J. Fr. Michaud

——

A.D. 1248-1255.

Whilst the Christian army was forgetting in its sojourn at Damietta both the laws of discipline and the object of the holy war, Alphonse, count of Poictiers, prepared to set out for the East. All the churches of France still resounded with pathetic exhortations addressed to the Christian warriors; the bishops, in the name of the sovereign pontiff, conjured the faithful to second, by means of charity, the enterprise against the Saracens; an apostolic brief, granted to the brother of the king not only the tribute imposed upon the Crusaders who repurchased their vow, but all the sums destined by testament to acts of piety, the object of which was not distinctly signified. These sums must have been considerable, but could scarcely suffice for the expenses of an expedition which bore the appearance of another crusade. The knights and barons who had not been affected by the example of Louis IX. showed but very little enthusiasm, or else wanted money for so long a voyage. Piety and the love of glory were not powerful enough to seduce them to join the banners of the holy war. History has preserved an agreement, by which Hugh Lebrun, count of AngoulÊme, consented to set out for the crusade with twelve knights, but on the express condition that the count of Poictiers should feed them at his own table during the expedition; that he would advance the seigneur Hugh Lebrun the sum of four thousand livres; and should pay him, in perpetuity, a pension of six hundred livres tournois. This agreement and several other similar ones were innovations in the military usages of feudalism, and even in the usages consecrated by the holy wars.

The English nobles, however, were impatient to follow the example set them by Louis IX. We read in Matthew Paris, that the English lords and knights had already sold or empawned their lands, and placed themselves entirely at the mercy of the Jews; which appeared to be the preliminary of a departure for the Holy Land. It is not out of place to add here, that this impatience to set out for the East, arose less from a religious motive than from the spirit of opposition that animated the barons against their monarch, Henry III., who was accused of being desirous of taking advantage of the absence of Louis IX., and did all in his power to retain the barons and lords of his kingdom; and as the latter resisted his solicitations with contempt, he resolved to employ the influence of the Church; “so that,” says Matthew Paris, “like a young child who, having been ill-used, goes to its mother to complain, the king of England carried his complaints to the sovereign pontiff, adding that he proposed to go himself, and lead his barons shortly to the Holy Land.” The pope, in his replies, forbade Henry III. to undertake anything against the kingdom of France; but, at the same time, he threatened with the thunders of the Church, all the knights and barons that should leave the kingdom against the will of the king. Henry, supported by the authority of the pope, ordered the commanders at Dover and the other ports to take measures that no Crusader should embark. Thus the court of Rome on one side preached the crusade, and on the other prevented the departure of the soldiers of the cross; which must have tended to dissipate all the illusions and annihilate the spirit of the holy war.

Baymoud, count of Thoulouse, had likewise taken the oath to combat the infidels; but the inconstancy of his character, and the policy of the pope, soon led him into other enterprises. His age had seen him, by turns, full of zeal for the Church, ardent to persecute it; the apostle of heresy, and the terror of heretics: sometimes abandoned to the furies of revolt, sometimes submissive to servitude; braving the thunders of the court of Rome, afterwards seeking the favour of the pontiffs; pursued by unjust wars, and himself declaring war without a motive. At the epoch of which we are speaking, the count of Thoulouse had given up all idea of fighting against the infidels, and was preparing to minister to the personal vengeance of Innocent IV., by turning his arms against Thomas of Savoy, who had recently married a daughter of the emperor Frederick, in opposition to the commands of the pope. He had already received the money necessary for his preparations from the pope, and had taken leave of his daughter, the countess of Poictiers, about to depart for the East, when he fell sick at Milan. From that time all the projects of his ambition faded away, and, to borrow the expression of a modern historian, he went into another world to learn the result of the incomprehensible varieties of his life.

With him the illustrious house of Thoulouse became extinct, a house of which several of the princes had been heroes of the holy wars, others deplorable victims of crusades. The county of Thoulouse thus became a property of the family of the king of France, and whilst Louis IX. was dissipating his armies and his treasures in vain endeavours to make conquests in the East, conquests less brilliant, but also less expensive, more useful and more durable, were increasing the power of the monarchy and extending the limits of the kingdom.

Germany, Holland, and Italy, filled with troubles, at that time occupied all the attention of Frederick II., and did not allow him to turn his thoughts towards the East. He sent the count of Poictiers fifty horses and a quantity of provisions, delighted, as he said, to seize an opportunity of acquitting some of the obligations he had received from France; he put up prayers for the success of the crusade, and deeply regretted his inability to take a part in it. Frederick had lived as the count of Thoulouse had done, and like him, he was soon, in another world, to behold the end of his ambition, of the inconstancy of his designs, and of the vicissitudes of fortune.

Although the count of Poictiers was little favoured by circumstances, he finished his preparations and got together an army. The new Crusaders embarked at Aigues-Mortes, at the moment the news of the taking of Damietta arrived in the West. The Christian army expected them in Egypt with greater anxiety, from the circumstance of the Sea of Damietta having been, for more than a month, agitated, unceasingly, by a furious tempest. Three weeks before their arrival, all the pilgrims had put up prayers on their account; on the Saturday of each week they went in procession to the seashore, to implore the protection of Heaven in favour of the warriors about to join the Christian army. At length, after a passage of two months, the count of Poictiers disembarked before Damietta, His arrival not only diffused joy and hope among the Crusaders, but permitted them to leave their long and fatal state of inactivity.

Louis IX. assembled the council of the princes and barons, to consult them on the line of march most advisable to be taken, and upon measures for perfecting the conquest of Egypt. Several of the leaders proposed to lay siege to Alexandria: they represented that that city had a commodious port; that the Christian fleet would there find certain shelter; and that they could there procure munitions and provisions with great facility: this was the opinion of all that had experience in war. The headstrong youth of the army, persuaded that they had sacrificed sufficiently to prudence, by remaining several months in idleness, maintained that they ought to proceed immediately against Cairo; they thought nothing of the dangers the Christian army must encounter in an unknown country, where they must expect to meet with enemies irritated by fanaticism and despair. The count d’Artois put himself particularly forward among those who wished them to attack the capital of Egypt. “When you wish to kill the serpent,” cried he, “you ought always first to endeavour to crush his head.” This opinion, expressed with warmth, prevailed in the council; Louis himself partook of the ardour and hopes of short-sighted youth, and the order was given for marching towards Cairo.[303]

The army of the Crusaders consisted of sixty thousand fighting men, more than twenty thousand of whom were horse. A numerous fleet ascended the Nile, laden with provisions, baggage, and machines of war. Queen Marguerite, with the countesses of Artois, Anjou, and Poictiers, remained at Damietta, where the king had left a garrison under the command of Olivier de Thermes.

The Crusaders encamped at Pharescour the 7th of December; terror had preceded their triumphant march, and every thing seemed to favour their enterprise. One circumstance, of which they were ignorant, would have increased the security and joy of the Christian knights if they had known of it; Negmeddin, after having struggled for a long time against a cruel malady, was at length dead. This death might have produced serious trouble in both the Egyptian nation and army, if it had not been carefully concealed for several days. After the sultan had breathed his last, the Mamelukes guarded the gates of his palace as if he had been still living; prayers were put up, and orders were issued in his name: with the Mussulmans, nothing interrupted the preparations for defence or attention to the war against the Christians. All these precautions were the work of a woman—a woman who had been purchased as a slave, and had become the favourite wife of Negmeddin. The Arabian historians are eloquent in the praise of the courage and talents of Chegger-Eddour, and agree in saying, that no woman surpassed her in beauty, and no man excelled her in genius.

After the death of Negmeddin, the sultana assembled the principal emirs; in this council the command of Egypt was given to Fakreddin, and they acknowledged as sultan Almoadam Touranschah, whom his father had banished to Mesopotamia: some authors assert that in this council it was resolved to send ambassadors to the king of the Franks, to propose peace in the name of the prince of whose death he was still ignorant. The ambassadors, in order to obtain a truce, were to offer the Christians Damietta with its territories, and Jerusalem with several other cities of Palestine. It was not probable that this negotiation should succeed; the Christians had advanced too far, and had too much confidence in their arms, to listen to any proposition.

The Christian army pursued its march along the banks of the Nile, and entered the town of Scharmesah, without meeting any other enemy than five hundred Mussulman horsemen. These horsemen at first evinced nothing but pacific intentions, and, from the smallness of their numbers, they inspired no dread.[304] Louis IX., whose protection they seemed to implore, forbade the Crusaders to attack them; but the Mamelukes, abusing the confidence that was placed in them, and taking advantage of a favourable opportunity, fell all at once upon the Templars, and killed a knight of that order. A cry to arms immediately rung through the French army, and the Mussulman battalion was assailed on all sides: such as did not fall beneath the swords of the Crusaders, were drowned in the Nile. In proportion with the approach of the Christians to Mansourah, the anxiety and terror of the Egyptians increased: the emir Fakreddin exposed the dangers of the country in a letter that was read at the hour of prayer in the great mosque of the capital. After the formula, “In the name of God and of Mahomet his prophet,” the letter of Fakreddin began by these words of the Koran: “Hasten, great and small, the cause of God has need of your arms and of your wealth.” “The Franks,” added the emir, “the Franks (Heaven curse them) are arrived in our country with their standards and their swords; they wish to obtain possession of our cities and ravage our provinces: what Mussulman can refuse to march against them, and avenge the glory of Islamism?”

Upon hearing this letter read, all the people were melted to tears; the greatest agitation prevailed throughout the city of Cairo; the death of the sultan, which began to be known, added greatly to the general consternation; orders were sent to raise troops in all the Egyptian provinces; war was preached in all the mosques, and the imauns endeavoured by every means to awaken fanaticism, in order to combat the depression of despair.

The Christian army arrived before the canal Aschmoum Theriah on the 19th of December. The Mussulman army was encamped on the opposite shore, having the Nile on its left, and behind it the city of Mansourah; close to them, in the direction of Cairo, the Saracens had a numerous fleet upon the river. That of the Christians had advanced to the head of the canal. Everything seemed to announce that the fate of the war would be decided on this spot. The Crusaders marked out their camp in the place in which the army of John of Brienne had encamped thirty years before. The remembrance of a great disaster ought to have served them as a lesson, and, at least, have tempered the excessive confidence that the too easy conquest of Damietta had given them.

The canal of Aschmoum was of the width of the Seine, its bed was deep, and its banks steep. In order to cross it, it was necessary that a dike should be constructed: the work was begun, but as fast as they heaped up the sand and stones, the Saracens dug away the earth in front of the dike, and thus removed further back the opposite bank of the canal; in vain the causeway advanced, the Crusaders had always the same distance to fill up, and each of the trenches dug by the enemy tended to make their labours useless. In addition to which, they were night and day interrupted in their works, and were constantly exposed to the arrows and javelins of the Saracens.

Although the Mussulman general had fled without fighting at the first appearance of the Franks, the chronicles of the times speak very highly of his bravery and military talents. They add that he had been made a knight by Frederick II., and that he bore the arms of the emperor of Germany with those of the sultans of Cairo and Damascus upon his escutcheon. These distinctions might draw the attention of the multitude; but that which was for Fakreddin a true title of glory is, that he was able, by his speeches and his example, to reanimate the courage and confidence of a conquered army.

Scarcely had the Crusaders seated themselves down in their camp, and begun the works necessary for the passage of the Aschmoum, than Fakreddin sent a party of troops to Scharmesah, to attack the rear of the Christian army. The Saracens, by this unexpected assault, spread disorder and terror through the camp of their enemies. The first advantage redoubled their audacity, and soon after an assault was made upon the Christians, along the whole line of their camp, extending from the canal to the Nile. The Mussulmans several times passed the intrenchments of the Crusaders; the duke of Anjou, Guy count of Forest, the sieur de Joinville, and several other knights, were compelled to exert all their bravery to repulse from their camp an enemy whom every fresh combat taught that the French were not invincible, and that it was at least possible to stop them on their march.

Conflicts took place every day in the plain and upon the river. Several vessels belonging to the Christians fell into the hands of the Mussulmans; the Arabs, constantly prowling round the camp, bore away into captivity every man that ventured to stray from his colours. As the emir Fakreddin could only learn from the reports of prisoners the state and disposition of the Christian army, he promised a recompense for every captive that should be brought into his tents: all the means that audacity and cunning could suggest were employed to surprise the Crusaders. It is related that a Mussulman soldier having buried his head in a melon that had been hollowed out, threw himself into the Nile, and swam down the stream. The melon, which appeared to float upon the water, attracted the eyes of a Christian warrior, who sprang into the river, and as he stretched out his hand to seize the floating melon, he himself was seized and dragged away to the camp of the Mussulmans. This anecdote, more whimsical than instructive, is related by several Arabian historians, who scarcely say anything of the preceding combats. Such are the spirit and character of the greater part of oriental histories, in which the most frivolous details often take the place of useful truths and important events.

Whilst the armies were thus in face of each other, the Crusaders pursued the work they had begun upon the Aschmoum. Towers of wood and machines were constructed, to protect the workmen employed in making the dike upon which the Christians were to cross the canal. On their side, the Mussulmans redoubled their efforts to prevent their enemies from completing their work. The dike advanced but very slowly, and the wooden towers that had been constructed in front of the causeway, could not defend either the workmen or the soldiers against the arrows, stones, and fiery darts that were being constantly launched from the camp of the Egyptians. Nothing could equal the surprise and terror that the sight alone of the Greek fire caused the Christian army. According to the relation of ocular witnesses, this redoubtable fire, cast sometimes through a brass tube, and sometimes by an instrument that was called the perriÈre, was of the size of a tun or large cask; the flaming tail, which it drew after it, was many feet in length; the Crusaders imagined they beheld a fiery dragon flying through the air; the noise of its explosion resembled that of thunder, which rolls in repeated peals. When it was launched during the night, it cast a lurid splendour over the whole camp. At the first sight of this terrible fire, the knights set to guard the towers, ran here and there, like men bewildered; some called their companions to their aid, whilst others threw themselves on the ground, or fell on their knees, invoking the celestial powers. Joinville could not conceal his fright, and thanked Heaven with all his heart when the Greek fire fell at a distance from him. Louis IX. was not less terrified than his barons and knights, and when he heard the detonation of the fire, he burst into tears, exclaiming: “Great God! Jesus Christ, protect me and all my people!”[305]

“The good prayers and orisons of the king,” says his historian, “were of great service to us;” nevertheless, they were not able to save the towers and wooden works constructed by the Crusaders: all were consumed by the flames in sight of the Christian army, without their having any power to arrest their devastation. This misfortune was a lesson by which they ought to have profited; the Christians ought to have perceived that they had undertaken an impossible enterprise, and that they ought to seek for some means, more easy and more certain, of crossing the canal. But, unhappily, the leaders persisted in causing other erections to be made, which shared the fate of the first. They thus lost much time, and the futility of their attempts assisted in raising the pride and confidence of the Saracens.

The Mamelukes at this time learned that their new sovereign had arrived in Damascus, and that he was hourly expected in his capital. This arrival gave them fresh hopes, and rendered them more confident of victory. To redouble the ardour of his soldiers, Fakreddin often repeated, with a tone of assurance, that he should soon go and sleep in the tent of the king of the Franks.

The Christians had been a month before Aschmoum, exhausting themselves in useless efforts. Their leaders never took the trouble to examine if it were possible to ford the canal, or cross it by swimming, as the Egyptian cavalry had done. They were beginning to despair, when chance revealed to them a means of extricating themselves from their embarrassment, a means they might have known much sooner, if they had had less obstinacy and more foresight. A Bedouin Arab came to propose to Imbert de Beaujeu, constable of France, to show him, at a distance of half a league from the camp, a ford, by which the Crusaders might cross without danger or obstacles, to the opposite bank of the Aschmoum. After having ascertained that the Arab told the truth, they paid him the sum of five hundred golden byzants, which he had demanded, and the Christian army prepared to profit by this happy but late discovery.

The king and the princes his brothers, with all the cavalry, began their march in the middle of the night; the duke of Burgundy remained in the camp with the infantry, to observe the enemy, and guard the machines and the baggage. At daybreak, all the squadrons that were to cross the canal, awaited the signal on the bank. The count d’Artois was ambitious of crossing first; the king, who knew the impetuous character of his brother, at first wished to restrain him; but Robert insisted warmly, and swore upon the Gospel, that when he arrived on the opposite shore, he would wait till the Christian army had passed. Louis imprudently placed faith in the promise of a young, fiery, and haughty knight, to master his warlike transports, and resist all the temptations of glory on the field of battle. The count d’Artois placed himself at the head of the van, in which were the Hospitallers, the Templars, and the English. This van crossed the Aschmoum, and put to flight three hundred Saracen horsemen. At the sight of the flying Mussulmans, young Robert was on fire to pursue them. In vain the two grand masters represented to him that the flight of the enemy was perhaps nothing but a stratagem, and that he ought to wait for the army, and follow the orders of the king. Robert feared to lose an opportunity of triumphing over the infidels, and would listen to nothing but his ardour for conquest. He rushed on to the plain, sword in hand, drawing the whole van after him, and pursuing the Saracens to their camp, into which he entered with them.

Fakreddin, the leader of the Mussulman army, was at the moment in the bath, and, after the custom of the Orientals, was having his beard coloured. He sprang on horseback, almost naked, rallied his troops, and resisted for some time; but soon, left almost alone on the field of battle, he was surrounded, and died, covered with a thousand wounds.

The whole Mussulman army fled away towards Mansourah. How was it possible to resist the inclination to pursue them? What was to be feared from enemies that abandoned their camp? Might it not be believed that the Saracens fled as they had done at Damietta, and that terror would prevent their rallying? All these thoughts arose in the mind of the count d’Artois, and would not permit him to wait for the rest of the army to complete his victory. The grand-master of the Temple in vain renewed his representations; the young prince replied with great heat to the counsels of experience. In his passion he accused the Templars and Hospitallers of maintaining an intelligence with the infidels, and with wishing to perpetuate a war that was advantageous to their ambition. “Thus, then,” replied the two grand masters, “it would appear that we and our knights have abandoned our families and our country, and would desire to pass our days in a foreign land, amidst the fatigues and perils of war, in order to betray the cause of the Christian church!” On finishing these words, the master of the Templars sternly bade the standard-bearer of his order to unfurl the banner of battle. The earl of Salisbury, who commanded the English, ventured to speak of the danger to which the army would be exposed, thus separated from its van; but the count d’Artois interrupted him by saying, sharply, “Timid counsels do not suit us!” Then the quarrels that had so often disturbed the discipline of the army were renewed, and the heat of debate completely stifled the voice of prudence. Whilst they were thus inflaming each other, the ancient governor of the count d’Artois, who was deaf, and who believed they were preparing for battle, never ceased crying, “Ores À eux, ores À eux!”[306] (Hurrah! on them! hurrah! on them!) These words became a fatal signal for warriors, urged on at once by anger and impatience for victory. The Templars, the English, the French, all set forward together, all flew towards Mansourah, and penetrated into the city abandoned by the enemy; some stopped to pillage, whilst the others pursued the Saracens along the road to Cairo.

If all the Christian troops had crossed the canal at the moment that the count d’Artois entered Mansourah, the defeat of the enemy could have been complete. But the passage was made with much difficulty and confusion; and when the French army had crossed the Aschmoum, a space of two leagues separated it from its van.

The Mussulmans, who had been driven from their camp, at first believed they had fought with all the forces of the Crusaders, commanded by the king of France; but they soon became aware of the small number of their enemies, and were astonished at having been put to flight. From the very bosom of peril and disorder, a skilful leader arose among them, whose presence of mind all at once revived their courage.[307] Bibars Bondocdar, whom the Mamelukes had recently placed at their head, having perceived the imprudence of the Christians, rallied the Mussulmans, led a part of his army between the canal and Mansourah, got possession of the gates of the city, and, with a chosen part of his troops, poured down upon the Crusaders, who were pillaging the palace of the sultan. “The Mamelukes, lions of fights,” says an Arabian historian, “rushed upon the Franks, like a furious tempest; their terrible maces dealing deaths and wounds in all directions.” The Christians, dispersed about in the city, had scarcely time to rally; pressed together in narrow streets, they could neither fight on horseback nor make use of their swords. From the roofs of the houses and from the windows, the Mussulmans hurled stones and other missives, or poured down upon them heated sand and boiling water. The gates of the city were closed, a multitude of Mussulmans occupied all the roads, and there remained not a single hope of salvation for warriors who had so recently put to flight a whole army.

This first disaster brought on several others; and soon the Christian army, which had just crossed the canal, found itself in the greatest danger. As fast as the Crusaders arrived on the other bank of the Aschmoum, some learned that the count d’Artois was pursuing the enemy, others that he was shut up in Mansourah, and most of the barons and knights, who burned, according to what they heard, to share his glory or aid him in his danger, without waiting for those who followed them, flew first towards the camp of the Saracens, and then towards the city.

The count of Brittany was one of the first who moved forward, and he was quickly followed by Guy of Malvoisin, the sieur de Joinville, and the bravest knights of the Christian army. They advanced in great haste, and without the least precaution, through a country covered with enemies; they were not long in being separated from each other, when some retraced their steps, but the greater part were surrounded by the Mussulmans. A thousand combats were fought at once upon the plain; here the Christians were conquerors, further on they were conquered; in every direction they, by turns, attacked their enemies or defended themselves, at one moment putting the Saracens to flight, and the next flying before them.

