To this same land I straight should hie,
And win it back with mickle blood,
Nor gaine one foot of soil thereby.
While here dejected and forlorn,
My wife and babes are left to mourn;
My goodly mansion rudely marred,
All trusted to my dogs to guard.
But I, fair comrade, well I wot
An ancient saw, of pregnant wit,
Doth bid us keep what we have got,
And troth I mean to follow it."
This being the general feeling, it is not to be wondered at that Louis
IX. was occupied fully three years in organizing his forces, and in
making the necessary preparations for his departure. When all was ready
he set sail for Cyprus, accompanied by his Queen, his two brothers, the
Counts d'Anjou and d'Artois, and a long train of the noblest chivalry
of France. His third brother, the Count de Poitiers, remained behind to
collect another corps of crusaders, and followed him in a few months
afterwards. The army united at Cyprus, and amounted to fifty thousand
men, exclusive of the English crusaders under William Longsword. Again,
a pestilential disease made its appearance, to which many hundreds fell
victims. It was in consequence found necessary to remain in Cyprus
until the spring. Louis then embarked for Egypt with his whole host;
but a violent tempest separated his fleet, and he arrived before
Damietta with only a few thousand men. They were, however, impetuous
and full of hope; and although the Sultan Melick Shah was drawn up on
the shore with a force infinitely superior, it was resolved to attempt
a landing without waiting the arrival of the rest of the army. Louis
himself in wild impatience sprang from his boat, and waded on shore;
while his army, inspired by his enthusiastic bravery, followed,
shouting the old war-cry of the first crusaders, Dieu le veut! Dieu le
veut! A panic seized the Turks. A body of their cavalry attempted to
bear down upon the crusaders, but the knights fixed their large shields
deep in the sands of the shore, and rested their lances upon them, so
that they projected above, and formed a barrier so imposing, that the
Turks, afraid to breast it, turned round and fairly took to flight. At
the moment of this panic, a false report was spread in the Saracen
host, that the Sultan had been slain. The confusion immediately became
general--the deroute was complete: Damietta itself was abandoned, and
the same night the victorious crusaders fixed their headquarters in
that city. The soldiers who had been separated from their chief by the
tempest, arrived shortly afterwards; and Louis was in a position to
justify the hope, not only of the conquest of Palestine, but of Egypt
itself.
But too much confidence proved the bane of his army. They thought, as
they had accomplished so much, that nothing more remained to be done,
and gave themselves up to ease and luxury. When, by the command of
Louis, they marched towards Cairo, they were no longer the same men;
success, instead of inspiring, had unnerved them; debauchery had
brought on disease, and disease was aggravated by the heat of a climate
to which none of them were accustomed. Their progress towards Massoura,
on the road to Cairo, was checked by the Thanisian canal, on the banks
of which the Saracens were drawn up to dispute the passage. Louis gave
orders that a bridge should be thrown across; and the operations
commenced under cover of two cat-castles, or high moveable towers. The
Saracens soon destroyed them by throwing quantities of Greek fire, the
artillery of that day, upon them, and Louis was forced to think of some
other means of effecting his design. A peasant agreed, for a
considerable bribe, to point out a ford where the army might wade
across, and the Count d'Artois was despatched with fourteen hundred men
to attempt it, while Louis remained to face the Saracens with the main
body of the army. The Count d'Artois got safely over, and defeated the
detachment that had been sent to oppose his landing. Flushed with the
victory, the brave Count forgot the inferiority of his numbers, and
pursued the panic-stricken enemy into Massoura. He was now completely
cut off from the aid of his brother-crusaders, which the Moslems
perceiving, took courage and returned upon him, with a force swollen by
the garrison of Massoura, and by reinforcements from the surrounding
districts. The battle now became hand to hand. The Christians fought
with the energy of desperate men, but the continually increasing
numbers of the foe surrounded them completely, and cut off all hope,
either of victory or escape. The Count d'Artois was among the foremost
of the slain, and when Louis arrived to the rescue, the brave
advance-guard was nearly cut to pieces. Of the fourteen hundred but
three hundred remained. The fury of the battle was now increased
threefold. The French King and his troops performed prodigies of
valour, and the Saracens, under the command of the Emir Ceccidun,
fought as if they were determined to exterminate, in one last decisive
effort, the new European swarm that had settled upon their coast. At
the fall of the evening dews the Christians were masters of the field
of Massoura, and flattered themselves that they were the victors.
