows. In the evening, swiftness yielded to

strength; on either side, the numbers were equal, or at least as great as

any ground could hold, or any generals could manage; but in turning the

hills, the last division of Raymond and his provincials was led, perhaps

without design, on the rear of an exhausted enemy, and the long contest

was determined. Besides a nameless and unaccounted multitude, three

thousand pagan knights were slain in the battle and pursuit; the camp

of Suleiman was pillaged. Reserving ten thousand guards of the relics

of his army, Suleiman evacuated the kingdom of Roum, and hastened to

implore the aid, and kindle the resentment, of his eastern brethren. In

a march of five hundred miles, the crusaders traversed the Lesser Asia,

through a wasted land and deserted towns, without either finding a friend

or an enemy. The geographer may trace the position of Dorylæum, Antioch

of Pisidia, Iconium, Archelais, and Germanicia, and may compare those

classic appellations with the modern names of Eskishehr the old city,

Akshehr the white city, Cogni, Erekli, and Marash.

PRINCIPALITY OF EDESSA FOUNDED

To improve the general consternation, the cousin of Bohemond and the

brother of Godfrey were detached from the main army with their respective

squadrons of five, and of seven, hundred knights. They overran in a rapid

career the hills and sea coast of Cilicia, from Cogni to the Syrian

gates; the Norman standard was first planted on the walls of Tarsus and

Malmistra; but the proud injustice of Baldwin at length provoked the

patient and generous Italian; and they turned their consecrated swords

against each other in a private and profane quarrel. Honour was the

motive, and fame the reward, of Tancred; but fortune smiled on the more

selfish enterprise of his rival. He was called to the assistance of a

Greek or Armenian tyrant, who had been suffered under the Turkish yoke to

reign over the Christians of Edessa. Baldwin accepted the character of

his son and champion; but no sooner was he introduced into the city than

he inflamed the people to the massacre of his father, occupied the throne

and treasure, extended his conquests over the hills of Armenia and the

plain of Mesopotamia, and founded the first principality of the Franks or

Latins, which subsisted fifty-four years beyond the Euphrates.

SIEGE OF ANTIOCH

[Sidenote: [1097-1098 A.D.]]

Before the Franks could enter Syria, the summer, and even the autumn,

were completely wasted. The siege of Antioch, or the separation and

repose of the army during the winter season, was strongly debated in

their council. At the head of the Turkish emirs, Baghi Sian, a veteran

chief, commanded in the place; his garrison was composed of six or seven

thousand horse, and fifteen or twenty thousand foot. Notwithstanding

strong fortifications, the city had been repeatedly taken by the

Persians, the Arabs, the Greeks, and the Turks; so large a circuit must

have yielded many previous points of attack; and in a siege that was

formed about the middle of October, the vigour of the execution could

alone justify the boldness of the attempt. Whatever strength and valour

could perform in the field was abundantly discharged by the champions

of the cross; in the frequent occasions of sallies, of forage, of the

attack and defence of convoys, they were often victorious; and we can

only complain that their exploits are sometimes enlarged beyond the scale

of probability and truth. The sword of Godfrey divided a Turk from the

shoulder to the haunch; and one half of the infidel fell to the ground,

while the other was transported by his horse to the city gate. But the

reality or report of such gigantic prowess must have taught the Moslems

to keep within their walls; and against those walls of earth or stone,

the sword and the lance were unavailing weapons.

Indolence or weakness had prevented the Franks from investing the entire

circuit; and the perpetual freedom of two gates relieved the wants and

recruited the garrison of the city. At the end of seven months, after

the ruin of their cavalry, and an enormous loss by famine, desertion,

and fatigue, the progress of the crusaders was imperceptible, and their

success remote, if the Latin Ulysses, the artful and ambitious Bohemond,

had not employed the arms of cunning and deceit. The Christians of

Antioch were numerous and discontented; Firuz, a Syrian renegado, had

acquired the favour of the emir and the command of three towers. A secret

correspondence was soon established. Bohemond declared in the council

of the chiefs that he could deliver the city into their hands. But he

claimed the sovereignty of Antioch as the reward of his service; and the

proposal which had been rejected by the envy, was at length extorted from

the distress, of his equals. The nocturnal surprise was executed by the

French and Norman princes, who ascended in person the scaling ladders

that were thrown from the wall; their new proselyte, after the murder

of his too scrupulous brother, embraced and introduced the servants of

Christ; the army rushed through the gates; and the Moslems soon found,

that, although mercy was hopeless, resistance was impotent.

But the citadel still refused to surrender, and the victors themselves

were speedily encompassed and besieged by the innumerable forces of

Kerboga, prince of Mosul, who with twenty-eight Turkish emirs advanced

to the deliverance of Antioch. Five-and-twenty days the Christians spent

on the verge of destruction; and the proud lieutenant of the caliph and

the sultan left them only the choice of servitude or death. In this

extremity they collected the relics of their strength, sallied from the

town, and in a single memorable day annihilated or dispersed the host of

Turks and Arabians, which they might safely report to have consisted of

six hundred thousand men. Their supernatural allies we shall proceed to

consider; the human causes of the victory of Antioch were the fearless

despair of the Franks, and the surprise, the discord, perhaps the errors,

of their adversaries.

In the eventful period of the siege and defence of Antioch, the crusaders

were alternately exalted by victory or sunk in despair; either swelled

with plenty or emaciated with hunger. A speculative reasoner might

suppose that their faith had a strong and serious influence on their

practice; and that the soldiers of the cross, the deliverers of the Holy

Sepulchre, prepared themselves by a sober and virtuous life for the

daily contemplation of martyrdom. Experience blows away this charitable

illusion; and seldom does the history of profane war display such scenes

of intemperance and prostitution as were exhibited under the walls of

Antioch. The grove of Daphne no longer flourished; but the Syrian air was

still impregnated with the same vices; the Christians were seduced by

every temptation that nature either prompts or reprobates; the authority

of the chiefs was despised; and sermons and edicts were alike fruitless

against those scandalous disorders, not less pernicious to military

discipline, than repugnant to evangelic purity. In the first days of the

siege and the possession of Antioch, the Franks consumed with wanton and

thoughtless prodigality the frugal subsistence of weeks and months; the

desolate country no longer yielded a supply; and from that country they

were at length excluded by the arms of the besieging Turks. Disease, the

faithful companion of want, was envenomed by the rains of the winter, the

summer heats, unwholesome food, and the close imprisonment of multitudes.

The pictures of famine and pestilence are always the same, and always

disgustful.

The remains of treasure or spoil were eagerly lavished in the purchase of

the vilest nourishment; and dreadful must have been the calamities of the

poor, since, after paying three marks of silver for a goat, and fifteen

for a lean camel, the count of Flanders was reduced to beg a dinner, and

Duke Godfrey to borrow a horse. Sixty thousand horses had been reviewed

in the camp; before the end of the siege they were diminished to two

thousand, and scarcely two hundred fit for service could be mustered

on the day of battle. Weakness of body and terror of mind extinguished

the ardent enthusiasm of the pilgrims; and every motive of honour and

religion was subdued by the desire of life. Among the chiefs, three

heroes may be found without fear or reproach: Godfrey de Bouillon was

supported by his magnanimous piety; Bohemond by ambition and interest;

and Tancred declared, in the true spirit of chivalry, that as long as he

was at the head of forty knights he would never relinquish the enterprise

of Palestine. But the count of Toulouse and Provence was suspected of a

voluntary indisposition; the duke of Normandy was recalled from the sea

shore by the censures of the church; Hugh the Great, though he led the

vanguard of the battle, embraced an ambiguous opportunity of returning

to France; and Stephen count of Chartres basely deserted the standard

which he bore, and the council in which he presided. The soldiers were

discouraged by the flight of William, viscount of Melun, surnamed the

Carpenter from the weighty strokes of his axe; and the saints were

scandalised by the fall of Peter the Hermit, who attempted to escape from

the penance of a necessary fast.[49]

A TYPICAL MIRACLE

[Illustration: A NORMAN CRUSADER]

In such a cause, and in such an army, visions, prophecies, and miracles

were frequent and familiar. In the distress of Antioch, they were

repeated with unusual energy and success; St. Ambrose had assured a

pious ecclesiastic that two years of trial must precede the season of

deliverance and grace; the deserters were stopped by the presence and

reproaches of Christ himself; the dead had promised to arise and combat

with their brethren; the Virgin had obtained the pardon of their sins;

and their confidence was revived by a visible sign, the seasonable and

splendid discovery of the holy lance. The policy of their chiefs has on

this occasion been admired, and might surely be excused; but a pious

fraud is seldom produced by the cool conspiracy of many persons; and

a voluntary impostor might depend on the support of the wise and the

credulity of the people. Of the diocese of Marseilles, there was a priest

of low cunning and loose manners, and his name was Peter Bartholemy.

He presented himself at the door of the council-chamber to disclose

an apparition of St. Andrew which had been thrice reiterated in his

sleep, with a dreadful menace, if he presumed to suppress the commands

of heaven. “At Antioch,” said the apostle, “in the church of my brother

St. Peter, near the high altar, is concealed the steel head of the lance

that pierced the side of our Redeemer. In three days, that instrument

of eternal, and now of temporal salvation, will be manifested to his

disciples. Search and ye shall find; bear it aloft in battle, and that

mystic weapon shall penetrate the souls of the miscreants.” The pope’s

legate, the bishop of Puy, affected to listen with coldness and distrust;

but the revelation was eagerly accepted by Count Raymond, whom his

faithful subject, in the name of the apostle, had chosen for the guardian

of the holy lance.

The experiment was resolved; and on the third day after a due preparation

of prayer and fasting the priest of Marseilles introduced twelve trusty

spectators, among whom were the count and his chaplain; and the church

doors were barred against the impetuous multitude. The ground was opened

in the appointed place; but the workmen, who relieved each other, dug

to the depth of twelve feet without discovering the object of their

search. In the evening, when Count Raymond had withdrawn to his post,

and the weary assistants began to murmur, Bartholemy in his shirt, and

without his shoes, boldly descended into the pit; the darkness of the

hour and of the place enabled him to secrete and deposit the head of a

Saracen lance; and the first sound, the first gleam of the steel, was

saluted with a devout rapture. The holy lance was drawn from its recess,

wrapped in a veil of silk and gold, and exposed to the veneration of

the crusaders; their anxious suspense burst forth in a general shout of

joy and hope, and the desponding troops were again inflamed with the

enthusiasm of valour. Next day the gates of Antioch were thrown open;

the battle array was marshalled; the holy lance was carried by Raymond’s

chaplain; and the hosts of the enemy were annihilated or scattered.