All at once a cloud of dust arose from the bank of the Aschmoum, and the sound of trumpets and clarions arose, mingled with the neighing of horses and the shouts of warriors; it was the main body of the Christian army advancing. Saint Louis, marching at the head of the cavalry, halted on the summit of an acclivity, where all eyes were turned towards him. The knights scattered about at the foot of the hill, no longer able to resist the Saracens, believed they saw the angel of battles come to their assistance; Joinville, in particular, who, though pressed hard by the enemy, was, nevertheless, struck by the majestic aspect of the monarch. Louis wore a golden helmet, and held in his hand a German sword; his armour was resplendent, and his noble bearing animated all his warriors; “in short,” says the ingenuous seneschal, in whom, perhaps, the feeling of danger increased that of admiration, “I declare that a more noble armed man was never seen.”[308]

Many of the knights who accompanied the French king, seeing the Christian warriors engaged with the Saracens in all directions, broke from their ranks, and rushed down to the mÊlÉe. Then the confusion proceeded fast to its climax; every one hastened forward without knowing where the enemy’s army was, and they very soon became equally ignorant where that of the Christians was, or the king that commanded it; there was no one to issue an order, and no signal was given, except that of peril. In this horrible tumult, prudence and caution were useless, strength and skill in arms alone were triumphant; the mace and the battle-axe dash polished casques and proudly-deviced shields to fragments; some knights sink covered with wounds, others are trampled to death beneath the feet of the horses; the cry of the French, “Montjoie, St. Denis!” and that of the Mussulmans, “Islam! Islam!” are confounded together, and mingle with the plaintive voices of the dying, and the menacing clamours of the triumphant, with the clash of cuirasses, lances, and swords. From the canal to Mansourah, and from the Nile to the shore whereon the Crusaders had just landed, the country presented but one vast field of battle, where fury and despair by turns animated the combatants, where torrents of blood were shed on both sides, without allowing either Christians or Mussulmans to claim the victory.

The Crusaders had the advantage in almost all the combats, or more properly duels, as the fights were generally man to man; but their army was in a great measure dispersed. At this moment, Bibars, having left in Mansourah a sufficient number of troops to triumph over the resistance of the count d’Artois and his knights, set forward with all his forces, directing his course towards the canal, for the purpose of sustaining the Mussulmans, who were beginning to fly, or to bring on a decisive battle. Louis and the leaders that surrounded him at once perceived the movement and the plans of the enemy. It was immediately decided that the Christian army should draw near to the canal, in order to prevent its being surrounded, and, at the same time, to preserve some communication with the duke of Burgundy, who remained on the opposite bank. The oriflamme, at the head of the battalions, already pointed out the direction the army was to take, when the counts of Poictiers and Flanders, who had advanced into the plain, sent word to the king that they must succumb unless speedily succoured: at the same moment, Imbert de Beaujeu came to announce that Robert of Artois was perishing in Mansourah. Struck by the conflicting demands, Louis hesitated for a moment, and in that moment a crowd of impetuous warriors, unable to wait for his orders, galloped off, some to the succour of the Poitevins and the Flemings, others to the aid of the count d’Artois; the Saracens completely covered the country, and the French warriors, who had thus separated themselves from the king, were totally unable to contend with such a multitude of enemies, and, falling back upon the Christian army, produced disorder and created terror.

Amidst the general confusion, a report was spread that the Mussulmans were everywhere victorious, and that the king had given orders for retreat. Several squadrons disbanded, and rushed towards the canal. In an instant the waters appeared covered with drowning men and horses. In this extreme peril, Louis in vain endeavoured to rally his troops. His voice was scarcely heard, no one executed the orders he endeavoured to give. He then precipitated himself into the thickest of the fight, and so impetuously was he carried forward by his ardour, that his squires had great difficulty in keeping up with him; at last he remained alone, surrounded on all sides by Saracens. Thus situated, he had to defend himself against six Mussulman horsemen, who were determined to take him prisoner. Louis defeated all their endeavours, and succeeded in disengaging himself, and putting them to flight. This brilliant act of bravery reanimated the flying Crusaders that witnessed it; they crowded after their gallant king, recommenced the fight, and once more dispersed the Mussulman battalions.

Whilst the whole Christian army was thus fighting to repair the faults and save the life of the count d’Artois, this unfortunate prince was defending himself with heroic bravery; but all his efforts, without the walls and within the walls of Mansourah, could not free him from the host of Saracens his imprudence had drawn upon him. Robert, with his knights, the Templars, and the English, forgetting all their fatal quarrels, resolved to die together as knights and Christian soldiers. The combat had lasted from ten o’clock in the morning till three in the afternoon; the Crusaders, covered with wounds and stained with blood and dust, fought on bravely, though only sustained by the flickering strength of exhausted life. They fell almost all at the same time; Salisbury was killed at the head of the warriors he commanded; Robert de Vair, who bore the English banner, folded it round him before he died; Raoul de Coucy expired on a heap of dead; the count d’Artois, intrenched within a house, defended himself for a long time, but at length sank amidst carnage and ruins. The Christian warriors had entered Mansourah to the number of fifteen hundred, and almost all met with death there. The grand master of the Hospitallers, left alone upon the field of battle, was taken prisoner. The master of the Templars escaped by a miracle, and came back in the evening to the Christian camp, wounded in the face, his vestments torn to rags, and his cuirass pierced in several places. He had beheld two hundred and eighty of his knights fall around him.

Most of those who advanced towards Mansourah to succour the count d’Artois, fell victims to their intrepid zeal. The brave Guy de Malvoisin succeeded in reaching the walls, but not in gaining entrance to the city. The duke of Brittany made incredible efforts to gain the place of combat; he heard the threats, cries, and tumult with which the city resounded, without being able to force the gates or scale the ramparts. He returned towards night-fall; he vomited blood in streams; his horse, stuck all over with arrows, had lost its bridle and part of its furniture; and every warrior that followed him was wounded. Even in this state he proved himself terrible to the enemy, killing or driving away, with powerful thrusts of his lance, all who dared to pursue or oppose him, and jeering at their abortive attempts.[309]

When night separated the combatants, the prior of the hospital of Rosnay came towards the king, and kissing his hand, asked him if he had received any tidings of the count d’Artois. “All that I know,” replied the pious monarch, “is that he is now in Paradise.” The good knight, to remove such sad thoughts, was about to expatiate upon the advantages they had gained; but then Louis, raising his eyes towards heaven, burst into tears. The prior of Rosnay became silent; the barons and lords assembled round the king were unable to offer a word of consolation, but were all oppressed with pain, compassion, and pity at seeing him weep.[310]

The Christian army, although it had to reproach the count d’Artois for all the misfortunes of this day’s conflict, sympathized with the sorrows of Louis. Such was the ascendancy of bravery among the French warriors, that the greatest faults appeared to them to be expiated by a glorious death. It was likewise acknowledged in all the crusades, that they who died with arms in their hands were placed in the rank of martyrs. The Christian warriors only considered the count d’Artois as a soldier of Christ, whom God had recalled to his bosom: it was thus that piety accorded with glory, and that men honoured as saints the same persons they admired as heroes. Matthew Paris asserts in his History that the mother of Salisbury saw her son ascending into heaven on the day of the battle of Mansourah. The same opinion was established among the Saracens; all who fell in the field of battle, in the wars against the Christians, passed for martyrs of Islamism. “The Franks,” says the continuator of Tabary, “sent Fakreddin to the banks of the celestial river, and his end was a glorious end.”

History has not preserved the names of all the warriors who signalized their valour at the battle of Mansourah. The seneschal of Champagne was not one of those who were backward in seeking danger, or in evincing want of courage; one of six, he defended a bridge against a host of Saracens. He was twice unhorsed. In such great distress, the pious knight did not forget his patron saint, and exclaimed to him: “My lord, great sire, St. James, I supplicate thee, aid me and succour me in this my need.” Joinville continued fighting during the whole day; his horse received fifteen wounds, and he himself was pierced by five arrows.

The seneschal informs us that during the battle of this memorable day, he saw several men of high distinction running disgracefully away, in the general confusion: he does not name them, because at the time he wrote they were dead, and it does not appear becoming to him to speak ill of the departed. The reserve with which the historian here expresses himself, shows plainly enough what was the general spirit of the French army, in which it was considered as an ineffaceable shame, and as the greatest of misfortunes, to have ever experienced a single moment of fear.

The greater part of the French warriors, when in the presence of danger, were never abandoned by that sentiment of honour that constituted the spirit and character of chivalry. Erard de Severy, whilst fighting bravely with a small number of knights, received a sabre-cut in the face; his blood flowed fast, and it appeared not at all likely that he would survive the wound; when, addressing the knights that fought near him, he said, “If you will assure me that I and my children shall be free from all blame, I will go and demand help for you, of the duke of Anjou, whom I see yonder on the plain.” All praised this determination highly, and he immediately mounted on horseback, pierced through the enemy’s squadrons, reached the duke of Anjou, and returned with him to rescue his companions, who were near perishing. Erard de Severy expired shortly after this heroic achievement: he died, bearing away with him, not the sentiments of a vain glory, but the consoling certainty that no blame, as he had desired, should stain his name, or that of his children.

That which at the same time astonishes and charms us in the relations of the old chroniclers who have spoken of this battle of Mansourah is, to find, amidst scenes of carnage, traces of French gaiety, of that gaiety which despises death and laughs at peril. We have spoken of six knights who defended the passage of a bridge against a great number of Saracens; whilst these preux chevaliers, surrounded by enemies, maintained such a perilous post, the count de Soissons, addressing Joinville, exclaimed: “Seneschal, let us leave this rascally canaille to cry and bray as they please, you and I will yet talk of this day, and in ladies’ bowers too.”

The Mussulmans having retired, the Christian army occupied their camp, which the van had taken possession of in the morning, and which the Arabs had plundered during the battle. The camp of the enemy, and the machines of war they had left in it, were the only fruit of the exploits of this day. The Crusaders had shown what valour could effect, and their triumph would have been complete if they had been able to rally and fight together. Their leaders had not sufficient ability or ascendancy to repair the error of the count d’Artois; the Mussulman leaders, who proved themselves to be more skilful, were also better seconded by the discipline and obedience of the Mamelukes.

When they became fully aware of the losses they had experienced, the Christians gave up all idea of celebrating their victory. To appreciate the result of so many bloody conflicts, it was quite sufficient to contemplate the contrast between the sentiments that animated the two armies. A melancholy sadness prevailed among the conquerors; whilst the Saracens, on the contrary, although driven from their camp, and obliged to fall back upon Mansourah, considered it a triumph to have stopped the march of their enemies; and, reassured as to the issue of the war, they abandoned themselves to the greater joy, from having, before the battle, entertained the most depressing fears.

In fact, nothing can paint the consternation which the first attack of the count d’Artois had created among the infidels. At the beginning of the day, a pigeon that was sent to Cairo, conveyed a message expressed in these words: “At the moment this bird is dispatched, the enemy is attacking Mansourah; a terrible battle has been fought between the Christians and the Mussulmans.” At this news the people of Cairo were seized with the greatest terror; and sinister reports soon added to the alarm. The gates of the city were left open all night, to receive such as might have fled; and all of these exaggerated the danger to excuse their desertion. It was believed that the days of Islamism were numbered, and many were already abandoning the capital, to seek an asylum in Upper Egypt, when, on the morrow, another pigeon arrived, bearing news calculated to raise the spirits of the Mussulmans. The fresh message announced that the God of Mahomet had declared himself to be against the Christians; then all fears were dispersed, and the issue of the battle of Mansourah, says an Arabian author, was the note of joy for all true believers.

During the very night that followed the battle, the Mussulmans made several attempts to recover their camp and the machines of war that remained in the hands of the Franks. The Christian warriors, oppressed by fatigue, were repeatedly aroused by cries to arms; the continual attacks of the enemy would not allow them to repair their strength by sleep; many among them were so weakened by their wounds, they could scarcely put on their cuirasses; nevertheless, they defended themselves with their accustomed bravery.

The day after the battle was Ash-Wednesday, and the priests performed the ceremonies ordered by religion for the opening of Lent. The Christian army passed a part of the day in prayer, the rest of it in preparations for defence. Whilst the soldiers of the cross prostrated themselves at the foot of their altars, or prepared to repulse the infidels, images of mourning were mingled in their hearts with sentiments of piety and bravery. Whilst remembering their past victories, they could not forbear dreading the future; and the symbol of human fragilities, that the Church offers to each of her children on that solemn day, must have kept up their sad presentiments.

On the same day they employed themselves in throwing a bridge over the Aschmoum, in order to form a junction with the camp of the duke of Burgundy. The leaders and soldiers all lent a hand to the work, which was finished in the space of a few hours. The infantry, which had been left on the other side of the canal, came to reinforce the army, which was fated to be soon engaged in fresh contests.

Bibars, who had the command of the Mamelukes, hastened to take advantage of his first successes. When the body of the count d’Artois was found, the Mamelukes exhibited his cuirass, sown over with fleurs des lis, and declared it was the spoil of the king of France. They carried about the heads of several knights in triumph, and heralds-at-arms repeated in a loud voice: “The Christian army is nothing but a trunk without life, like the heads you behold on the points of these lances.”

This spectacle completely inflamed the ardour of the Mussulmans. The leaders and soldiers, with great cries, demanded to be led against the Christians. The Mussulman army had orders to hold themselves in readiness for battle on the morrow, the first Friday in Lent.

Louis IX. was warned of the intention of the Saracens; he gave orders to the leaders to fortify the camp, and prepare their troops for the conflict. On the Friday, by daybreak, the Christians were all under arms; and at the same time the leader of the Mussulmans appeared in the plain, ranging his men in battle-array. He placed his cavalry in the front, behind them the infantry, and still further back, the reserve. He extended or strengthened his lines according to the positions he saw his enemies take. His army covered the plain from the canal to the river. At midday he unfurled the banners and sounded the charge.

The duke of Anjou was at the head of the camp on the side towards the Nile; he was the first attacked. The infantry of the Saracens commenced by launching the Greek fire. This fire seized the clothes of the soldiers and the caparisons of the horses. The soldiers, enveloped in flames they could not extinguish, ran about uttering the most frightful cries; the horses broke away, and created confusion in the ranks. By means of this disorder, the enemy’s cavalry opened themselves a passage, dispersed such as were still fighting, and penetrated within the intrenchments. The duke of Anjou was unable to resist the multiplied attacks of the Saracens; his horse having been killed under him, he fought on foot, and, nearly overwhelmed by the number of his enemies, he at length sent to Louis IX. for aid.

The king, himself engaged with the Mussulmans, redoubles his ardour and his efforts, drives the enemy back on to the plain, and then flies where other dangers call him. The knights who follow him precipitate themselves upon the Mussulman battalions which were attacking the quarter of the duke of Anjou. Louis is not stopped, either by the numberless arrows shot at him, or by the Greek fire, which covers his arms and the caparison of his horse. In the account of this battle, Joinville is astonished that the king of France escaped being killed, and can in no other way explain this species of miracle than by attributing it to the power of God: “Then it may well be believed” (we let the seneschal of Champagne speak) “that the holy king had his God in remembrance and wish: for, in truth, our Lord was then a great friend to him in his need, and aided him so effectually, that he delivered his brother, the duke of Anjou, and drove away the Turks.”

On the left of the duke of Anjou, the Crusaders from the isle of Cyprus and Palestine were encamped, under the command of Guy d’Ibelin and his brother Baldwin. These Crusaders had not been engaged in the last battle, and had lost neither their horses nor their arms. Near them fought the brave Gauthier de Chatilion, at the head of a chosen troop. These intrepid warriors were proof against all attacks, and remaining firm at the post confided to them, contributed greatly to the saving of both the camp and the army.

The Templars, having lost the greater part of their knights in Mansourah, formed an intrenchment or barricade in front of them, of the wood of the machines taken from the Saracens; but this feeble defence was of little avail against the Greek fire. The enemy rushed into the camp through the flames; the Templars formed an impenetrable rampart of their bodies, and resisted the violent attacks of the assailants during several hours. The conflict was so severe at this point, that the earth could scarcely be seen behind the spot occupied by the Templars, so completely was it covered with arrows and javelins. The grand master of the Templars lost his life in the mÊlÉe, and a great number of knights died in defending or avenging him. The prodigies of their bravery at last succeeded in arresting the progress of the enemy, and the last who fell in this hardly-contested battle had the consolation, when dying, to see the Saracens fly.

Guy de Malvoisin was placed near to the post which the knights of the Temple defended so bravely; the battalion he commanded was composed almost entirely of his relations, and in battle presented the spectacle of a family of warriors, ever united and ever invincible. Guy incurred the greatest peril; he was wounded several times, but never dreamt of retiring from the contest. His example and the sight of his wounds redoubled the courage of his companions, who, at length, repulsed the Mussulmans. Not far from Guy de Malvoisin, descending towards the canal, the Flemish Crusaders were posted. William, their count, was at their head; they sustained the furious shock of the Mussulmans without giving way in the least: Joinville, with some other knights, fought on their left, and on this occasion owed his safety to the warriors of Flanders, to whom he accords the warmest praises. The Flemings, united with the Champenois, put the Mussulman cavalry and infantry to flight, pursued them out of the camp, and returned loaded with the bucklers and cuirasses they had taken from their enemies.

The count of Poictiers occupied the left wing of the army; but as this prince had only infantry under his command, he was unable to resist the cavalry of the Saracens. Such were the warriors of these remote times, that when they were not on horseback, they seemed to be disarmed, and could not fight even for the defence of intrenchments. The quarter confided to the Poitevins was attacked by the Mussulmans at an early period of the fight; the Mamelukes plundered the tents of the Christians, the brother of the king was dragged out of the camp by some Saracen horsemen, and was being carried away a prisoner. In this extreme peril the count of Poictiers could not look to Louis IX. for any assistance, as he had gone to the succour of the count of Anjou; nor to the other leaders of the Christian army, all so closely pressed by the enemy themselves. This prince was adored by the people for his goodness; and on this occasion received the reward of his virtues, by owing his deliverance to the love with which he inspired all the Crusaders. When the workmen, sutlers, and women that followed the army saw him made a prisoner, they assembled in the greatest fury, and arming themselves with axes, clubs, sticks, or anything that fell in their way, flew after the Mussulmans, delivered the count of Poictiers, and brought him back in triumph.

At the extremity of the camp, close to the quarters of the Poitevins, fought Josserant de BranÇon, with his son and his knights. The companions in arms of Josserant had all left Europe well mounted and magnificently equipped: now they all fought on foot, and had nothing left but lance and sword. Their leader alone was on horseback, and rode from rank to rank, exciting the soldiers, and flying to every point where the danger seemed most pressing. This weak troop would entirely have perished, if Henry of Brienne, who remained in the camp of the duke of Burgundy, had not caused his cross-bowmen to shoot across the arm of the river, every time the Saracens renewed their attacks. Of twenty knights that accompanied Josserant, twelve were left upon the field of battle. This old warrior had been present in thirty-six battles, in all of which he had borne away the prize of valour. Joinville, when relating the exploits of this day, remembers that he had formerly seen Josserant de BranÇon come out victorious from a combat against some Germans who were pillaging the church of MÂcon; he had seen him prostrate himself at the foot of the altar, and pray with ardour for the favour of dying in fight against the enemies of Christ. And Josserant obtained the blessing he had asked of God; for a few days after the battle he died of his wounds.

Such was the contest of which Louis IX., in the account which he sent to France, speaks with such admirable simplicity. “On the first Friday in Lent, the camp being attacked, God favoured the French, and the infidels were repulsed with much loss.”

In this battle, as in the last, the Christians had had all the glory, the Saracens all the advantage. The Christian army lost a great number of its warriors, and almost all its horses: the enemy was reinforced every day; the Crusaders could not attempt to march upon Cairo, and prudence seemed to suggest that they should retrace their steps to Damietta. Retreat, still easy, offered a means of preserving the army for a more favourable season: but this plan could only be counselled by despair, and despair has great difficulty in mastering the hearts of the brave. Nothing could appear more disgraceful to the French than flying, or appearing to fly, before a conquered enemy: they resolved to remain.

Towards the end of February, Almoadam, whom Chigger-Eddour and the principal leaders of the Mamelukes had called to the throne of his father, arrived in Egypt, and was received with loud acclamations by the people, always desirous of change, and always delighted with a new reign. The emirs and magnates likewise displayed great joy, but their demonstrations were less sincere; they looked for the coming of the successor of Negmeddin with more anxiety than impatience; placing a very high value upon that which they had done for him, they, beforehand, expected his ingratitude. On the other side, the young prince was jealous of his authority; and the power of the emirs, the nature even of their services, gave him alarms that he had not the prudence to dissemble. It was not long before a mutual mistrust and a reciprocal estrangement arose between Almoadam and the leaders of the Mussulman army; the latter repented of having raised to empire a prince who showed a disposition to rule alone, and the former was determined to defend his power, even against those who had bestowed it upon him. This state of things and the disposition of men’s minds, appeared ominous of new revolutions in Egypt; unhappily these revolutions broke out too late to allow the Christians to derive any advantage from them.

The Crusaders likewise had soon to contend with calamities more destructive to them than even the power or the arms of the Mussulmans; a contagious disease made its appearance in the Christian army. They had neglected to bury the dead after the last two battles; the bodies cast confusedly and heedlessly into the Aschmoum, and floating on its waters, stopped before the bridge of boats constructed by the Crusaders, and covered the surface of the canal from one shore to the other. Pestilential exhalations quickly arose from this heap of carcasses. Louis IX. ordered the bodies of the Christians to be buried in the ditches dug by the Saracens on the bank; but these spoils of death, moved and transported without precaution, only assisted the progress of the epidemic. The spectacle which was then presented to the eyes of the Crusaders spread the deepest grief throughout the camp, and awakened a more perfect consciousness of their losses. Christian soldiers were seen searching among bodies which wounds, the hues of death, and the action of the sun and air had disfigured, for the deplorable remains of their friends or companions. Many of those upon whom friendship imposed this pious task, fell sick and died almost instantly. The devotedness and grief of one of the knights of Robert count d’Artois, were conspicuous among these affecting instances. This inconsolable knight passed whole nights and days on the banks of the canal, with his eyes intensely fixed upon the waters, braving contagion and death, in the hope of recovering and burying the young prince, whose loss was so deeply deplored by the French army.