Self-love would not suffer them to confess that the Saracens had
withdrawn, and not retreated; but their leaders were too wofully
convinced that that fatal field had completed the disorganization of
the Christian army, and that all hopes of future conquest were at an
end.
Impressed with this truth, the crusaders sued for peace. The Sultan
insisted upon the immediate evacuation of Damietta, and that Louis
himself should be delivered as hostage for the fulfilment of the
condition. His army at once refused, and the negotiations were broken
off. It was now resolved to attempt a retreat; but the agile Saracens,
now in the front and now in the rear, rendered it a matter of extreme
difficulty, and cut off the stragglers in great numbers. Hundreds of
them were drowned in the Nile; and sickness and famine worked sad
ravage upon those who escaped all other casualties. Louis himself was
so weakened by disease, fatigue, and discouragement that he was hardly
able to sit upon his horse. In the confusion of the flight he was
separated from his attendants, and left a total stranger upon the sands
of Egypt, sick, weary, and almost friendless. One knight, Geffry de
Sergines, alone attended him, and led him to a miserable hut in a small
village, where for several days he lay in the hourly expectation of
death. He was at last discovered and taken prisoner by the Saracens,
who treated him with all the honour due to his rank and all the pity
due to his misfortunes. Under their care his health rapidly improved,
and the next consideration was that of his ransom.
The Saracens demanded, besides money, the cession of Acre, Tripoli, and
other cities of Palestine. Louis unhesitatingly refused, and conducted
himself with so much pride and courage that the Sultan declared he was
the proudest infidel he had ever beheld. After a good deal of haggling,
the Sultan agreed to waive these conditions, and a treaty was finally
concluded. The city of Damietta was restored; a truce of ten years
agreed upon, and ten thousand golden bezants paid for the release of
Louis and the liberation of all the captives. Louis then withdrew to
Jaffa, and spent two years in putting that city, and Cesarea, with the
other possessions of the Christians in Palestine, into a proper state
of defence. He then returned to his own country, with great reputation
as a saint, but very little as a soldier.
Matthew Paris informs us that, in the year 1250, while Louis was in
Egypt, "thousands of the English were resolved to go to the holy war,
had not the King strictly guarded his ports and kept his people from
running out of doors." When the news arrived of the reverses and
captivity of the French King, their ardour cooled; and the Crusade was
sung of only, but not spoken of.
In France, a very different feeling was the result. The news of the
King's capture spread consternation through the country. A fanatic monk
of Citeaux suddenly appeared in the villages, preaching to the people,
and announcing that the Holy Virgin, accompanied by a whole army of
saints and martyrs, had appeared to him, and commanded him to stir up
the shepherds and farm labourers to the defence of the Cross. To them
only was his discourse addressed, and his eloquence was such that
thousands flocked around him, ready to follow wherever he should lead.
The pastures and the corn-fields were deserted, and the shepherds, or
pastoureaux, as they were termed, became at last so numerous as to
amount to upwards of fifty thousand,--Millot says one hundred thousand
men. [Elemens de l'Histoire de France.] The Queen Blanche, who governed
as Regent during the absence of the King, encouraged at first the
armies of the pastoureaux; but they soon gave way to such vile excesses
that the peaceably disposed were driven to resistance. Robbery, murder,
and violation marked their path; and all good men, assisted by the
government, united in putting them down. They were finally dispersed,
but not before three thousand of them had been massacred. Many authors
say that the slaughter was still greater.