In the season of danger and triumph, the revelation of Bartholemy of

Marseilles was unanimously asserted; but as soon as the temporary service

was accomplished, the personal dignity and liberal alms which the count

of Toulouse derived from the custody of the holy lance provoked the envy,

and awakened the reason, of his rivals. A Norman clerk presumed to sift,

with a philosophic spirit, the truth of the legend, the circumstances of

the discovery, and the character of the prophet; and the pious Bohemond

ascribed their deliverance to the merits and intercession of Christ

alone. For a while, the provincials defended their national palladium

with clamours and arms; and new visions condemned to death and hell the

profane sceptics who presumed to scrutinise the truth and merit of the

discovery. The prevalence of incredulity compelled the author to submit

his life and veracity to the judgment of God. A pile of dry fagots, four

feet high, and fourteen long, was erected in the midst of the camp; the

flames burned fiercely to the elevation of thirty cubits; and a narrow

path of twelve inches was left for the perilous trial. The unfortunate

priest of Marseilles traversed the fire with dexterity and speed; but

his thighs and belly were scorched by the intense heat; he expired the

next day; and the logic of believing minds will pay some regard to his

dying protestations of innocence and truth. Some efforts were made by the

provincials to substitute a cross, a ring, or a tabernacle, in the place

of the holy lance, which soon vanished in contempt and oblivion.

The prudence or fortune of the Franks had delayed their invasion till the

decline of the Turkish Empire. Under the manly government of the first

three sultans, the kingdoms of Asia were united in peace and justice; and

the innumerable armies which they led in person were equal in courage,

and superior in discipline, to the barbarians of the West. But at the

time of the crusade the inheritance of Malik Shah was disputed by his

four sons. The twenty-eight emirs, who marched with the standard of

Kerboga, were his rivals or enemies; their hasty levies were drawn from

the towns and tents of Mesopotamia and Syria; and the Turkish veterans

were employed or consumed in the civil wars beyond the Tigris. The caliph

of Egypt embraced this opportunity of weakness and discord, to recover

his ancient possessions; and his sultan Afdal besieged Jerusalem and

Tyre, expelled the children of Ortok, and restored in Palestine the

civil and ecclesiastical authority of the Fatimites. They heard with

astonishment of the vast armies of Christians that had passed from Europe

to Asia, and rejoiced in the sieges and battles which broke the power

of the Turks, the adversaries of their sect and monarchy. But the same

Christians were the enemies of the prophet; and from the overthrow of

Nicæa and Antioch, the motive of their enterprise, which was gradually

understood, would urge them forwards to the banks of the Jordan, or

perhaps of the Nile. An intercourse of epistles and embassies, which

rose and fell with the events of war, was maintained between the throne

of Cairo and the camp of the Latins; and their adverse pride was the

result of ignorance and enthusiasm. The ministers of Egypt declared in

a haughty, or insinuated in a milder, tone, that their sovereign, the

true and lawful commander of the faithful, had rescued Jerusalem from

the Turkish yoke; and that the pilgrims, if they would divide their

numbers, and lay aside their arms, should find a safe and hospitable

reception at the sepulchre of Jesus. In either fortune the answer of

the crusaders was firm and uniform; they disdained to inquire into the

private claims or possessions of the followers of Mohammed; whatsoever

was his name or nation, the usurper of Jerusalem was their enemy; and

instead of prescribing the mode and terms of their pilgrimage, it was

only by a timely surrender of the city and province, their sacred right,

that he could deserve their alliance, or deprecate their impending and

irresistible attack.

JERUSALEM BESIEGED

[Sidenote: [1098-1099 A.D.]]

Yet this attack, when they were within the view and reach of their

glorious prize, was suspended above ten months after the defeat of

Kerboga. The zeal and courage of the crusaders were chilled in the

moment of victory; and instead of marching to improve the consternation,

they hastily dispersed to enjoy the luxury of Syria. The causes of this

strange delay may be found in the want of strength and subordination. In

the painful and various service of Antioch, the cavalry was annihilated;

many thousands of every rank had been lost by famine, sickness, and

desertion; the same abuse of plenty had been productive of a third

famine; and the alternation of intemperance and distress had generated

a pestilence, which swept away above fifty thousand of the pilgrims.

Few were able to command, and none were willing to obey; and Count

Raymond exhausted his troops and treasures in an idle expedition into

the heart of Syria. The winter was consumed in discord and disorder. In

the month of May, the relics of this mighty host proceeded from Antioch

to Laodicea; about forty thousand Latins, of whom no more than fifteen

hundred horse, and twenty thousand foot, were capable of immediate

service. Their easy march was continued between Mount Libanus and the

sea shore; their wants were liberally supplied by the coasting traders

of Genoa and Pisa; and they drew large contributions from the emirs of

Tripolis, Tyre, Sidon, Acre, and Cæsarea, who granted a free passage and

promised to follow the example of Jerusalem. From Cæsarea they advanced

into the midland country; their clerks recognised the sacred geography

of Lydda, Ramla, Emmaus, and Bethlehem, and as soon as they descried the

Holy City, the crusaders forgot their toils and claimed their reward.

Jerusalem has derived some reputation from the number and importance

of her memorable sieges. It was not till after a long and obstinate

contest that Babylon and Rome could prevail against the obstinacy of

the people, the craggy ground that might supersede the necessity of

fortifications, and the walls and towers that would have fortified the

most accessible plain. By the experience of a recent siege, and a three

years’ possession, the Saracens of Egypt had been taught to discern,

and in some degree to remedy, the defects of a place, which religion as

well as honour forbade them to resign. Aladin, or Iftikhar, the caliph’s

lieutenant, was entrusted with the defence; his policy strove to restrain

the native Christians by the dread of their own ruin and that of the

Holy Sepulchre. His garrison is said to have consisted of forty thousand

Turks and Arabians; and if he could muster twenty thousand of the

inhabitants, it must be confessed that the besieged were more numerous

than the besieging army. Their siege was more reasonably directed against

the northern and western sides of the city. Godfrey de Bouillon erected

his standard on the first swell of Mount Calvary; to the left, as far

as St. Stephen’s gate, the line of attack was continued by Tancred and

the two Roberts; and Count Raymond established his quarters from the

citadel to the foot of Mount Zion, which was no longer included within

the precincts of the city. On the fifth day, the crusaders made a general

assault. By dint of brutal force, they burst the first barrier, but they

were driven back with shame and slaughter to the camp; the influence

of vision and prophecy was deadened by the too frequent abuse of those

pious stratagems; and time and labour were found to be the only means

of victory. The time of the siege was indeed fulfilled in forty days,

but they were forty days of calamity and anguish. On a Friday, at three

in the afternoon, the day and hour of the passion, Godfrey de Bouillon

stood victorious on the walls of Jerusalem. His example was followed on

every side by the emulation of valour; and about 460 years after the

conquest of Omar, the Holy City was rescued from the Mohammedan yoke.

In the pillage of public and private wealth, the adventurers had agreed

to respect the exclusive property of the first occupant; and the spoils

of the great mosque, seventy lamps and massy vases of gold and silver,

rewarded the diligence, and displayed the generosity, of Tancred.

A bloody sacrifice was offered by his mistaken votaries to the God of

the Christians; resistance might provoke, but neither age nor sex could

mollify, their implacable rage; they indulged themselves three days in a

promiscuous massacre; and the infection of the dead bodies produced an

epidemical disease. After seventy thousand Moslems had been put to the

sword, and the harmless Jews had been burned in their synagogue, they

could still reserve a multitude of captives, whom interest or lassitude

persuaded them to spare. Of these savage heroes of the cross, Tancred

alone betrayed some sentiments of compassion; yet we may praise the more

selfish lenity of Raymond, who granted a capitulation and safe conduct to

the garrison of the citadel.

The Holy Sepulchre was now free; and the bloody victors prepared to

accomplish their vow. Bareheaded and barefoot, with contrite hearts, and

in a humble posture, they ascended the hill of Calvary, amidst the loud

anthems of the clergy; kissed the stone which had covered the Saviour of

the world, and bedewed with tears of joy and penitence the monument of

their redemption.[b]

THE ARAB ACCOUNT

It is well in a moment of such historic import as this to see how the

other side accepts the crisis. The Arab historian Ibn Guzi[d] wrote

as follows: “The Franks, when they set out from Antioch, numbered one

million men, of whom five hundred thousand were fit for war. The rest

consisted of workmen and those employed on the swivel-guns and other

instruments of war. They marched along the sea shore. Jerusalem at that

time belonged to the Egyptians. Their commander was named Iftikhar

ad-Daulah, or ‘the glory of the empire.’

“The siege lasted forty days. The Franks built two towers to command the

walls of the town, one in the direction of the gate of Sidon, the other

in that of the gates of Asbat and Amud, or the gates of the Tribes and

of the Column. The besieged succeeded in burning the tower near the gate

of Sidon; the second was brought up close to the walls. Then the Franks

set all their machines to work at the same time; attacking like one

single man, they put the Moslems to flight and entered the town by force.

The inhabitants took refuge in the mosque Alacsa and its dependencies;

the Franks, following them there, killed it is said one hundred thousand

persons, and made an equal number prisoners. They did not even spare the

aged of both sexes.

“In this spot immense riches were stored. They found seventy lamps,

twenty of which were of gold and the others of silver; they also carried

off a _tennur_ or large silver lamp, weighing forty Syrian pounds. The

Jews they shut up in their synagogue, and burned them there. Jerusalem

had been in the power of Islam without a break since the reign of Caliph

Omar, in the sixteenth year of the Hegira (637 A.D.). A Moslem author

named Ibn Zulak,[d] thinking no doubt to give greater importance to this

event, declares that at the moment when the Christians entered the Holy

City the sun was eclipsed, the earth was hidden in darkness, and the

stars appeared in broad daylight.”[d]

The Moslem poets describe the horrors of massacre in vehement terms,

bewailing the butchery of the women and the children and the fate of

their fathers who “but lately masters of Syria, now found no other refuge

than the backs of swift camels or even the entrails of the vultures!”[a]

GODFREY ELECTED KING (1099 A.D.)

[Sidenote: [1099-1147 A.D.]]

Eight days after this memorable event, which Pope Urban did not live

to hear, the Latin chiefs proceeded to the election of a king to guard

and govern their conquest in Palestine. The jealousy and ambition of

Raymond were condemned by his own followers; and the free, the just,

the unanimous voice of the army proclaimed Godfrey de Bouillon the

first and most worthy of the champions of Christendom. His magnanimity

accepted a trust as full of danger as of glory; but in a city where his

Saviour had been crowned with thorns, the devout pilgrim rejected the

name and ensigns of royalty; and the founder of the kingdom of Jerusalem

contented himself with the modest title of Defender and Baron of the Holy

Sepulchre. His government of a single year, too short for the public

happiness, was interrupted in the first fortnight by a summons to the

field by the approach of the vizir or sultan of Egypt, who had been too

slow to prevent, but who was impatient to avenge, the loss of Jerusalem.

His total overthrow in the battle of Askalon sealed the establishment of

the Latins in Syria, and signalised the valour of the French princes, who

in this action bade a long farewell to the holy wars.