The fatigues of war did not at all prevent the pious warriors from observing the abstinence of Lent; and the privations and austerities of penitence completed the exhaustion of their strength. The contagion attacked the most robust as well as the most weak;[311] their flesh withered away, their skin became livid, and was covered with black spots; their gums were inflamed and swollen so as to prevent the passage of food; the flowing of the blood from the nose was the sign of approaching death. Most of the diseased viewed the grim monarch without fear, and considered his dominions as the wished-for end of all their sufferings.

Dysentery and dangerous fevers were soon added to the above malady; nothing was heard in the Christian camp but prayers for the dying or the dead; nothing was seen but the pale and haggard countenances of unhappy beings who accompanied their companions to the tomb, and whom death must soon sweep away in their turn. The soldiers capable of bearing arms did not suffice for the guarding of the avenues of the camp. A thing unheard of in Christian armies, the grooms of knights were seen clothed in the armour of their masters, and taking their places in the post of danger. The clergy, who attended the sick and buried the dead, suffered greatly from the epidemic; very quickly there were not ecclesiastics enough to minister at the altars and perform the Christian ceremonies. One day, the sieur de Joinville, himself sick, and listening to the mass in his bed, was obliged to rise and support his almoner, ready to faint upon the steps of the altar. “Thus supported,” adds the kindly historian, “he finished his sacrament, chanted the mass quite through—but never chanted more.”[312]

We have seen in former holy wars, multitudes of Crusaders a prey to the most cruel scourges; the bravest of the warriors often despaired of the cause of the pilgrims, and deserted the banners of the cross; and many times the excess of their misery drew from them imprecations and blasphemies. We must here remark that the soldiers and companions of Louis IX. supported their evils with more patience and resignation. Not one knight thought of deserting the banners of the crusade, and not a seditious or sacrilegious complaint was heard in the army; the example of the pious monarch doubtless strengthened the courage of the Crusaders, and preserved them from the excesses of despair. Louis IX., deeply affected by the evils that desolated his army, employed every effort to mitigate and end them. If anything could have consoled the Crusaders in the miserable condition in which they were placed, it must have been seeing a king of France himself attending the sick, lavishing upon them every kind of assistance, and preparing them for death. In vain he was conjured not to expose himself to dangers still greater than those of the field of battle; nothing could shake his courage or check the ardour of his charity; he considered it his duty (it is thus he expressed himself) to expose his life for those who every day exposed theirs for him. One of his servants, a worthy man, being at the point of death, and exhorted by a priest to meet his fate like a Christian, replied, “I will not die till I have seen the king.” The king complied with his desire, and the man died in peace, consoled by the presence and words of his kind master. But at length he who consoled all others fell sick himself. The king was not able to leave his tent; the desolation became more profound and more general; they who suffered began now to lose all hope; it seemed as if Providence had abandoned them, and that heaven no longer protected the soldiers of the cross.

The Saracens remained motionless in their camp, leaving their awful auxiliaries, diseases, to perform their mission undisturbed; only Almoadam, in order to add famine to the other evils his enemies experienced, resolved to interrupt all communication between the Christians and Damietta, whence they received provisions by way of the Nile. Having got together a great number of boats, the sultan caused them to be taken to pieces, and afterwards transported over-land to the mouth of the canal of Mehallah. A French flotilla came up the river without suspicion, bearing provisions for the camp, and fell directly into an ambuscade of galleys, placed behind a small island. All at once the enemies appear, surprise the Christians, attack them with fury, kill a thousand soldiers, and obtain possession of fifty vessels laden with provisions. A few days afterwards, other vessels coming up the river towards Mansourah experienced the same fate. No one arrived at the camp; no news came from Damietta, and the Christians were abandoning themselves to the most melancholy presentiments, when a vessel belonging to the count of Flanders, which had escaped the enemy by a miracle, came to announce to them that all the vessels of the Crusaders had been taken, and that the Mussulman flag dominated along the whole course of the river.

Famine soon made frightful ravages in the army; and such as had been spared by disease, were threatened with death from misery and hunger. Both leaders and soldiers were seized with the deepest despondency; and the king at length judged it best to attempt to enter into a truce with the Mussulmans. Philip de Montfort was employed in the embassy to the sultan of Egypt; commissioners were named on both sides to conclude a treaty. Those of the king of France proposed to surrender Damietta to the sultan, on condition that Jerusalem and all the other places in Palestine, that had fallen into the hands of the Mussulmans in the late wars, should be given up to the Christians. The sultan, who dreaded the bravery and the despair of the Crusaders, who, besides, had reason to fear that his enemies might receive reinforcements, and that Damietta might hold out for a considerable time, accepted the proposed conditions. When the question of hostages came to be discussed, the king offered his two brothers; but whether the sultan placed no faith in the loyalty of his enemies, or whether he was wanting in it himself, he required that the king of France should remain in his hands, as a guarantee of the treaty. Sergines, one of the commissioners, could not listen to this proposal without anger. “You ought to know Frenchmen better,” cried he, “than to suppose they would ever allow their king to remain a prisoner with Mussulmans.” A council was held on this subject in the Christian army. The king consented to everything, but the lords and barons exclaimed with vehemence against the giving up of their sovereign. On one side, the monarch was willing to purchase the safety of his people by his own personal danger; on the other, a crowd of warriors all warmly declared they could not suffer such a disgrace, and that they would rather die than place their king in pledge. The more Louis was beloved by his warriors, the less he was master in this circumstance; and every one thinking it to his honour, and almost consistent with his duty, to disobey him, the negotiation was abandoned.

To paint the frightful scarcity that desolated the Christian camp, contemporary chronicles relate, as an extraordinary thing, that a sheep was sold for as much as ten crowns, an ox for eighty livres, and an egg for twelve deniers. Such high prices exceeded the means of most of the pilgrims; some were obliged to live upon the fish caught in the Nile, others upon herbs and roots.

Louis IX. preserving his courage and tranquillity of mind amidst the general mourning and depression, as a means of endeavouring to save the miserable remains of his army, resolved to repass to the other side of the Aschmoum. Whilst the Christians were crossing the wooden bridge thrown over the canal, they were warmly attacked by the Mussulmans. Gaucher de Chatillon, who commanded the rear, at first repulsed them; but as the Saracens returned several times to the charge, and as they had greatly the advantage in numbers, victory was upon the point of being adverse to the Crusaders. The brilliant valour of the count of Anjou checked the impetuosity of the Mussulmans. Erard and John de Valeri performed prodigies of bravery. Jeffroi de Hassemburgh likewise distinguished himself by heroic actions, and merited the palm of valour in that day’s fight. Thus glory was always mingled with the misfortunes of the French Crusaders: but victory procured them no advantages, and always left them still exposed to the same perils, still a prey to the same calamities. They were not more fortunate on one side of the Aschmoum than on the other; and after remaining some days in their old camp, they were obliged at length to form the disheartening resolution of returning to Damietta.

As soon as Almoadam was informed of these last dispositions of the Christians, he himself harangued his troops, distributed provisions and money to them, and reinforced them with a great number of Arabs, attracted to his standards by the hopes of booty. By his orders, boats loaded with soldiers descended the Nile, and joined the Mussulman fleet that had intercepted the convoys of the Crusaders. Bodies of light cavalry were distributed along the whole course of the roads which the French army would take in its retreat.

On the fifth day of April,[313] the Tuesday after the octave of Easter, Louis IX. ordered everything to be prepared for the departure of his army: the women, the children, and the sick were embarked upon the Nile; they waited till night-fall, to conceal these sad preparations from the enemy. The bank of the Nile presented the most heart-breaking spectacle; nothing was to be seen but Crusaders overcome by their sufferings, parting, with tears in their eyes, from friends they were doomed never to see again. Amidst these painful scenes, the Arabs, taking advantage of the darkness of the night, penetrated into the camp, plundered the baggage, and slaughtered every living creature they met with. A terrified crowd fled on all sides, and cries of alarm resounded along the whole bank of the river. The mariners perceiving, by the light of the fires in the boats, this frightful disorder, and that the Christians were being massacred, became terrified on their own account, and prepared to depart. The king, who, in spite of his weakness, was present everywhere, and watched over everything, drove the infidels from the camp, reassured the Christian multitude, and commanded the vessels which had left the shore, to put back and take the rest of the sick on board.

The pope’s legate and several French nobles got on board a large vessel. The king was pressed to follow this example, but he could not make up his mind to abandon his army. In vain his anxious and loving friends represented to him that his state of weakness would not permit him to fight, and exposed him to the risk of falling into the hands of the Saracens; in vain they added, that by thus hazarding his life he compromised the safety of the army. These and many other remonstrances, dictated by sincere attachment for his person, were not able to make him change his resolution. He replied, that no danger should separate him from his faithful warriors; that he had brought them with him; that he would return with them; or, if it proved necessary, die in the midst of them. This heroic determination, the inevitable consequences of which were foreseen, plunged all his knights into consternation and grief. The soldiers, partaking the feelings of the knights, ran along the bank of the Nile, crying with all their strength to those that were going down the river, “Wait for the king! wait for the king!”[314] Arrows and javelins were falling thick upon the vessels which continued to go down the river. Many stopped; but Louis insisted upon their pursuing their course.

Most of the French warriors were borne down by disease and weakened by hunger. The fatigues and new perils they were about to undergo did not at all diminish their courage; but they could not endure the thoughts of abandoning places rendered dear to them by the remembrance of their victories. The duke of Burgundy set out on his march at night-fall; and, a short time after, the rest of the troops quitted the camp, taking away their tents and baggage. Louis, who was determined to go with the rear-guard, only kept with him the brave Sergines and a few other knights and barons who were still fortunate enough to have horses. The king, scarcely able to support himself in his saddle, appeared in the midst of them mounted on an Arabian horse; he wore neither helmet nor cuirass, and had no other weapon but his sword. The warriors who had surrounded his person, followed him in silence; and in the deplorable state to which they were reduced, evinced still some joy at having been chosen to defend their king and die by his side.

The retreat of the Christian army was already known to the Saracens. The king had ordered the bridge of Aschmoum to be broken; but this order had not been executed, and it furnished the Mussulmans with an easy means of crossing the canal. In a moment the whole plain which extended on the Damietta side was covered with enemies. The rear-guard of the Christians was stopped at every step of its route, sometimes by the crossing of a rivulet, but more frequently by a charge of Mussulman cavalry. Amidst the darkness of the night, the Crusaders could not see which way to direct their blows, and when they did obtain some trifling advantage, they did not dare to pursue their enemy; they advanced fighting, and in disorder; fearing to lose themselves, such as were at any distance from their companions, called upon them by name; such as adhered closely to the standard, ran against and impeded each other in their march: over the whole plain nothing was heard but the neighing of horses, the clash of arms, and cries of rage and despair; but the most deplorable spectacle in this defeat was that of the wounded lying stretched along the roads, holding up their hands to their comrades, and conjuring them, with tears, not to leave them exposed to the fury of the Saracens. They looked for day with the most anxious impatience; but the daylight, by discovering the small number of the Christians, redoubled the confidence of the Mussulmans: it filled the former with proportionate dread, as it showed them the multitude of their enemies.

Menaced and pursued on all sides, the knights who had taken the route by land, envied those who had embarked upon the Nile; but these latter were in no less danger than their unfortunate companions. A short time after their departure, a high wind arose, and drove back the vessels towards Mansourah: some of them were run aground, others were dashed violently against accompanying boats, and were near being sunk. Towards dawn their flotilla arrived near Mehallah, a place fatal to the Christians. The Mussulman fleet awaited them there. The archers charged to proceed along the shore and protect them, had fled, and in their place appeared a multitude of Mussulman horsemen, launching such a number of arrows armed with the Greek fire, that it might have been believed, says Joinville, “that all the stars of heaven were falling.”

The wind disconcerted all the manoeuvres of the mariners. The Crusaders, crowded closely in their vessels, could scarcely stand upright, and were most of them without arms. Turning their eyes, sometimes towards the shore, where they perceived clouds of dust at a distance, and sometimes towards heaven, whose mercy they implored, they still hoped that some unexpected event might deliver them, or else that the army advancing towards Damietta would come to their succour; thus placing their last hopes in the miracles of Providence and in those of bravery. Deceitful illusions! one division of the Christian troops had been dispersed; the rear-guard, encouraged by the presence of the king, made incredible but useless efforts to repulse the crowd of Saracens, which increased from moment to moment. The despair of the French warriors gave birth to a thousand glorious actions; but so much heroism was only able to procure them the palm of martyrdom. Guy du ChÂtel, bishop of Soissons, giving up all hopes of gaining Damietta or revisiting France, resolved to seek death, and rushed, followed by several knights, into the thickest of the ranks of the Saracens, who, according to the expression of Joinville, killed them, and sent them into the company of God. Gaucher de Chatillon and Sergines still fought on, in the hope of saving the life of the king of France. Sergines, adhering close to the side of the king, drove away the enemies with mighty blows of the sword; danger seemed to have doubled his strength. Contemporary history, which describes him to us driving away the Saracens that surrounded Louis, compares him to the vigilant servant who carefully drives away the flies from his master’s cup.

In the mean time the hope of victory inflamed the enthusiasm and the fanaticism of the Mussulmans; they were persuaded they were fighting for the cause of their prophet: their dervises and imauns, who had preached the war against the Christians, followed them on the field of battle, pervaded the ranks of the army, and excited the soldiers to carnage.[315] An Arabian historian, mixing the marvellous with his account, relates that the scheikh Ezzedin, seeing that victory for a moment inclined towards the Christians, because a whirlwind of dust covered the Mussulmans and prevented them from fighting, addresses these words to the wind: “Oh wind, direct thy breath against our enemies!” The tempest, adds the same historian, obeyed the voice of this holy person, and victory was the reward of the soldiers of Islamism. We only report this circumstance here, to show the spirit that animated the Mussulmans in their wars against the Christians. The Saracens did not require a miracle to triumph over a dispersed army reduced to so small a number of combatants. The rear-guard of the Christians, always pursued and unceasingly attacked, arrived with much difficulty before the little town of Minieh.[316] The king, escorted by a few knights, preceded the troops into the city, where he alighted as weak “as a child in its mother’s lap,” says Joinville. Fatigue, sickness, and the grief which such disasters caused him, had so overcome him, that all believed (we still quote the same author) he was about to die.

The intrepid Gaucher de Chatillon watched over his safety; alone, he for a length of time defended the entrance of a narrow street, which led to the house in which his faithful servants were endeavouring to recall the exhausted monarch to life. At one moment he rushed like lightning upon the infidels, dispersed them, cut them down; then, after turning to pull from his cuirass, and even his body, the arrows and darts with which he was stuck all over, he flew again upon the enemy, rising from time to time in his stirrups, and shouting with all his force, “Chatillon, knights! Chatillon, to the rescue! Where are ye, my gallant men?” The remainder of the rear-guard were still at some distance; nobody appeared, but the Saracens, on the contrary, came up in crowds; at length, overwhelmed by numbers, bristling with arrows, and covered with wounds, he fell; none of the Crusaders could succour him, not one could witness his heroic end! His horse, one sheet of blood and foam, became the prey of the infidels, and his last exploits were narrated by a Mussulman warrior, who exhibited his sword, and boasted of having killed the bravest of the Christians.

The rear-guard drew up upon a neighbouring hill, and still defended themselves with some advantage. Philip de Montfort, who commanded them, came to inform the king that he had just seen the emir with whom they had treated for a suspension of hostilities at the camp of Mansourah; and if it were his good pleasure, he would go and speak to him about it again. The monarch consented, promising to submit to the conditions the sultan had first required. However miserable the situation of the Crusaders, they still inspired considerable dread in their enemies. Five hundred knights remained under arms, and many of those who had gone past Minieh, retraced their steps to dispute the victory with the Saracens. The emir accepted the proposition for a truce. Montfort, as a pledge of his word, gave him a ring which he wore on his finger. Their hands already touched, when a traitor, a rascal doorkeeper, named Marcel, cried aloud: “Seigneurs, noble French knights, surrender yourselves all, the king commands you by me; do not cause him to be killed!” At these last words, the consternation became general; they believed that the life of the monarch was in great danger, and the leaders, officers, and soldiers, all laid down their arms.

The emir, who had begun to treat for peace, perceived this sudden change, and he broke off the negotiation by saying: “It is not customary to treat with conquered enemies.” Soon after, one of the principal emirs, Djemal-eddin, entered Minieh. Finding the king surrounded by his weeping servants, he took possession of his person, and without any regard for royal majesty, without any respect for the greatest misfortunes, ordered chains to be placed upon his hands and feet; from that moment there was no safety for the Crusaders. Both the brothers of the king fell into the hands of the infidels; all those that had reached Pharescour, were seized, and lost either their lives or their liberty. Many of them might have gained Damietta; but when they learnt the captivity of the king, they lost all strength or spirit to continue their route or to defend themselves. These knights, but lately so intrepid, remained motionless on the high roads, and allowed themselves to be slaughtered or manacled, without offering the least complaint or making the slightest resistance. The oriflamme, the other standards, and the baggage, all became the prey of the Saracens. Amidst scenes of carnage, the Mussulman warriors uttered the most horrible imprecations against Jesus Christ and his defenders: they trampled under-foot, they profaned by insults, crosses and sacred images—a crowning cause for scandal and despair for Christians, who, having seen their king loaded with chains, beheld their God given up to the outrages of the conqueror!

The Crusaders who had embarked upon the Nile had no better destiny; all the vessels of the Christians, except that of the legate, were sunk by the tempest, consumed by the Greek fire, or taken by the Mussulmans. The crowd of Saracens, assembled on the shore or on board the barks, immolated all that came within reach of their arms. They spared neither the women nor the sick. Avarice, rather than humanity, saved such as could expect to be ransomed. The sieur de Joinville, still suffering from his wounds and the disease that had prevailed in the camp of Mansourah, had embarked with the only two knights he had left and some of his serving-men. Four Mussulman galleys came up to his vessel, which had just cast anchor in the middle of the river, and the soldiers threatened them with instant death if they did not at once surrender. The seneschal deliberated with the persons of his suite upon what was best to be done in such an imminent danger: all agreed that it would be most prudent to surrender, except one of his ecclesiastics, who said it would be best to be killed, that they might go at once to Paradise; but this the others were not willing to comply with. Joinville then took a little coffer, and emptying it of the jewels and relics it contained, he threw them into the water, and surrendered at discretion. In spite of the laws of war, the seneschal would have been killed, if a renegade, who knew him, had not covered him with his body, crying: “It is the king’s cousin!” Joinville, scarcely able to support himself, was dragged into a Mussulman galley, and from that transported to a house close to the shore. As they had deprived him of his coat of mail, and he remained almost without covering, the Saracens, whose prisoner he was, gave him a little cap, which he placed upon his head, and threw over his shoulders a scarlet cloak of his own, furred with minever, which his mother had given him: he was trembling all over, as well from his disease as the great fear that possessed him. Being unable to swallow a glass of water that was given to him, he believed himself to be dying, and called his servants around him, who all began to weep. Among those who wept the most bitterly, was a young boy, a natural son of the seigneur Montfaucon. This child, upon seeing the persons perish who had charge of him, had thrown himself into the arms and under the protection of Joinville. The sight of abandoned infancy and the despair of the worthy seneschal, excited the compassion of some of the emirs that were present, and one of them, whom Joinville at one time calls the good Saracen, and at another the poor Saracen, took pity on the boy, and when he left the seneschal, he said to him, “Be sure to hold this little child constantly by the hand, or I am certain the Saracens will kill him.”

The carnage was prolonged for a considerable time after the battle; it lasted during many days. All the captives that had escaped the first fury of the Mussulman soldiers, were landed; and woe to such as sickness had weakened or as exhibited marks of poverty! the more worthy the victims were of pity, the more they roused the barbarity of the conquerors. Soldiers armed with swords and maces, charged to execute the terrible sentence of victory, awaited the prisoners on the shore. John of Vaissy, the priest, and some other servants belonging to Joinville, crawled from the ships in a dying state: the Saracens completed the work before the eyes of their master, saying that these poor wretches were good for nothing, and could pay for neither their liberty nor their lives.

In these days of disasters and calamities, more than thirty thousand Christians lost their lives, killed on the field of battle, drowned in the Nile, or massacred after the fight. The news of this victory obtained by the Mussulmans was soon spread throughout Egypt. The sultan of Cairo wrote to the governor of Damascus, to inform him of the last triumphs of Islamism. “Let thanks be rendered,” said he in his letter, “to the All Powerful, who has changed our sadness into joy; it is to him alone we owe the glory of our arms; the blessings with which he has deigned to favour us are numberless, and the last is the most precious of all. You will announce to the people of Damascus, or rather to all Mussulmans, that God has enabled us to gain a complete victory over the Christians, at the moment they were conspiring to effect our ruin.”[317]

The day after that on which the Christian army had laid down their arms, the king of France was taken to Mansourah on board a war-boat, escorted by a great number of Egyptian vessels. The trumpets and kettle-drums carried the notes of triumph to a vast distance. The Egyptian army, in order of battle, marched along the eastern bank of the Nile as the fleet advanced. All the prisoners whom the fury of the enemy had spared, followed the Mussulman troops, with their hands tied behind them. The Arabs were in arms on the western bank, and the multitude flocked from all parts to witness this strange spectacle. On his arrival at Mansourah, Louis IX. was confined in the house of Fakreddin ben Lokman, secretary of the sultan, and placed under the guard of the eunuch Sabyh. A vast inclosure, surrounded by walls of earth, and guarded by the fiercest of the Mussulman warriors, received the other prisoners of war.