The ten years' truce concluded in 1264, and St. Louis was urged by two
powerful motives to undertake a second expedition for the relief of
Palestine. These were fanaticism on the one hand, and a desire of
retrieving his military fame on the other, which had suffered more than
his parasites liked to remind him of. The Pope, of course, encouraged
his design, and once more the chivalry of Europe began to bestir
themselves. In 1268, Edward, the heir of the English monarchy,
announced his determination to join the Crusade; and the Pope (Clement
IV.) wrote to the prelates and clergy to aid the cause by their
persuasions and their revenues. In England, they agreed to contribute a
tenth of their possessions; and by a parliamentary order, a twentieth
was taken from the corn and moveables of all the laity at Michaelmas.
In spite of the remonstrances of the few clearheaded statesmen who
surrounded him, urging the ruin that might in consequence fall upon his
then prosperous kingdom, Louis made every preparation for his
departure. The warlike nobility were nothing loth, and in the spring of
1270, the King set sail with an army of sixty thousand men. He was
driven by stress of weather into Sardinia, and while there, a change in
his plans took place. Instead of proceeding to Acre, as he originally
intended, he shaped his course for Tunis, on the African coast. The
King of Tunis had some time previously expressed himself favourably
disposed towards the Christians and their religion, and Louis, it
appears, had hopes of converting him, and securing his aid against the
Sultan of Egypt. "What honour would be mine," he used to say, "if I
could become godfather to this Mussulman King." Filled with this idea
he landed in Africa, near the site of the city of Carthage, but found
that he had reckoned without his host. The King of Tunis had no
thoughts of renouncing his religion, nor intention of aiding the
Crusaders in any way. On the contrary, he opposed their landing with
all the forces that could be collected on so sudden an emergency. The
French, however, made good their first position, and defeated the
Moslems with considerable loss. They also gained some advantage over
the reinforcements that were sent to oppose them; but an infectious
flux appeared in the army, and put a stop to all future victories. The
soldiers died at the rate of a hundred in a day. The enemy, at the same
time, made as great havoc as the plague. St. Louis himself was one of
the first attacked by the disease. His constitution had been weakened
by fatigues, and even before he left France he was unable to bear the
full weight of his armour. It was soon evident to his sorrowing
soldiers that their beloved monarch could not long survive. He
lingered for some days, and died in Carthage, in the fifty-sixth year
of his age, deeply regretted by his army and his subjects, and leaving
behind him one of the most singular reputations in history. He is the
model-king of ecclesiastical writers, in whose eyes his very defects
became virtues, because they were manifested in furtherance of their
cause. More unprejudiced historians, while they condemn his fanaticism,
admit that he was endowed with many high and rare qualities; that he
was in no one point behind his age, and, in many, in advance of it.
His brother, Charles of Anjou, in consequence of a revolution in
Sicily, had become King of that country. Before he heard of the death
of Louis, he had sailed from Messina with large reinforcements. On his
landing near Carthage, he advanced at the head of his army, amid the
martial music of drums and trumpets. He was soon informed how
inopportune was his rejoicing, and shed tears before his whole army,
such as no warrior would have been ashamed to shed. A peace was
speedily agreed upon with the King of Tunis, and the armies of France
and Sicily returned to their homes.
So little favour had the Crusade found in England, that even the
exertions of the heir to the throne had only collected a small force of
fifteen hundred men. With these few Prince Edward sailed from Dover to
Bourdeaux, in the expectation that he would find the French King in
that city. St. Louis, however, had left a few weeks previously; upon
which Edward followed him to Sardinia, and afterwards to Tunis. Before
his arrival in Africa, St. Louis was no more, and peace had been
concluded between France and Tunis. He determined, however, not to
relinquish the Crusade. Returning to Sicily, he passed the winter in
that country, and endeavoured to augment his little army. In the spring
he set sail for Palestine, and arrived in safety at Acre. The
Christians were torn, as usual, by mutual jealousies and animosities.