After suspending before the Holy Sepulchre the sword and standard of

the sultan, the new king (he deserves the title) embraced his departing

companions, and could retain only, with the gallant Tancred, three

hundred knights and two thousand foot soldiers, for the defence of

Palestine. His sovereignty was soon attacked by a new enemy, the only one

against whom Godfrey was a coward. Adhemar, bishop of Puy, who excelled

both in council and action, had been swept away in the last plague of

Antioch; the remaining ecclesiastics preserved only the pride and avarice

of their character; and their seditious clamours had required that

the choice of a bishop should precede that of a king. The revenue and

jurisdiction of the lawful patriarch were usurped by the Latin clergy;

the exclusion of the Greeks and Syrians was justified by the reproach

of heresy or schism; and, under the iron yoke of their deliverers, the

oriental Christians regretted the tolerating government of the Arabian

caliphs. Daimbert, archbishop of Pisa, had long been trained in the

secret policy of Rome; he brought a fleet of his countrymen to the

succour of the Holy Land, and was installed, without a competitor, the

spiritual and temporal head of the church. The new patriarch immediately

grasped the sceptre which had been acquired by the toil and blood of the

victorious pilgrims; and both Godfrey and Bohemond submitted to receive

at his hands the investiture of their feudal possessions. Nor was this

sufficient; Daimbert claimed the immediate property of Jerusalem and

Joppa; instead of a firm and generous refusal, the hero negotiated with

the priest; a quarter of either city was ceded to the church; and the

modest bishop was satisfied with an eventual reversion of the rest, on

the death of Godfrey without children, or on the future acquisition of a

new seat at Cairo or Damascus.

[Illustration: A CRUSADER

(From an effigy on a tomb in Florence)]

Without this indulgence, the conqueror would have been almost stripped

of his infant kingdom, which consisted only of Jerusalem and Joppa, with

about twenty villages and towns of the adjacent country. Within this

narrow verge, the Mohammedans were still lodged in some impregnable

castles; and the husbandman, the trader, and the pilgrim were exposed to

daily and domestic hostility. By the arms of Godfrey himself, and of the

two Baldwins, his brother and cousin, who succeeded to the throne, the

Latins breathed with more ease and safety; and at length they equalled,

in the extent of their dominions, though not in the millions of their

subjects, the ancient princes of Judah and Israel. After the reduction

of the maritime cities of Laodicea, Tripolis, Tyre, and Askalon, which

were powerfully assisted by the fleets of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, and

even of Flanders and Norway, the range of sea coast from Scanderoon to

the borders of Egypt was possessed by the Christian pilgrims. If the

prince of Antioch disclaimed his supremacy, the counts of Edessa and

Tripolis owned themselves the vassals of the king of Jerusalem; the

Latins reigned beyond the Euphrates; and the four cities of Hems, Hamah,

Damascus, and Aleppo were the only relics of the Mohammedan conquests in

Syria.

The laws and language, the manners and titles, of the French nation

and Latin church, were introduced into these transmarine colonies. The

whole legal militia of the kingdom could not exceed eleven thousand

men, a slender defence against the surrounding myriads of Saracens and

Turks. But the firmest bulwark of Jerusalem was founded on the knights

of the Hospital of St. John, and of the Temple of Solomon; on the

strange association of a monastic and military life, which fanaticism

might suggest, but which policy must approve. The flower of the nobility

of Europe aspired to wear the cross, and to profess the vows of these

respectable orders; their spirit and discipline were immortal; and the

speedy donation of twenty-eight thousand farms, or manors, enabled them

to support a regular force of cavalry and infantry for the defence of

Palestine. The austerity of the convent soon evaporated in the exercise

of arms; the world was scandalised by the pride, avarice, and corruption

of these Christian soldiers. But in their most dissolute period, the

knights of the Hospital and Temple maintained their fearless and fanatic

character; they neglected to live, but they were prepared to die, in the

service of Christ; and the spirit of chivalry, the parent and offspring

of the Crusades, has been transplanted by this institution from the Holy

Sepulchre to the Isle of Malta.

No sooner had Godfrey de Bouillon accepted the office of supreme

magistrate, than he solicited the public and private advice of the

Latin pilgrims, who were the best skilled in the statutes and customs

of Europe. From these materials, with the counsel and approbation of

the patriarchs and barons of the clergy and laity, Godfrey composed the

_Assize of Jerusalem_--a precious monument of feudal jurisprudence.

The justice and freedom of the constitution were maintained by two

tribunals of unequal dignity, which were instituted by Godfrey de

Bouillon after the conquest of Jerusalem. The king, in person, presided

in the upper court, the court of the barons. Of those the four most

conspicuous were the prince of Galilee, the lord of Sidon and Cæsarea,

and the counts of Joppa and Tripolis, who, perhaps with the constable

and marshal, were in a special manner the compeers and judges of each

other. But all the nobles who held their lands immediately of the crown

were entitled and bound to attend the king’s court; and each baron

exercised a similar jurisdiction in the subordinate assemblies of his own

feudatories. The trial by battle was established in all criminal cases

which affected the life, or limb, or honour, of any person; and in all

civil transactions, of or above the value of one mark of silver.

Among the causes which enfranchised the plebeians from the yoke of feudal

tyranny, the institution of cities and corporations is one of the most

powerful; and if those of Palestine are coeval with the First Crusade,

they may be ranked with the most ancient of the Latin world. Many of the

pilgrims had escaped from their lords under the banner of the cross;

and it was the policy of the French princes to tempt their stay by the

assurance of the rights and privileges of freemen. It is expressly

declared in the _Assize of Jerusalem_, that after instituting, for his

knights and barons, the court of peers, in which he presided himself,

Godfrey de Bouillon established a second tribunal, in which his person

was represented by his viscount. The jurisdiction of this inferior court

extended over the burgesses of the kingdom; and it was composed of a

select number of the most discreet and worthy citizens, who were sworn

to judge, according to the laws, of the actions and fortunes of their

equals. In the conquest and settlement of new cities, the example of

Jerusalem was imitated by the kings and their great vassals; and above

thirty similar corporations were founded before the loss of the Holy

Land. Another class of subjects, the Syrians, or oriental Christians,

were oppressed by the zeal of the clergy, and protected by the toleration

of the state. Godfrey listened to their reasonable prayer, that they

might be judged by their own national laws. A third court was instituted

for their use, of limited and domestic jurisdiction; the sworn members

were Syrians, in blood, language, and religion; but the office of the

president (in Arabic, of the _rais_) was sometimes exercised by the

viscount of the city. At an immeasurable distance below the nobles, the

burgesses, and the strangers, the _Assize of Jerusalem_ condescends

to mention the villeins and slaves, the peasants of the land and the

captives of war, who were almost equally considered as the objects of

property. The relief or protection of these unhappy men was not esteemed

worthy of the care of the legislator; but he diligently provides for the

recovery, though not indeed for the punishment, of the fugitives. Like

hounds, or hawks, which had strayed from the lawful owner, they might

be lost and claimed; the slave and falcon were of the same value; but

three slaves, or twelve oxen, were accumulated to equal the price of the

war-horse; and a sum of three hundred pieces of gold was fixed, in the

age of chivalry, as the equivalent of the more noble animal.[b]

RESULTS OF THE FIRST CRUSADE

As if obeying the impetus it had received, the new state continued the

spirit of conquest under Godfrey’s first two successors--Baldwin I

(1100-1118) and Baldwin II of Bourg (1118-1131). But after these two

reigns decadence began in discord. The atabegs who ruled at Mosul and

Damascus took Edessa and massacred its people in 1144. There needed

nothing less than this bloody disaster, which left Palestine exposed, to

drive Europe to the renewal of crusade.

The First Crusade was very different from the seven others. It kindled

all Europe, profoundly stirred the masses, both people and peers, and was

the symptom of a great upheaval of sentiments and ideals. Those of the

two following centuries had not the same motive. They were almost all

conducted by kings who had kept aloof from the first; and even if faith

were never absent, politics was often superior.

The Second Crusade felt still a vivid reflection of the spirit of

devotion that animated the First; but it was no longer the work of

the people but of princes--the emperor Conrad III and King Louis VII

of France, who took the cross in spite of the prudent counsels of his

minister, Abbé Suger. This Crusade was preached in France and Germany

by St. Bernard; but already the zeal was somewhat chilled. A general

tax levied on the whole kingdom of France, and on every class--nobles,

priests, or peasants--roused much protest; at Sens the people killed

the abbé of St. Pierre le Vif, ruler of part of their city, because of

an impost he had wished to collect. “The king,” said a contemporary,

“started on his way in the midst of curses.” St. Bernard had been offered

the command of the expedition, but remembering Peter the Hermit, he

refused.[e]

This Peter the Hermit, who for all his meek and lowly manner had unhinged

all Europe and led a huge rabble to the slaughter in Asia Minor, had

received an address of thanks in Jerusalem when the city had been taken;

and then retiring to his native France had built a monastery at Huy on

the Maas, where he lived quietly and died obscurely in 1115, recking

nothing of the series of bloody wars that were to follow as the aftermath

of his perfervid oratory and fanatic frenzy.[a]

FOOTNOTES

[48] [The reader will be cautious in giving some of these numbers his

full credence, but there are often no existing documents on which to base

a modification or substitution, and we can only quote the old chronicler

and take his figures with a liberal pinch of salt.]

[49] Peter and William fled, during the night, from the distress which

prevailed in the camp of the crusaders before the capture of Antioch. In

the morning they were pursued by Tancred, brought back, and obliged to

swear publicly that they would never again desert the army.--WILKEN,[c]

I, p. 184.

[Illustration: HORSE ARMOUR OF THE THIRTEENTH AND FOURTEENTH CENTURIES]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER III. THE SECOND CRUSADE

Winged is each heart, and winged every heel;

They fly, yet notice not how fast they fly;

But by the time the dewless meads reveal

The fervent sun’s ascension in the sky,

Lo, towered Jerusalem salutes the eye!

A thousand pointing fingers tell the tale;

“Jerusalem!” a thousand voices cry,

“All hail, Jerusalem!” hill, down, and dale

Catch the glad sounds, and shout, “Jerusalem, all hail!”

--TASSO (_Jerusalem_, Canto iii).

[Sidenote: [1147-1189 A.D.]]

The enthusiasm of the First Crusade is a natural and simple event, while

hope was fresh, danger untried, and enterprise congenial to the spirit

of the times. But the obstinate perseverance of Europe may indeed excite

our pity and admiration: that no instruction should have been drawn from

constant and adverse experience; that the same confidence should have

repeatedly grown from the same failures; that six succeeding generations

should have rushed headlong down the precipice that was open before them;

and that men of every condition should have staked their public and

private fortunes on the desperate adventure of possessing or recovering

a tombstone two thousand miles from their country. In a period of two

centuries after the Council of Clermont, each spring and summer produced

a new emigration of pilgrim warriors for the defence of the Holy Land;

but the seven great armaments or crusades were excited by some impending

or recent calamity; the nations were moved by the authority of their

pontiffs and the example of their kings; their zeal was kindled, and

their reason was silenced, by the voice of their holy orators; and among

these, Bernard, the monk or the saint, may claim the most honourable

place.

ST. BERNARD

[Sidenote: [1115-1147 A.D.]]