The news of these disasters carried consternation and despair to the city of Damietta, over the walls of which the standard of the French still floated. Confused reports at first were circulated; but soon a few Crusaders, who had escaped from the carnage, announced that the whole Christian army had perished. Queen Marguerite was on the point of being confined: her terrified imagination, at one moment, represented to her her husband falling beneath the swords of the enemy, and at the next, the Saracens at the gates of the city. Her emotions became so violent, that her servants believed her to be expiring. A knight of more than eighty years of age served her as esquire, and never left her either night or day. This unhappy princess, after having, for a moment, sobbed herself to sleep, started up in the greatest terror, imagining that her chamber was filled with Saracens about to kill her. The old knight, who had held her hand while she slept, pressed it, and said: “Be not afraid, madam, I am with you.” An instant after she had reclosed her eyes, she awoke again, and uttered loud and fearful cries, and the grave esquire reassured her again. At length, to free herself from these cruel alarms, the queen ordered every one to leave her chamber except her knight, and then, throwing herself upon her knees before him, with tearful eyes, she exclaimed: “Sir knight, promise that you will grant the favour I am about to ask of you.” He promised upon his oath. Marguerite then continued: “I require you, on the faith you have pledged to me, that if the Saracens should take this city, you will cut off my head rather than allow me to become their captive.” “Certainly, I will do it,” replied the old knight; “I meant to do so, if the thing should so happen!”[318]

On the morrow the queen was brought to bed of a son, who was named Jean Tristan, on account of the melancholy circumstances amidst which he was born. The same day her attendants informed her that the Pisans, and many Crusaders from the maritime cities of Europe, were desirous of abandoning Damietta and returning to their homes. Marguerite caused the leaders of them to be brought before her bed, and said to them: “Seigneurs, for the love of God, do not quit this city; its loss would bring on that of the king and of the whole Christian army. Be moved by my tears, have pity on the poor child that you behold lying beside me!” The merchants of Genoa and Pisa were at first but very little affected by these words. Joinville reproaches them with bitterness for their want of feeling for the cause of Christ, or for that of humanity. As they answered the queen that they had no provisions left, this princess gave orders that all the provisions in Damietta should be immediately bought up, and caused it to be announced to the Genoese and Pisans, that from that time they should be supported at the expense of the king. By this means, the city of Damietta preserved a garrison and defenders, whose presence, more than their valour, produced an effect upon the Saracens. It is even asserted that the Mussulmans, after the victory of Minieh, being desirous of surprising Damietta, presented themselves before the walls, clothed in the arms and bearing the standards of the conquered Christians; but they were betrayed by their language, their long beards, and their bronzed countenances. As the Christians showed themselves in great numbers upon the ramparts, the enemy drew off in haste from a city which they believed was disposed to defend itself, but in which, really, nothing but despondency and fear prevailed.

During this time, Louis IX. was more calm at Mansourah than they were at Damietta. That which misery and misfortune have of the most bitter for the exalted of this world, only served to develop in him the virtue of a Christian hero and the character of a great king. He had no covering at night but a coarse cassock, which he owed to the charity of another prisoner. In this state, he never addressed one petition to his enemies, nor did the tone of his language announce either fear or submission. One of his almoners afterwards attested upon oath, that Louis never suffered a word of despair or a movement of impatience to escape from him. The Mussulmans were astonished at this resignation, and said among themselves, that if ever their prophet should leave them a prey to such great adversities, they would abandon his faith and his worship. Of all his riches, Louis had only saved his book of psalms, too sterile a spoil to be worth the attention of the Saracens; and when all the world seemed to have abandoned him, this book alone consoled him in his misfortunes. He every day recited those hymns of the prophets in which God himself speaks of his justice and his mercy, reassures virtue which suffers in his name, and threatens with his anger those whom prosperity intoxicates, and who abuse their triumph.

Thus religious sentiments and remembrances sustained the courage of Louis even in fetters; and the pious monarch, surrounded every day by fresh perils, amidst a Mussulman army that he had irritated by his victories, might still cry out with the prophet-king: “Supported by the living God, who is my buckler and my glory, I will not fear the crowd of enemies encamped around me.”

The sultan of Cairo, appearing inclined to soften his rigorous policy, sent Louis fifty magnificent dresses for himself and the lords of his train. Louis refused to clothe himself in them, saying that he was the sovereign of a greater kingdom than Egypt, and that he would never wear the livery of a foreign prince. Almoadam ordered a great feast to be prepared, to which he invited the king. But Louis would not accept of this invitation, as he was persuaded it was only meant to exhibit him as a spectacle to the Mussulman army. At length the sultan sent his most skilful physicians to him, and did all he could to preserve a prince whom he destined to adorn his triumph, and by whose means he hoped to obtain the advantages attached to his last victory. Before long he proposed to the king to break his chains upon condition of his giving up Damietta and the cities of Palestine that were still under the power of the Franks. Louis replied, that the Christian cities of Palestine did not belong to him; that God had recently replaced Damietta in the hands of the Christians, and that no human power had the right to dispose of it. The sultan, irritated by this refusal, resolved to employ violence. At one time he threatened Louis to send him to the caliph of Bagdad, who would closely imprison him till death; at another, he announced the project of leading his illustrious captive throughout the East, and of exhibiting to all Asia a king of the Christians reduced to slavery. At length he went so far as to threaten to have him placed in the bernicles,[319] a frightful punishment reserved for the greatest criminals. Louis still showed himself firm, and, as the only reply to all these menaces, said, “I am the sultan’s prisoner, he can do with me what he pleases.”

The king of France suffered, though he did not complain; he feared nothing on his own account, but when he thought of his faithful army, and of the fate of the other captives, his heart was a prey to the deepest sorrow. The Christian prisoners were crowded into one open court, some sick, others wounded, the greater part naked, and all exposed to hunger, the injuries of the elements, and the ill-treatment of their pitiless guards. A Mussulman was commanded to write the names of all these wretched captives, whose number amounted to more than ten thousand. They led all such as could purchase their liberty into a vast tent; the others remained in the place into which they had been driven like a flock of animals, destined to perish miserably. Every day an emir, by the sultan’s orders, entered this abode of despair, and caused two or three hundred prisoners be be dragged out of the inclosure. They were asked if they would abjure the religion of Christ, and those whom the fear of death induced to desert their faith, received their liberty; the others were put to the sword, and their bodies were cast into the Nile. They were slaughtered during the night; silence and darkness adding to the horrors of the execution. During several days the steel of the executioner thus decimated the unhappy prisoners. None were ever seen to return who went out of the inclosure. Their sad companions, on bidding them farewell, wept beforehand over their tragical end, and lived in certain expectation of a similar fate. At length the lassitude of slaughter caused those that remained to be spared. They were led away to Cairo; and the capital of Egypt, into which they had flattered themselves they should enter in triumph, beheld them arrive covered with rags and loaded with chains. They were thrown into dungeons, where many died of hunger and grief; the others, condemned to slavery in a foreign land, deprived of all assistance and of all communication with their leaders, without knowing what was become of their king, were hopeless of ever recovering their liberty, or of revisiting the West.

The Oriental historians relate the scenes we have just described with indifference; many even seem to consider the massacre of prisoners of war as a second victory; and, as if the misfortune and murder of a disarmed enemy could heighten the glory of a conqueror, they exaggerate in their accounts the misery of the vanquished, and particularly the number of the victims immolated to Islamism.

The barons and knights that were shut up in the pavilion, were not ignorant of the fate of their companions in arms; they passed their days and nights in continual terrors. The sultan wished to obtain from them that which he had not been able to obtain from Louis IX. He sent an emir to inform them that he would set them at liberty if Damietta and the Christian cities of Palestine were restored to the Mussulmans. The count of Brittany replied in the name of all the prisoners, that that which was asked of them was not in their power, and that French warriors had no other will than that of their king. “It is plainly to be perceived,” said the messenger of Almoadam, “that you care very little for liberty or life. You shall see some men accustomed to sword-playing.” The emir retired, leaving the prisoners in the expectation of an early death. The apparatus of punishment was exhibited before them. The sword remained several days suspended over their heads; but Almoadam could make no impression upon their firmness. Thus, neither the captivity of an entire army, nor the death of so many warriors, had been able to deprive the Christians of a single one of their conquests, and one of the bulwarks of Egypt was still in their hands. The conquerors prayed and threatened by turns; the conquered resisted all their endeavours, and always appeared masters.

In the mean time several French nobles offered to pay their own ransom. Louis was informed of this; and as he feared that many, not having the means to redeem themselves, would remain in chains, he forbade any particular treaty. The barons and knights, but lately so intractable, did not persist in opposing the will of an unfortunate king, and instantly gave up all idea of a separate negotiation. The king said he would pay for everybody, and that he would never think about his own liberty till after he had assured that of all others.

Whilst the sultan of Cairo was thus making useless attempts to overcome the pride and lower the courage of Louis and his knights, the favourites he had brought with him from Mesopotamia pressed their master to conclude the peace quickly. “You have,” said they to him, “enemies much more dangerous than the Christians; they are the emirs, who wish to reign in your place, and who never cease to boast of their victories, as if you had not yourself conquered the Franks, as if the God of Mahomet had not sent pestilence and famine to aid you in triumphing over the defenders of Christ: hasten, then, to terminate the war, in order that you may strengthen your power within, and begin to reign.” These speeches, which flattered the pride of Almoadam, induced him to make rather more reasonable proposals to his enemies. The sultan limited his demand to a ransom of a million of golden byzants, and the restitution of Damietta. Louis, aware that the city of Damietta could not resist, consented to the proposals that were made to him, if the queen approved of them. As the Mussulmans expressed some surprise at this, the king added, “The queen is my lady, I can do nothing without her consent.” The ministers of the sultan returned a second time, and told the French monarch, that if the queen would pay the sum agreed upon, he should be free. “A king of France,” answered he, “is not to be redeemed by money; the city of Damietta shall be given up for my deliverance,[320] and a million of golden byzants paid for that of my army.” The sultan agreed to all; and, whether he was pleased at having terminated the negotiations, or whether he was touched by the noble character the captive monarch had displayed, he reduced the sum fixed upon as the ransom of the Christian army a fifth.

The knights and barons were still ignorant of the conclusion of the treaty, and were revolving in their minds their customary melancholy reflections, when they saw an old Saracen enter their pavilion. His venerable figure and the gravity of his carriage inspired respect. His train, composed of men-at-arms, inspired fear. The old man, without any preliminary discourse, asked the prisoners, by means of an interpreter, if it was true that they believed in a God, born of a woman, crucified for the salvation of the human race, and resuscitated the third day? All having answered at once that that was their belief: “In that case,” added he, “congratulate yourselves at suffering for your God; you are yet far from having suffered as much for him as he suffered for you. Place your hopes in him, and if he has been able to recall himself to life, he will not want power to put an end to the evils that afflict you now.”

On finishing these words, the old Mussulman retired, leaving the Crusaders divided between surprise, fear, and hope. On the next day it was announced to them that the king had concluded a truce, and wished to take counsel of his barons. John of Vallery, Philip de Montfort, and Guy and Baldwin d’Ibelin were deputed to wait upon the king. It was not long before the Crusaders learnt that their captivity was about to end, and that the king had paid the ransom of the poor as well as the rich. When these brave knights turned their thoughts towards their victories, they never could conceive how it was possible for them to have fallen into the hands of the infidels; and when they reflected on their late misfortunes, their deliverance appeared equally miraculous to them. All raised their voices in praises to God and benedictions to the king of France.

All the cities of Palestine that had belonged to the Christians at the arrival of the Crusaders in the East, were comprised in the treaty. On both sides, the prisoners of war made since the truce concluded between the emperor Frederick and Melik-Kamel, were to be given up. It was agreed, also, that the munitions and machines of war belonging to the Christian army should remain provisionally at Damietta, under the safeguard of the sultan of Egypt.

It next became the object to perform the conditions of the treaty of peace. Four large galleys were prepared to transport the principal prisoners to the mouth of the Nile. The sultan left Mansourah, and repaired to Pharescour by land.

After the battle of Minieh, a vast palace, built of fir timber, of which the chronicles of the times have left pompous descriptions, had been erected in that city. It was in this palace Almoadam received the felicitations of the Mussulmans, upon the happy issue of a war against the enemies of Islamism. All the cities, all the principalities of Syria, sent ambassadors to salute the conqueror of the Christians. The governor of Damascus, to whom he had sent a helmet, found on the field of battle, that had belonged to the king of France, replied to him thus: “There is no doubt that God destines for you the conquest of the universe, or that you will proceed from victory to victory; who can doubt of this when we already see your slaves clothed in the spoils of conquered kings?” Thus the young sultan imbibed intoxicating draughts of praise, and passed his time in the festivities and pleasures of peace, forgetting the cares of his empire, and foreseeing none of the dangers which threatened him amidst his triumphs.

Almoadam had disgraced, and deprived of their places, many of the ministers of his father; most of the emirs were in fear of a similar fall, and this fear even led them to brave everything for the preservation of their fortunes and their lives. Among these malcontents, the Mamelukes and their leader were most conspicuous. This military body owed their origin to Saladin, and they had enjoyed the greatest privileges under the preceding reign. They reproached the sultan with preferring young favourites to old warriors, the support of the throne and the saviours of Egypt. They reproached him with having concluded a peace, without consulting those who had supported the burden of the war; and with having bestowed the spoils of the vanquished upon courtiers, who had only deserved them by coming from the banks of the Euphrates to the shores of the Nile. In order to justify beforehand all they might attempt against the prince, they attributed to him projects of the most sinister nature; and nascent rebellion inflamed itself by the recital of future persecutions. The emirs who were to die were designated; the instruments of death were named, the day was fixed, everything was appointed, everything was ready. It was asserted that the sultan, in the course of one of his nocturnal orgies, had cut off the tops of the flambeaux in his apartment, crying, “Thus shall fly the heads of all the Mamelukes.” A woman animated the minds of the warriors by her discourse: this was Chegger-Eddour, who, having disposed of the empire, could not endure the neglect of the new sultan. From complaints they soon passed to open revolt; for it was less perilous to attack the prince sword in hand, than to declaim for any length of time against him. A conspiracy was formed, in which the Mamelukes and all the emirs who had outrages to avenge or to fear were concerned. The conspirators were impatient to execute their project, and fearing that the sultan, if once arrived at Damietta, might escape them, they resolved to proceed to the consummation at Pharescour.

The galleys which transported the Christian prisoners arrived before that city. The king landed, with the princes, his brothers, and was received in a pavilion, where he had an interview with the sultan. History says nothing of this conference between two princes, who equally commanded attention, and whose position was so different; the one, intoxicated by his victories, blinded by his prosperities; the other, the conqueror of ill-fortune, coming out much greater from the ordeal of adversity.

The two sovereigns had appointed Saturday, the eve of the Ascension, for the giving up of Damietta. According to this convention, the Crusaders, who had been detained more than a month in chains, had only to endure the pains of captivity three days longer; but new misfortunes awaited them, and their courage and resignation were doomed to further trials. The day after their arrival before Pharescour, the sultan of Cairo, in celebration of the peace, determined to give a banquet to the principal officers of the Mussulman army. The conspirators took advantage of this opportunity, and, towards the end of the repast, all rushed upon him, sword in hand. Bendocdar struck the first blow. Almoadam, being only wounded in the hand, arises in a state of terrified amazement, escapes through his motionless guards, takes refuge in a tower, shuts the door of it, and appears at a window, sometimes imploring succour, and sometimes demanding of the conspirators what they required of him. The envoy of the caliph of Bagdad was at Pharescour. He mounted on horseback, but the Mamelukes threatened him with instant death if he did not return to his tent. At the same moment some drums were heard, giving the signal for assembling the troops; but the leaders of the conspiracy told the soldiers that Damietta was taken, and immediately the whole army precipitated themselves upon the road to that city, leaving the sultan at the mercy of men who thirsted for his blood. The Mamelukes accuse and threaten him. He endeavours to justify himself; but his words are drowned in the tumult. A thousand voices cry out to him to descend; he hesitates; he groans; he weeps; arrows fly against the tower in showers; the Greek fire, hurled from every direction, gives birth to a conflagration. Almoadam, nearly surrounded by the flames, precipitates himself from the window; a nail catches his mantle, and he remains for a moment suspended. At length he falls to the earth; sabres and naked swords wave over him on all sides; he casts himself on his knees, at the feet of Octai, one of the principal officers of his guard, who repulses him with contempt. The unhappy prince arises, holding forth his imploring hands to all the assembly, saying, that he was willing to abandon the throne of Egypt, and would return into Mesopotamia. These supplications, unworthy of a prince, inspire more contempt than pity; nevertheless, the crowd of conspirators hesitate; but the leaders know too well there can be no safety for them but in completing the crime they have begun. Bendocdar, who had inflicted the first blow, strikes him a second time with his sabre; Almoadam, streaming with blood, throws himself into the Nile, and endeavours to gain some vessels that appear to be drawing near to the shore to receive him; nine Mamelukes follow him into the water, and pour upon him a thousand blows, within sight of the galley which Joinville was on board of![321]

Such was the end of Almoadam, who neither knew how to reign nor how to die. Arabian authors point it out as a remarkable circumstance, that he perished at once by the sword, fire, and water. The same authors agree in saying, that he himself provoked his ruin by his imprudence and his injustice. But oriental history, accustomed to laud success and blame all who succumb, repeats the complaints of the Mamelukes without examining them; and, passing lightly over this revolution, contents itself with saying, “When God wills an event, he prepares the causes beforehand.”

The Nile and its shore presented, at that moment, two very different spectacles: on one side was a prince, whilst revelling in all the pomps of grandeur, in all the triumphs of victory, massacred by his own guards; on the other, an unfortunate king, surrounded by his knights, as unfortunate as himself, inspiring them with more respect in his adversity than when he was encompassed with all the splendour of prosperity and power. The French knights and barons, although they had been victims of the barbarity of the sultan, felt more astonishment than joy at the sight of his tragical death; they could not comprehend the murderous attack of the Mamelukes; and these revolutions of military despotism, at war with itself, filled them with dread.

After this sanguinary scene, thirty Saracen officers, sword in hand and battle-axes on their shoulders, entered the galley in which were the counts of Brittany and de Montfort, Baldwin and Guy d’Ibelin, and the sieur de Joinville. These furious men vomited imprecations, and threatening the prisoners with both voice and gesture, made them believe that their last hour was come. The Christian warriors prepared themselves for death, and throwing themselves on their knees before a monk of the Trinity, asked him for absolution of their sins; but as the priest could not hear them all at once, they confessed to each other. Guy d’Ibelin, constable of Cyprus, confessed to Joinville, who gave him “such absolution as God had given him the power to give.” It was thus, in after-times, history represents the Chevalier Bayard, wounded to death, and ready to expire, confessing himself at the foot of an oak to one of his faithful companions in arms.[322]

But these menaces and violences of the emirs might have a politic aim. At the conclusion of a conspiracy that had divided men’s minds, in order to awaken fresh passions, it was necessary for the leaders to excite the fanaticism of the multitude, and direct the general fury against the Christians. It was important for them to make others believe, and they might have believed it themselves, that Almoadam had endeavoured to find an asylum amongst the enemies of Islamism.

The lords and barons did not meet with the fate they expected; but as if their understanding with Almoadam had been really dreaded, they were thrust into the hold of the vessel, where they passed the night with the terrible images of death constantly before their eyes.

Louis, shut up in his tent with his brothers, had heard the tumult. In ignorance of what was passing, he concluded that either they were massacring the French prisoners, or else that Damietta was taken. He was a prey to a thousand terrors, when he saw OctaÏ, the chief of the Mamelukes, enter his tent. This emir ordered the guards to retire, and pointing to his bloody sword, exclaimed: “Almoadam is no more; what will you give me for having delivered you from an enemy who meditated your destruction as well as ours?” Louis made no reply. Then the furious emir, presenting the point of his sword, cried, “Dost thou not know that I am master of thy person? Make me a knight, or thou art a dead man.” “Make thyself a Christian,” replied the monarch, “and I will make thee a knight.”[323] Without insisting further, OctaÏ retired, and in a very short time the tent of the king was filled with Saracen warriors, armed with sabres and swords. Their demeanour, their cries, the fury painted on their countenances, announced sufficiently that they had just committed a great crime, and that they were ready to commit others; but by a species of miracle, changing, all at once, both countenance and language at the sight of the king, they approached him with respect; then, as if they felt in the presence of Louis the necessity for justifying themselves, they told him that they had been forced to kill a tyrant, who aimed at their destruction as well as that of the Christians; now, they added, they had only to forget the past; all they required for the future was the faithful execution of the treaty concluded with Almoadam. Then lifting their hands to their turbans, and bending their brows to the ground, they retired in silence, and left the monarch in a state of astonishment at seeing them thus pass, all at once, from transports of rage to sentiments apparently the most respectful.

