MEDIEVAL HISTORY LIBRARY

BOOK III.

HENRY VI—PHILIP—OTHO IV.

CHAPTER II.

KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM. GUY, ISABEL AND CONRAD, ISABEL AND HENRY. 

[ 1191 — 1192.

Conclusion of Third Crusade—Arrival of Philip Augustus— Richard's Capture of Cyprus—Arrival in Palestine—Capture of Acre—Departure of Philip Augustus—Richard’s Campaigns—Murder of Conrad—Isabel’s third Marriage—Rescue of Joppa—Treaty with Saladin.

The siege of Acre proceeded, but the want of a Commander-in-Chief was deeply felt, none of the crusading princes combining the requisite qualifications for that office, military experience and reputation, with high station; whilst Guy, since Sibylla’s death and the contention for the royal authority, scarcely retained a shadow of power. Impatiently was the arrival of the Kings of France and England expected. The 13th of April, 1191 brought the first named monarch; but the very small accession of numerical strength that came with him (six ships contained his whole army) cruelly disappointed the hopes that had been entertained. Philip Augustus at once involved himself in the feuds dividing and embroiling both camp and kingdom, by adopting the cause of his relation, Conrad of Montferrat, who hurried from Tyre to the camp, in order to secure his support. 

Richard’s voyage had been variously delayed; first by a storm, that dispersed the English fleet, next by the consequent necessity of recollecting the scattered vessels. Whilst, for this purpose, successfully visiting Crete and Rhodes, he learned that some of his ships, amongst others that which bore the keeper of his signet, had been wrecked off the coast of Cyprus and plundered by the Cypriots; who, murdering many, had made prisoners of more, of the sailors and crusaders, as, exhausted and defenceless, they reached the shore. He learned further, that vessels of his, having put into the Cypriot harbour of Limasol for shelter, the passengers had been invited to land, and similarly made prisoners.

Cyprus was then governed by a prince named Isaac; a descendant by females of the Comneni, who, by means of forged documents, had possessed himself of the sovereign authority there, whilst Andronicus was seizing the throne at Constantinople. He entitled himself Emperor of Cyprus, proved a worse tyrant than even the Constantinopolitan usurper, and was yet more detested by his subjects than by the Syro-Franks, to whom he was as troublesome a neighbour as a nest of pirates could have been; intercepting, plundering and imprisoning crusaders and pilgrims who ventured within his reach. The ill-usage of Richard’s Crusaders was not the crime of popular lawlessness, but inflicted by his positive command.

The Lion-heart was not the man to overlook such conduct; he steered directly for Limasol, where he found the bark to which he had intrusted his sister and his bride, lying off the mouth of the harbour. He hastened on board, and learned from their lips the subsequent transactions there. The bold Crusaders who had been entrapped had broken prison, had, with two or three weapons, which they had managed to secrete when captured, defeated the multitude of their guards, achieved their liberty, and rejoined their ship. Isaac had thereupon disavowed the unsuccessful outrage, and endeavoured, by the most courteous messages to lure the two princesses on shore. They, fearing to trust themselves in his power, had declined his invitations: whereupon, in his exasperation at being thus foiled, he had ordered the captives taken from the wrecks to be executed. The perpetration of this fresh atrocity had been prevented by the tumultuary opposition of the people and the Cypriot Emperor had now equipped four galleys to seize the ship containing the Queen and Princess.

The King of England immediately sent to demand from the Emperor of Cyprus the restitution of the arms and other property taken from the English Crusaders. An answer of supercilious defiance was returned; and Richard, with a moderation wholly unexpected, sent two more demands for redress, when his messengers were not even suffered to land; and now he gave his anger the reins. Manning his boats, he in them attacked the large armed vessels guarding the entrance of the inner harbour; and the crews, instead of attempting resistance, threw themselves into the sea to escape from the Lion-heart and his Englishmen. The assailants landed; and the troops, headed by Isaac, fled with equal headlong precipitation. His horses being yet afloat, the King could not pursue them; but he occupied Limasol, and established his sister and his bride in the palace of him, whose prisoners they had so nearly been. The next day, his horses were brought on shore, and he proceeded to seek, engage, and defeat the Cypriot army, that Isaac had now assembled in numbers far superior to his small band. Isaac took refuge in Nicosia, and, leaving him blockaded there, Richard returned, laden with booty and prisoners, to Limasol.

During these operations, more and more of the English fleet had gradually made the harbour, where the King was by this time known to have landed, and he was joined by more of his troops. At Limasol, he was likewise visited by Guy; who, seeing his rival's interest adopted by the King of France, felt himself lost unless he could secure the favour of the King of England. The Lusignans, as before said, appear to have been distantly related to the Queen-mother Elinor, whose vassals they were; and Richard, frankly forgiving the rebellious acts that had forced both brothers, Guy and Geoffrey, to make pilgrimages to the Holy Land, at once recognised as King of Jerusalem, him, as whose ally in that character he had left Europe, even as though the death of the Queen made no change in his position. Guy had brought with him his brother Geoffrey, the Grand-Master of the Hospital, the Princes of Antioch and Tripoli, a son of the Prince of Armenia, Isabel’s repudiated husband, and some other Palestine magnates. In their presence, Richard, Lent being now over, solemnized his marriage with Berengaria; and his guests accompanied him in the short campaign, that ensued in Cyprus. Isaac, terrified at Richard’s power, first sued for peace, and through the mediation of the Grand-Master obtained it; then, in a fit of offended arrogance, broke it; whereupon he was again attacked, completely vanquished, and made prisoner. The Cypriots now gladly hastened to tender their homage and allegiance to Richard, who took possession of the island as his conquest: which the Greek historian Nicetas, as well as Frank chroniclers, holds to have been the happiest possible event for Palestine. In fact, during the remainder of the Crusade, the army was fed from that island. Richard now appointed an Anglo-Norman Governor of Cyprus, with whom he left sufficient garrison, sent Isaac, in the custody of one of his Chamberlains, to Tripoli in Syria, placed his only child, a daughter, amongst Berengaria’s ladies, partly for education, partly as a captive, and set sail for Acre. Again Berengaria and Joanna performed the voyage in a separate vessel; the object clearly being, that Richard might be free to seize any opportunity of fighting that should offer.

The English fleet, consisting of twenty-five sail, first made Tyre; where, in accordance with Conrad’s prospective orders, upon the futile plea that Richard designed to take Tyre, as he had taken Cyprus, he was refused admittance; he therefore uninterruptedly prosecuted his voyage to Acre. By the way he fell in with a prodigiously large Saracen ship, under French colours, detected the fraud, and attacked her. She was defended with admirable courage; and the Greek fire terrified the English sailors, who had never before seen it; but Richard’s firmness prevailed. Her captain, when he despaired of saving, strove to sink her. In vain! She was taken, and proved to be bound for Acre, laden with provisions, arms, the ingredients of which the Greek fire was compounded, and some barrels filled with the most venomous snakes, destined to be flung into the besiegers’ camp. The capture of this ship was accepted by both parties as an omen; depressing the garrison of Acre, and even Saladin, as much as it delighted the besiegers.