The two great military orders were as virulent and as intractable as
ever; opposed to each other, and to all the world. The arrival of
Edward had the effect of causing them to lay aside their unworthy
contention, and of uniting heart to heart, in one last effort for the
deliverance of their adopted country. A force of six thousand effective
warriors was soon formed to join those of the English prince, and
preparations were made for the renewal of hostilities. The Sultan,
Bibars or Bendocdar, [Mills, in his history, gives the name of this
chief as "Al Malek al Dhaker Rokneddin Abulfeth Bibars al Ali al
Bundokdari al Salehi."] a fierce Mamluke, who had been placed on the
throne by a bloody revolution, was at war with all his neighbours, and
unable, for that reason, to concentrate his whole strength against
them. Edward took advantage of this; and marching boldly forward to
Nazareth, defeated the Turks and gained possession of that city. This
was the whole amount of his successes. The hot weather engendered
disease among his troops, and he himself, the life and soul of the
expedition, fell sick among the first. He had been ill for some time,
and was slowly recovering, when a messenger desired to speak with him
on important matters, and to deliver some despatches into his own hand.
While the Prince was occupied in examining them, the traitorous
messenger drew a dagger from his belt, and stabbed him in the breast.
The wound fortunately was not deep, and Edward had gained a portion of
his strength. He struggled with the assassin, and put him to death with
his own dagger, at the same time calling loudly for assistance. [The
reader will recognise the incident which Sir Walter Scott has
introduced into his beautiful romance, "The Talisman," and which, with
the licence claimed by poets and romancers, he represents as having
befallen King Richard I.] His attendants came at his call, and found
him bleeding profusely, and ascertained on inspection that the dagger
was poisoned. Means were instantly taken to purify the wound; and an
antidote was sent by the Grand Master of the Templars which removed all
danger from the effects of the poison. Camden, in his history, has
adopted the more popular, and certainly more beautiful, version of this
story, which says that the Princess Eleonora, in her love for her
gallant husband, sucked the poison from his wound at the risk of her
own life: to use the words of old Fuller, "It is a pity so pretty a
story should not be true; and that so sovereign a remedy as a woman's
tongue, anointed with the virtue of loving affection," should not have
performed the good deed.
Edward suspected, and doubtless not without reason, that the assassin
was employed by the Sultan of Egypt. But it amounted to suspicion only;
and by the sudden death of the assassin, the principal clue to the
discovery of the truth was lost for ever. Edward, on his recovery,
prepared to resume the offensive; but the Sultan, embarrassed by the
defence of interests which, for the time being, he considered of more
importance, made offers of peace to the crusaders. This proof of
weakness on the part of the enemy was calculated to render a man of
Edward's temperament more anxious to prosecute the war; but he had also
other interests to defend. News arrived in Palestine of the death of
his father, King Henry III; and his presence being necessary in
England, he agreed to the terms of the Sultan. These were, that the
Christians should be allowed to retain their possessions in the Holy
Land, and that a truce of ten years should be proclaimed. Edward then
set sail for England; and thus ended the last Crusade.
The after-fate of the Holy Land may be told in a few words. The
Christians, unmindful of their past sufferings and of the jealous
neighbours they had to deal with, first broke the truce by plundering
some Egyptian traders near Margat. The Sultan immediately revenged the
outrage by taking possession of Margat, and war once more raged between
the nations. Margat made a gallant defence, but no reinforcements
arrived from Europe to prevent its fall. Tripoli was the next, and
other cities in succession, until at last Acre was the only city of
Palestine that remained in possession of the Christians.
The Grand Master of the Templars collected together his small and
devoted band; and with the trifling aid afforded by the King of Cyprus,
prepared to defend to the death the last possession of his order.
Europe was deaf to his cry for aid, the numbers of the foe were
overwhelming, and devoted bravery was of no avail. In that disastrous
siege the Christians were all but exterminated. The King of Cyprus fled
when he saw that resistance was vain, and the Grand Master fell at the
head of his knights, pierced with a hundred wounds. Seven Templars, and
as many Hospitallets, alone escaped from the dreadful carnage. The
victorious Moslems then set fire to the city, and the rule of the
Christians in Palestine was brought to a close for ever.