This singular scene has made some historians say that the Mamelukes offered the throne of Egypt to St. Louis. This opinion has rather gained ground in our days, so easy is it for us to give faith to everything that appears favourable to the glory of the French name. The sieur de Joinville, who is quoted in support of this assertion, only relates a conversation he had held with Louis. The king asked him what he thought he ought to have done, in case the emirs had offered him the supreme authority. The good seneschal conceived it was not possible to accept a crown from the hands of those seditious emirs, who had killed their sovereign. Louis was not of this opinion, and said that, truly, if they had proposed to him to become the successor of the sultan, he would not in the least have refused to be so (il ne l’eÛt mie refusÉ).[324] These words alone prove sufficiently that they had proposed nothing to the captive monarch. Joinville, it is true, adds to this recital, that according to reports that were circulated in the Christian army, the emirs had caused the trumpets to be sounded and the drums to be beaten before the tent of the king of France, and that at the same time they deliberated among themselves, whether it would not be best to break the chains of their prisoner, and make him their sovereign. The sieur de Joinville relates this fact, without affirming it; and as oriental history preserves the most profound silence upon it, an historian of the present day cannot adopt it without compromising his veracity. It is, without doubt, possible that the emirs might have expressed the desire of having a prince amongst them possessed of the firmness, bravery, and virtues of Louis IX.; but how can it be believed that Mussulmans, animated by the double fanaticism of religion and war, could have, for a moment, entertained a thought of choosing an absolute master among the Christians, whom they had just treated with unexampled barbarity; and thus place their property, their liberty, their lives in the hands of the most implacable enemies of their country, their laws, and their faith?

The supreme power, of which the emirs had shown themselves to be so jealous, and which they had wrested with so much violence from the hands of Almoadam, appeared at first to terrify their ambition, when they had it in their power to dispose of it. In a council called to nominate a sultan, the wisest declined to rule over a country filled with troubles, or command an army given up to the spirit of sedition. Upon their refusal, the crown was given to Chegger-Eddour, who had had so great a share, first in the elevation, and then in the fall of Almoadam. As governor with her, in the quality of Atabec, they chose Ezz-Eddin Aybek, who had been brought a slave into Egypt, and whose barbarous origin procured him the surname of the Turcoman.

The new sultana soon arrived at Pharescour, and was proclaimed under the name of Mostassemieh Salehieh, queen of the Mussulmans, mother of Malek-Almansor Khalil. Almansor Khalil, a young prince, the son of Negmeddin, had preceded his father to the tomb. Thus finished the powerful dynasty of the Ayoubites, a dynasty founded by victory, and overturned by an army which the pride of victory had rendered seditious. Whilst they were thus forming a new government, the body of Almoadam was abandoned on the banks of the Nile, where it remained two days without sepulture. The ambassador from the caliph of Bagdad at length obtained permission to bury it, and deposited in an obscure place the sad remains of the last successor of Saladin.

The elevation of Chegger-Eddour astonished the Mussulmans; the name of a woman or of a slave had never till that time been seen engraved upon the coins, or pronounced in public prayers. The caliph of Bagdad protested against the scandal of this innovation; and when he afterwards wrote to the emirs, he asked them if they had not been able to find a single man in all Egypt to govern them. The supreme authority, placed in the hands of a woman, could neither restrain the passions which troubled the empire, nor cause treaties to be respected; which became very fatal to the Christians, condemned to suffer by turns from the revolt and the submission, from the union and the discord of their enemies.

Among the emirs, some wished that the treaty concluded with the sultan should be executed; whilst others were desirous that a fresh one should be made: many were indignant that the Christians should be treated with at all. After long debates, they returned to that which had been done at first, adding to it the condition that the king of France should give up Damietta before he was set at liberty, and that he should pay half of the sum agreed upon for the ransom of himself and his army, before he left the banks of the Nile. These last conditions announced the mistrust of the emirs, and might give the Christian prisoners reason to fear that the day of their deliverance was not yet arrived.

When the observance of the treaty was to be sworn to, the forms of the oaths caused some discussion. The emirs swore that if they failed in their promises, “they consented to be jeered at like the pilgrim who makes the journey to Mecca bareheaded; or else to be as much despised as he who takes back his women after having left them.” The Mussulmans, according to their manners and customs, had no more solemn expression with which to guarantee their sworn faith. They proposed to Louis IX. the following formula: “If I keep not my oath, I shall be like to him who denies his God, who spits upon the cross, and tramples it under-foot.” This formula of the oath which they wished the king to take, appeared to him to be an insult to God and himself. He refused to pronounce it. In vain the emirs showed their anger and their passion; he braved all their menaces. This resistance of St. Louis, celebrated by his contemporaries, will not perhaps obtain the same eulogies in the age we now live in; nevertheless it must be considered that the king was not only restrained on this occasion by the scruples of an exaggerated devotion, but by a feeling of royal dignity. It may be remembered, that in the third crusade, Richard and Saladin had judged it unworthy of the majesty of kings to degrade their word to the formula of an oath; and had been satisfied with a touch of the hand, to cement the peace. Seditious emirs, still stained with the blood of their master, might undervalue the dignity of the supreme rank; but, on important occasions, Louis never forgot he was a great king; and the supposition of a perjury, the thought even of a blasphemy, could not ally itself in his mind with the character of a Christian prince and of a king of France.

The Mussulmans, irritated at seeing a king in fetters dictate laws to them, and resist all their demands, began to talk of putting him to death accompanied by tortures. “You are masters of my body,” he replied, “but you have no power over my will.” The princes, his brothers, implored him to pronounce the required formula; but he was as firm against the entreaties of friendship and affection, as he had been against the threats of his enemies. Even the exhortations of the prelates had no more effect. At length the Mamelukes, attributing such an obstinate resistance to the patriarch of Jerusalem, seized this prelate, who was more than eighty years of age, fastened him to a post, and tied his hands behind him so tightly, that the blood sprang from beneath the nails. The patriarch, overcome by the pain, cried, “Sire! Sire! swear; I will take the sin upon myself.” But Louis, who was throughout persuaded that they insulted his good faith, and that they demanded of him a thing unjust and dishonourable, remained immovable. The emirs, at length subdued by so much firmness, consented to accept the simple word of the king, and retired, saying that “this Frank prince was the most haughty Christian that had ever been seen in the East.”

All now gave their attention to the execution of the treaty. The galleys, on board of which were the prisoners, heaved their anchors, and descended towards the mouth of the Nile; the Mussulman army accompanying them by land. The Christians were to deliver up Damietta the next morning at daybreak. It is impossible to describe the trouble, consternation, and despair that reigned in the city throughout the night. The unfortunate inhabitants ran about the streets, asking each other questions, and communicating their fears with breathless anxiety. The most sinister reports prevailed; it was said that the whole of the Christian army had been massacred by the Mussulmans, and that the king of France was poisoned. When they received orders to evacuate the place, most of the warriors declared aloud that they would not obey, and that they preferred dying on the ramparts to being slaughtered as prisoners of war.

At the same time excitement began to prevail in the Mussulman army. It was whispered that the king of France refused to execute the treaty, and that he had ordered the garrison of Damietta to defend themselves. The soldiers and their leaders repented of having made a truce with the Franks, and appeared determined to take advantage of the least pretext for breaking it.

The commissioners of Louis IX., however, at length persuaded the Christians of Damietta to evacuate the city. Queen Marguerite, scarcely recovered from her confinement, went on board a Genoese vessel. She was accompanied by the duchess of Anjou, the countess of Poictiers, and the unhappy widow of the count d’Artois, who, amidst present calamities, still wept over the first misfortune of the war. Towards the end of the night, Olivier de Thermes, who commanded the garrison, the duke of Burgundy, the pope’s legate, and all the Franks, except the sick that remained in the city, embarked on the Nile.

Geoffrey de Sergines having entered Damietta, brought the keys to the emirs; and when day broke, the Mussulman standards were seen floating over the towers and ramparts. At sight of this, the whole Egyptian army rushed tumultuously into the city. The reports that had been circulated during the night, had excited the fury of the soldiers, and they entered Damietta as if the opening of the gates had been the result of a sanguinary contest; they massacred the sick wherever they found them, they pillaged the houses, and gave to the flames the machines of war, the arms, and all the munitions that belonged to the Christians.

This early violation of the treaty, the intoxication of carnage, and the impunity of license, only served to inflame still further the minds of the Mussulmans, and to lead them to greater excesses. The emirs, partaking of the fury of the soldiers, formed the idea of putting all the Christian prisoners to death. The galleys in which the French barons and knights were crowded, immediately received orders to reascend the river towards Pharescour, “which caused great grief amongst us,” says Joinville, “and many tears issued from our eyes; for we all believed they were about to kill us.”

Whilst the galleys re-ascended the Nile, the Mussulman leaders deliberated in council upon the fate of the king of France and the French warriors. “Now we are masters of Damietta,” said one of the emirs, “and a powerful monarch of the Franks, with the bravest of his warriors, may receive from our hands death or liberty. Fortune offers us an opportunity of securing peace to Egypt for ever, and with it the triumph of Islamism. We have shed the blood of Mussulman princes without scruple; why should we then respect that of Christian princes, who have come into the East to set fire to our cities and reduce our provinces to slavery?” This opinion was that of the people and the army; and most of the emirs, actuated by the general spirit, held similar language. An emir of Mauritania, whose name Joinville has not preserved, opposed, almost alone, this violation of the laws of war and peace. “You have,” said he, “put to death your prince, whom the Koran commands you to cherish as the apple of your eye. This death might, doubtless, be necessary for your own safety; but what can you expect from the action that is proposed to you, except the anger of God and the maledictions of men?” This speech was interrupted by murmurs; the language of reason only added heat to hatred and fanaticism. As violent passions are never at a loss for motives of self-justification, or for excuses for their excesses, the Crusaders were accused of perfidy, treachery, and all the crimes that they themselves contemplated against them. There was no imputation that did not appear probable, consequently no violence that did not appear just. “If the Koran ordered Mussulmans to watch over the lives of their princes, it likewise commanded them to watch over the preservation of the Mussulman faith: death ought to be the reward of those who came to bring death, and their bones ought to whiten upon the same plains that they had laid waste. The safety of Egypt and the laws of the prophet required that it should be so.”

After a very stormy deliberation, the terrible sentence of the captives was about to be pronounced; but cupidity came to the aid of justice and humanity;[325] the emir who had spoken in favour of the Christian prisoners, had, in his speech, more than once repeated the words, Dead men pay no ransom; and they at length acknowledged that the sword, by immolating the Crusaders, would only rob victory of its dues, and deprive the conquerors of the fruit of their labours. This observation at length calmed the minds of the assembly, and brought about a change of opinions. The fear of losing eight hundred thousand golden byzants caused the treaty to be respected, and saved the lives of the king of France and his companions in misfortune.

The emirs issued orders for the galleys to be brought back towards Damietta. The Mamelukes appeared, all at once, to be governed by the most pacific sentiments; and, as it is natural for the multitude to pass from one extreme to another, they treated with all the attentions of hospitality the very men whom, a few hours before, they had wished to put to death. On their arrival before the city, the prisoners were treated with fritters cooked in the sun, and with hard eggs, “which,” says Joinville, “in honour of our persons, were painted of various colours.”

The knights and barons at length had permission to leave the ships that had been their prisons, to go and join the king, whom many of them had not seen since the disaster of Minieh. As they left their vessels, Louis was marching towards the mouth of the Nile, escorted by Mussulman warriors; an innumerable multitude followed him, and contemplated, in silence, the features, the bearing, and the arms of the Christian monarch. A Genoese galley awaited him; as soon as he was on board, eighty archers, with their crossbows strung, appeared suddenly upon the deck of the vessel; the crowd of Egyptians immediately dispersed, and the ship glided away from the shore. Louis had with him the count of Anjou, the count de Soissons, Geoffrey de Sergines, Philip de Nemours, and the seneschal de Joinville. The count of Poictiers remained as a hostage in Damietta, until the payment of the four hundred thousand golden byzants, which the king ought to have paid to the emirs before he put to sea, should be completed. Louis had not enough by thirty thousand livres; this sum was requested of the Templars, who, to the great scandal of the lords and barons, at first refused it. They were threatened with being forced to furnish it; and then complied. The amount stipulated in the treaty was paid to the Saracens. The count of Poictiers had left Damietta, and everything was ready for the departure of the Crusaders, when Philip de Montfort, who had been directed to make the payment, returned to give an account of his mission, and told the king that he had contrived to cheat the emirs out of ten thousand livres. Louis expressed himself much dissatisfied with such a proceeding, and sent Philip de Montfort back to Damietta, to make restitution of the money he had kept back—a lesson of justice which he wished to give to both his enemies and his servants. This last mission is spoken of by an Arabian author, who attributes it to a very whimsical and singular motive. He says that Philip de Montfort was sent to the emirs to tell them that they were deficient in religion and good sense; in religion, because they had murdered their sovereign; in good sense, because, for a moderate sum, they had released a powerful prince, who would have given half of his kingdom to recover his liberty. This explanation, however improbable it may be, at least serves to inform us of the opinion then common in the East, that the Egyptian emirs were reproached with having destroyed their sultan, and allowed their enemy to escape.

Louis IX., with the miserable wreck of his army, soon passed out at the mouth of the Nile, and in a few days arrived at PtolemaÏs, where the people and the clergy were still putting up prayers for his deliverance.

The Egyptians celebrated the restitution of Damietta with public rejoicings; the Mussulman army broke up their camp, and returned towards the capital. The sultana, Chegger-Eddour, caused vests of gold and silver to be distributed to the leaders, and her liberality even extended to the soldiers. An Arabian poet composed some verses upon this occasion, which history has preserved, and which contain the remarkable passage that follows:—

“When thou shalt see this Frenchman (the king of France), tell him these words from the mouth of a sincere friend:

Thou camest into Egypt, thou covetedest its riches; thou believedst that its powers would fade away as smoke.

Behold now thine army! see how thy imprudent conduct has precipitated it into the bosom of the tomb!

Fifty thousand men! and not one that is not either killed, a prisoner, or covered with wounds!

And if he should be ever tempted to come to avenge his defeat; if any motive should bring him back to these places;

Tell him, that the house of the son of Lokman is reserved for him; that he will still find there both his chains and the eunuch Sabyh.”[326]

Whilst Louis IX. was landing at PtolemaÏs, general consternation prevailed in the West; as it always happens in distant wars, fame had spread the most extraordinary reports relative to the expedition of the Crusaders. At first it was believed that the Christian standards were floating from the walls of Cairo and Alexandria; but to these news other rumours soon succeeded, announcing great disasters. The most marvellous accounts had found plenty of credulous minds in France to receive them; they refused to believe in reverses, and the first who spoke of them were given up to the hands of justice, as enemies of religion and of the kingdom. The sinister reports, however, were not long in being confirmed; the people passed from the excess of joy to the excess of grief; there was not a family in the kingdom that had not to deplore a loss in the disasters of which they acquired the painful certainty. But for the French, that which rendered so many misfortunes irreparable, and for which no one could find consolation, was the captivity of the king! Dances, festivals, spectacles,[327] everything that bore the air of joy or pleasure, was forbidden: the kingdom, plunged in sorrow and abasement, appeared, all at once, to be like one of those cities of which the Scripture speaks,—threatened with the wrath of God, they gave themselves up to grief, and covered themselves with the mourning garb of penitence.

The whole Church deplored so great a misfortune with torrents of tears; the father of the faithful was nearly in despair for the safety of Christendom. He addressed letters filled with affliction to all the prelates of the West. He ordered the clergy to put up public prayers; he exhorted the faithful to take up arms. Innocent wrote to Blanche to console her, and to Louis to sustain him in his adversity. When addressing the king of France, he is astonished at finding one man oppressed by so many calamities, and endowed with so many virtues; and demands of God what justice had been able to find in the most Christian of kings, which deserved to be expiated by misfortunes so great.

England was likewise much afflicted by the captivity of the French monarch; the barons and knights were indignant towards their king for having prevented them from going into the East to share the perils of the Crusaders. The King of Castile, then at war with the Moors, was sensible only of the evils of the Christians beyond the seas, and swore to go and fight with the victorious infidels on the banks of the Nile or the Jordan. No monarch of the West expressed more grief than Frederick II., emperor of Germany; in his letters he spoke of the king of France as his best friend, and deplored the disasters of the crusade with bitterness. Frederick, still at variance with the pope, did not neglect this opportunity of accusing Innocent, whom he reproached with the ruin of the Christians. Frederick repaired to Sicily, for the purpose of arming a fleet that might convey prompt assistance to the Crusaders; and whilst the vessels were getting ready, he sent an embassy into the East, to solicit of the sultan of Egypt the deliverance of the king of France and his army.

Amidst the universal desolation, a single Christian city gave demonstrations of joy: Florence, according to Villani, celebrated the reverses of the French Crusaders with festivities. Some pirates from Genoa, Pisa, and Venice took advantage of the disasters of Louis IX. to put to sea, and pillage the Crusaders that were returning into Europe. The joy of the Florentines, and the brigandages of the Italian pirates, were subjects of great scandal for all Christendom.

Louis IX., on his arrival at PtolemaÏs, had only been able to retain a small number of faithful knights; many of the French nobles, the companions of his captivity, instead of following him to Palestine, returned into the West. Among those who had quitted the banner of the crusade, were the duke of Burgundy and the brave count of Brittany: the latter, worn out with sickness and covered with wounds, died on his passage: his mortal remains, preserved by his knights, were transported to the abbey of Villeneuve, near Nantes, where, many ages afterwards, his tomb was still to be seen.

The appearance of the sad remains of the Christian army must have excited the compassion of the inhabitants of PtolemaÏs. Both knights and soldiers were almost naked; the seneschal of Champagne, in order to appear at the king’s table, was forced to make himself a vestment of the shreds of a bed-quilt. An epidemic disease, the fruit of lengthened misery and all sorts of privations, broke out among the Crusaders, and soon extended its ravages to the city. Joinville, who was lodged in the house of the curÉ of PtolemaÏs, informs us that he saw daily twenty convoys pass beneath his windows; and that every time he heard the funeral words, “Libera me, Domine” he burst into tears, and addressed himself to God crying, Mercy!

In the mean time the king of France was engaged in endeavouring to deliver the captives that still remained in Egypt. These captives amounted to twelve thousand, and most of them might be able to resume their arms and serve under the banner of the crusade. Louis sent his ambassadors to pay the four hundred thousand francs that he still owed to the Saracens, and to press the execution of the last treaties. These ambassadors found Egypt filled with troubles; the emirs were divided into several factions, all disputing for power: fanaticism animated these divisions; they reciprocally accused each other of having favoured or spared the Christians. Amidst these debates, many captives had been massacred, and some forced to abjure the faith of Christ. The messengers of Louis IX. could scarcely obtain a hearing; in answer to their demands, they were told that the king of France might esteem himself fortunate in having regained his liberty, and that the Mamelukes would soon go and besiege him in PtolemaÏs. At length the Christian ambassadors were obliged to quit Egypt without having obtained anything; and only brought back to Palestine four hundred prisoners, the greater part of whom had paid their own ransom.

On their return, Louis IX. was plunged in the deepest distress; he had just received a letter from Queen Blanche, who exhorted him to leave the East. He, thereupon, was desirous of returning to France; but how could he make up his mind to abandon twelve thousand Christians in slavery, or to quit the Holy Land when it was threatened with invasion? The three military orders, the barons, and the nobles of Palestine, conjured Louis not to abandon them; repeating with accents of despair, that if they were deprived of his support, the Christians of Syria would have no other resource than to follow him into the West.

Louis was touched by their prayers, but before he would form a resolution, he was desirous of consulting his two brothers and the principal nobles that had remained with him. He exhibited to them the reasons he had for returning to France, and those that would lead him to remain in Palestine: on the one side, his kingdom threatened by the king of England, and the impossibility of his undertaking anything against the infidels, ought to induce him to quit the East; on the other side, the want of good faith in the emirs, who had failed in executing the first conditions of the treaty; the perils to which the Holy Land would be exposed by his departure; the hope, in short, of receiving succours, and profiting by them, to break the chains of the Christian prisoners and deliver Jerusalem, in some sort, imposed upon him the obligation to defer his return.

After having thus described the state of things, without saying a word that might reveal his own opinion, he requested his knights and barons to reflect seriously upon the line of action it would be best for them to pursue. On the following Sunday he again convoked them, and demanded their opinion. The first that spoke was Guy de Malvoisin, whose bravery in fight and wisdom in council were admired and respected by all the Crusaders. “Sire,” said he, addressing Louis, “when I consider the honour of your person and the glory of your reign, I do not think you ought to remain in this country. Remember that flourishing army with which you left the ports of Cyprus, and then turn your eyes upon the warriors you have with you; on that day we reckoned two thousand eight hundred knights with banners in the Christian army; now, one hundred knights constitute your whole force; most of them are sick; they have neither arms nor horses, nor the means of procuring any; they have not the power of serving you with either honour or advantage. You do not possess a single city of war in the East; that in which you now are belongs to several different nations; by remaining here, you inspire no fear in the infidels, and you allow the audacity of your enemies in Europe to increase; you expose yourself to the risk of losing both the kingdom of France, where your absence may embolden ambitious neighbours, and the kingdom of Jesus Christ, upon which your presence will draw the attacks of the Mussulmans. We are all persuaded that the pride of the Saracens should be punished; but it is not in a country far distant from home that the preparations for a decisive and glorious war can be carried on. Thus, then, we advise you to return into the West, where you will watch in safety over the welfare of your states; where you will obtain, amidst a peace which is your own work, the necessary means for avenging our defeats, and, some day, repairing the reverses we have undergone.”