Upon the 8th of June, Richard landed, and found the siege still languishing, notwithstanding Philip’s arrival. The filling of the ditch was still in progress; and the chief occupation of the French King, who averred that not to rob Richard, of this share of the glory of taking Acre, he had waited for him, had hitherto been putting the machines constructed in Sicily in order, and erecting for himself a stone mansion, proof against the weapons of the age. This house was situated opposite to the Acre castle named la Maudite, and was in its turn called Malvoisin.

From the hour of Richard’s landing, dissentions arose between the royal Crusaders: and so contradictory are the accounts given by French and English historians, that the only chance of eliciting the truth, lies in comparing the several statements with the respective characters of the supposed actors; and even so, and at this distance of time, it may not be easy to avoid a tinge of partiality. Richard was the very impersonation of the feudal chivalry of his day, as Frederic Barbarossa of that of some half century earlier; and in judging of his probable conduct it must ever be borne in mind that the unbounded admiration which his excellence in all knightly exercises, and his proficiency in the gai saber commanded, would naturally render him self willed, and likely in every way, except by artifice, or by declining an opportunity of doing battle, to offend a rival. Philip, on the other hand, was more admired as a politic and successful monarch, than as a knight; and in those days, as long after them, almost to our own times, craft was deemed an essential element of policy. That it was so, esteemed by Philip, one instance will sufficiently prove; which, as he did but appear in Palestine to vanish again, must be taken from his acts in France. A Brabançon corps—the employment of such mercenaries became daily more general—having mutinied for their pay, which was greatly in arrear, he appointed them to meet him at Bourges, where he would satisfy their demands. Bourges was then occupied by French troops in numbers infinitely superior to the Brabançons; and there these French troops, as Philip had pre-arranged, fell by surprise upon his unprepared creditors, disarmed them, and robbing them even of their horses, drove them penniless, helpless, nearly naked, out of the town. And this politic monarch, naturally jealous of a vassal more powerful than his suzerain, felt himself eclipsed as well by that vassal’s brilliant and impetuous valour as by his wealth. Philip had offered three gold pieces to every poor knight who would engage in his service. Crusaders who had dissipated their own resources caught at such offers—Richard gave four, and Philip was deserted for him who paid better. Richard, however, generally rejected those whom he knew to have previously accepted the French King’s offers, or to be in treaty with him. For his nephew, Henry of Champagne, he made an exception. This Earl, finding his means exhausted, had applied for assistance to his uncle Philip, who offered him a loan upon mortgage of Champagne. The nephew said, “I have done my duty in applying first to my liege Lord”; and had re­course to his English uncle, who supplied him freely with what he wanted.

Immediately upon his rival’s landing, the French King produced his engines, announced his purpose of battering the walls preparatory to storming the town, and summoned the English King to co-operate in both measures. Richard returned for answer, that the ships freighted with his battering train were not yet arrived, and that he, individually, disabled by the still prevailing epidemic—of which the Earl of Flanders had just died—could not then rise from his bed. Philip made the attack without him, and was repulsed, with loss of many lives and of much machinery, destroyed by, the Greek fire. This is the English account; the French version is, that Richard, then in good health, his illness beginning subsequently, promised all co-operation and failed; thus, either of malice prepense, or capriciously, causing Philip’s discomfiture.

This disaster, however caused, superadded to previous quarrels, gave birth to ill blood and recriminations that embittered the dissensions, respecting points really in dispute betwixt the Kings. These were two; namely, the conflicting claims of Guy and Conrad to the kingdom of Jerusalem; and the pretensions advanced by Philip to half the island of Cyprus,—as previously in Sicily to half Messina— in virtue of the convention by which all crusading acquisitions—looking probably beyond the recovery of Palestine to conquests from Mohammedans—were to be shared equally. Both these disputes necessarily embarrassed the conduct of the war. The first deprived the besiegers of the assistance of Conrad, who, challenged by Geoffrey de Lusignan to test his pretensions by a judicial combat, had refused, and again retired to Tyre. The second, exacerbating the rivalry of the crusading monarchs, was still more inconvenient. To Philip’s demand, Richard replied that Cyprus was no crusading acquisition, but an accidental conquest, made in punishing an abominable outrage offered to his own family and vassals; nevertheless, if Philip would give him half his recent acquisitions, pecuniary in Syria, and landed in Europe—upon the death of the Earl of Flanders, Philip, as suzerain, had seized his money, and claimed many of his Flemish fiefs as lapsed to the crown—half of Cyprus was much at his service. Neither King was disposed to accept a compromise, and no means of conciliation could be devised.

But if the ill-will existing between the royal Crusaders prevented positive co-operation, it likewise produced an emulation in some measure compensating that evil. Philip built new engines, and repeated his unsuccessful assaults. Richard’s battering train, as soon as landed, was brought into action; and he, whilst still unable to stand, was carried to the scene of danger, and there laid upon cushions, that his presence might animate, whilst his judgment directed the exertions of his troops. And even in this debilitated condition, he added to the general’s part, the soldier’s, so much more congenial to his temperament. From his cushions, he, with his crossbow, mortally wounded two Saracens upon the walls, one of whom was pranking in the armour of a French Knight, slain in one of Philip’s unsuccessful attacks; the other deliberately defiling a crucifix. Richard’s machines are said to have been more ingeniously contrived than Philip’s, and securely protected against the destructive Greek fire; but his assaults were equally unsuccessful. During the earlier part of this time, his impatience of the inactivity, unavoidably caused by disease, was relieved by an interchange of messages and courtesies with Saladin; who, hearing of his illness, as in the case of the Landgrave, sent presents of fruits and delicacies adapted to his condition. Richard, charmed with so chivalrous an enemy, made overtures for an interview, which the more cautious Sultan declined whilst they were at war.

Richard gradually recovered; and now the siege, after lingering on for two years, assumed a character of vigorous activity, that by the 4th of July, drove Karakush, the Commandant of Acre, to propose a capitulation. The proposal was entertained; but he demanded terms to which neither Richard nor Philip would listen. Various stipulations for the surrender of Acre were then, on either side, suggested and rejected. Amongst others, Saladin is averred to have offered the restitution of the whole of Palestine, except a few southern fortresses, indispensable to the safe communication between Cairo and Damascus, if the two Kings would aid him with their whole force to subdue Kotbeddin, a still refractory nephew of Noureddin’s, reigning beyond the Euphrates. This mode of attaining the object for which they were in arms, was probably deemed inconsistent with their crusading vow and character; since the offer, if really made—a startling one from so zealous a Mussulman—was not closed with. The negotiations went on, and so did the assaults; the last being led by the Earl of Leicester and the Bishop of Salisbury on the 11th. Though repulsed, it apparently determined Karakush to surrender upon whatever terms he could obtain.