About eight years before the first conquest of Jerusalem he was born

of a noble family in Burgundy; at the age of twenty-three he buried

himself in the monastery of Citeaux, then in the primitive fervour

of the institution; at the end of two years he led forth her third

colony, or daughter, to the valley of Clairvaux in Champagne; and was

content till the hour of his death with the humble station of abbot of

his own community. A philosophic age has abolished, with too liberal

and indiscriminate disdain, the honours of these spiritual heroes. The

meanest among them are distinguished by some energies of the mind; they

were at least superior to their votaries and disciples; and in the

race of superstition, they attained the prize for which such numbers

contended. In speech, in writing, in action, Bernard stood high above his

rivals and contemporaries; his compositions are not devoid of wit and

eloquence; and he seems to have preserved as much reason and humanity as

may be reconciled with the character of a saint. In a secular life he

would have shared the seventh part of a private inheritance; by a vow

of poverty and penance, by closing his eyes against the visible world,

by the refusal of all ecclesiastical dignities, the abbot of Clairvaux

became the oracle of Europe, and the founder of 160 convents. Princes and

pontiffs trembled at the freedom of his apostolical censures; France,

England, and Milan consulted and obeyed his judgment in a schism of the

church; the debt was repaid by the gratitude of Innocent II; and his

successor, Eugenius III, was the friend and disciple of the holy Bernard.

It was in the proclamation of the Second Crusade that he shone as the

missionary and prophet of God, who called the nations to the defence of

the Holy Sepulchre. At the parliament of Vézelay he spoke before the

king; and Louis VII, with his nobles, received their crosses from his

hand. The abbot of Clairvaux then marched to the less easy conquest of

the emperor Conrad; a phlegmatic people, ignorant of his language, was

transported by the pathetic vehemence of his tone and gestures; and his

progress from Constance to Cologne was the triumph of eloquence and zeal.

Bernard applauds his own success in the depopulation of Europe; affirms

that cities and castles were emptied of their inhabitants; and computes

that only one man was left behind for the consolation of seven widows.

The blind fanatics were desirous of electing him for their general; but

the example of the hermit Peter was before his eyes; and while he assured

the crusaders of the divine favour, he prudently declined a military

command in which failure and victory would have been almost equally

disgraceful to his character.[b]

In the consternation throughout Palestine which the fall of Edessa

occasioned, all classes of people beckoned their compatriots in the

West. The news of the loss of the eastern frontier of the Latin kingdom

reached France at a time peculiarly favourable for foreign war. After

having reduced his vassal the count of Champagne to obedience, Louis VII

the French king exceeded the usual cruelty of conquerors, and instead of

sheathing his sword, when the inhabitants of Vetri submitted, he set fire

to a church, to which more than thirteen hundred of them had fled for

refuge. His sacrilegious barbarity excited the indignation of the clergy

and laity. A fit of sickness calmed his passions; his conscience accused

and condemned him, and he resolved to expiate his sins by a pilgrimage to

Jerusalem. Louis VII was the first sovereign prince who engaged himself

to fight under the banner of the cross. The news of the calamities in

Palestine quickened his holy resolution, and like other men he was

impetuously moved by the eloquence of St. Bernard, the great oracle of

the age.

The wish of Louis for a crusade was applauded by Pope Eugenius III. His

intention was pronounced to be holy; and Bernard was ordered to travel

through France and Germany, and preach a plenary indulgence to those

who followed the royal example. Eugenius wrote to the faithful sons

of the church, urging them to cross the seas to Palestine. The first

crusaders had provoked the wrath of heaven by their dissoluteness and

folly; but the new soldiers of Christ ought to travel simple in dress,

and disdaining the luxury of falcons and dogs of the chase. As Peter had

represented the scandal of suffering the sacred places to remain in the

hands of the infidels, the eloquent Bernard thundered from the pulpit

the disgrace of allowing a land which had been recovered from pollution

again to sink into it. He was admitted to the thrones of princes, as well

as to the pulpits of their churches; to public assemblies and to private

meetings. In a parliament held at Vézelay, in the season of Easter,

1146, Louis was confirmed in his pious resolve; and having on his knees

received the holy symbol, he joined with Bernard in moving the barons and

knights to save the sanctuary of David from the hands of the Philistines.

No house could contain the multitude; they assembled in the fields

and Bernard addressed them from a lofty pulpit. As at the Council of

Clermont, so on this occasion shouts of “_Deus id vult_” rent the skies;

the crosses which the man of God had brought with him to the meeting fell

far short of the number of enthusiasts; and he therefore tore his simple

monkish garment into small pieces, and affixed them to the shoulders of

his kneeling converts. The successful incendiary then crossed the Rhine;

and every city and village from Constance to Carinthia echoed the call to

war.

[Sidenote: [1147-1148 A.D.]]

But the emperor Conrad III made a long and firm denial. As politics

prevented the exercise of religious fervour, the preacher endeavoured

to impress him with the belief that were he in arms for the kingdom

of God, heaven would protect his kingdom in Europe. Still the emperor

wanted faith; but when the holy orator, in a moment of peculiar energy,

drew an animated picture of the proceedings of the day of judgment, of

the punishments which would be inflicted on the idle, and the rewards

which would be showered upon the Christians militant, then it was

that conviction flashed across the mind of the royal auditor; and the

profession was made that the lord of the Germans knew and would perform

his duty to the church. Encouraged by this example, the barons and people

flew to arms.[50]

Mainz was the rendezvous of the French crusaders, and Ratisbon of those

from Germany. The French levies were of priests, of people, and of

soldiers; and of the last class the number of men armed with the helmet

and coat of mail was seventy thousand. The civil wars of England had

been closed by the weakness of all parties; but some of the nobility,

restless when not engaged in deeds of blood, joined themselves to the

force of Louis. Conrad had an army quite as large and formidable, with a

due proportion of light-armed men, and simple pilgrims. The enthusiasm

of the crusade realised the dreams of romancers, and heroines as well

as heroes had prepared themselves to make war upon the paynim brethren.

A considerable troop of women rode among the Germans; they were arrayed

with the spear and shield, but (like Virgil’s Camilla) some love of

usual delights had mingled itself with the desire of great exploits, for

they were remarkable by the splendour of their dress, and the bold leader

was called “the golden-footed dame.”[51] The emperor marched through

Hungary and solicited the friendship of the Grecian court.

[Illustration: ST. BERNARD FEEDING THE POOR]

Manuel, the grandson of Alexius, was on the throne, and although like

his ancestor he beheld with secret dread the armaments of Europe, yet

for the protection of his subjects he entered into a treaty with Conrad

for the regular purchase and sale of provisions. There was frequent

matter of charge and recrimination between the Greeks and the Germans in

the march of the latter to Constantinople; and circumstances occasioned

many negotiations between the two emperors. But Conrad apprehended the

duplicity of Manuel, and in indignation at the Grecian’s infraction of

the treaty relating to intercourse, he crossed the Bosporus without

meeting or conferring with the emperor.

Manuel received the king of France as an equal. He met him in the court

of his palace, and after mutual embraces conducted him into an apartment,

where they sat with equal dignity. In the midst of feasts and public

rejoicings the French monarch learned that the emperor and the sultan of

Iconium were in correspondence. The impatience of the barons and knights

to visit Jerusalem overcame every suggestion to revenge, and made them

think that the defence of the Holy Land, and not the destruction of the

Greek Empire, was the object for which they had taken up arms. But there

were not wanting men who urged that the time was arrived for removing the

barrier between Europe and Asia.

DISASTERS OF THE GERMANS

The passage through Bithynia completed, Conrad entered Lycaonia, the

heart of the dominions of the Seljuk Turks. The sultan had assembled

from every quarter of his states all the troops that could possibly be

brought into the field, and the number was so great that the rivers could

not satisfy their thirst or the country furnish provisions. The imperial

guides conducted the objects of their care either through deserts where

the soldiers perished from hunger, or led them into the jaws of the

Moslems. In their occasional transactions, the bread which the crusaders

purchased was mixed with chalk, and various other cruel frauds were

practised by the Greeks. The assaults of the Turks were incessant. The

staff of the pilgrim was a poor defence from a scimitar, and the heavily

armed Germans could not retreat from the activity of the Tatars. Only a

tenth part of the soldiers and palmers that had left the banks of the

Danube and the Rhine escaped the arrows of the Moslems, and with their

commander secured their retreat to the French army. Louis had been lulled

into security by the flattering assurances of Manuel that Conrad, so far

from standing in need of succour, had even defeated the Turks and taken

Iconium. The French king was lying in camp on the borders of the lake

near Nicæa, when some wretched German fugitives arrived with news of

the perfidy of the Greeks, and the triumph of the Moslems. The allied

monarchs soon met and consulted on the road which the champions of the

cross should take. They united their crusaders, turned aside from the

path which had been trodden by the feudal princes of Europe, and marched

in concert as far as Philadelphia in Lydia; but the Germans had lost

their baggage, and on a prospect of new calamities, many returned to

Constantinople, and near Ephesus (to which place the army directed its

course) the emperor himself embarked, and went to Jerusalem by ship.

THE FRENCH FAILURE

[Illustration: DUBBING A KNIGHT ON THE FIELD OF BATTLE]

The French recruited themselves on the shores of the Ægean Sea, and

pursued their march in an easterly direction. They rejected with disdain

an offer of Manuel of a protection from Moslem fury, and they gallantly

kept up their course with the usual portion of suffering, till they

arrived at the banks of the Mæander. They found there the Turks, who

having safely deposited their spoils came to dispute with the Latins the

passage of the river. The battle was not of long duration; the French

made so great a slaughter of their foe, that the bones of the Moslems

were conspicuous for years. The crusaders proceeded in good order and

discipline through the town of Laodicea, into the barrier mountains

between Phrygia and Pisidia. The vanguard of the army advanced beyond

the appointed rendezvous. The rearguard, in which was the king, moved

forwards with perfect confidence that the heights before them were in

possession of their friends. Their ravenous enemy, who always hovered

round them, seized the moment when the ranks of the Christians were

divided, and casting aside their bows and arrows, fell upon them with

tumultuous rapidity, sword in hand. It was in a defile of the mountains

that the Turkish tempest burst on the Latin troops. Rocks ascending to

the clouds were above the crusaders, and fathomless precipices beneath

them. The French could not recover from the shock and horror of the

surprise. Men, horses, and baggage were cast into the abyss. The Turks

were innumerable and irresistible. The life of the king was saved more by

fortune than by skill. He escaped to an eminence with a few soldiers, and

in the deep obscurity of the night made his way to the advanced guard.

The snows of winter, deficiency of stores, and the refusal of the Greeks

to trade with them, were the evils with which the French had to contend.

They marched, or rather wandered, for they knew not the roads, and the

discipline of the army was broken. They arrived at Attalia (Adalia), the

metropolis of Pamphylia, seated on the sea shore near the mouth of the

Cestrus. But the unchristian Greeks refused hospitality to the enemies of

the infidel name.

[Sidenote: [1148-1149 A.D.]]