The duke of Anjou, the duke of Poictiers, and most of the French nobles, who spoke after Guy de Malvoisin, expressed the same opinion. When they came to the count of Jaffa, he refused to speak, saying, “that he possessed several castles in Palestine, and might be accused of defending his own personal interests.” Upon being pressed by the king to give his opinion as the others had done, he contented himself with saying, “that the glory of the Christian arms, that the safety of the land of Jesus Christ, required that the Crusaders should not at that time return to Europe.” When it came to Joinville’s turn, the good seneschal remembered the advice that his cousin, the seigneur de Bollaincourt, had given him on the eve of his departure for the crusade. “You are going beyond the seas,”—it was thus the good seigneur Bollaincourt expressed himself,—“but take care how you return; no knight, either poor or rich, can come back without shame, if he leaves any of the common people in whose company he quits France in the hands of the Saracens.” Joinville, full of the remembrance of these words, declared that they could not abandon the great numbers of Christian prisoners without shame. “These unhappy captives,” added he, “were in the service of the king as well as in the service of God; and never will they escape from their captivity if the king should go away.” There was not one of the lords and knights who had not either relations or friends among the prisoners; therefore, many of them could not restrain their tears whilst listening to Joinville; but this kindly feeling was not sufficiently strong to stifle in their hearts their desire to revisit their own country. In vain the seneschal added that the king had still a portion of his treasure left; that he could raise troops in the Morea and other countries; and that with the succours which would come from Europe, they should soon be in a condition to renew the war. These reasons, with many others, made no impression upon the greater part of the assembly: they could only view the crusade as a long and painful exile. The sieur de Chastenai, and Beaumont marshal of France, were all that agreed with the opinion of Joinville. “What shall we reply,” said they, “to those who shall ask us on our return what we have done with the heritage and the soldiers of Jesus Christ? Listen to the unfortunate inhabitants of Palestine: they accuse us of having brought war to them, and reproach us with preparing their entire ruin by our departure. If we do not receive succours, it will be then time enough to go; but why anticipate days of despair? The Crusaders, it is true, are not in great numbers; but can we forget that their leader, even when in chains, made himself respected by the Saracens? Report, likewise, tells us, that discord prevails among our enemies, and that the sultan of Damascus has declared war against the Mamelukes of Egypt.” These two knights spoke amidst the murmurs of their companions; and the more reasonable the opinions they advanced appeared, the greater was the impatience with which they were listened to. The seigneur de Beaumont was about to continue; but he was interrupted with great warmth by his uncle, John de Beaumont, who loaded him with the most bitter reproaches. In vain the king urged the right that every one had to express his opinion; authority of blood prevailed over the authority of the king; the stern old man continued to raise his voice, and reduced his nephew to silence. When he had received the opinions of the assembly, the king dismissed them, and convoked them again for the following Sunday. Upon leaving the council, Joinville found himself exposed to the railleries and insults of the knights, for having expressed an opinion contrary to that of the general meeting. To complete his chagrin, he thought he had incurred the displeasure of the king; and in his despair, he formed the resolution of joining the prince of Antioch, his relation. As he was revolving these gloomy thoughts in his mind, the king took him aside, and opening his heart to him, declared that it was his intention to remain some time longer in Palestine. Then Joinville forgot all the scoffs of the barons and knights; he was so joyous with what the king had told him, that all his griefs were at an end. On the following Sunday the barons assembled for the third time. The king of France invoked the inspiration of the Holy Ghost by a sign of the cross, and pronounced the following words:—“Seigneurs, I thank equally those who have advised me to remain in Asia, and those who have advised me to return to the West. Both, I am convinced, had no other view but the interest of my kingdom and the glory of Jesus Christ. After the most serious and lengthened reflection, I think I may, without injury or peril to my states, prolong my sojourn in this country. The queen, my mother, has defended the honour of my crown in troublesome times; she will now exhibit the same firmness, and will meet with fewer obstacles. No, my kingdom will not suffer by my absence; but if I quit this land, for which Europe has made so many sacrifices, who will protect it against its enemies? Is it to be wished, that, having come here to defend the kingdom of Jerusalem, I shall be hereafter reproached with its ruin? I remain then to save that which is left, to deliver our prisoners, and if possible, to take advantage of the discords of the Saracens. I am not willing, however, to impose restraint upon anybody; such as are desirous of quitting the East are free to depart; as to those who shall determine to remain beneath the banners of the cross, I promise that they shall want for nothing, and that I will ever share with them both good and ill fortune.”

After these words, says Joinville, most were astonished, and many began to shed hot tears. From that time, the dukes of Anjou and Poictiers, with a great number of the leaders, made preparations for their departure. Louis charged them with a letter addressed to the clergy, the nobility, and people of his kingdom. In this letter, Louis described, with a noble simplicity, the victories, defeats, and captivity of the Christian knights, and conjured his subjects of all classes to take up arms for the assistance of the Holy Land.

As soon as the two brothers of the king were gone, a levy of soldiers was commenced, and Palestine was placed in a state of defence. But that which most materially favoured the Crusaders, and gave a chance of security to the Christian colonies, was the discord that then prevailed among the Saracens. After the murder of Almoadam, the Mussulmans of Syria refused to recognise the authority of the Mamelukes. The principality and city of Damascus had recently been given up to Nasser, who was preparing to march against Cairo, at the head of a formidable army; the greatest agitation reigned amongst the Mamelukes of Egypt, in whom remorse seemed to be accompanied by fear. The sultana, Chegger-Eddour, was forced to descend from the throne, and to yield the supreme authority to the Turcoman Ezz-Eddin, whose wife she had become. This change allayed agitation for a time; but in such a state of things, one revolution seemed immediately to bring on another. The turbulent, restless soldiery, that had overthrown the empire of the Ayoubites, could neither endure that which was ancient, nor that which was new. To suppress sedition, the leaders at one time exhibited to the multitude a child of that family which they had proscribed, and decorated him with the vain title of sultan. They afterwards declared that Egypt belonged to the caliph of Bagdad, and that they governed it in his name.

It was at this period that the sultan of Aleppo and Damascus sent ambassadors to Louis IX. to invite the French monarch to unite with him to chastise the pride and the revolt of the soldiery of Cairo. He promised the Christians to share with them the spoils of the conquered, and to restore to them the kingdom of Jerusalem. These brilliant promises were likely to produce an effect upon the king of France, and at least merited all his attention. The emirs of Egypt equally solicited the alliance of the Christians, and proposed very advantageous conditions. In the choice before him, there were powerful motives to incline the king to the party of the sultan of Damascus. He had, on one side, to treat with emirs whose good-will was very uncertain, whose fortune might be transitory, and whose authority was menaced and tottering. On the other, he had to deal with a powerful prince, whose authority being much better established, offered a more sure guarantee to his allies. Another motive, which could not be indifferent in the eyes of the virtuous monarch, was, that the only aim of the policy of the Mamelukes was to secure impunity for a great crime, and that the sovereign of Damascus was aiming to avenge the cause of princes. All these considerations were, no doubt, presented in the council of Louis, and must have left the monarch great difficulty in deciding which side it would be best for him to take. But he could not forget that he had signed a treaty with the emirs, and that nothing could liberate him from his oath; but above all, he could not forget that the Mamelukes still held in their hands the destiny of twelve thousand Christian prisoners, and that by breaking with them, he should renounce the hope of delivering the unhappy companions of his captivity. Louis answered the Syrian ambassadors, that he would willingly join his arms to those of the sultan of Damascus, if the Mamelukes did not perform their treaties. At the same time, he sent John de Valence to Cairo, with directions to offer the emirs peace or war. The latter promised at length to fulfil all the conditions of the treaty, if Louis should consent to become their ally and auxiliary: more than two hundred knights were immediately set at liberty.

These unfortunate victims of the crusade arrived at PtolemaÏs about the month of October (1251): the people flocked in crowds to see them land; they exhibited too evident signs of their late captivity, and the remembrance of what they had undergone, together with their present wretchedness, drew tears of compassion from all the spectators. These prisoners, whose chains Louis had succeeded in breaking, brought with them, in a kind of triumph, a coffin, containing the bones of Gauthier de Brienne, who fell into the hands of the infidels at the battle of Gaza, and had been massacred by a furious mob at Cairo. The clergy accompanied the remains of the Christian hero to the church of the Hospitallers; and the companions in arms of Gauthier described his exploits and the glorious death he had undergone for the cause of Christ. Religion displayed all its pomps, and in its holy songs celebrated the glory of a martyr, and the devotion that it alone had inspired. The charity of the faithful relieved and consoled the misery of the captives, and Louis took into his service all whom age or infirmities rendered incapable of bearing arms.

The king learnt with much pain that many Christian prisoners still remained in Egypt. As the Egyptian ambassadors arrived at that time at PtolemaÏs, Louis IX. declared that they must not at all depend upon the alliance they came to solicit, if the emirs did not hasten to liberate all the captives and all the children of Christians brought up in the Mussulman faith, and even send to him the heads of the Crusaders that had been exposed upon the walls of Cairo.

Thus the position of the Christians was ameliorated daily by the divisions among their enemies. The king of France dictated the conditions to the emirs, and if he had had troops, he might have repaired some of the reverses he had experienced in Egypt; but the East furnished him with but a very small number of soldiers, and the West did not seem at all disposed to send him any supplies.

The king of Castile, who had taken the cross, died at the moment he was preparing to set out. In England, Henry III., who had likewise assumed the cross, obtained from the pope and the parliament the power to levy a tenth upon his people and clergy; he at the same time imposed enormous taxes upon the Jews of his kingdom. The preachers of the crusade were directed to announce his approaching departure for the East, and he himself swore upon the Gospel, in the presence of the assembled barons and people, that he would go to the Holy Land, at the head of his army; but after having obtained what he wanted, he forgot all his promises.

Frederick II., at the moment he was about to assist Louis IX., died at Naples; and his death proved to be a fresh source of trouble and agitation for Christendom. Although he had, when dying, bequeathed a hundred thousand ounces of gold for the succour of the Holy Land, and by his testament had restored to the Church all that had belonged to it, Innocent received the news of his death with a joy that he did not seek to conceal. “Let the Heavens rejoice!” wrote he to the clergy and people of Sicily; “let the earth be in gladness!” and he pursued with anathemas the memory of a prince who had borne the title of king of Jerusalem during thirty-eight years. He excommunicated Conrad, whom Frederick had named as his successor to the empire; he sent emissaries into the kingdom of Naples, to corrupt the fidelity of the people; and ecclesiastics in Germany received the mission to preach a crusade against the princes of the house of Swabia.

France was not less agitated than other countries on the return of the dukes of Anjou and Poictiers, the letter of Louis addressed to his subjects was read in all the churches. This letter revived all the sorrow that had been felt when the account was received of the captivity of the king and his army. The exhortations which Louis addressed to the French to obtain assistance, together with the news that arrived daily from the East, affected all hearts; and as the people have no idea of moderation in either grief or joy, a spirit of sedition, mixed with enthusiasm for the crusade, agitated the cities, pervaded the provinces, and, for a time, placed the kingdom in peril.

Princes and magnates having failed in their enterprise, the multitude was led to believe that Christ rejected the great ones of the earth from his service, and was only willing to have for defenders humble men, shepherds, and labourers. A man appeared, who undertook, with the help of this popular opinion, to inflame the public mind, and to create a general movement. This man, named Jacob, born in Hungary, and far advanced in age, was said to have preached the crusade of children, of which we have spoken in the twelfth book of this work. A long beard, which descended to his girdle, with a pale face and mysterious language, gave him the air of a prophet. He passed from hamlet to hamlet, saying that he was sent by Heaven to deliver the city of God, and avenge the king of France. Shepherds left their flocks, labourers laid down the plough to follow his footsteps. Jacob, who was called the master of Hungary, caused a standard to be borne before him, upon which was painted a lamb, the symbol of the Saviour of the world; provisions were brought to him from all parts, and his disciples asserted that, like Christ, he had the gift of multiplying loaves.

The name of Pastors was given to these village Crusaders. Their first meetings, to which little attention was paid, were held in the provinces of Flanders and Picardy; they then directed their course towards Amiens, and afterwards towards the capital; increasing as they went, with a crowd of vagabonds, thieves, and prostitutes. Although they had committed some disorders, Queen Blanche tolerated them, in the hope they might be the means of procuring some assistance for the king. The implied protection of the queen regent inflamed their pride, and impunity increased their license and redoubled their audacity. The impostor Jacob and the other heads of his gang, with whom chance or corruption had associated him, declaimed with vehemence against the wealth and the supremacy of the clergy, which pleased the multitude they drew at their heels; to the great scandal of all pious men, they themselves performed sacerdotal functions, and took the place, in the pulpits, of the sacred orators, employing violence against the ministers of the altars, and seeking to awaken the passions of the people. At length, assembled to the number of more than a hundred thousand, these redoubtable pilgrims left Paris, and divided themselves into several troops, to repair to the coast, whence they were to embark for the East. The city of Orleans, which happened to be in their passage, became the theatre of frightful disorders. The progress of their enormities at length created serious alarm in the government and the magistracy; orders were sent to the provinces to pursue and disperse these turbulent and seditious bands. The most numerous assemblage of the pastors was fixed to take place at Bourges, where the master of Hungary was to perform miracles and communicate the will of Heaven. Their arrival in that city was the signal for murder, fire, and pillage. The irritated people took up arms and marched against these disturbers of the public peace; they overtook them between Mortemer and Villeneuve-sur-le-Cher, where, in spite of their numbers, they were routed, and received the punishment due to their brigandages. Jacob had his head cut off by the blow of an axe; many of his companions and disciples met with death on the field of battle, or were consigned to punishment; the remainder took to flight.[328]

Thus this storm, formed so suddenly, was dispersed in the same manner; another band, which had directed its course towards Bordeaux, was likewise subdued; some of the pastors who succeeded in getting to England, were served in the same way. A report was spread that correspondences with the Saracens had been found upon the persons of their leaders, and they were accused of having formed the project of delivering up Christian people to the swords of the infidels; which accusation, however improbable, completed the hatred the people began to entertain for them. The government, which had not at first strength enough to oppose them, armed the passions of the multitude against them, and tranquillity was soon reËstablished in the kingdom.

In the mean time the crusade to the East was preached in most of the countries of Europe; new indulgences were added to those which had been accorded to the soldiers of Christ; the bishop of Avignon received power to absolve those who had struck clerks, or burnt churches; the same bishop had the faculty of converting all vows, except that of religion, into a vow for the crusade: similar powers were given to the prior of the Jacobins at Paris. These new encouragements might have aroused a momentary ardour in the faithful, if the court of Rome had not been constantly diverted from the cares of a crusade in the East, by the war it had declared against the house of Swabia. The Holy See willingly granted dispensations to Crusaders who took a part in its cause, or who paid it a tribute; which made the good bishop of Lincoln accuse Innocent of exchanging the treasures of heaven for those of earth, and of selling the Crusaders as the heifers and rains of sacrifice were formerly sold in the Temple. At length, no longer concealing either his hatred or his ambition, the sovereign pontiff ordered the Cordeliers to preach a crusade against the heir and successor of Frederick; the indulgence for those who took the cross extended to the father and mother of the Crusaders, a thing that had never taken place in any other crusade. At the moment when Louis IX. was so earnestly requesting succour, the preaching of this impious crusade excited great scandal among the French nobility; the new Crusaders were treated as rebels; Queen Blanche caused their lands to be seized; and the princes and lords followed the example of the queen in their domains. The Cordeliers were severely reprimanded, and their preaching proved ineffectual.

Whilst the crusade against Conrad was being suppressed, no increased zeal was exhibited for the war in the East. Those who entertained the warmest attachment for Louis IX. might with justice believe, that by sending him assistance they should prolong his absence. Thus, in spite of the reiterated prayers of the king, France, which had shed so many tears over his captivity, could not resolve to take up arms to succour him, and was satisfied with putting up vows for his return.

All that Blanche was able to do for her son was to send him a vessel laden with money, which was lost on the coast of Syria. A small number of those who had taken the cross in the West, determined to cross the sea; the young count of Eu, and Raymond count of Turenne, whom the queen commanded to set out for Palestine, were almost the only nobles of this party. Most of the knights and barons that had remained in Palestine with the king, having spent everything, and being entirely ruined, fixed so high a price upon their services, and, according to the expression of the commissaries of Louis, made themselves so dear, that the treasury of the monarch would not suffice to support them.[329] Levies were made in Greece, in Cyprus, and in the Christian cities of Syria; but these levies only brought to the banners of the crusade a few adventurers, very ill calculated to share the labours and dangers of a great enterprise.

Among the warriors whom the love of danger and distant adventures led at this time to the Holy Land, history speaks of Alemar of Selingan. This knight had come from a country of the West,[330] in which the summer, he said, had almost no nights. Selingan and his companions sought every opportunity for signalizing their skill in arms and their romantic bravery. Whilst waiting for the happy moment, at which they might fight with the Saracens, they made war upon the lions, which they pursued on horseback into the deserts, and killed with their arrows; which was a subject of great surprise and admiration for the French warriors.

Another very noble knight also arrived, says Joinville, who was called De Toucy. The chevalier de Toucy had been regent of the Latin empire of Constantinople, in the absence of Baldwin, and prided himself upon belonging to the family of the kings of France. In company with nine other knights, he abandoned an empire which was falling rapidly to ruin, in order to endeavor to support the miserable remains of the kingdom of Jerusalem. Toucy related the misfortunes of Baldwin, and the deplorable circumstances that had forced a Christian emperor to ally himself with a chief of the Comans. According to the custom of the barbarians, the prince of the Comans and the emperor of Constantinople had punctured themselves, and mixing the blood in a cup, had both drunk of it, as a sign of alliance and brotherhood. The knights who accompanied the seigneur de Toucy had borrowed this practice of the barbarians: the French warriors at first were disgusted with it; but soon, led away by the strange novelty of the thing, they themselves mingled their blood with that of their companions, and diluting it with floods of wine, they got intoxicated together over the mystical draught, which, as they said, made them brothers.

The manners and customs of the Eastern nations strongly raised the curiosity and fixed the attention of the Crusaders. When the missionaries whom Louis IX. had sent into Tartary returned to PtolemaÏs, the French warriors were never tired of interrogating and listening to them. Andrew de Lonjumeau, who was at the head of the mission, had set out from Antioch, and travelling ten leagues every day, had prosecuted his journey for a year before he arrived at the place at which the great khan of the Tartars resided. The missionaries traversed deserts where they met with enormous heaps of human bones—sad monuments of the victories of a barbarous people: they related marvellous things of the court of the monarch of the Moguls, of the manners and customs of the countries they had travelled through, of the conquests and legislation of Gengiskhan, and of the prodigies which had prepared the power and greatness of the conqueror of Asia. Among the extraordinary and somewhat fabulous circumstances they related, the Christians learned with much joy that the religion of Christ was extending its empire among the most distant nations; the missionaries declared they had seen, in a single horde of Tartars, more than eight hundred chapels, in which the praises of the true God were celebrated. Louis IX. hoped that the Moguls might some day become auxiliaries of the Christians in the great struggle against the infidels; and this hope made him resolve to send fresh missionaries into Tartary.

But if the Crusaders were thus astonished at all they heard concerning the most distant regions of Asia, they had close to them a barbarous colony which must have excited their surprise to a still greater degree. Some months after his arrival, Louis received an embassy from the Old Man of the Mountains, who, as we have already said, reigned over about thirty villages or towns, built on the southern declivity of Mount Libanus. The envoys of the prince of the Assassins, when admitted into the presence of the king of France, asked him if he was acquainted with their master. “I have heard of him,” replied the monarch. “Why, then,” added one of the ambassadors, “have you not sought after his friendship by sending him presents, as the emperor of Germany, the king of Hungary, the sultan of Cairo, and so many other great princes have done?” The king listened to this strange language without anger, and appointed the ambassadors another audience, at which the grand masters of the Templars and the Hospitallers were present. The name alone of the two military orders, which the poniard of the Assassins did not venture to attack, inspired some degree of terror in the Old Man of the Mountain, who had been constrained to pay them a tribute. In the second audience, the two grand masters sternly reproved the ambassadors, and told them that if the lord of the Mountain did not send presents to the king of France, his insolence would draw upon him a prompt and just chastisement. The envoys repeated these threatening words to their master, who himself experienced some of the fear he wished to inspire, and sent them back to Louis to express much more pacific sentiments. Among the presents which they were charged to offer to the king of the Franks, there were several vases, a chess-board, and an elephant in rock crystal; to these the lord of the Mountain added a shirt and a ring, as symbols of alliance, according to which, said the envoys to the French monarch, “you and our master will remain united as the fingers of the hand are, and as the shirt is to the body.”[331]

Louis IX. received this new embassy with distinction, and by their hands sent to the prince of the Assassins vases of gold and silver, and stuffs of scarlet and silk; he commanded brother Yves, a man learned in Arabic, to accompany them. Yves, who remained for some time at the court of the Old Man of the Mountain, on his return related many curious particulars, which history has not despised. The prince of the Assassins belonged to the sect of Ali, and professed some admiration for the Gospel. He had, in particular, a veneration for Monseigneur St. Peter, who, according to his belief, was still living, and whose soul, he said, had been successively that of Abel, Noah, and Abraham. Brother Yves spoke strongly of the terror with which the Old Man of the Mountain inspired his subjects. A fearful silence reigned around his palace, and when he appeared in public, he was preceded by a herald-at-arms, who cried with a loud voice, “Whoever you may be, dread to appear before him who holds the life and death of kings in his hands.”