The next day, July 12th, he therefore agreed, upon condition of the lives of the garrison and of the inhabitants being spared, to deliver up the city, with all its arms, wealth, and provisions, and also the ships in port; to pay a sum of 200,000 bezaunts as ransom for their lives; and to procure the restitution of the True Cross, together with the release of a certain number of prisoners—it should seem of 250 knights, and 2,500 common men; but authorities differ both as to the numbers, and as to the precise time within which all this was to be performed. The Emirs and part of the garrison were to remain, as hostages for the fulfilment of these stipulations, in the hands of the two Kings, and at their mercy, should the Sultan reject the terms of the capitulation. This provision appears very strange, when it is recollected that the Sultan was close at hand, and of course still in communication with Acre by signal,— his own proposal might not particularly refer to Acre—and suspicion that he did not choose to be consulted upon the matter, involuntarily intrudes itself. For we are told that after the capitulation had been not only concluded but executed, as far as was in the power of Karakush, the indignant Saladin was disposed to reject the terms, had not his Mollahs so earnestly represented the danger to which he would thus expose all Moslem prisoners of the Christians, as to prevent his actually so doing. But that he never ratified the capitulation seems equally certain, and whether he in any way, ever formally assented to, or recognised it, is still a question. The whole transaction is indeed involved in considerable obscurity. Conrad, who, at the request of the French monarch, had returned to the camp and negotiated the arrangement, being accused of having bargained with either Karakush or Saladin himself for a pecuniary remuneration of his pains; whilst it is self-evident that, had he been bribed, he would not have extorted concessions which the briber, if the Commandant, doubted his master’s sanctioning, if the Sultan, could hardly be induced even tacitly to admit.

The two Kings, as though Acre were one of their conquests to be shared, not a city of the King of Jerusalem’s recovered for him, entered the town with their own troops, excluding all others, hoisted their own flags, divided the booty between themselves, and occupied, Philip, the Preceptory of the Templars, Richard, the Castle. They justified such autocratical proceedings by the uncertainty as to who really was the King of Jerusalem, which must be ascertained ere Acre could be given up to him. The Duke of Austria was, like all other vassal princes, of course excluded from any partnership with the monarchs; and it is exceedingly doubtful, whether he advanced any pretension to share with them, or to place his banner beside theirs. If he did, there can be no doubt that Philip, as well as Richard, would contemptuously reject it, though the former, it may be presumed, would manage to throw the active and offensive part of the rejection upon the latter. Yet do German historians, even of the present day, forgetting that the vassal Duke of Austria of the twelfth century held a very different station from the Dukes of Austria, hereditary German Emperors, of later times, and taking no notice of the French King, state the Duke’s exclusion as an assumption of superiority, so unwarranted as to justify the hatred borne by Leopold the Virtuous to Richard Coeur de Lion; who, they assert, ordered the Austrian flag to be dragged in the mire, in spiteful jealousy of Leopold, as a rival in “deeds of derring do.” The question of the cause of Leopold’s hatred, for which divers are assigned, will be more properly discussed, when the others, as suggested, occur.

At Acre both Kings were occupied during the remainder of July in negotiating with the Saracens, in settling conflicting claims to property, of Christians—fugitives, or expelled whilst the city had been under Moslem rule—now returning; and in investigating and pronouncing between the more important conflicting claims of the rival pretenders to the kingdom.

Judges were appointed to examine the first class of uncertain pretensions, and restore all property to which a right could be clearly established; when the potent Venetians found no difficulty in recovering their portion of Acre. With respect to the kingdom, the claim of Guy, supported by the Hospitalers, Venetians, and Pisans, and that of Conrad maintained by the Templars, had been previously referred to the two Kings and their Baronage, and the decision by them postponed until Acre should be taken. This decision, to which both rivals were pledged to submit, was now pronounced. It ordained that Guy should be King for his life, Isabel, with Conrad, or their children, succeeding at his death, and that during his life the revenue derived from crown domains, royalties, &c., should be equally divided between them; Conrad meanwhile holding Tyre, Sidon, and Berytus, as an hereditary, vassal principality. To Geoffrey de Lusignan were similarly assigned the counties of Joppa and Ascalon, of which he was to receive investiture, as was Conrad of his principality, in guerdon of their valour and their services, both doing homage to Guy. With the exception of Tyre, neither grant could be very beneficial to the grantee, until the territories granted should be recovered from Saladin, in whose possession they then were. Upon the 27th of July, both Guy and Conrad bound themselves by oath in the prescribed form, to observe these terms. Saladin is reported to have, during these transactions, renewed his offer of restoring Palestine in consideration, of effective aid against Kotbeddin; and Kotbeddin, on his part, to have offered to turn Christian, with all his subjects, as the price of an alliance offensive and defensive against Saladin. Neither offer was positively accepted or rejected, and the negotiations lingered. Nor were the clashing proposals the only matters that diversified the royal deliberations.

A week before the sentence was pronounced, the Duke of Burgundy, the Bishop of Beauvais, and two French Earls waited upon the King of England on the part of the King of France. They appeared from excessive agitation unable to speak, and Richard noticing their distress, thus addressed thein: “I know your errand. The King your master intends to go home, and you come to ask my opinion on the subject.” The envoys replied: “Gracious Lord, you know all. We do indeed come to inform you of this resolution, and to ask your opinion thereon. Our Liege Lord the King of France is persuaded that he cannot longer remain here without peril to his life”. Richard rejoined: “Doubtless to quit the Holy Land without fulfilling his vow, must brand King Philip himself and his kingdom with shame ineffaceable; but if he believes that a sojourn here would be his death, I shall not oppose his departure. Let him do what he and his people think fit.”

French writers generally ascribe this abrupt determination of Philip’s to a dreadful illness, caused, as he supposed, by poison administered at Richard’s instigation, and to mistrust of Richard’s good faith, awakened by his intercourse with Saladin. Generally, but not without exceptions; Bernardus Thesaurarius, believed to have been a Frenchman, and evidently a French partisan, admitting impatience to seize Flemish fiefs as one strong motive; and amongst moderns, Michaud, allowing that he affected fears which he did not feel. English writers impute it partly to jealousy of Richard’s superior celebrity, and consequent greater weight with both Christians and Mohammedans; but more to impatience to seize upon Flanders, and to try whether, in Richard’s absence, he could not, by disregarding their reciprocal oaths of forbearance, and the especial protection and guarantee assured by the Church, to the property, real and personal, of all Crusaders, possess himself of some of the English King’s French dominions. Richard himself suspected the influence of the last suggested motive; for he required and obtained from Philip, a renewed oath to respect both his possessions, and those of every Crusader, during not only the absence of their respective sovereigns, but also for forty days after the return of such sovereigns. He then, in proof of reconciliation and amity, complied with the French King’s request for the loan of two ships to take him home. Two sufficed, a body of French Crusaders, amounting to 500 knights and 1000 foot, remaining in Palestine under the command of the Duke of Burgundy. With the Duke, Philip left such of the Acre prisoners as fell to his share, assigning his half of the Acre ransom, for which they were hostages, as the fund out of which was to be defrayed the expense of the troops remaining in Palestine; and who were even then in so destitute a condition, that the Duke of Burgundy was almost immediately obliged to request the loan of 10,000 marks from Richard for their support. It was as immediately advanced him.