This intelligence spread alarm and sorrow among the clergy of Europe,
who endeavoured to rouse once more the energy and enthusiasm of the
nations, in the cause of the Holy Land: but the popular mania had run
its career; the spark of zeal had burned its appointed time, and was
never again to be re-illumined. Here and there a solitary knight
announced his determination to take up arms, and now and then a king
gave cold encouragement to the scheme; but it dropped almost as soon as
spoken of, to be renewed again, still more feebly, at some longer
interval.
Now what was the grand result of all these struggles? Europe expended
millions of her treasures, and the blood of two millions of her
children; and a handful of quarrelsome knights retained possession of
Palestine for about one hundred years! Even had Christendom retained it
to this day, the advantage, if confined to that, would have been too
dearly purchased. But notwithstanding the fanaticism that originated,
and the folly that conducted them, the Crusades were not productive of
unmitigated evil. The feudal chiefs became better members of society,
by coming in contact, in Asia, with a civilization superior to their
own; the people secured some small instalments of their rights; kings,
no longer at war with their nobility, had time to pass some good laws;
the human mind learned some little wisdom from hard experience, and,
casting off the slough of superstition in which the Roman clergy had so
long enveloped it, became prepared to receive the seeds of the
approaching Reformation. Thus did the all-wise Disposer of events bring
good out of evil, and advance the civilization and ultimate happiness
of the nations of the West, by means of the very fanaticism that had
led them against the East. But the whole subject is one of absorbing
interest; and if carried fully out in all its bearings, would consume
more space than the plan of this work will allow. The philosophic
student will draw his own conclusions; and he can have no better field
for the exercise of his powers than this European madness; its
advantages and disadvantages; its causes and results.
THE WITCH MANIA.
What wrath of gods, or wicked influence
Of tears, conspiring wretched men t' afflict,
Hath pour'd on earth this noyous pestilence,
That mortal minds doth inwardly infect
With love of blindness and of ignorance?
Spencer's Tears of the Muses.
Countrymen: "Hang her!--beat her!--kill her!"
Justice: "How now? Forbear this violence!"
Mother Sawyer: "A crew of villains--a knot of bloody hangmen!
set to torment me!--I know not why."
Justice: "Alas! neighbour Banks, are you a ringleader in mischief?
Fie I to abuse an aged woman!"
Banks: "Woman!--a she hell-cat, a witch! To prove her one, we no
sooner set fire on the thatch of her house, but in she came
running, as if the Devil had sent her in a barrel of
gunpowder."
Ford's Witch of Edmonton.
The belief that disembodied spirits may be permitted to revisit this
world, has its foundation upon that sublime hope of immortality, which
is at once the chief solace and greatest triumph of our reason. Even
if revelation did not teach us, we feel that we have that within us
which shall never die; and all our experience of this life but makes us
cling the more fondly to that one repaying hope. But in the early days
of "little knowledge," this grand belief became the source of a whole
train of superstitions, which, in their turn, became the fount from
whence flowed a deluge of blood and horror. Europe, for a period of two
centuries and a half, brooded upon the idea, not only that parted
spirits walked the earth to meddle in the affairs of men, but that men
had power to summon evil spirits to their aid to work woe upon their
fellows. An epidemic terror seized upon the nations; no man thought
himself secure, either in his person or possessions, from the
machinations of the devil and his agents. Every calamity that befell
him, he attributed to a witch. If a storm arose and blew down his barn,
it was witchcraft; if his cattle died of a murrain-if disease fastened
upon his limbs, or death entered suddenly, and snatched a beloved face
from his hearth--they were not visitations of Providence, but the works
of some neighbouring hag, whose wretchedness or insanity caused the
ignorant to raise their finger, and point at her as a witch. The word
was upon everybody's tongue--France, Italy, Germany, England, Scotland,
and the far North, successively ran mad upon this subject, and for a
long series of years, furnished their tribunals with so many trials for
witchcraft that other crimes were seldom or never spoken of. Thousands
upon thousands of unhappy persons fell victims to this cruel and absurd
delusion. In many cities of Germany, as will be shown more fully in its
due place hereafter, the average number of executions for this
pretended crime, was six hundred annually, or two every day, if we
leave out the Sundays, when, it is to be supposed, that even this
madness refrained from its work.