Whilst these marvellous recitals were amusing the leisure of the Crusaders, war was declared between the sultans of Damascus and Cairo. The Christian warriors, impatient for fight, sighed at being thus condemned to waste their time in listless idleness. But they mustered scarcely seven hundred knights beneath the banners of the cross; and their small number would not permit Louis to think of attempting any important enterprise.

Whilst anxiously looking forward to the perils and hazards of war, the holy monarch never relaxed in his endeavours to ameliorate the destiny and break the chains of the captives who still remained in the hands of the Mussulmans. But the captivity of the Christian warriors was not the only grief with which his heart was afflicted: it added greatly to his sorrow to learn that many of his companions in arms had embraced Islamism. It is a singular circumstance to remark,[332] that the Crusaders, whose aim always was to bring about the triumph of Christianity, present us with frequent examples of apostasy, and history does not hesitate to affirm, that during the course of the holy wars more Christians became Mussulmans than Mussulmans became Christians. Joinville informs us in his Memoirs, that most of the mariners who manned the Christian fleet in the retreat from Mansourah, renounced their faith to save their lives: in these disastrous days, many warriors were unable to resist the menaces of the Saracens, and the fear of death made them forget a religion for which they had taken up arms. We have seen what evils the Crusaders had endured in the expeditions to the East; among the crowd of pilgrims there were always some who had not sufficient virtue to pass through the ordeal of great misfortunes: on the arrival of Louis IX. in Egypt, that country already contained many of these perjured and unfaithful Christians, who, in the perils and calamities of preceding wars, had forsaken the God of their fathers. All these renegadoes were despised by the Saracens. Oriental authors quote a saying of Saladin’s on this subject, which expresses an opinion generally established, and which was maintained to the very last days of the crusades; he said that a good Christian was never made of a bad Mussulman, nor a good Mussulman of a bad Christian. History affords a few details upon the lives of these degenerate Franks, who had renounced their religion and their country; many employed themselves in agriculture and the mechanical arts; a great number were enrolled in the Mussulman armies; some obtained employments, and succeeded in amassing great wealth. We may well, however, believe, that remorse empoisoned every moment of their lives, and would not permit them to enjoy the advantages they had acquired among the infidels:[333] the religion they had quitted still inspired them with respect, and the presence and language of the Franks, who had been their brothers, recalled to them the most saddening remembrances; but, withheld by I know not what false shame, and as if God had struck them with an eternal reprobation, they remained chained to their error by an invincible link, and although sensible of the misery of living in a foreign land, they did not dare to entertain the idea of returning to their own country.

One of these renegadoes, born at Provins, who had fought under the banners of John of Brienne, came to salute Louis IX., and bring him presents, at the moment the monarch was embarking on the Nile, to repair to Palestine. As Joinville told him, that if he persisted in practising the religion of Mahomet, he would go straight to hell after his death; he replied, that he believed the religion of Christ to be better than that of the prophet of Mecca; but, he added, that if he returned to the faith of the Christians, he should sink into poverty, and that during the rest of his life he should be loaded with infamous reproaches, and be everywhere hooted as a renegado! a renegado! Thus, the fear of poverty, together with a dread of the judgments of the world, held fast the deserters from the Christian faith, and prevented their return to the belief they had abandoned. Louis IX. neglected no means to bring them back to the right path; his liberality always met half-way such as were disposed to revert to Christianity; and to shield them, from the contempt of men, he issued an ordinance that none should reproach them with their apostasy.

The king of France expended considerable sums in placing several of the Christian cities in a state of defence; the towers and walls of CÆsarea, as well as those of PtolemaÏs, were heightened and enlarged; the walls and fortifications of Jaffa and CaÏpha, which were almost in ruins, were repaired. Amidst these useful labours, carried on in peace, the warriors remained idle, and not a few of them began to be forgetful of both military discipline and Gospel morality. The precaution that the sieur de Joinville took to place his bed in such a manner as to remove all evil thoughts respecting his familiarity with women, proves that the morals of the Christian knights were not entirely free from suspicion at least. Louis was much more severe against licentiousness of manners than he had been during his abode at Damietta. History mentions several instances of his severity; and such was the strangeness of the penal laws charged with the protection of public decency and morality, that excess of libertinism would at the present day appear less scandalous than the punishments then inflicted on the guilty.

The clergy, however, never relaxed in their endeavours to recall the Crusaders to the principles of the Christian religion; and their efforts were not fruitless. There was no city, no place in Palestine, that did not remind the warriors of the holy traditions of the Scriptures, or of the mercy and justice of God. Many of the French nobles, who had been models of courage, showed an equally bright example of devotion and piety; it was common to see the bravest knights lay down their arms, and assuming the scrip and staff of the pilgrim, repair to the spots consecrated by the miracles and the presence of Christ and the holy personages whose memory is preserved by religion. Louis himself visited Mount Thabor and the village of Cana several times, and went on a pilgrimage to Nazareth. The sultan of Damascus, who sought every opportunity of forming an alliance with him, invited him to come as far as Jerusalem; and this pilgrimage would have crowned the wishes of the pious monarch; but his barons, and more particularly the bishops, represented to him that it was not befitting for him to enter Jerusalem as a simple pilgrim, and that he had come into the East not only to visit, but to deliver the holy tomb. They added, that the Western princes who should take the cross after him, would believe, from his example, that they had fulfilled their duty, and performed their vow, by merely visiting the holy city; and thus the devotion of the Crusaders would no longer have the deliverance of the sepulchre of Christ for its object. Louis IX. yielded to the representations of the prelates, and consented not to visit Jerusalem at that time, as he still cherished the hope of one day entering it sword in hand. But this hope was doomed soon to fade away—God never afterwards permitted the holy city to be wrested from the yoke of the infidels.

The sultans of Cairo and Damascus continued to negotiate with the monarch of the Franks. Each of these two Mussulman princes hoped to have the Christians for allies, and was particularly anxious not to have them for enemies. Every time they entertained a fear of being vanquished, the emirs of Egypt renewed their proposals, and they at length accepted all the conditions that the Christians required. A treaty was concluded, by which the Mamelukes engaged to liberate all the captives that remained in Egypt, the children of Christians brought up in the Mussulman faith, and, which had often been demanded by Louis, the heads of the martyrs of the cross that had been exposed upon the walls of Cairo. Jerusalem and all the cities of Palestine, with the exception of Gaza, Daroum, and two other fortresses, were to be placed in the hands of the Franks. The treaty likewise stipulated that, during fifteen years, the kingdom of Jerusalem should have no war with Egypt; that the two states should combine their forces; and that all conquests should be shared between the Christians and the Mamelukes. Some ecclesiastics expressed their doubts and scruples upon an alliance with the enemies of Christ; but the pious monarch disdained to notice their representations; no treaty had ever offered so many advantages for the Christian cause, if good faith had presided over its execution: but the generous loyalty of Louis rendered him incapable of suspecting fraud or perfidy in his allies, or even in his enemies.

The leaders of the Mussulmans were to repair to Gaza, and from thence to Jaffa, to confirm the alliance they had just contracted, and to arrange with the French king the plan for carrying on the war. When the sultan of Damascus heard of the treaty thus entered into, he sent an army of twenty thousand men to take a position between Gaza and Daroum, so as to prevent the junction of the Egyptians and Franks. Whether the Mamelukes were prevented by their internal divisions, or whether they did not dare to face the troops of Damascus, they did not appear at Jaffa at the time agreed upon. They, however, fulfilled all the other conditions of the treaty, and added to the convoy of captives and funereal relics, the present of an elephant, which Louis sent to Henry III. of England. As they often repeated their promise of coming to Jaffa, Louis was constantly in expectation of them, and waited for them an entire year. The French monarch being thus deceived in his hopes, might, without injustice, have renounced a treaty that the other contracting party did not execute; he might again have opened a communication with the sultan of Damascus, who offered the same advantages, with much more probability of his promises being fulfilled. The emirs of Egypt had sought the alliance of the Christians when their own situation appeared desperate, and when they had reason to believe that the king of France would receive succours from the West; seeing, however, that Louis had no army, and that all the forces he could muster did not amount to more than seven hundred knights, they were fearful of entering too deeply into engagements that would expose them to the hatred of the Mussulmans, without offering them any substantial support against their enemies. All these emirs besides, only fought to secure for themselves impunity for their crime, and to be left in quiet possession of the fruits of their revolt. They were at all times ready to lay down their arms, if they procured pardon for the past, and had Egypt abandoned to them. The caliph of Bagdad was always anxious to establish peace among the Mussulman powers; he prevailed upon the sultan of Damascus and Aleppo to forget his causes of resentment, and upon the emirs of Egypt to express repentance, with a desire for peace. Several battles were fought without any decisive results; in one of these battles a party of Syrian troops were defeated by the Mamelukes, and fled away towards Damascus; whilst other bodies of Mamelukes were beaten by the Syrians, and pursued up to the gates of Cairo. A war in which victory was always uncertain, necessarily weakened the courage and exhausted the patience of both parties; and they appealed to the spiritual father of the Mussulmans to arbitrate between them. The sultans of Syria and Egypt at length concluded a peace, and agreed to unite their arms against the Christians. From that time the hopes of the Crusaders all vanished; the king of France, from having procrastinated so long, and at the same time neglected a favourable opportunity, had, all at once, two united enemies to dread. It is necessary to be perfectly acquainted with the situation and policy of the Mussulman powers, to ascertain how far history has reason to blame the indecision and tardiness of Louis IX. Le pÈre Maimbourg does not scruple to blame him with much severity, and declares plainly, that to be a saint, it appears not necessary to be infallible, particularly in political affairs, and even still less in those of war.

The treaty concluded between the Mamelukes and Syrians was the signal for war; the sultan of Damascus, at the head of an army, came under the very walls of PtolemaÏs, and threatened to ravage the gardens and fields which supplied the city with provisions, if the inhabitants did not pay him a tribute of fifty thousand golden byzants. The Christians were not in a condition to resist their enemies, if the latter had then had any intention of attacking them in earnest; but the Syrians, exhausted by fatigue, were in want of provisions, and returned to Damascus, whilst the Mamelukes, at the same time, retook the route to Cairo; both of them departing with an intention of returning on the first favourable occasion to invade and desolate Palestine.

The threats of the Mussulmans redoubled the zeal and the efforts of Louis to place the Christian cities in a state of defence; he determined to restore the fortifications of Sidon, which had been demolished by the Saracens of Damascus, at the time that the Crusaders landed in Egypt. He sent a great number of workmen into this city, and the works were rapidly advancing, when they were all at once interrupted by the most deplorable occurrence. The place having a weak garrison, was surprised, and every Christian it contained put to the sword by the Turcomans, a wandering, ferocious race, accustomed to live by murder and plunder. Louis was at Tyre when he learned this disastrous news, and was about to go to Sidon. Some of the few Syrian inhabitants that had escaped the carnage, described to him the unheard-of cruelties of the barbarians; the fury of the Turcomans had spared neither age nor sex, and in their retreat they had slaughtered two thousand prisoners. Louis, deeply afflicted by what he heard, formed at once the determination to go and attack the Turcomans in Belinas, to which place they had retired. At the first signal all the warriors that accompanied him eagerly assumed their armour. The king wished to place himself at their head, but the barons strongly opposed his intention, saying, “that he must not expose a life of so much consequence to the Holy Land, in such an expedition.” The Christian warriors set forward on their march. Belinas, or CÆsarea Philippi, was built upon a declivity of Mount Libanus, near the sources of the Jordan: the place was only to be approached by narrow roads and steep ascents; but nothing could stop the Crusaders, impatient to avenge their murdered brethren. Upon their arrival at Belinas, the enemy fled in all directions; the city was taken, and this victory would have been complete, if the Christian warriors had observed the laws of discipline, and followed the orders of their leaders. Whilst the French were taking possession of Belinas, the Teutonic knights went to attack a Mussulman castle, built upon the neighbouring heights, whose towers appeared mingled with the peaks of Libanus. The Saracens, who had rallied at this place, and began to recover their courage, repulsed the assailants, and pursued them across the rocks and precipices. The precipitate retreat of the Teutonic knights threw the other Christian warriors into confusion; these latter being huddled together upon a mountainous piece of ground, where they could neither fight on horseback nor form a line of battle. The sieur de Joinville, who led the king’s guards, was more than once upon the point of losing his life, or of falling into the hands of the Turcomans. At length the French, by hard fighting, repaired the error of the Germans; Olivier de Thermes, and the warriors he commanded, succeeded in repulsing the Mussulmans. The Crusaders, after having pillaged Belinas, abandoned it, and returned to Sidon.

Louis IX. arrived there before them: on his approach to the city, what was his sorrow at seeing on his route the ground covered with plundered and bloody carcases! These were the miserable remains of the Christians that had been slain by the Turcomans.[334] They were putrefying fast, and there had been no one to undertake the charge of burying them. Louis stopped at beholding the melancholy spectacle, and turning to the legate, requested him to consecrate a cemetery, and then gave orders for the burial of the dead that covered the roads; but instead of obeying him, every one turned away his eyes and recoiled with disgust. Louis then sprang from his horse, and taking in his hands one of the bodies from which exhaled an infectious odour, exclaimed, “Come, my friends, come, let us bestow a little earth upon the martyrs of Jesus Christ.” The example of the king reanimated the courage and the charity of the persons of his suite; all were eager to imitate him, and the Christians, whom the barbarians had slaughtered, thus received the honours of sepulture. This act of pious devotedness of Louis IX. to the memory of his companions in arms, has been celebrated by all historians; it presents a strange contrast to the insensibility of a hero of modern times, who, in a circumstance almost similar, and in the same country, caused all the wounded who were left upon a field of battle to be poisoned.

The king remained several months at Sidon, employed in fortifying the city. In the mean time Queen Blanche was constantly writing to him and entreating him to return to France, as she greatly feared she should never see her son again.

Her presentiments were but too quickly realized. Louis was still at Sidon, when a message arrived in Palestine, announcing that the queen regent was no more. It was the legate of the pope who first received this melancholy news. He went to seek the king, accompanied by the archbishop of Tyre and Geoffrey de Beaulieu, Louis’s confessor. As the prelate announced that he had something important to communicate, and at the same time exhibited marks of great grief upon his countenance, the monarch led him into his chapel, which, according to an old author, “was his arsenal against all the crosses of the world.” The prelate began by reminding the king that all that man loves upon the earth was perishable; “be thankful to God,” added he, “for having given you a mother who has watched over your family and your kingdom with such anxious care, and so much ability.” The legate paused for a moment, and then, breathing a profound sigh, continued, “This tender mother, this virtuous princess, is now in heaven.” At these words, Louis uttered a piercing cry, and then burst into a torrent of tears. As soon as he had a little recovered himself, he fell on his knees before the altar, and joining and raising his hands, exclaimed, “I thank you O my God! for having given me so good a mother; it was a gift of your mercy; you take her back to-day as your own; you know that I loved her above all creatures; but since, before all things, your decrees must be accomplished, O Lord! be your name blessed for ever, and for ever!” Louis sent away the two prelates, and, remaining alone with his confessor, he recited the service for the dead. Two days passed away before he would see anybody. He then desired Joinville to be called, and upon seeing him, said, “Ah! seneschal, I have lost my mother.” “Sire,” replied Joinville, “I am not surprised at that; you knew that she must die at some time; but I marvel at the great and extravagant grief that you feel for it, you who have always been so wise a prince.” When Joinville left the king, Madame Marie de bonnes Vertus came to beg that he would come to the queen and endeavour to console her. The good seneschal found Marguerite bathed in tears, and could not refrain from expressing his surprise by saying to her, “It is a difficult matter to believe you are a woman by your weeping, for the grief you show is for the loss of a woman that you hated more than any other in the world.” Marguerite replied that it was not, in fact, for the death of Blanche she was weeping, “but for the great uneasiness in which I see the king, and also for our daughter, left under the guardianship of men.”

Louis IX. was present every day at a funeral service celebrated in memory of his mother. He sent into the West a great number of jewels and precious stones to be distributed among the principal churches of France; at the same time exhorting the clergy to put up prayers for him and for the repose of the queen Blanche. In proportion with his endeavours to procure prayers for his mother, his grief yielded to the hope of seeing her again in heaven; and his mind, when calmed by resignation, found its most effectual consolations in that mysterious tie which still unites us with those we have lost, in that religious sentiment which mixes itself with our affections to purify them, and with our regrets to mitigate them.

The death of Queen Blanche seemed to impose an obligation upon Louis IX. to return to his dominions; and the news he received from the West convinced him that his presence was becoming more necessary every day. A war for the succession of Flanders had broken out again; the truce with England had just expired; the people were murmuring: on the other hand, Louis had now nothing he could undertake in Palestine. He therefore gave his serious attention to the subject of his return; but as if, on this occasion, he mistrusted his own understanding, he determined, before he formed a definitive resolution, to consult the will of God. Processions were made, and prayers were put up in all the Christian cities of Palestine, that Heaven might deign to enlighten those who had been charged with the directing of a war undertaken in its name. The clergy and barons of the kingdom of Jerusalem, persuaded that the presence of Louis was no longer necessary, and that his return to the West might rouse the enthusiasm of the French warriors for a new crusade, advised him to embark for Europe; at the same time expressing their fervent gratitude for all the services he had rendered to the cause of Jesus Christ during five years. On preparing for his departure, Louis left a hundred knights in the Holy Land, under the command of Geoffrey de Sergines, who fought against the Saracens for thirty years, and became, in his old age, viceroy of Jerusalem. Louis quitted Sidon, and, with the queen and three children that he had had in the East, repaired to PtolemaÏs, in the spring of 1254. A fleet of fourteen vessels was ready to receive him and all that remained of the warriors of the crusade. The day being arrived (April 24th), the king, walking on foot, followed by the legate, the patriarch of Jerusalem, and all the nobles and knights of Palestine, took the road to the port, amidst an immense crowd collected on his passage. All classes, as they saw him depart, recollected the virtues of which he had given so bright an example, particularly his kindness to the inhabitants of Palestine, whom he had treated as his own subjects. Some expressed their gratitude by warm acclamations, others by a melancholy silence; but all proclaimed him the father of the Christians, and implored Heaven to shower its blessings upon the virtuous monarch, and upon the kingdom of France. The countenance of Louis plainly indicated that he fully partook of the regrets of the Christians of the Holy Land; he addressed a few consoling words to them, gave them useful counsels, reproached himself with not having done enough for their cause, and expressed an earnest desire that God would some day judge him worthy of finishing the work of their deliverance.

At length the fleet set sail. Louis had obtained permission from the legate to take with him, in his vessel, the Holy Sacrament, for the assistance of the dying and the sick; so, when beholding altars raised on board a ship, priests clothed in their sacerdotal habits, celebrating divine service, and invoking the protection of Heaven at every hour in the day, it was easy to recognise the pious wreck of a crusade, and the last trophies of the war of Jesus Christ.[335] As the fleet approached the isle of Cyprus, the vessel in which the king was struck violently against a sand-bank; all the crew were seized with terror; the queen and her children uttered piercing cries; but Louis prostrated himself at the foot of the altar, and addressed himself to Him who commands the sea. When the vessel was examined, it was found that it had received considerable damage, and the pilots pressed the king to leave it; but seeing that they themselves did not purpose to abandon the ship, he determined to remain in it. “There is no one here,” said he, “who does not love his body as dearly as I do mine; if I leave, they will leave also, and, perhaps, will not see their country for a length of time; I prefer placing myself, my queen, and my children in the hands of God, to doing such an injury to so great a number of people as there are here.” These words, inspired by an heroic charity, revived the courage of the sailors and the pilgrims, and they resumed their course. When leaving the coasts of Sicily, the fleet very carefully kept clear of the coast of Tunis, as if a secret presentiment warned the French Crusaders of the misfortunes that awaited them upon that shore in a still more disastrous expedition. A tempest placed the fleet in great peril; it was upon this occasion Queen Marguerite made a vow to offer a ship of silver to St. Nicholas of Lorraine, and requested Joinville to become her security with the patron saint of such as are shipwrecked. Whilst everybody else was in despair, Louis found calmness in a philosophy derived from religion; and when the danger was past, he said to his companions: “See if God has not proved to us how vast is his power, when by means of a single one of the four winds, the king of France, the queen, their children, and so many other persons have escaped drowning.” The navigation lasted more than two months, during which many marvellous adventures and accidents were encountered by the pilgrims, which history has preserved an account of, and which would not figure unworthily in a Christian Odyssey.

The fleet at length cast anchor at the isles of HiÈres. Louis crossed Provence, and passing by Auvergne, arrived at Vincennes on the 5th of September, 1254. The people flocked from all parts to greet him on his passage; the more they appeared to forget his reverses, the more strongly was Louis affected by the remembrance of his lost companions; and the melancholy that clouded his countenance formed a painful contrast with the public joy. His first care was to go to St. Denis, to prostrate himself at the feet of the apostle of France; on the following day he made his public entrance into his capital, preceded by the clergy, the nobility, and the people. He continued to wear the cross upon his shoulder, the sight of which, whilst recalling the cause of his long absence, gave his subjects reason to fear that he had not yet abandoned his enterprise of the crusade. The greater number of the barons and knights that had gone with Louis, had found a grave in either Syria or Egypt. Such as had survived so many disasters, reËntered their castles, which they found deserted and falling to ruins. The good seneschal, after having revisited his home, repaired, barefooted, to the church of St. Nicholas of Lorraine, to discharge the vow of Queen Marguerite. He then set earnestly about repairing the evils his absence had caused, and swore never again to quit the castle of Joinville to seek adventures in Asia.