Upon the 80th of July, the King of France, after a stay of between three and four months, embarked for Europe. He first visited Tyre; whither Conrad accompanied him, and where he seems to have deposited, as a check probably upon the Duke of Burgundy, part if not all of his Moslem prisoners; and proceeded on his voyage. He landed at Otranto, in continental Sicily, and repaired to Rome. There he so satisfied Celestin III of the validity of his reasons for returning after this very imperfect performance of his vow, that he obtained a release from his obligations as a Crusader, and palm branches for himself and suite, as if those obligations had been fully discharged. But the dispensation from his oath to respect Richard’s dominions during the Crusade, which the general opinion of even German writers, hostilely disposed to Richard, charges him with soliciting, on the plea that his sister was not yet sent home, the Pope positively refused him. From Rome, Philip traversed Italy and Savoy to France, with a safe conduct from Henry VI.

We now come to one of those transactions which it is difficult to reconcile to modern notions of the chivalrous character; and yet more difficult to palliate to modern feelings, by recollecting that such were not the feelings of the 12th century. When the time prefixed for the full execution of the terms of capitulation granted to Acre arrived, Saladin had only part of the ransom-money, with part of the Christian prisoners, and those of the lowest grade, ready for delivery. Whether the True Cross was or was not forthcoming, is another of the points upon which historians, modern as well as old, disagree. It seems pretty certain that Saladin neither declared that he had not the Cross to restore, as those writers who hold that it was buried at Hittin, and so lost, assert; nor refused to sanction, by restoring it, what he deemed idolatry, as has been alleged by others; actually destroying it to prevent the possibility of such an offence. Saladin’s views upon the subject could not be known to the Crusaders or their Chroniclers, and the Relic being of no value in Moslem eyes, information could hardly be hoped from Oriental historians; nevertheless the subject is mentioned by two. Bohaeddin states both that the True Cross was found at Hittin, and that Saladin had it ready for delivery. He even says that the Sultan caused it to be shewn to two English negotiators, whose adoration of it amazed the Mohammedans. And this biographer of his friend is surely the best authority as to Saladin’s acts. When the negotiation so disastrously broke off upon the question of prisoners, the True Cross would of course be withheld, and in the end, probably, lost. According to Vinisauf, it was exhibited to some of the Crusaders, who visited Jerusalem as pilgrims, when the Crusade had ended in a truce; though he himself was not one of the fortunate party; but there could be no difficulty in finding a Cross to satisfy the pilgrims of those days.

To return from a subject upon which nothing certain is or can be known, to the painful negotiation, followed by a more painful catastrophe, Saladin required an extension of the time fixed for the delivery of the prisoners and the payment of the money. This Richard once or twice granted, and seems to have been willing again to concede, receiving the part then ready as an instalment; but he insisted upon keeping all his hostages—a few who had escaped excepted—until the terms of the capitulation should be completely executed. Saladin, on the other hand, required the release of all the hostages, or at least of a large majority of them, to be selected by himself, before he would part with the Cross, one prisoner, or one gold piece; whilst Conrad, expecting to obtain a heavy ransom for the hostages Philip had left with him, and perhaps mistrustful of Saladin’s intending to fulfil his officer’s engagements, refused to part with those in his hands, even for exchange, according to the treaty he himself had negotiated. Some bargaining and haggling went on through agents; some personal interviews for discussion were arranged; but at these neither the Sultan nor any person in his name appeared. For the first fault in this deplorable business, Saladin— whom even Moslem historians have suspected of seeking to evade conditions which he disapproved—is therefore clearly responsible; for the horrible consequences of that fault, Richard and the whole Crusading Council, but yet more the unchristian opinions of the age influencing them. Richard, and the Council of leaders of the different nations, now sent Saladin word that they would give him ten days more to redeem his officer’s plighted word; but if then the terms of the capitulation were still unfulfilled, the hostages must be put to death. To this message, Saladin replied, that if the hostages were touched he would dreadfully retaliate. When the last period fixed for the execution of the terms of capitulation expired, without a step on Saladin’s part that way tending, Richard brought his hostages, to the number, variously stated, of from 1750 to 8000, but, according to the most authentic accounts, of 2500, or 2700, into the vicinity of the Sultan’s camp, and again demanded the fulfilment of the engagements entered into. Again he received no satisfaction; whereupon Richard, who rarely if ever punished treason against himself with death, merely, like Frederic Barbarossa, destroying towns and castles—Richard ordered these defenceless hostages to be put to the sword.

Some writers have averred, that the Duke of Burgundy wrung from the Prince of Tyre some portion of the Trench share of hostages, others that he gave or sold to the King prisoners of his own, to swell the amount, and that these were simultaneously sacrificed within Acre. But the more general opinion is that only those belonging to Richard perished; and the rumour is chiefly noticeable as it demonstrates the tone of mediaeval feeling upon the subject. Hardly any one dreamt of imputing the deed to cruelty or unbridled passion. Of contemporary Christian writers, the Bishop of Cremona stands almost alone in censuring this fearful carnage; the rest of Europe admired the disinterested piety that sacrificed the immense ransom the prisoners might have paid, and blamed the mercenary temper of Philip or Conrad, who, for thirst of lucre kept their prisoners back. And Richard himself, in a letter to the Abbot of Clairvaux, narrating the transaction, says, “Sicut decuit 2500 fecimus expirare”. Moslem writers, indeed,—to whom the immolation of the Templars and Hospitalers seemed not merely unobjectionable, but a praiseworthy deed, inspired by devotion—speak of this, its exaggerated counterpart, with due horror; ascribing it partly to revenge for the great loss on the Christian side during the siege—the deaths have been estimated at 120,000 —and partly to a politic fear of leaving so many prisoners at Acre when the army should remove.

With respect to Saladin’s conduct throughout the transaction, one report is, that, exasperated at Richard’s insisting upon the complete fulfilment of the conditions, he had slain many, if not all the Christian prisoners brought prior to the slaughter of the hostages for exchange; and this is supposed to be implied by Bohaeddin’s remark that “Richard perhaps used the right of retaliation.” But the expression might refer to the slaughter of the Templars and Hospitalers. That the Sultan was deeply grieved, was uncontrollably exasperated by the massacre of the hostages, all True Believers and his own subjects, there is no doubt; nor would his exasperation be softened by the consciousness that he was himself the cause, by his non-execution of his own officer’ capitulation. As little doubt is there, that in the first burst of his wrath he forbade the giving quarter to Christians for the future, and ordered those Christians, who were hoping for liberty, to be put to death. Many suffered in consequence of this mandate, ere he had time to cool. Then, repenting of these reprisals, he stopped the butchery, and sent the survivors to Damascus, to be there kept in slavery, till ransomed or advantageously exchanged.

Richard now planned his future operations ; and, clearly perceiving that the recovery of the sea-coast must be the first step towards the re-establishment of the Kingdom, decided upon beginning with the siege of Ascalon. This design was announced—together with the day appointed for the army assembling, equipped for service. But, amidst the orgies of Acre, the bulk of the Crusaders had forgotten their vow. Only his own vassals, and the two Orders, answered to his call; even his offers of high pay could but partially counterbalance present pleasures; and, again and again, was the acknowledged Chief of the Crusade obliged to have the lingerers forcibly driven out of the town. At length, upon the 21st of August, he was able to set forward.