Famine had so dreadfully thinned the ranks of the army, and so many

horses and other beasts of burden had perished, that the most sage and

prudent among the crusaders advised their companions to turn aside from

scenes of desolation, and proceed by sea to Antioch. The king and his

soldiers embarked for Antioch. The way-worn pilgrims and the sick were

committed to the charge of Thierry, count of Flanders, who was to march

with them to Cilicia. But when Louis quitted the harbour, the Turks fell

upon the Christians who were left behind, and the escort was found to

be feeble and ineffective. The people of Attalia not only declined to

open their gates, but even murdered the sick. Every day the Turks killed

hundreds of the pilgrims, and as it was evident that flight alone could

save the remainder, Thierry escaped by sea. Seven thousand wretched

votaries of the cross attempted to surmount the higher difficulties of

the land journey to Jerusalem; but the Holy City never opened to their

view, and in perishing under Moslem vengeance they thought that the loss

of the completion of the pilgrimage was compensated by the glories of

martyrdom.

The nobility, the clergy, and people of Antioch received the French king

with every demonstration of respect; but no blandishments of persuasion

or petulant threats of divorce from his wife Eleanora, could move Louis

from his purpose of marching into Palestine. He repaired to the Holy

City; entered it in religious procession, while crowds of ecclesiastics

and laymen were singing the psalm, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name

of the Lord.” His arrival had been preceded by that of the emperor of

Germany, the dukes of Saxony and Bavaria, and the ruined German band.

A council was held at Ptolemais, composed of the princes, barons, and

prelates of Syria and Palestine, and the new commanders from Europe.

The misfortunes of the Edessenes were forgotten, or yielded to higher

feelings, for though the recapture of the principality of the Courtenais

was the great object of the crusade, yet there were Moslem cities in

Syria far more dangerous to Jerusalem than the remote city of Edessa. The

decree for a march to Damascus was passed, and the emperor of Germany and

the kings of France and Jerusalem brought their troops into the field;

but the best disciplined parts of the army were the knights of the Temple

and St. John. Eager to relieve Damascus from the yoke under which she

had groaned for nearly five centuries, the champions of Christianity

soon arrived under her walls. Numerous and of long continuance were the

engagements between the Latins and the Syrians. The city was apparently

in the power of the crusaders, and the people abandoned themselves

to despair. But instead of taking possession of Damascus the Latins

anticipated the event and thought only to whom the prize should be given.

Much time was wasted in intrigues, and after sustaining for a short time

the sallies of reinforcements, and rejecting in a council of war the

advice of some unsubdued spirits for an attack on Askalon, the Christian

army raised the siege of Damascus, and retrograded to Jerusalem in sorrow

and in shame. Conrad soon returned to Europe with the shattered relics

of the German host, and his steps were a year afterwards traced by the

French king, the queen, and most of the French lords.

Among the few men whose virtues and abilities spread some rays of moral

and intellectual light over the twelfth century was Suger, the abbot of

the celebrated religious fraternity of St. Denis, in France. Strongly

imbued with the superstition of his time, his fondest wish was for the

overthrow of the Moslems. As minister of Louis VII, however, he had

exposed to his royal master the embarrassment of the state finances, the

fierce and menacing aspect of the crown vassals, and other circumstances

of a political nature, to deter him from quitting his dominions. But

the spirit of romantic devotion in the heir of Charlemagne could not

be quenched, and Louis well consulted the interests of his kingdom in

delivering the sceptre to the charge of the abbot of St. Denis. After his

return from Palestine, the king ardently wished to recross the seas, and

by martial achievements to obliterate the memory of former disasters.

When all thoughts of a crusade had apparently died away, France was

astonished at the appearance of a martial missionary in the person of

him who had opposed the second holy war. The clergy of the East implored

Suger to restore the fortunes of the Holy Land, knowing that he possessed

more credit in France than all the other princes and prelates, and that

his piety equalled his authority. Papal benediction was bestowed upon

him, though the pope was at first amazed at the enthusiasm of a man

nearly seventy years of age; but his influence was exerted in vain. Angry

at the timidity of his countrymen, his own courage rose; he resolved to

conduct a small army to Palestine himself, and his reliance on the favour

of heaven made him hope that the vassals of St. Denis alone would be more

powerful than the congregated myriads of Europe. All aspirations for

glory were humbled by a fever; he died at St. Denis, and his successor in

the abbacy pursued the usual duties of his station, without superadding

those of a martial description.[c]

THE FALL OF THE KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM

[Sidenote: [1149-1154 A.D.]]

The very question that had proved a stumbling-block to the Germano-Roman

world, namely, the right of women to succeed to the throne, also kept the

knightly ecclesiastical colony of the kingdom of Jerusalem in perpetual

unrest. War broke out between Melusina--who, assuming the management of

public affairs at the death of her husband Fulk, gave great power into

the hands of her cousin, the constable of Manassa--and her son, King

Baldwin III, around whom rallied a number of barons, all ill-disposed

to acknowledge the new rule. The feud was fought out by the mother and

son near the Holy Sepulchre in 1152, with the result that Melusina was

obliged to relinquish all her pretensions.

Hodierna, Melusina’s sister, on the other hand, was given guardianship

over her youngest son, after the murder of her husband, Raymond I of

Tripolis. The remainder of the countship of Edessa passed to Greece, by

reason of a pact which assured to the widowed countess and her children a

considerable income; Jocelyn II was taken prisoner by the Turkomans and

died in captivity. Raymond of Antioch had also been killed while bravely

fighting in 1149, and his widow Constantia now became the object of the

liveliest contention. It was at first feared that she would listen to the

many proposals made to her by Greeks; but when she finally accepted the

French knight, Rainald de Chatillon, a struggle broke out between him

and the patriarchs, who had hitherto held the preponderance of power,

laming the forces of both sides. Under such circumstances there could be

as little thought of establishing one solid supremacy and power in the

Orient as of accomplishing a like result in France at the same period.

[Sidenote: [1154-1163 A.D.]]

The wonder was that there had actually risen to prominence on the side of

the Abbasids and Seljuks, during the late struggles for the possession

of Aleppo, Edessa, and Damascus, a well-consolidated might--that of

the atabegs of Mosul, who disposed of a particularly warlike element

in the Kurds, with whom their borders were overrun from the north. Nur

ad-Din vigorously pursued the policy laid down by his father, Zenki.

He was by far the more capable and enlightened of the two; since the

days of the Omayyads, so historians tell us, there had been no prince

so liberal and law-abiding, and there never reigned one more just. Four

times each week he sat in judgment. He made no personal use of the state

revenues, looking upon them as a sacred trust placed in his hands to be

expended for the public good. He was equally zealous in the conduct of

the holy war. All the dust that settled on his shoes and garments during

his various battles against unbelievers, he caused to be collected in a

sack which was to be placed under his head when he was dead. As already

related, he conquered Damascus (1154), which was under the rule of a weak

prince who had in vain sought safety on the side of the Christians, and

took up his residence in the immediate neighbourhood of that kingdom. He

was a brave and worthy representative of the Abbasid caliphate, which

he had formerly served in the capacity of Emir al-Omara. At times the

Christians rallied for a successful feat of arms, and under the sacred

symbol of the cross, which after preliminary worship in the king’s tent

they gave into the keeping of the archbishop of Tyre, they even inflicted

defeat on Nur ad-Din (1158). Also Baldwin III, who died in 1162 at the

age of thirty-three, achieved some fame and several victories. He was

brave and circumspect--in every way a fit man for the particular kind of

warfare he was obliged to carry on. Still it was not in these battles

alone that the real issue lay; the result was determined as much by the

weakness of the Fatimites in Egypt as by the strength of the atabegs in

Syria.

Neither had the power of the Ismailite doctrines, founded on those in

circulation before the beginning of the Fatimite caliphate, suffered

any diminution; rather it had recently taken on a new form in the most

singular and hideous of all religious sects. Who has not heard of the

Assassins and of their leader, the Old Man of the Mountain? Unlike the

Sunnite caliphate which had been restored to power by the victories

of the great Seljuk sultans, the sect founded by the Persian, Hassan,

towards the end of the eleventh century, rose to prominence by reason

of teachings based on the extremest Ismailite beliefs, and compounded

of fanaticism, sensuality, and blind obedience, which raised up men to

be assassins and general instruments of terror. Mainly by the agency of

that Ridwan of Aleppo who fought with the crusaders before Antioch, and

wavered in allegiance between the Abbasids and the Fatimites, there was

planted in northwestern Syria a colony of Assassins which, under the

rule of a certain sheikh, Al-Jebel, grew to occupy an important place in

history--if such can be said of a purely destructive principle. It was by

the Assassins that Raymond of Tripolis was slain. But their dagger struck

Moslem as well as Christian, Shiite as well as Sunnite, since a foe of

their nature lies outside all partisanship--is in fact beyond the pale of

any human ordinance.

That the Fatimite caliphate profited nothing by this latest religious

movement is apparent from the symptoms of decay that shortly afterward

began to be manifest. The caliphs themselves were given over to a life

of luxury and disorder, and vizirs, who bore the title of sultan, were

constantly engaged in quarrels with each other, in which right was

decided by might alone. The conditions were similar to those which

preceded the fall of the Abbasid caliphate in the tenth century. In the

year 1163 the sultan and vizir Shawer was deposed and supplanted by his

rival Dargham, who enjoyed for some time the fruits of his usurpation.

But Shawer eventually returned, and with him the emir and Kurd chieftain,

Shirkuh, whom Nur ad-Din, regardless of religious differences, had sent

to his assistance. Dargham was murdered and Shawer again assumed the

sultanate, but he could not reconcile himself to fulfilling the promise

he had made the Kurds, that he would pay over to them one third of the

revenues of Egypt. To protect himself more fully against his extortionate

allies, he besought assistance of Almeric, king of Jerusalem, brother and

successor of Baldwin III.

[Sidenote: [1163-1168 A.D.]]

Inheriting the desire of Baldwin I for ascendency in Egypt, Baldwin

III had besieged and taken Askalon in 1153. The garrison had defended

itself ably, even to the point of driving back a body of Templars that

had penetrated within the walls, and the king had reason to believe that

all was lost. But the support of the Jerusalem patriarchs enabled him to

press the siege, and a successful sally on the part of the knights of St.

John, who with their grand master had been particularly active, finally

placed Askalon at his mercy. At this the inhabitants, in despair, having

received no reinforcements from either Damascus or Egypt, called upon

their military commander to surrender. Without doubt Almeric (1162-1173)

was the most important of the later kings of Jerusalem. Like Louis VII he

was tireless, despite his corpulence, in the hunt and in war, and took

no pleasure in any kind of diversion. In theological questions he often

revealed an acuteness that brought his prelates to confusion; with a firm

hand he held the troublesome barons in subjection, even giving precedence

over them to certain newly arrived Franks--Milo de Plancy, for example.