Thus terminated this holy war, the commencement of which had filled the Christian nations with so much delight, and which had, in the end, plunged the whole West into mourning. Throughout the events I have just described, the seneschal de Joinville has been my guide, and I cannot terminate my recital without paying him the just tribute of my gratitude. The unpretending tone of his narration, the simplicity of his style, the gaiety of his character, have afforded me a happy relief amidst a labour always dry and sometimes revolting. I take delight in beholding him intrepid in the field of battle, preserving his cheerfulness amidst the misfortunes of war, resigned in his captivity, and in all his actions recalling to our minds the true spirit of chivalry. Like his compatriot Villehardouin, he often makes his heroes weep, and as often weeps himself. He braves danger, when danger is present; but he thanks God with all his heart when he has no longer anything to fear.

When I read his memoirs, I am transported back to the thirteenth century, and I think I am listening to a knight who is returned from the crusade, and who tells to me all he has seen and all he has done. He has neither method nor rule; he drops the line of his discourse, and takes it up again; and he extends or abridges his narration, as his imagination is more or less struck by that which he relates. When we read the narratives of Joinville, we are not surprised that Louis should have taken so much delight in his conversation; there is not one of his readers who does not feel the same confidence and friendship for him that the virtuous monarch accorded him, and history adopts without hesitation all that he affirms upon his honour, persuaded that he who was bold enough to speak the truth in the courts of kings will not deceive posterity.

The crusade of St. Louis was like that which immediately preceded it. The enthusiasm for these distant expeditions was daily losing its vivacity and its energy: the crusade no longer appeared anything to the knights beyond a common war, in which the spirit of chivalry was a more powerful principle than religion. It was only a religious affair to Louis IX.

The manner in which this crusade was preached in Europe, the troubles amidst which the voices of the preachers were raised, and particularly the means that were employed to levy the tributes in the West, were calculated to turn away all minds from the object that would be supposed to be the governing one in a holy expedition.

And yet Louis took precautions that had been neglected in preceding wars. Three years were employed in preparing this great enterprise; the knights who arrived in the isle of Cyprus could not express their astonishment at seeing the casks of wine piled one upon another, so high that they appeared like houses; and heaps of wheat, barley, and other grains, so immense, that they might be believed to be mountains. There is no doubt that the princes and nobles who accompanied Louis imitated his example: happy had it been for the Crusaders, if their leaders had shown in war the same prudence and sagacity they displayed in preparing for their expedition!

The French warriors upon all occasions evinced their accustomed bravery; but throughout the crusade there was never exhibited one instance of the genius of a great captain; Louis himself, when in danger, afforded no example to his troops beyond courage and firmness. We have related the prodigies of French valour, and we have described the prodigies of pious resignation in reverses; the Crusaders and their leaders merited, even in their disasters and in the depth of their misery, the esteem and admiration of their enemies; and it is here that history presents the most beautiful spectacle she can offer to man: “Glory, the faithful companion of misfortune.”

We have had occasion, in the course of our narrative, to remark that French gaiety never abandoned the cross-knights in their distant expeditions. This gaiety often mixed itself with the saddest images, and sometimes even did not respect severe propriety. We beg to be permitted to repeat on this head a singular anecdote related by Joinville. On the eve of the battle of Mansourah, one of the knights of the seneschal of Champagne, named Landricourt, died; and whilst the funeral honours were being paid to him, six of his companions in arms talked so loud that they interrupted the priest who was chanting mass. Joinville reproved them warmly, and they then laughed aloud, saying they were talking about remarrying the wife of Messire Hugh de Landricourt, who was on the bier there. The good Joinville was very much scandalized at such discourse, and ordered them to keep silent. When speaking of this indiscreet gaiety of his knights, the seneschal takes care to add that God punished them on the day of battle; for of all the six, he says, there was not one that was not killed and buried, and whose wife did not afterwards find it convenient to marry again.

The manners of the European knights formed a very striking contrast with those of the Mussulmans, who were always grave and serious, even amidst the festivities in which they celebrated the deliverance of their country and the defeat of the Christians.

We have spoken many times of the want of discipline of the Crusaders; the Saracens were very little better in this respect; but in addition to having the advantage of fighting in their own country, with every foot of which they were acquainted, fortune gave them, in their greatest dangers, skilful and experienced leaders, who knew how to take advantage of all the errors of the Christians, and bring back to their banners that victory that appeared to have been driven away by the valour of their enemies.

History describes the whole Egyptian nation as struck with terror at the first appearance of the Crusaders; but the Mussulmans, reassured by their leaders, soon felt as much security and confidence as they had experienced alarm; and as if there was nothing that men forgot so easily as danger, a year after the taking of Damietta, they could not conceive what species of madness had led a king of France to the banks of the Nile. The continuator of Tabary relates a circumstance on this subject, which paints at once the opinion and the character of the Mussulmans. The emir Hossam-Eddin, in the course of a conference with the captive monarch, said to him: “How did it come into the mind of the king, whom I perceive endowed with wisdom and good qualities,—how did it ever enter his thoughts to trust himself to a fragile wooden bark, to brave the rocks of the sea, to venture into a country filled with warriors impatient to fight for the Mussulman faith; how could he possibly believe that he should take possession of Egypt, or that he should land upon these coasts, without exposing both himself and his people to the greatest dangers?” The king of France smiled, but made no reply; and the emir thus continued: “Some of the doctors of our law have decided that he who embarks upon the sea twice consecutively, by thus exposing his life and his fortune, renders himself unfit to have his evidence taken in a court of justice, because such gross imprudence sufficiently proves the weakness of his reason and the unsoundness of his judgment.” Louis IX. again smiled, and answered the emir: “He who said so was not deceived; that is a wise decision.”[336]

We have transcribed the account of the Arabian historian, without according him more credit than he merits. Christian authors have not been less severe towards St. Louis, and can find no excuse for his expedition beyond the seas. Without seeking to justify this crusade, we will content ourselves with saying here, that the aim of Louis IX. was not only to defend the Christian states of Syria and to fight with the enemies of the faith, but to found a colony which might unite the East and the West by the happy interchange of productions and knowledge. We have produced, in the thirteenth book of this history, a letter from the sultan of Cairo, by which it may be plainly perceived, that the king of France had other views than those of a mere conqueror. The historian Mezerai formally says that the project of the king of France was to establish a colony in Egypt, a project of which the execution has been attempted in modern times. “For this purpose,” says Mezerai, “he took with him a great number of labourers and artisans, capable, nevertheless, of bearing arms and fighting in case of need.” To support our opinion, we might add to the authority of Mezerai that of Leibnitz, who, in a memoir addressed to Louis XIV., does not hesitate to affirm that the motives which determined Louis IX. to undertake the conquest of Egypt, were inspired by profound wisdom, and merited the attention of the most skilful statesmen, and of the most enlightened political writers.

We must however believe that Louis IX. did not contemplate in their full extent the advantages that might be derived from his expedition, or that have been discovered in our age. All the policy of those distant ages consisted in religious ideas, which insinuated themselves into human affairs, and often directed them towards an end that human intelligence was incapable of perceiving. What we do now for the interests of commerce or civilization, was then done for the interests of Christianity; and the results were often the same. Religion, in those times of barbarism and ignorance, was like a mysterious reason, like a sublime instinct, given to man to assist him in his search for all that was doomed to become good and useful to him. We must not forget that the Christian religion always directed the conduct of Louis IX., and that it was to the religious inspirations of this monarch, that France owed those treaties, at which frankness and good faith presided; those institutions that consecrated the principles of justice; and all those monuments of a wise policy, to which modern philosophers have not been able to refuse their admiration.

The expedition of Louis IX. produced two results for Egypt that were not at all expected. Two years after the deliverance of the king, and whilst he was still in Palestine, the Mamelukes, fearing a fresh invasion of the Franks, in order to prevent their enemies from taking Damietta and fortifying themselves in that city, entirely destroyed it. Some years after, as their fears were not yet removed, and the second crusade of Louis IX. spread fresh alarms throughout the East, the Egyptians caused immense heaps of stones to be cast into the mouth of the Nile, in order that the Christian fleets might not be able to sail up the river. Since that period a new Damietta has been built at a small distance from the site of the former city; but the entrance to the Nile is still, in our days, closed against all vessels, a sad and deplorable testimony of the terror which the arms of the Franks formerly inspired.

History has a deeper lament to make over the second consequence of this crusade. It is certain that it contributed greatly to change the form of the Egyptian government, and to fill that unhappy country with all the scourges that military despotism brings in its train. It was a spectacle worthy of our attention and our pity, to see, after a bloody revolution, a rich and vast country abandoned all at once to slaves purchased in the most barbarous regions of Asia. Despotism, which always suspects everything that approaches it, dreaded the natural defenders of Egypt, and was willing to confide its safety to men without country and without family; to those men who, according to the expression of Tacitus, when speaking of the guards of Artabanus, have not the least idea of virtue, are incapable of remorse, are instruments always ready for crime, and only know the hand that pays them. Most of the dynasties of Syria had already perished victims of their imprudent confidence in foreign soldiers. That of Saladin shared the same fate, and was, like all the others, overthrown by the barbarians whom it had intrusted with its defence. The dynasty of the Baharite Mamelukes, which succeeded that of Ayoub, was not destined to have a long duration; and a body of slaves, purchased in Circassia, in their turn got possession of the power that had armed them. Two centuries after, the Ottoman empire overcame the second dynasty of the Mamelukes; but their military government, amidst the crimes of tyranny and excesses of disorder, for a long time braved the power of the conqueror, and subsisted to the end of the eighteenth century, when the presence of a French army completed its annihilation. Thus, two French expeditions into Egypt were marked, one by the revolt and elevation of the Mamelukes, the other by their destruction.

Philosophy and humanity, however, derived some advantages from the expedition of St. Louis, which history does not dispute. The French monarch heard in Syria that a powerful emir was collecting a great number of books, and forming a library which was to be open to all the learned, and to all desirous of gaining knowledge. He became anxious to imitate this noble example, and gave orders for having all the manuscripts preserved in the monasteries transcribed. This literary treasure, confided to the care of Vincent de Beauvais, was placed in an apartment near the holy chapel, and became the first model of those bibliographical establishments, of those precious depositories of letters and sciences, of which the capital of France is now so justly proud.

It has often been said, that the hospital of the Quinze-Vingts was established by Louis IX. as an asylum for three hundred gentlemen who had returned blind from the holy war. The ordinance by which Louis founded this hospital says nothing to confirm the opinion at first spread by several writers, and which has since become sanctioned as a popular tradition.[337] Joinville speaks of the institution of the Quinze-Vingts; but he says nothing of the motives that induced the pious monarch to found this establishment. Besides, we should add that the origin of the Quinze-Vingts is posterior by several years to his return from the crusade. Mezerai relates in his history, that an hospital for the blind was established at Rouen in the middle of the twelfth century; and this ancient monument of charity might give Louis the idea of founding a similar institution in his capital.

Before this crusade, Tartary was only known by the formidable emigrations of the Moguls. This vast region was in some sort revealed to the West by the missionaries sent thither by the king of France. William de Longjumeau, who set out from the isle of Cyprus, collected a great number of fabulous traditions in the course of his voyage; but he likewise brought back some curious notices and some exact observations. Rubruquis, who started during the king’s abode in Palestine, and returned after the departure of the Crusaders, did not succeed in his embassy to the powerful emperor of the Moguls; but, as a traveller, he observed with sagacity the country, the manners, and the laws of the Tartars; and his relation is still a valuable monument, that more recent voyages have not thrown into oblivion.

The chroniclers of the time, even Joinville himself, who never turned their attention to anything but the events of the war, and gave no heed to the progress of civilization, have said nothing of the knowledge Louis might have acquired concerning the legislation of the East. What interest would not the old chronicles possess in our eyes, if they had reported the conversations of the royal legislator with the Oriental Christians versed in the study of the laws and customs that prevailed in the colonies of the Franks! It was during the sojourn of the king in Syria, that the chancellor of the kingdom of Cyprus collected all the laws that formed the Assizes of Jerusalem. Should we not be warranted, then, in saying that we owe this precious collection to the counsels, and still more to the encouragement, of Louis IX.? It is certain that the pious monarch neglected nothing that would enable him to acquire a knowledge of the usages and customs of the countries he visited; and that the Assizes of Jerusalem served as a model for the monument of legislation which afterwards constituted the greatest glory of his reign.

One advantage of this crusade, and that, doubtless, the greatest of all, was, that Louis returned much better than he was when he went, and that adversity developed and perfected in him all the qualities to which his subjects looked for their future prosperity. A Protestant historian, when speaking of this subject, makes use of these remarkable words: “The fruit of his voyage and of his affliction was, that he returned a much better man, having increased in zeal, modesty, prudence, and diligence; and that he was more honoured and beloved by his people than he had ever been before his departure; and by the universal earth was held in singular admiration for his good life and constancy amidst dangers, as a miracle among kings.”[338]

Far from seeking to forget his misfortunes, Louis was constantly referring to them, as a great example that God had been willing to present to the world. He attributed them principally to his own faults; and the austerities to which he condemned himself during the remainder of his life, were, says Father Daniel, a kind of mourning, which he always wore for the brave men who had perished in the crusade. On his return, he reformed the coinage, and by his order, silver Parisis and Gros Tournois were struck, upon which chains were figured, in order to preserve the memory of his captivity. These remembrances rendered him more dear to his people, and greater in the eyes of all Christians. Happy are princes upon whom the lessons of misfortune are not lost! happy also is the age in which men are not judged according to the favours of fortune, and in which the adversity of the great ones of the earth has in it something respectable and sacred!

The misfortunes of the time, as we have already said, had ruined a great number of the most illustrious families of the kingdom. We know that many nobles had sold their lands to provide means for undertaking the crusade; and history has preserved acts passed in the camp, even of Mansourah, by which several gentlemen sold their domains to the crown. Louis was not at all willing that his companions in arms should be condemned to poverty for having followed him into the East, and for having shared with him the labours and perils of the holy war; he therefore ordered a list to be made of the indigent nobility, and found means to assist them out of his own revenue; he relieved, with affecting kindness, the widows and orphans of the brave knights he had seen fall by his side; and his solicitude extended even to the poor labourers who had suffered, either in the war of the Pastors, by his absence, or by the inefficiency of the laws. “Serfs,” said he, “belong to Jesus Christ as well as to us, and in a Christian kingdom we ought never to forget that they are our brethren.” Since his war with the Mussulmans, he could not endure the idea of the blood of Christians being shed in battle. His ordinances forbade war between individuals in all the domains of the crown; and the authority of his example contributed to maintain order and peace throughout the provinces.

Before his departure, Louis had sent commissaries to repair the iniquities committed in the government of his kingdom. On his return, he was determined to see everything himself, and pervaded his provinces; being convinced that God will not pardon kings who have neglected any opportunity or means of becoming acquainted with the truth. What a touching spectacle it must have been to see a king as anxious to discover all the ills that had been effected in his name, as other men are to trace out any injustice done to themselves! In short, his paternal vigilance succeeded in destroying all abuses, and repairing all faults; “and finally,” says the noble confidant of his thoughts, “in lapse of time, the kingdom of France multiplied so greatly by the justice and rectitude that reigned in it that the domains, feudal fines, rents, and revenues, increased in one year by a half, and vastly improved the kingdom of France.”

We cannot finish the account of this crusade without speaking of the emperor Frederick II. and Innocent IV., who had so much influence over the events we have described. It may be said of Frederick, that his glory underwent as many vicissitudes as his fortune. Contemporary chronicles sometimes praise him with exaggeration, and at others blame him without measure. Such is ever the fate of princes who have lived amidst the conflict of parties. The spirit of party, which has judged them in their lifetime, leaves to history nothing but uncertainties, and appears still to exist for them in posterity. No historian has denied the talent or the genius of Frederick; he was one of the most illustrious captains of his times; he is placed among the princes who, by their example and their munificence, encouraged the revival of letters in the middle ages. He displayed great qualities upon the throne, but he did not know how to put himself in harmony with the spirit of his contemporaries;[339] he had neither the defects nor the virtues of his age, and that is the reason that he succumbed in the obstinate struggle with the popes. If this struggle had not troubled and divided Europe, and if Frederick had been animated by the same sentiments as St. Louis, there is no doubt that Christianity would have triumphed over Islamism, and that the Crusaders would have subdued a great portion of the East.

The memory of Innocent IV. has been judged as variously as that of his redoubtable adversary. When looking at his manifestoes, his warlike enterprises, his spiritual and temporal triumphs, we might believe that the most able and ambitious of conquerors was seated in the chair of St. Peter. The events to which he has attached his name, and which he directed by his policy, leave us nothing to say regarding his genius or his character. After the death of Frederick, this pontiff returned to Italy, which country he traversed in triumph; but by a singular contrast, he who had shaken the power of emperors, only entered Rome tremblingly. The Romans had sent envoys to him to express their surprise at seeing him lead a wandering life far from his capital, and from the flock of which he would have to render an account to the sovereign judge.

Although obedient in this respect to the will of the people of Rome, Innocent pursued his projects against the remains of the imperial family, and death surprised him in the kingdom of Naples, of which he was taking possession in the name of the Church; having lost all care for the fate of the Christian colonies of the East. The pontiff who succeeded him, although he had neither his ambition, nor his authority, nor his genius, followed not the less the career that had been marked out for him. He endeavoured to accomplish all the threats of the Holy See, and the thunders of Rome reposed no more in the hands of Alexander VI. than they had done in those of his predecessors.

That which might justify the persevering, obstinate ardour with which the popes pursued the posterity of Frederick, is that by it they liberated Italy from the yoke of the emperors of Germany; and that this rich country remained sixty years without seeing the armies of the Germanic empire. But, on the other side, this advantage was purchased by so much violence, and by so many calamities, that the nations were never able to enjoy or know the value of it. The popes, who were not always sufficiently strong to maintain the work of their policy, were sometimes obliged to call in foreign princes to their aid, who introduced fresh subjects of discord into Italy. War constantly brought on war; conquerors were expelled by other conquerors. This revolution lasted during several centuries, and became fatal, not only to Italy, but to Germany, France, and Spain, to all who wished to partake of the spoils of the house of Swabia.

It is not our task to describe these afflicting scenes: to return to that which more particularly belongs to our subject, we will glance, whilst terminating these general considerations, at the crusade which was then being preached in all the Italian cities against Eccelino de Romano, whom the voice of the people, as well as the voice of the Church, had declared to be the enemy of God and men.

This Italian noble had taken advantage of the disorder of the civil wars, to usurp a tyrannical domination over several cities of Lombardy and Trevisano. All that we are told of the tyrants of fabulous antiquity falls short of the cruelties of Eccelino. Contemporary history compares his barbarous reign to pestilence, inundations, conflagrations, and the most terrible convulsions of nature. The pope at first excommunicated Eccelino, in whom he could see nothing but a wild beast in a human form; a short time afterwards he published a crusade against this scourge of God and humanity. John of Vicenza, who had preached public peace twenty years before, was the first preacher of this holy war. The faithful who took up arms against Eccelino, were to receive the same indulgences as those who went to Palestine. This crusade, which was undertaken in the cause of humanity and liberty, was preached in all the republics of Italy: the eloquence of the holy orators easily prevailed over the multitude; but that which most inflamed the zeal and ardour of the people, was the sight of the wretches whom Eccelino had caused to be mutilated amidst tortures, and the groans and lamentations of the families from which the tyrant had chosen his victims. In most of the provinces of Italy, the inhabitants of the cities and country took up arms to defend the cause of religion and their native land; eager to obtain the civic crown, if they triumphed over tyranny, and the crown of martyrdom, if they chanced to fall.

The standard of the cross was displayed at the head of the army; the crowd of Crusaders marched against Eccelino, singing this hymn of the Church,—

“Vexilla regis prodeunt,
Fulget crucis mysterium.”

The army of the faithful at first obtained rapid successes; but as the archbishop of Ravenna, who commanded it, wanted skill, and as the Crusaders of each town had no leaders but monks and ecclesiastics, they did not profit by their early advantages. The intrigues of policy and the spirit of rivalry relaxed the ardour of the combatants; victory was sometimes balanced by reverses: four years of labours and perils scarcely sufficed for the suppression of an impious domination, or to avenge humanity by the defeat and death of Eccelino.

I regret that the plan of this work does not permit me to speak in greater detail of this war, in which religion so happily assisted the cause of liberty, and which forms so great a contrast with most contemporary events. At this period such a number of crusades were preached, that history can scarcely follow them, and we feel astonished that the population of the West was not exhausted by so many unfortunate wars. Whilst Louis IX. was returning from the East, where he had left his army, and a holy league was being formed in Italy against the tyrant Eccelino, sixty thousand Crusaders, commanded by a king of Bohemia, marched against the people of Lithuania, still addicted to the worship of idols; and another army of Crusaders was leaving the banks of the Oder and the Vistula to combat the pagans of Prussia, so many times attacked and conquered by the Teutonic knights. History is gratified at being able to remark that in this last expedition the cities of Brunsbad and Konigsberg were founded; but the founding of two flourishing cities cannot obliterate the remembrance of the desolation of many provinces. If any advantages could arise from these sanguinary expeditions, they were certainly the progressive steps of Christianity, which brought together people till that time separated by difference in manners and religious belief; they were the lessons of misfortune and the fruits of experience, which in the end enlightened Europe, and gave to the human mind a new direction more conformable with the laws of justice and reason, more favourable to the interests of humanity. It is thus that Providence, always mixing good with evil, renews human societies, and sows the prolific seeds of civilization in the very heart of disorder and barbarism.

END OF VOL. II.

[494]
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