Upon this occasion, as well in the preliminary arrangements, as in the whole conduct of his projected operation, the Lion-heart displayed all the generalship which modern Germans deny him; it was indeed the generalship of the age, but the best of the age. He cleared his army of female camp-followers, with the exception of a very few to serve as washerwomen. He marched in regular divisions; the first, which he himself commanded, consisted of the English, the Normans, and his other French vassals, in whose centre was stationed his banner, in Carroccio style. A second division seems to have comprised the Germans and Italians, with the Syro-Franks, and the men of Poitou separated from the rest of Richard’s vassals, probably that the King of Jerusalem, as a Lusignan, their countryman, might lead them. The Duke of Burgundy, with the French and Flemings, formed the third division; whilst the Templars and Hospitalers protected the front and the rear alternately. The Earl of Champagne, with the light troops, was on the left of the whole line, near the hills. The route lay along the sea coast, to ensure the supply of provisions from the English fleet; and accordingly the troops never experienced any want, unless storms drove off the ships. Every night when the camp was pitched, the hour of rest was announced by the cry of “Help! Help! Holy Sepulchre!” which a Herald thrice repeated, and the whole army re-echoed in chorus.

Saladin, considerably to the left of the Earl, kept the Christian army in sight, marching among or along the side of the hills, out of reach of the dreaded charge of their heavily armed cavalry, whilst, with his clouds of light horse, he incessantly harassed them; skirmishing, cutting off stragglers and baggage, and watching his opportunity for more serious attacks. Richard, his object being to reach Ascalon in unbroken force, controlled his natural eagerness for action, and carefully avoided an engagement; for which, as much as for his knight-errant-like love of adventure, he has been censured by his modern French and German detractors, who impute his forbearance to indif­ference with regard to the success or failure of the Crusade.

Saladin’s incessant harassings afforded Richard some compensation for his self-denial. Though the brunt of the battle generally fell upon the two Orders, wherever a blow was struck, there the Lion-heart was found, often by his individual prowess deciding the fate of the day. And so gallantly did des Barres, who would not return home with Philip, support him in these encounters— especially once, when the French division seemed irretrievably lost, till rescued by the King and his former antagonist, and once, when Richard himself was alone in the midst of the enemy—that he actually gained his especial favour. The most serious of these encounters took place at Arsuf, on the 7th of September, when the impatience of the Hospitalers baffled Richard’s efforts either to avoid an action, or to delay it until the whole of Saladin’s force should be so fully brought out against them, as to prevent their disappointing, as usual, by their light activity, the Crusaders’ charge. In this battle, in which Jacques d’Avesnes fell overpowered by numbers, and the Duke of Burgundy owed his escape from a similar fate solely to Saladin’s sacrifice of fortresses. Richard’s own arm, even the detractors of the chivalrous King allow that to his personal exploits was the victory, gained by 100,000 Christians over 300,000 Mohammedans, mainly due.

This defeat appears to have finally convinced Saladin that his troops were no more able to cope with the Crusaders in the field, than to defend fortresses against them; the latter being moreover a duty to which the fate of the Acre garrison had rendered his Emirs and warriors, even his Mamelukes, averse. He resolved, therefore, to guard against the evils that must ensue from Richard’s making a stronghold of Ascalon, by sacrificing the place he so highly valued; and, with expressions of deep regret, he ordered it to be not only dismantled but destroyed. This was done, whilst the Christian army halted amidst the ruins of Joppa for rest and refreshment upon so arduous a march. The object of the movement was now annihilated, and a new plan of campaign had therefore to be formed; when Richard, apparently in concurrence with all entitled to be consulted, resolved that Ascalon, become insignificant, must be neglected, but Joppa restored and fortified, as a support both to their own operations and to those of all future Crusaders: and when this was accomplished the army should advance upon Jerusalem.

But repairing fortresses, for the defence of the not yet recovered Holy Land, was a very dull mode of discharging the crusading vow; and such numbers, disliking the task, returned to their Acre revels, that Richard was obliged first to send Guy, and then to go himself to drive them back to the camp. Disgusted with their levity and insubordination, and under some apprehension from the intrigues of his brother John, and of his suzerain Philip, the English King now grew impatient to return home, and opened negotiations with the Sultan for a long truce, based upon some division of Palestine between Moslem and Christian, Saladin and Guy. But both parties insisting upon the possession of Jerusalem, the negotiation, by which Saladin only sought to gain time for strengthening the fortification of the Holy City, receiving reinforcements, and completing the demolitions he judged necessary, made little progress. That little became less, when Conrad offered the Sultan his alliance against the Crusaders, provided Tyre, Sidon, and Berytus were assured to him.

Meanwhile, the restoration of Joppa being nearly complete, Richard determined to begin his movement upon Jerusalem. This was a measure to the taste of the Crusaders, and again they thronged to his standard. But, in order to maintain possession of the Holy City when recovered, it was indispensable to be master of its line of communication with the sea; and to this end Richard halted upon the road to repair two important fortresses, which the Sultan, conformably to his new scheme of defence, had razed. In consequence of this delay he was surprised by the winter; and, quartering his army as he best could in the position he had gained, he suspended his operations. The King relieved the dulness of this period of inaction by excursions of knight-errantry, or the chase, often idly exposing his person to danger. Upon one such occasion he escaped capture by a numerous troop of Saracens, only through the self-devotion of Guillaume des Preaux or des Pratelies—which is the name seems doubtful—who announcing himself as the King, gave his Liege Lord time to fly. The loyal pseudo­King was ransomed, and the army extorted from the true King a promise not again to incur such risks.

During all this time the negotiation was proceeding; and it was now that Richard, in his impatience to get the affairs of the Holy Land settled, and thus recover liberty to attend to his own, devised the strange compromise, if indeed it were not, as has been supposed, a mere jest, of giving his sister, the widowed Queen of Sicily, to Saladin’s brother, Malek el Adel, in marriage; and then, the claims of Guy and of Isabel to the portion of Palestine in Saladin’s possession alike set aside, making the newly united Moslem and Christian couple jointly King and Queen of Jerusalem. The scheme, if seriously projected, was foiled by Joanna’s positive refusal to wed a Mohammedan.

In January the weather improved and again the army was in motion. But, by the time it had reached Baitnubah or Bethanopolis, about a day’s march distant from their goal, Richard had listened to the expostulatory representations of the two Grand-Masters, and of the Palestine nobles, as to the utter impossibility of taking a city of which the defences, ever since it was menaced with a siege, had been diligently repaired and improved, in the very face of Saladin’s army. Representations, enhanced by those of the unprejudiced Pisans, upon the further impossibility of keeping it if taken, unless more of the coast, and of the intervening district were in the hands of the Syro-Franks. He felt the weight of all these objections; and, reluctantly curbing his eagerness to be hailed as the second liberator of the Holy City, he resolved first to restore Ascalon, as he had restored Joppa.

The rage of the great body of the Crusaders at what they termed the abandonment of the sole object of the Crusade, and their disgust at being again required to assist in the dull work of repairing the fortified towns, indispensable to the very possibility of a Christian kingdom of Jerusalem’s existence, were actually boundless. The Duke of Burgundy now applied to Richard for a second loan; the first was still owing, and the bulk of the Crusaders had for some time subsisted chiefly upon English gold. The King declared himself unable to afford him further aid; whereupon the Duke announced his intention of no longer submitting to the arbitrary and absurd caprices of the English monarch, but returning, with all French Crusaders to France, at Easter. He at once quitted Ascalon; withdrawing to Tyre, whither he summoned, it is averred at its Prince’s instigation, those French Crusaders who had remained in the camp, to follow him. Unwillingly they obeyed.