[Illustration: ITALIAN ARMOUR, TWELFTH AND THIRTEENTH CENTURIES]

It could escape no one that there was danger to the kingdom in allowing

the Kurds of Nur ad-Din to become firmly established in Egypt. Losing

no time in reflection, Almeric took decisive steps at once, and fortune

so far favoured him that he succeeded in confining the Kurds within

Pelusium (1164); he was obliged to grant them a free withdrawal, however,

in consequence of domestic troubles that had befallen Nur ad-Din. A

Christian knight addressed Shirkuh, who was striding with uplifted axe

behind his followers: “Think you we do not mean to keep our pact with

you?” “You dare not break it!” was the reply.

No sooner had they returned home than the Kurds began preparations for

a second and greater expedition; Shirkuh incited the Sunnites to wrath

against the perfidious caliph in Cairo, and in 1167 he set out for Egypt.

Almeric also assembled his forces at the same time, and in Egypt the

native populations consolidated with the Pullanes in a formal alliance.

That the caliph might be encouraged by the support of their presence, the

Christian delegates were conducted into the palace. Scarcely could they

repress their admiration and astonishment at the wonders that everywhere

met their gaze. When they arrived in a splendid hall that was divided

in the middle by a curtain embroidered in gold and pearls, the vizir

prostrated himself and went through the form of taking a solemn oath;

at the conclusion of this ceremony the curtain was drawn aside and the

figure of the caliph was revealed. From his golden chair he extended his

right hand to the Christian knights, but the hand was enveloped in a

veil. Hugo of Cæsarea objected that in entering upon a pact both sides

must act with perfect fairness and good faith; whereupon the caliph

uncovered his hand, but with exceeding ill grace, as though his royal

dignity had been affronted. To the Christian knights was entrusted the

defence of the walls and towers of Cairo.

[Sidenote: [1168 A.D.]]

Compelled to abandon his position opposite Cairo on the left bank of

the Nile, Shirkuh withdrew his forces in the direction of Upper Egypt.

Almeric pursued him hotly at the head of a mixed band of Frankish and

oriental troops, such as were never again brought together in that land

until the time of Napoleon. The two armies met in the pass of Babein.

Shirkuh was about to cross over to the other side of the river with the

intention of fleeing into the regions beyond, when a mameluke of Nur

ad-Din overtook him and exclaimed: “What, you who rejoice in all the

blessings of Islam are about to fly from the enemy? Do you not know

that the atabegs will take from the Kurds all the lands they may find

on the other side?” Thus it came about that Shirkuh remained where he

was, and taking up his position with a picked band of men on the right

flank of the main body of his troops, he overcame the king while the

latter was making an attack on the enfeebled centre. So hard was Almeric

beset that he could scarcely cut his way back to his own forces. He

retained sufficient power, however, to surround and harass Alexandria,

which Shirkuh had left in the charge of his nephew, Saladin, the son of

Eyyub. Shirkuh was induced to conclude a peace, according to the terms of

which both sides, Christians as well as Kurds, were obliged to evacuate

Egypt. As the price of this concession Shirkuh received from Shawer fifty

thousand pieces of gold, while to the Christians, so Abulfeda tells us,

were promised a special magistracy in Cairo and an important yearly

revenue.

It is well to contemplate closely these events, as they offer not only

the final standpoint from which to judge the kingdom of Jerusalem,

but the highest and best from which to take cognisance of the entire

Christian world of that time in its relation to Islam. The main fact

derived by history is that the establishment of the Franks in the Orient

was made possible only by the antagonism that subsisted between the

Abbasid and Fatimite dynasties; so long as this antagonism continued the

colonial kingdom could be upheld, but let it once subside and the whole

structure would fall to the ground. At the period of which we write the

Cairo caliphate had sunk into a state of impotency and demoralisation;

in order to prevent its falling into the hands of the Mohammedans of

Syria the kings of Jerusalem must either take forceful possession of

Egypt themselves, or must sustain it in its present show of independence

by the most rigid political conjunction. For the first course they were

far too weak, as the sequel showed, and as might have been expected from

a study of the circumstances by which they were surrounded; but for the

second they possessed quite sufficient strength, as was evidenced by

the successes of Almeric. Indeed in all respects this was the better

course to pursue, since by the exercise of a moderate degree of wisdom

affairs would doubtless, even in the natural course of events, so have

shaped themselves that to the Christian element would gradually fall a

peaceful sovereignty over the whole realm of Egypt. What a position in

the world would have been gained to the Latin races by such a solution!

Entrance into all the Indian waters would have been open to the Italian

sea powers, and it was furthermore to be expected that northern Africa,

cut off entirely from the powers of the East, would eventually fall into

the hands of the Spaniards or of the Sicilian Normans.

[Illustration: A NORMAN ARCHER OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY]

It is not to be denied, however, that mankind at that period was not yet

ripe to exercise complete ascendency either over the Orient or over any

other considerable portion of the world. The religions of both divisions

of humanity permitted not the slightest compromise with unbelievers,

and the very factors that had brought about the first amazing successes

later acted as a check on the progress of their cause towards complete

fulfilment. It seemed to be self-evident that no kind of serious

alliance could ever permanently subsist between the crusaders and the

caliphs; nay, there was something almost against nature in the thought

of Christians defending the towers of Cairo on behalf of infidels in a

struggle of Moslem against Moslem. Religious antagonism was stronger in

the guardians of the Holy Sepulchre than loyalty and good faith.

Almeric united with Manuel of Byzantium,[52] who had already formed a

league with the Lombards and the pope, and allowed himself to be drawn

into a joint scheme of conquest in Egypt. This union between Greeks and

Latins was the more easily effected inasmuch as the king had married a

Greek and the emperor a Syrian princess. The idea of the expedition seems

to have emanated from Manuel who, in his all-embracing policy, kept a

constant watch on both East and West, in search of undertakings that

might promise him success. Influence was brought to bear on Almeric to

gain his consent by the grand-master of the knights of St. John; but the

Templars were strongly opposed to the project, seeing in it a shameful

violation of the peace.

Without waiting for the arrival of the Greek forces, the Christians of

Jerusalem opened the war in November, 1168. They took Pelusium, and

advanced on Cairo--at a very slow rate of progress, to be sure, as they

were awaiting ransom for a son of Shawer, whom they had taken prisoner.

The ransom was brought them, but at the same time they learned that the

invincible Shirkuh had set out from his desert in their direction. Both

Shawer and the caliph had overcome their former repugnance and had

addressed an appeal for aid to Nur ad-Din. Thus the supporters of the two

caliphs came together in a coalition similar to that formed by the Greeks

and Latins. The bravest and hardiest Turkomans composed the troops led by

Shirkuh and Saladin. Almeric had courageously advanced into the desert

to meet them, but Shirkuh passed him by; it was destined that the Franks

should depart from Egypt in dishonour. And now fate hurried events on to

the climax. Arrived in Jerusalem Shirkuh and Saladin opened hostilities

with the sultan, Shawer, who was accused of having plotted to murder the

Turkoman emirs. An opportunity was given Saladin to become possessed of

the sultan’s person on the occasion of a visit the latter made to the

grave of a Moslem saint. The caliph gave his consent to the captive’s

execution, and was further persuaded to appoint Shirkuh his vizir.

[Sidenote: [1169-1174 A.D.]]

On the death of Shirkuh, shortly after, Saladin acceded to the vacant

post (1169). He looked upon himself as in truth the chief power under Nur

ad-Din, who persistently urged him to overthrow the Fatimite caliphate.

But Saladin shrewdly withheld compliance[53] until he had obtained

complete possession of the capital and had rid himself of all his

enemies, even delaying until the Fatimite Aladid, who was still young,

fell sick unto death. He died in 1171 and Saladin, who had meanwhile

repulsed an attack by Almeric and a Byzantine fleet from Damietta,

and torn from the Franks the harbour of Ailah, on the Red Sea, took

possession of the entire treasure of the Fatimites and became master over

all Egypt.

[Sidenote: [1174-1181 A.D.]]

A momentary advantage accrued to the Christians from this usurpation,

inasmuch as a continuance of friendly relations between the new master

of the Nile and his supreme chief, the atabeg in Damascus, was not to

be thought of. Saladin immediately sought to cut himself loose from all

allegiance to Nur ad-Din. That no hostages might be left in the hands of

the atabeg ruler, he caused his entire family to come to him in Egypt,

giving to his aged father, Eyyub, the post of guardian of his treasure.

Nur ad-Din first conceived suspicions as to his subordinate’s fealty

when the latter refused to assist him in conquering certain Frankish

settlements that guarded the route from Damascus to Egypt. He was

stricken by death, however (1174), in the midst of preparations for an

expedition that was to punish the faithless emir. Now Saladin’s plans

took on wider expansion, and his aspirations soared to greater heights.

Nur ad-Din had left behind him but one minor son, Malik as-Salih, and it

was his name that appeared on the coins Saladin at first caused to be

struck off. But the Syrians were highly dissatisfied with the rule that

had succeeded that of Nur ad-Din, and were inclined to welcome Saladin

whenever he should present himself among them. Without drawing sword he

entered Damascus in 1174, and Emesa, Hama, and Baalbek also fell into

his power. Malik as-Salih was allowed to retain Aleppo on condition that

he should withdraw from Damascus. At his death (1181) Saladin gained

possession of Aleppo and little by little extended his territory as far

as Mesopotamia; eventually the entire heritage of Nur ad-Din fell into

his hands.

In this manner there arose in the course of a few years a might that,

springing as it did from a union of Egypt and Syria, threatened great

danger to the Christians, and even placed in question the further

existence of the many Frankish colonies that were scattered about the

Orient. The forces at the command of the consolidated power were trained

to obey the slightest gesture of a single chief, and were saturated with

the doctrines of a single religion. Of lateral religious branches there

was no longer any question, save as they still survived in the sect of

the Assassins of Lebanon, whose leader, the Old Man of the Mountain,

occasionally instigated some fresh disturbance. Saladin himself was

one day set upon by three assailants, but his strong arm successfully

defended his life. He immediately thereafter started out to exterminate

the Assassins, and devastated their entire domains, making his name

a terror wherever he went. All Saladin’s prowess and success was the

outgrowth of a remarkable personality. Like Zenki and Nur ad-Din, he

was a devout Mohammedan; it was even his custom to read the _Koran_ to

armies about to rush upon each other in battle. He scrupulously made up

for all fasts that he missed, and never failed to say the five prayers

through to the end. He drank nothing but water, wore garments of harsh

wool, and allowed himself to be summoned before the bar of judgment. He

personally instructed his children in the tenets of Islam; but his own

close observance of religion did not prevent him from unlawfully usurping

power. When fortune favoured him, as on the achievement of some brilliant

victory, he delighted in exhibiting a certain careless magnanimity

that greatly enhanced the majesty of his bearing. In misfortune he was

steadfast and patient, never once turning aside from the aim he had in

view. He was brave and crafty, contriving to win for himself supporters

even among the ranks of his enemies, and he governed his subjects with

justice and moderation. As a ruler he possessed all the qualities

necessary to accomplish the building up of a state and its conservation

in prosperity and power; and to a far greater degree than had the atabegs

he became the hero of reconstructed Islam, the man of fate in the

destinies of the kingdom of Jerusalem.

Had the Christians then but known how to make the most of the little

time that was left them, all might yet have been well; but it is not to

be denied that simultaneously with the rise of the new oriental might

occurred the rapid and shameful decay of the Christian administration in

the East. The western laws of succession which had been transplanted in

full force, and which secured the throne to the direct line of descent

whether male or female, dealt the finishing blow to the tottering

kingdom. In a community of which the head should be above all a military

commander, where the commonweal could be secured only by holding the

whole state in constant readiness for war, the rule frequently fell into

the hands of feeble, incompetent youths, the whole question of succession

was repeatedly and violently reopened by the marriages of female heirs to

the throne; and regencies were successively established, disputed, and

destroyed. There was no permanent, inflexible power to hold in check the

inordinate ambition of the knights, and a general lawlessness prevailed

that penetrated to every rank of political and religious life.

[Sidenote: [1173-1185 A.D.]]

Almeric died before Nur ad-Din in 1173. He was succeeded by his

thirteen-year-old son, Baldwin IV, who was a victim to the terrible

disease of leprosy, and up to the time of his early death in 1185 never

really came into possession of the rule. During the first part of his

reign Raymond II of Tripolis, son of Hodierna, acted as vicegerent, and

in 1175 he concluded a truce with Saladin by which he bound himself

not to oppose the latter in any of his struggles for the succession of

Nur ad-Din. It was this act that lost for Raymond all his authority in

the realm. The knights now looked towards the West for a ruler more to

their liking, and Longaspada, marquis of Montferrat, arrived among them

in answer to their summons in October, 1176, shortly afterward marrying

Sybilla, the eldest sister of the minor king. He had firmly established

himself in the respect and confidence of all when his untimely death

occurred (1177). His successor was Philip of Flanders and Vermandois,

a former adversary of Henry II of England and an adherent of Becket,

who was obliged to make this pilgrimage to Jerusalem in expiation of

certain violent acts he had committed. There was some reluctance felt

at placing the government in the hands of this prince, the general

opinion being that only one who was bound by self-interest to the kingdom

could effectually serve it. Philip was willing either to assume the

authority himself or to relinquish it into the hands of the count of

Bethune, provided the latter would cede to him certain possessions in the

vicinity. The project had been formed of organising, in alliance with the

Greeks, an expedition against Saladin; but Philip proved to be totally

inadequate to the command of such an enterprise, and returned home

without having performed a single act of moment.

A prince who fulfilled in all respects the requirements of the knights

next assumed the vicegerency, Rainald of Chatillon, who had taken part

in the siege of Askalon, and was afterwards chosen as husband and the

guardian of her son by Constantia, widow of Raymond of Antioch. In this

noble were represented all the warlike tendencies of the times. He

defeated Saladin in November, 1178, near Askalon, as he had only a short

time previously defeated Saladin’s brother, Turan Shah, near Damascus.

A breathing space fell to the kingdom after these victories that was

utilised to construct near Paneas, on the Jordan, a citadel which was

entrusted to the Templars to defend. Near this very place, however,

Saladin achieved a victory over the Christians in a battle wherein fell

the grand master of the Templars, Odo de St. Amand. On his death Saladin

laid siege to the stronghold and carried it by storm. The defeated

Templars sought death by remaining behind in the burning citadel,

plunging into the waters of the Jordan, or precipitating themselves from

the top of a steep cliff.

About this time the bishops of the oriental Latin church began to assume

prominence in the Council of Lateran; among them being Archbishop

William of Tyre, historian of the kingdom, who in chronicling the defeat

of the Templars employed the language of the Bible: “The Lord, their

God, departed from them.” The eyes of all were now turned towards the

West. Nothing would have so fully met the aspirations of Alexander III

as another crusade, entered upon in the spirit that had marked that

of Urban II; shortly before his death he even caused a petition to be

drawn up urging the advisability of such an undertaking. It was then

generally assumed that in case the two great western monarchs, the kings

of England and France, should again decide to invade the Orient, they

could count on the support and assistance of the emperor Manuel, who

had maintained friendly relations with the Christians of Syria while

engaging in fresh wars with the Seljuks of Asia Minor. Most reluctantly

had he given up the expedition against Egypt, even after Saladin had

made himself master of the land; he could not have been induced to do

so at all, in fact, had not the knights of Jerusalem been so tardy in

rendering aid. Unfortunately for the Christian cause he died in the year

1180; conditions in the West at that time were also unfavourable to the

undertaking of any important enterprise, Frederick I being deeply engaged

in war with Henry the Lion and in negotiations for a treaty with the

Lombards while the sons of Henry II kept France and England in a state of

constant turmoil. Thus the kingdom of Jerusalem, being deprived of all

hope of outside aid, was thrown completely on its own resources.

[Illustration: A CRUSADER OF THE SECOND CRUSADE]

Life was not utterly intolerable there, nor was hope definitively

abandoned so long as Saladin was kept from entering into possession

of the entire inheritance of Nur ad-Din. The knights still gained an

occasional victory over him, as in the plain of Belveir and Ferbelet

in 1182; and he was compelled to raise the siege of Berytus at the

approach of the Christian troops. The daring Rainald de Chatillon even

succeeded in his bold attempt to reconquer the harbour of Ailah, on the

Mediterranean sea. The Latin fleet proceeded thence to the coast of

Arabia, where it threatened Mecca and Medina, but was finally overcome

near Haura, and the knights were slain in a battle with the Arab prophet.

By this defeat Ailah was again lost to Jerusalem. Brave to the point of

foolhardiness as was Rainald de Chatillon in his undertakings against

Saladin, and knightly as was the spirit by which he was moved, he failed

to achieve any serious result for the cause to which he was devoted.

The affairs of the opposite side now took a decisive turn. In 1181 Malik

as-Salih, prince of Aleppo and Nur ad-Din’s son, had died, leaving no

kinsman worthy to succeed him. Imad ad-Din had essayed to fill the

difficult post of ruler, but was totally incompetent, and when Saladin

marched against him in 1183 he surrendered Aleppo without a struggle, and

made no attempt to regain any of the fortresses that had already been

taken from him. Saladin made his formal entry into Aleppo in June, 1183.

He was universally accepted as the bravest and mightiest warrior that

had ever fought on the side of Islam, and religious fervour, once more

risen to great height among the Mohammedans, further aided to smooth all

difficulties from his path.

[Sidenote: [1185-1187 A.D.]]

In contrast to this success disaster followed disaster in the Frankish

camp. In 1185 Baldwin IV succumbed to his fatal malady, and was

succeeded by his nephew, Baldwin V, the son of Sybilla and of William

Longaspada, who was but five years old. As if this misfortune were not

enough, Sybilla espoused in second marriage, contrary to the wishes of

all her advisers, a certain knight, Guy de Lusignan, of an ancient and

noble family of Poitou, whom no one believed capable of successfully

defending the kingdom in case of need.[54]

[Illustration: SALADIN]

At this juncture Raymond of Tripolis again assumed the vicegerency, and

as before held a compact with Saladin to be the only means by which he

could preserve authority over the realm. A truce was concluded on the

only terms possible--the payment by Raymond of a certain tribute. A fresh

disturbance arose when Sybilla gave the crown, which she had claimed for

herself on the death of Baldwin V in 1186, over to her husband, Guy de

Lusignan. This was done in direct opposition to Raymond, who had planned

to usurp the crown himself, and endangered his newly concluded pact

with Saladin. While Guy de Lusignan, at the head of the whole body of

knighthood which had gone unhesitatingly over to the side of the rightful

heiress, was preparing to attack Raymond at Tiberias, the latter appealed

for aid to Saladin, who sent him a band of Turkish horsemen. It had come,

then, to this, that a master Templar was obliged to fly to Saladin in

his distress, and march out, at the head of an army of infidels, to do

battle against his fellow Templars of Jerusalem! All bonds of honour

and tradition were severed at a single blow. The clergy made itself

particularly obnoxious at this crisis, being incited thereto by the

patriarch Heraclius of Jerusalem. Thus, eaten up by corruption from

within and left by its natural supporters in the West to face alone an

enemy that was practically all-powerful, the kingdom that had once given

such rich promise for the future was now tottering helplessly to its fall.

[Illustration: A CROSSBOW MAN OF THE SECOND CRUSADE]

Saladin, standing ready to seize the first favourable opportunity, had

some show of justice on his side in choosing the present crisis as the

most suitable for attack, since Rainald de Chatillon, now in command

of certain citadels on the other side of the Jordan, had recently, in

flagrant breach of the truce, fallen upon and plundered a passing caravan

in which was the mother of the sultan. After in vain demanding indemnity

of Rainald, Saladin rallied all his forces for another great sacred war,

and at head of countless warriors made forcible irruption into Galilee.

As on many previous occasions the Christian army again assembled near the

spring of Saffuria. The grand master of the Templars had contributed an

important sum, sent him by Henry II of England, toward the preparations

for war, and Count Raymond of Tripolis was present in person. Once

more the holy cross of Jerusalem was worshipped by the Christian army

on the eve of battle. The very first day’s operations were disastrous,

however, as the army, impelled by the knights, hurried to the relief of

beleaguered Tiberias. On the evening of July 4th, 1187, after a battle

that brought victory to neither side, Saladin’s light horse drove the

Christians back to a parched and arid eminence in the neighbourhood of

Hittin, named by tradition as the scene of Christ’s sermon on the mount.

Here, at the close of a torrid summer day, they were obliged to pass the

night in the tortures of thirst. On July 5th Saladin resumed his attack

on the enfeebled, exhausted Christians, of whom very few survived the

battle that ensued. Count Raymond escaped, thanks to the clemency of the

Saracens, who opened their ranks before him and his body of knights,

as before one who had once been their friend. King Guy and as many of

his followers as had not been slain, together with the holy cross, fell

into the hands of Saladin, who this time knew no mercy. All the captured

Templars and knights of St. John were put to death, while with his own

hand the angry monarch struck down Rainald de Chatillon, the perjured

violator of the truce.[d]

MOSLEM ACCOUNTS OF THE BATTLE OF TIBERIAS

[Sidenote: [1187 A.D.]]

Imad ad-Din, the Moslem historian, who took part in the battle, remarks

with astonishment that as long as the Christians kept in the saddle

they were unharmed, for they were covered from head to foot with a

protecting mail woven of iron rings; but when the horse fell, the rider

was lost. “That battle,” adds the writer, “took place on a Saturday. The

Christians, like lions at the beginning of the fray, were as scattered

lambs at the end. Of many thousands, but a small number survived. The

battle-field was covered with the dead and dying. I myself walked over

Mount Hittin; it was a horrible spectacle. I saw all that a happy nation

had done to a miserable people. I saw the condition of their leader--who

could describe it? I saw severed heads; dull, dead eyes; dust-covered

bodies, twisted limbs; severed arms; crushed bones; gashed and bloody

necks; broken thighs; feet no longer joined to the leg; bodies in two

pieces; torn lips and split foreheads. On seeing their faces strewn over

the ground and covered with blood and wounds, I recalled these words of

the _Koran_: “The infidel shall say ‘What am I but dust!’ What sweet

odour is exhaled from this victory!”