Nor was the Duke of Burgundy the only deserter from the Crusade; this being the epoch, fixed by most writers, for the Duke of Austria’s abandonment of the Holy War. So fixed, even by some of those who refer the quarrel to the occupation of Acre; thus making the Duke serve under Richard, and receive pecuniary assistance from him, subsequent to an affront resented so deeply as to induce breach of oath, with disregard of Church law and Papal authority. Other writers place the offence later; some upon the just ended march to or from Baitnubah; when, they say, a quarrel occurred between the King’s servants and the Duke’s, respecting a house that each party had selected for their master’s nocturnal quarters; and the latter being rudely ejected, the King ordered the ducal banner, planted as a sign of appropriation, to be torn down and left in the dirt. A more likely story than the former. The third account, from accompanying circumstances the most likely of all, makes the quarrel more personal, and Ascalon its scene. Richard, in his ardour to despatch all that must be preliminary to the recovery of Jerusalem, endeavoured to encourage the reluctantly labouring Crusaders by labouring with them in person, at the restoration of Ascalon, as at Jerusalem Saladin had done, thus to expedite the completion of its defences. Vinisauf says, that Richard and his nobles habitually thus assisted in all necessary labours, as in building military engines, unloading ships that brought materials for their construction, and the like. But upon this pressing occasion he first required all the crusading leaders, princes and nobles, to follow his example. Most of those present at Ascalon readily and zealously complied; but the Duke of Austria, when invited to take his turn, sneeringly replied that his father was neither a mason nor a carpenter. The King, meeting him, repeated his demand that the Duke should do what he himself had clone; and received a repetition of the impertinent answer, when Richard’s impetuous temper hurried him into forgetfulness of his own dignity, yet more than of the Duke’s. He struck the Duke, whether with hand or foot seems doubtful, and forbade the appearance of the Austrian colours beside his. Leopold left the camp swearing vengeance.

The first ships that arrived from Europe in 1192, brought Richard an earnest summons home from his vicegerent and Chancellor, the Bishop of Ely, whom Prince John had driven out of England. The Lion-heart had looked to resuming the attempt upon Jerusalem when Ascalon should be restored; but these tidings, joined to the desertion of the French and Austrians, changed his plans. He assembled the Crusading leaders and the Palestine magnates, made known to them the absolute need of his presence at home, and consulted them upon the arrangements that should precede his departure.

All urged the sacrificing Guy to Conrad, whose abilities no one questioned, if many did his honesty; while those who most distrusted him thought to render him innoxious, by making it his individual interest to defend the kingdom. Conrad was known to be, at this very moment, in treaty with Saladin, offering to hold his principality, considerably enlarged, of him. All the minor points of their alliance were not yet arranged; but the recall of the French from Ascalon is supposed to have been the first step towards co-operation against the Syro-Franks of Jerusalem, and the Crusaders; and even the former therefore judged it indispensable to bribe him with their crown. The haughty and self-willed Richard, upon this emergency, mastered his private feelings, and assented to the elevation of his almost avowed enemy, taking it upon himself to indemnify his friend. He had previously sold Cyprus, which he found quite as much a burthen as any acquisition, to the Templars. To them, likewise, the hatred borne by the Greek natives to a Latin Order had rendered the government of the island so troublesome, that they were tired of their kingdom. Richard now redeemed it from them, as a compensation to Guy for Palestine. Guy, having no choice but to submit and accept, was thenceforward King of Cyprus.

A deputation of Palestine Barons, and of Crusaders, headed by the Earl of Champagne, now repaired to Tyre, to announce to Conrad the resolution taken in his favour, as also Richard’s intention of meeting him at Acre. They and their tidings were received with great joy, accompanied by expressions of piety, and of a deep sense of regal responsibility, not very consistent with the new King’s previous conduct. But still he professed to mistrust Richard—to his Italian temper the Lion’s was incomprehensible—and he refused to accompany the deputation back to Acre to meet him, until he should first be crowned. Preparations were made in all haste for this ceremony, prior to which the government, it would seem, could hardly be assumed; when, before they were completed, upon the 28th of April, 1192, two emissaries of the Sheik of the Assassins—who, the better to execute their mission had received baptism, and resided six months at Tyre as neophytes—stabbed him as he rode along an open street of Tyre. They were instantly torn to pieces, boldly avowing the deed as executed by them at their Sheik’s command.

Three individuals are accused of this murder : that is to say, of having bribed the Sheik to its commission, for of his being the immediate author there never was any question; and not much that he openly acknowledged and justified it, upon the ground of Conrad’s having seized a ship belonging to him, and refused either to restore the property or to release the crew, besides having hanged a servant of his—it may be presumed lawfully, for murder. The three accused are Richard, Saladin, and Humphrey de Thoron. With respect to the last it is enough to point out the absurdity of supposing that a weak, avaricious man, who had taken money to concur in his divorce from his Queen-wife and her kingdom, could afterwards, merely to revenge himself for their loss, disburse any sum approaching the price at which the Sheik usually sold his assassins—for a sale, not a hiring out, it was, as they rarely survived. Saladin, again, could have no motive for such a deed, unless apprehension of the talents of Conrad—which all Moslem writers rate very high—when he should be King of Jerusalem, can be supposed sufficient. And surely to stain so lofty and generous a character as Saladin’s with murder, for so paltry a motive, and that through the Sheik, abhorred by him as a heretic, even more than as a murderer, who had attempted his own life, is repugnant to common sense: to say nothing of the little time remaining for resolve, negotiation, arrangement, and execution, after Saladin could be acquainted with the determination taken at Ascalon, (and, till he was so, why should he wish to kill an able Prince, whose alliance he was actually purchasing?) whilst the actual assassins appear to have been for some months’ time at Tyre, awaiting a convenient opportunity.

It is upon the English King that French and German writers, as champions respectively of Philip Augustus and the Duke of Austria, try to fix the crime. Much of what has been said in relation to Saladin applies equally here; as, the want of an adequate motive—none is assigned but dislike to Conrad, and therefore reluctance to see him King—want of time for such a negotiation, and repugnance to the character of the accused. It has been argued that he, who in cold blood could order the massacre of 2500 prisoners who were objects of indifference to him, could not hesitate to murder one man, whom he disliked. But this is again judging the twelfth century by the standard of the nineteenth. Take the sentiments of that age into consideration, and what analogy is there between the slaughter of two or three thousand enemies of God, of which he who ordered it could write, “it was done as was fitting”, and hiring assassins to murder a personal enemy, a fellow Christian, a Crusader, the champion of God? The only thing that really tells against Richard, is his having produced for his vindication an absurd supposititious letter from the Old Man of the Mountain, acquitting him, and taking the deed upon himself. This self-evident forgery—which appears to have been a clumsy device of Richard’s Chancellor, Longchamps Bishop of Ely, for making an acknowledgment, matter of notoriety in Syria, known in Europe—can hardly be thought to counterbalance the weight of improbability in Richard’s favour.