After these reflections, which show well the Arab taste, the writer

presents another picture: “The tent ropes,” he says, “did not suffice to

bind the prisoners. I saw thirty or forty men bound by the same rope; I

saw one or two hundred of them placed together and guarded by a single

man. These warriors, who formerly exhibited extraordinary prowess and

enjoyed might and power, now with lowered brows and naked bodies were

indeed a miserable sight. Counts and Christian lords had become the prey

of the hunter, the knights that of the lion. Those who had humiliated

others were humbled in their turn; the free man was in irons. Those who

accused the truth of falsehood and treated the _Koran_ as imposture had

fallen into the hands of the true believers.”

After the battle Saladin retired to his tent and caused King Guy and the

principal prisoners to be brought before him. It was his will that the

king be seated at his side; and as the prince was suffering from thirst

he had melted snow brought to him. The king, after drinking, offered the

cup to Rainald, but Saladin cried: “It is not I who have asked that

wretched man to drink; I am in no way bound to him.” In fact, according

to Imad ad-Din’s statement, it was the custom with the Arabs never to

kill a prisoner to whom drink or food had been offered. Now Saladin

had on two occasions vowed to kill Rainald did the lord of Karak ever

fall into his hands--the first, when the knight planned to attack Mecca

and Medina; the second, when he captured a caravan in times of peace.

The sultan turned to Rainald and in terrible tones reproached him with

these two deeds; then rushed upon him with uplifted sword. Following his

example the emirs threw themselves upon Rainald and severed head from

body. The trunk rolled to the feet of the king, who at the sight trembled

in great fear; but Saladin hastened to reassure him and promised to

respect his life.

Imad ad-Din relates later that what had most angered Saladin against

Rainald was that on the occasion of the above-mentioned seizure of the

Moslem caravan he called in jest to his captives to invoke Mohammed to

see whether the prophet would come to their assistance, and that before

killing him the sultan said to him: “Well, how does it seem to thee?

Have I not sufficiently avenged Mohammed for thy outrages?” Finally,

adds Imad ad-Din, he proposed to Rainald to become a Mohammedan; the

latter refused, saying that he preferred to die. Imad ad-Din relates on

his own side that when Saladin reproached Rainald with his perfidies and

bad faith, the lord replied by interpreter that such was the custom of

princes and that he in this respect had but followed the beaten path.

Finally the sultan had the king brought to Damascus, the captive lords

with him. With regard to the Templars and Hospitallers, Ibn al-Atir

relates that the sultan collected all he had in one place and cut off

their heads. He ordered also all those in his army who had any belonging

to these religious orders in their hands to put them to death; then

judging that the soldiers would not be sufficiently generous to make

this sacrifice, he offered fifty pieces of gold for each Templar or

Hospitaller surrendered to him. Two hundred of these warriors who were

brought to him were at once decapitated. What led the sultan to these

extreme measures was that the Templars and Hospitallers made war by

profession upon Islam and were its most cruel enemies. Thus Abul-Faraj in

his _Syrian Chronicle_ puts on this occasion these words into Saladin’s

mouth: “Since killing when it can be turned to the good of their religion

seems to them so sweet a thing, let us kill them in their turn.” Saladin

sent also to his lieutenant in Damascus ordering to be put to death all

the knights held in that city, whether they were his own property or that

of others; and this was done.

We read in Imad ad-Din, an eye-witness, that during the massacre of the

knights Saladin looked on with smiling countenance and that the victims

were sunk in hopeless despair. The Moslem army was drawn up in battle

array, the emirs in two rows. Some of the executioners performed their

duty, adds the author, with a degree of skill that brought deserved

praises; some, however, refused to act and left it to their companions.

Before beheading, a proposition was made to the prisoners to embrace

Islamism but the opportunity was taken by a very small number.

Such is the manner in which the Arabian chroniclers describe the battle

of Tiberias. The compiler of _The Two Gardens_ gives several letters

written on that occasion. We read in one of them, sent to Baghdad, that

of the forty-five thousand men composing the Christian army scarcely one

thousand survived, and since one poor Mohammedan soldier, having taken a

prisoner, exchanged him for a pair of sandals, posterity may know that

the number of prisoners was so great that they were sold for footgear.

Imad ad-Din says in another place that all Islam rejoiced in this victory

which was but the prelude to the conquest of Jerusalem and the source of

greater triumphs.[e]

THE FALL OF JERUSALEM

A panic terror now overspread the land, and under its resistless impulse

all hastened to place themselves in subjection to the conqueror. Even

the most strongly fortified coast towns fell one after the other; Tyre,

Tripolis, and Antioch alone upheld their independence. Askalon demanded

as the price of its surrender the release of the captive king. Jerusalem

held out in its own defence a few days longer; but what could the few

knights that remained avail against an enemy so mighty? On the 2nd of

October, 1187, Saladin took formal possession of the Christian capital,

to shouts of “_Allah akbar!_” instead of the “Christ victorious!” that

had been heard in former times.[d]

Jerusalem became the refuge for such of the Christians as had escaped the

swords or the chains of the Turks. One hundred thousand people are said

to have been in the place; but so few were the soldiers, and so feeble

was the government of the queen, that the Holy City was no object of

terror. Saladin declared his unwillingness to stain with human blood a

spot which even the Turks held in reverence, as having been sanctified

by the presence of many of God’s messengers. He offered the people, on

condition of the surrender of the city, money and settlements in Syria.

Prudence suggested the acceptance of this offer, but, clinging to that

feeling of superstition which had given birth to the holy wars, the

Christians declared that they would not resign to the infidels the place

where the Saviour had died. Saladin was indignant at this rejection of

his kindness, and swore to enter the place sword in hand, and retaliate

the dreadful carnage which the Franks had made in the days of Godfrey

de Bouillon. The people cast their eyes on Balean of Ibelin as their

commander. The veteran organised the forces, and put arms into the hands

of the citizens.

During fourteen days there were various engagements; but the Christians,

though brave to desperation, could never destroy the military engines

of the Moslems. At the end of fourteen days the Latins discovered that

the walls near the gate of St. Stephen’s were undermined. From that

moment the defence of the city was abandoned; the clergy prayed for the

miraculous protection of heaven, the soldiers threw down their arms

and crowded into the churches. The consternation was augmented by the

discovery of a correspondence between some Greeks that were in the place

and the Moslems. The Latins then recollected the proffered clemency of

Saladin, and a deputation of them implored a renewal of it. But he urged

the force of the oath which he had taken, and that it was ridiculous to

capitulate for a fallen town. “But,” said he, “if you will surrender the

city to me, I will behave to you with mercy, and allow you to redeem the

inhabitants.”

After some deliberation, the Christians resolved to trust the generosity

of the conqueror. Saladin stipulated that the military and nobles

should be escorted to Tyre, and that the Latin population should become

slaves, if they were not ransomed at the rate of ten crowns of gold for

a man, five for a woman, and one for a child. After four days had been

consumed by the miserable inhabitants in weeping over and embracing the

Holy Sepulchre and other sacred places, the Latins left the city and

passed through the enemy’s camp. Children of all ages clung round their

mothers, and the strength of the fathers was used in bearing away some

little portion of their household furniture. In solemn procession the

clergy, the queen, and her retinue of ladies followed. Saladin advanced

to meet them, and his heart melted with compassion, when they approached

him in the attitude and with the air of suppliants. The softened warrior

uttered some words of pity, and the women, encouraged by his sympathising

tenderness, declared that one word of his would remove their distress.

It is the generous remark of an enemy that Saladin was in nothing a

barbarian but in name. With courteous clemency he released all the

prisoners whom the women requested, and loaded them with presents. This

action, worthy of a gentle and Christian knight, was not the consequence

of a transient feeling of humanity; for when he entered the city of

Jerusalem, and heard of the tender care with which the military friars of

St. John treated the sick, he allowed ten of the order to remain in their

hospital till they could complete their work of humanity.

[Sidenote: [1188-1189 A.D.]]

The infidels were once more established in Jerusalem. The great cross was

taken down from the church of the sepulchre, and for two days dragged

through the mire of the streets. The bells of the churches were melted,

and the floors and walls of the mosque of Omar were purified with

Damascene rose-water. Prayers and thanksgivings were offered to heaven

for the victory; all individual merit was forgotten, and the conquest

of Jerusalem was attributed to the bounty of God, and his desire for

the universal influence of Islamism. Askalon, Laodicea, Gabala, Sidon,

Nazareth, Bethlehem--all those places and their territories fell when

their great support was gone, and Tyre was almost the only town of

consequence which remained to the Christians.

Saladin attacked it with all his efforts, but the spirit of freedom

triumphed over the thirst of conquest, and the Moslems were necessitated

to raise the siege. Some time after the capitulation of Askalon, Guy de

Lusignan, the grand master of the Templars, and others obtained their

liberty; and the husband of Sybilla solemnly renounced to Saladin his

title to the kingdom of Jerusalem. The unprincipled Guy took the road for

Tyre, and announced his resolve to enter the city as sovereign lord.

After the fall of Jerusalem, Saladin carried his conquering army into the

principality of Antioch. Five and twenty towns submitted, and Antioch

itself became tributary to the Moslems. The victories of Saladin and

the loss of Jerusalem were melancholy contrasts to those hopes of the

triumphs of Christianity over Islamism which the Council of Clermont

had held out to Europe. In the eighty-eight years that the crusaders

possessed the Holy City, peace seldom dwelt about her walls; surrounded

by numerous hostile nations, she was in a continual siege, and as great a

number of her wars were undertaken for the maintenance of her existence

as for the purposes of conquest. In the time of Godfrey de Bouillon, Asia

was in a state of more than usual imbecility. The Arabian and Tatarian

storms were spent, the caliphs were pontiffs rather than sovereign

princes, and the great empire of their predecessors was dismembered and

scattered.

But states which are formed by arms, not by policy, are as quick in their

rise as rapid in their decay, and ruin and disorder are the scenes of

ambition. The passions and abilities of the enterprising lords of Syria

raised several powerful governments; the hostile aspect of the Moslems

increased in terror when the imperial and royal crowns of Germany and

France were broken; and the crescent triumphed over the cross when

Saladin united and led the Moslem nations to the conquest of Jerusalem.

In the strength of body, and personal and military prowess, the Turks

and the Franks were equal; but the Turks were in multitudes, the Franks

were few; and as the twelfth century was an age of war rather than of

policy, the Latins did not by intellectual superiority raise themselves

above their enemies. The Christians scrupled not to break treaties[55]

with the Moslems; they never attempted to conciliate the foe, or to

live in terms of large and liberal intercourse. Except in the case of

Egypt, they allowed the Saracenian nations to unite, without making any

endeavour to break their force; and they were too proud and too ignorant

to win any members to their cause from the great confederacy of atabegs.

Conciliation could only be the result of weakness; a tender pitying

forbearance of error was held a criminal indifference by armed saints.

The Moslem contempt of infidels was not more sincere than was the hatred

which the Christians felt for the supposed enemies of God.[c]

FOOTNOTES