The only fruit of Conrad’s marriage with Isabel had not yet seen the light; but the Palestine Barons felt that a King they must have, and felt the necessity the more strongly when the French—after requiring Isabel to intrust Tyre to them; and being by her refused, because forbidden by her murdered Lord to intrust it to any one but King Richard (presumptive proof surely that Conrad did not impute his assassination to Richard, and that the murderers had not accused him)—prepared to seize it by force. Not only would the Barons not await the birth of the Queen’s first child, in the very first week of her widowhood they insisted upon her marrying again, and Isabel, who has been represented as devotedly attached to Conrad, apparently made little objection. The choice of the Barons fell upon the Earl of Champagne, who, as the nephew of the Kings of France and of England, they might reasonably hope would be vigorously supported from Europe. Henry, who was upon his way back to Acre there to meet Richard, made his acceptance subject to the approbation of that royal uncle who was still fighting for Palestine. He, as had been hoped, was much pleased with the election of his nephew, though he expressed considerable dislike of marriage with the wife of a living husband. But, finding, probably, that it was an indispensable condition of the kingship, he consented and hurried forward to Tyre to be present at its celebration. And now the new King, being the person who profited by the crime, became a fourth object of suspicion, as the instigator of Conrad’s murder.

The Duke of Burgundy and the French Crusaders testified their satisfaction at the exaltation of their countryman, the nephew of their King, by promising to devote another year to the fulfilment of their vow. Richard, on his part, transferred all his conquests at once to his nephew; and after a while added a promise similar to the Duke of Burgundy’s, notwithstanding the urgent need of his presence at home. During Richard’s sojourn at Acre, upon this occasion, he is stated by some writers to have conferred knighthood upon a nephew of Saladin’s, called a son of Saphadin’s, who visited him purposely to receive it; but Vinisauf places the incident earlier, upon one of the occasions, when, during the repairs of the ruined fortresses, the business of the Crusade and of the kingdom occasionally required Richard’s presence at Acre.

The restoration of Ascalon being now complete, and the return to Europe postponed, Richard resumed the project of laying siege to Jerusalem; for which favourite enterprise the Crusaders again thronged to swell his ranks. Again the army set forward for the Holy City, again reaching Baitnubah; and there, to await King Henry, who with his Syro-Franks had not yet joined the Crusaders, again halted. As usual, Richard, during the delay, relieved his impatience of inaction with feats of partisan warfare, one of which was the capture near Hebron, of a large convoy sent from Egypt to Jerusalem, to share in which spoils the Crusaders were willing to defer the capture even of the Holy City.

The sojourn at Beitnubah gave occasion to an incident worth mentioning; in proof that, whatever the degeneracy (if the demoralization resulting from wealth, pride, and ambition maybe so termed) of the two great Orders, from their primitive purity, relaxation of discipline was not among their faults. During Richard’s absence upon one of his adventurous excursions, the camp was attacked by the Turks in overwhelming numbers. Whilst the leaders were arraying their troops as they best could for defence, a knight of St. John, named Robert de Bruges, burst out from the ranks, slew the Turkish commander, broke through the hostile force, carried the news of the surprise to the English King, and returned with him to assail the enemy in the rear. This unexpected charge gave the almost defeated Christians the victory. But the knight had acted upon his own opinion, neither staying for the commands of his superior, nor even inquiring his pleasure; and the Grand-Master, instead of praising his zeal and judgment, punished his insubordination by a command to dismount, lead his horse to the stable, and await the Chapter’s decision upon his conduct. In silence he obeyed; but the prayers of the King and the Princes obtained his prompt pardon.

Henry arrived with his reinforcements; but again the main enterprise was abandoned, and again, and still, even now, historians differ as to the cause. Some again impute it to fickleness in Richard; others to the thwarting of the Duke of Burgundy, who either himself grudged Richard the glory of recovering Jerusalem, or had been commissioned by Philip to foil any such brilliant success of his rival. He had urged the English King to make the attempt without even waiting to be reinforced by the King of Jerusalem, in order, as Richard alleged, to involve him in the disgrace of a failure. Apprehending such a result, Richard refused to lead so rash an attempt, but offered to join it as a volunteer. Of course none was made. The better opinion seems to be, that Richard again listened to representations of those most interested; i.e., the King of Jerusalem, and the Grand-Master of the Temple and the Hospital, who opposed the siege of Jerusalem upon two grounds: the first, that, Saladin having destroyed all the wells in the district, the besieging army could not, in the dry season, be supplied with water; the second, the old one, that the moment the Holy City was taken, the Crusaders would deem their work done, and depart; when, unless more of the kingdom were previously recovered, it must infallibly be again lost. Again Richard yielded, but he proved the intense mortification with which he renounced, or postponed, the great object of his ambition, by refusing “to look upon the Holy City which he was unable to rescue from the enemies of God”, when informed that it was visible from a hill not far distant.

During this second halt at Beitnubah, a Syrian Abbot brought the King of England, as he averred, a piece of the True Cross, which, he asserted, he had himself concealed after the fatal defeat at Tiberias, and still kept safe in concealment, notwithstanding Saladin’s persecutions. The story refutes itself, but was believed by its hearers.

The army now retreated; disunion at its height, and every enterprise proposed by one, rejected by others. Richard accused the Duke of Burgundy of a treacherous correspondence with Saladin; the Duke again withdrew to Tyre, where he soon afterwards died, according to some accounts, raving mad ; which was esteemed by his contemporaries proof positive of his guilt.

Upon giving up the immediate recovery of Jerusalem, and finding every other proposed scheme of action baffled by French opposition, the Lion-heart felt his Crusade terminated; and, grieved and mortified, he was about to embark for Europe at Acre, when an opportunity presented itself of at least ending his enterprise with a brilliant exploit. A messenger brought information to Acre, that Joppa was besieged by Saladin, was defending itself gallantly, but against his swarms of warriors could not, unaided, hold out many days. Richard instantly set sail with his French and English vassals to relieve this important fortress, whilst Henry led a body of Templars, Hospitalers, and Crusaders thither by land. He was delayed by the necessity of fighting his way through defiles, which the Sultan’s troops guarded in great strength; as was Richard by contrary winds and a storm that dispersed his squadrons. When at length, August 1st, with so much of the fleet as had remained together or reassembled, he came in sight of Joppa, the crescent appeared upon the walls! The conclusion was that relief came too late, and even Richard hesitated.

And for all but Richard it would have been too late. The town was already evacuated; the citadel in process of surrender, when the sight of the Lion’s flag suspended the operation, and the battle was renewed. The besieged saw that the fleet paused, thinking all lost, and feared it might retire. A priest thereupon scrambling down from the battlements, where the waves washed the wall, flung himself into the sea, swam to the nearest ship, and announced the actual state of affairs. Richard ordered the vessels as near in shore as they could get, then leaped in full armour into the sea, and with the water up to his middle, waded ashore, eagerly followed by knights and archers. First, he made the shore; and speedily cleared it of the Turks who had hurried down to prevent their landing. First, whilst all were seeking means of entering the town or the citadel, to assail the assailants, he found an unfastened postern into the Templars’ tilt-yard, and rushing through, fell with his wonted impetuosity upon the victorious Saracens. They hardly awaited his blows, or the onslaught of his followers. At the very cry of le Roi Richard, they fled from their all but completed conquest. Town and castle were recovered; the hostile army had disappeared.

Richard encamped with his own company before the town to protect it till the walls should be sufficiently repaired, and to await Henry with the rest of his vessels and the Palestine army, still impeded by the already mentioned difficulties; and for the moment, the victor remained unmolested. But Saladin had only withdrawn, like the tiger, for a better spring; or rather to spring, as he hoped, upon an easier prey. He had received information of the King of Jerusalem’s movements, and thought to find him entangled in defiles, and so poor in numbers as to be indeed easily destroyed. But Richard, who knew his nephew's position, upon learning Saladin’s altered direction, instantly despatched the larger portion of the troops he had with him to reinforce Henry; and the Sultan, learning that he had done so, indulged a hope of the more important victim. He turned back to take advantage of Richard’s having thus further weakened himself. In the night of the 4th of August, a chosen party of light Saracen troops sought to creep stealthily into the English camp, trusting to surprise the Christians asleep, and thus carry off Richard himself, ere he had time for resistance; whilst the whole Saracen army was rapidly advancing to receive and secure their prize, if successful; to support the adventurers in case of resistance. Some accident fortunately delaying the attempt till peep of dawn, a Genoese chanced to descry the intruders as they were stealing into the camp, and flew to awaken and warn the King, alarming the sleepers as he ran. All were instantly afoot, and this scheme was foiled, but before King or Knights could fully arm, Saladin himself was upon them.

The battle that ensued is one of the Lion-hearted monarch’s most splendid exploits; even his detractors confessing that solely through his self-possession, skill, and valour, did his little band gain the victory over the immense Saracen host. He arrayed them with great judgment, so as to make the most of their reduced numbers—estimated at 17 knights and 1000 archers— constructing a sort of fortress with their shields. And such confidence had he in the steadiness of his men, and in their confidence in him, that, being informed, in the midst of the unequal conflict, that a body of the enemy had scaled the walls of Joppa, he bade the messenger keep the disaster secret, told his knights he would go see if all were safe and right in the town, and galloped off almost alone. In Joppa, he reanimated garrison and towns­men, cleared the place of the enemy, made the necessary dispositions for its security, should the attempt be repeated, and was then rowed to the ships, to summon the crews to the assistance of their imperilled brethren. With them he hastened back to the field, where he found his band maintaining their ground within their shield fort, but sore pressed, and much alarmed at his prolonged absence. With the reinforcement he brought, the victory was soon decided; and is said to have cost the life of only one of Richard’s knights, whilst 700 Turks lay dead upon the field.

Two little incidents of this battle are related, which, notwithstanding the length the narrative of this Crusade has been suffered to reach, must not be omitted. Saladin, when beginning to apprehend defeat, reproachfully exclaimed: “Where are those who were to bring me King Richard a prisoner?” To which one of the baffled nocturnal adventurers answered: “Lord Sultan, this king is not like other men: none can stand his blows.” The other anecdote is one of those touches of human nature, so soothing to the mind oppressed with the record of crimes and follies. Richard, whose armour is described as stuck over with darts, “like quills upon the fretful porcupine,” had charged through the whole hostile army, and, unlike the Earl of Tripoli, at Tiberias, charged back again, rescuing, upon his return, the dismounted and nearly overpowered Earl of Leicester and Raoul de Mauleon; when his own horse, exhausted or wounded, fell. Malek el Adel, who appears to have been much captivated by Richard during the intercourse to which their negotiations had given birth, saw the accident, and immediately sent him a very fine steed. The King was about to mount, when his attendants prevented him, proclaimed their dread of a foe’s gift, and insisted upon first trying the suspected quadruped, when the spirited animal carried off its rider into the midst of the Saracen host. The attendants were exulting in their wise distrust, when horse and rider reappeared, safely escorted back to the Christian troops, in company with a second, yet finer, charger.

The, unusual intercourse between the hostile armies, introduced by Richard, had never been quite broken off, and after this engagement some Moslem Emirs visited the King. They found him in bed and alarmingly ill, from the intense exertion of the preceding day; but he received them graciously, highly praised Saladin, and charged them with this more frank than diplomatic message to him: “In God’s name let us make peace! It is time this war should end, since it can benefit neither of us. If it leaves my hereditary dominions a prey to civil discord, what are you the better for that?” The message was duly delivered; for the Emirs had long been weary of the war, and Saladin was, for many reasons, as desirous of a cessation of hostilities, as Richard could be of getting home, to quell his brother’s revolt, and counteract Philip’s nefarious projects.

The negotiation now, therefore, made more progress; though divers conflicting interests still interposed. If Richard perforce submitted to leave Jerusalem, for the present at least, in Saladin’s possession, the disposal of Ascalon remained a question of seemingly insuperable difficulty, each party dreading it in the hands of the other. The compromise at length agreed upon was, jointly to destroy it; as a compensation for which sacrifice the King of Jerusalem—to whom the whole sea coast from Joppa to Tyre, both inclusive, was assigned—should share with the Sultan in Ramla and Lydda. The safety of Christian pilgrims, and the regular performance of Christian worship at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, at Bethlehem, and at Nazareth, was provided for. Saladin thought fit to include the Ismaelites in the treaty, as his allies; Richard and Henry, the Princes of Antioch and Tripoli, as theirs; the last having apparently renounced his vassalage when his suzerain became too weak to enforce it. The truce was for 3 years, 3 months, 3 weeks, 3 days, and 3 hours; and Richard, when, in the presence of Malek el Adel, it had been duly sworn by his Barons at his bedside, he himself giving his hand upon it, sent Saladin word, that as soon as it expired he should return with another army, to complete the recovery of the kingdom of Jerusalem. Saladin’s answer was, that were it to change hands, it could not be transferred to a worthier sovereign. .

Richard refused to owe the privilege of offering up his prayers at the Holy Sepulchre to the favour of a Mussulman; and did not, therefore, like nine tenths of his army, visit Jerusalem. Of those that did, the Bishop of Salisbury had an interview with Saladin, who, being pleased with him, bade him ask a boon. The prelate asked leave for Roman Catholic priests, in addition to the schismatic Syrians, to officiate at the hallowed spots to which pilgrims resorted in order to pay their devotions: and Saladin, admiring his disinterested piety, both assented, and, Vinisauf says, showed him the True Cross. The good Chronicler adds that he and his party were not so fortunate as to see and revere it.

Again, the King of England sent the two Queens, his wife and sister, in a separate vessel, now giving them the whole fleet for their escort. For his own conveyance, he borrowed a ship of the Templars, some of whom accompanied him; and it has been conjectured that, designing to cross Germany, in order to reach his own dominions earlier than he could in any other way, he further designed—as a prudential measure for eluding observation—to assume the garb of a Templar during his journey. Upon the 9th of October, 1192, weeping bitterly over the necessity of quitting the Holy Land without having recovered the Holy City, Richard embarked for Europe. This chivalrous Crusade is computed to have cost 500,000 Christian lives; and in it the value of infantry is said to have been first appreciated, through the excellent service of the English archers.